woodchurch science » news

12 year old hamburger…

woodchurchscience — Sun, 26 Jul 2009 18:37:42 +0000

…looks almost good enough to eat but it’s 12 years old…karen hanrahan has been using the same McDonald’s hamburger as a prop in her “Healthy Choices for Children” class since 1996 — 12 years! — and it’s hardly aged a day in all that time. read more here…

new element, Cp, copernicium added to periodic table

woodchurchscience — Thu, 16 Jul 2009 18:34:00 +0000

discovered 13 years ago, and officially added to the periodic table just weeks ago, element 112 finally has a name. it will be called “copernicium”, with the symbol Cp, in honour of the astronomer nicolaus copernicus. read more here.

is this news?

woodchurchscience — Thu, 16 Jul 2009 12:51:37 +0000

science GCSE ‘lacking in science’…read bbc article

periodic table gets another new element

woodchurchscience — Thu, 11 Jun 2009 08:40:56 +0000

more than a decade after experiments first produced a single atom of a new element, a team of german scientists has been credited with its discovery. you can read about it here. there is some stuff about the last element to be discovered (Ds darmstadtium) in 1994 here.

cell doll

woodchurchscience — Sun, 01 Feb 2009 12:49:17 +0000

researchers have found a way of cultivating cells in a doll shape, which can survive for a few days. read more on michael davies’ blog here

eco-friendly cement

woodchurchscience — Fri, 09 Jan 2009 11:27:29 +0000

making 2bn tonnes of cement globally every year pumps out 5% of the world’s CO2 emissions – more than the entire aviation industry, so any innovations which will reduce this must be welcomed. british scientists (hooray!) have developed a new type of cement that ‘eats CO2′. you can read all about it here.

we’ve been nominated! 2008 edublog awards

woodchurchscience — Wed, 03 Dec 2008 18:52:52 +0000

we’ve been nominated for the edublogs awards 2008 in the best resource sharing category. please vote for us at this page. but please no vote rigging, and don’t vote in school (they will only accept 1 vote from each ip address). so please vote at home. we came second last year…let’s see if we can go one better this year.

darwin day

woodchurchscience — Wed, 03 Dec 2008 13:16:28 +0000

surely no denizen of woodchurchscience could disagree with the notion of celebrating the life and works of charles darwin with a public holiday – unless perhaps you think some other scientist would be more deserving.
if darwin is your man then tell gordon brown by signing this petition on the number 10 website.

charles darwin was a truly remarkable scientist. his work on evolution deserves to be honoured in some way. making his birthday (12th february) a bank holiday would be a simple way of doing this.

sharks facing extinction

woodchurchscience — Mon, 10 Nov 2008 14:58:29 +0000

more than a quarter of sharks and rays in the north-east atlantic face extinction from overfishing, conservationists warned today. a “red list” report from the international union for conservation of nature (IUCN) found that 26% of all sharks, rays and related species in the regional waters are threatened with extinction. seven per cent are classed as critically endangered, while a fifth are regarded as “near-threatened”.
read more here.

teenagers do not see science as route to good career

woodchurchscience — Fri, 07 Nov 2008 16:28:24 +0000

two-thirds of teenagers do not believe science qualifications would help them to have rewarding careers. a poll of 1,000 16- to 18-year-olds found that just over a quarter (28%) saw the sciences as relevant. the study said that students were unaware of the range of career options – including in sectors such as fashion and sport – that studying sciences could open up for them.
many young people have preconceived ideas about science subjects leading solely to laboratory jobs and wearing a white coat, it said. read more about the survey here

the science minister, lord paul drayson, said: “i want to shake this image problem that science has. “i’m sure teenagers would agree that lewis hamilton’s formula one race engineers have an exciting life. we need to make them realise it’s because of what they studied at school.”

the end of the world? maybe but probably not…

woodchurchscience — Tue, 09 Sep 2008 18:13:05 +0000

the world’s most powerful physics experiment is ready to be powered up…today. there’s been a lot of interest in this over the last few weeks (not surprising really), and some scientists have been receiving death threats about the potential dangers, but now it’s almost ready to go and now 30 years after the idea was born scientists at cern are ready for the big switch on. the bbc has a good guide here, and if you thought particle physics was not something that you could ever rap about then this one has been doing the rounds for a week or so…

predicting the unpredictable

woodchurchscience — Thu, 05 Jun 2008 13:38:40 +0000

nasa scientists think they are on the verge of being able to predict earthquakes. they are looking at electrical signals in the atmosphere linked to seismic activity in the earth’s crust. just such a signal was received before last months china earthquake. they are working on a possible space based early warning system. read more here.

no more bees? no more humans?

woodchurchscience — Tue, 03 Jun 2008 17:54:11 +0000

we’ve had a question from abbie wilson in year 7 about bees. einstein once said that if all the worlds bees died out then humans would follow within four years! here are a couple of articles about this problem which is worrying conservationists worldwide. article one – last flight of the honeybee, and article two – so what’s plan bee?

but here’s something to look into…did einstein really say that? here’s a letter in this weekend’s guardian:

Alison Benjamin states in Last Flight Of The Honeybee? (May 31), “According to Albert Einstein, our very existence is inextricably linked to bees.” There is no evidence for this being true, as can be found easily by reference to the myth-busting snopes.com. Snopes’ conclusion is that the supposed quote was probably concocted as part of a campaign by European beekeepers protesting about perceived threats to their livelihoods. Martin Whittaker, Edinburgh

nanotechnology news in the guardian

woodchurchscience — Sun, 30 Mar 2008 15:13:57 +0000

this link should contain the most recent news in the nanotechnology area.

job vacancy: free spacesuit

woodchurchscience — Mon, 24 Mar 2008 17:20:20 +0000

an advert will be in the papers next week looking for europe’s first astronaut to walk on the moon. this will mark the beginning of one of the most exciting recruitment drives in more than 40 years. the european astronaut centre needs more astronauts, and if you’re physically fit, cool under pressure, willing to work away from home and have a good head for heights this could be just the job for you. read the rest of the article here

live longer, live better: the next 50 years

woodchurchscience — Sun, 17 Feb 2008 20:30:52 +0000

a team of scientists have met to discuss the biggest challenges of the next 50 years. top of the list is clean energy; in particular harnessing the power of the sun: just 1/10000 of the suns energy hitting us each day could provide 100% of our energy needs. read much more here

randy flies reveal effects of binge drinking

woodchurchscience — Thu, 03 Jan 2008 15:48:53 +0000

fruit flies that develop homosexual tendencies when drunk may help reveal how alcohol loosens human sexual inhibitions, claim researchers. they show in this video how flies lose their inhibitions after just one dose of alcohol, after six they’re well….you’ll have to see it to believe it.

magic carpets are now a reality

woodchurchscience — Fri, 21 Dec 2007 19:55:36 +0000

perfectly timed for panto season, a team of scientists has come up with instructions for how to make a flying carpet. the magical device may owe more to walt disney than to the arabian nights, but it is not pure fantasy, according to researchers at harvard university.
no such carpet is going to ferry humans around, though. the researchers say that, to stay afloat in air, a sheet would need to be typically about 10 cm long, 0.1 mm thick, and vibrate at about 10hz with an amplitude of about 0.25mm. making a heavier carpet ‘fly’ is not absolutely forbidden by physics, but it would require such a powerful engine to drive vibrations that the researchers say “our computations and scaling laws suggest it will remain in the magical, mystical and virtual realm.” so don’t put your order in just yet…

life 2.0

woodchurchscience — Sat, 20 Oct 2007 17:19:34 +0000

is this right? should scientists be doing this? what do you think?

geckoman versus spiderman!

woodchurchscience — Sun, 23 Sep 2007 19:00:56 +0000

forget spiderman, geckoman is the stickiest superhero. according to the university of turin, the secret of making a sticky yet non-stick material could lie in the branching bristles from fine carbon nanotubes. these would mimic the sticky nature of a gecko’s feet allowing to hang effortlessly upside down on even the smoothest of surfaces. coming soon? who knows we may all be able to chase each other up walls and across ceilings.

non-stick chewing gum

woodchurchscience — Fri, 14 Sep 2007 20:31:26 +0000

at last the problem of discarded chewing gum may soon be over. chemists have invented a completely biodegradable type of chewing gum that washes away within a week. revolymer claims its product is easier to remove from pavements, shoes and carpets than gums currently on sale.

upd8

woodchurchscience — Sun, 02 Sep 2007 18:03:46 +0000

loads of stuff here for students and teachers. well worth joining (use their sign-up page). pupils should find the topicality of the activities – especially those based on popular culture – motivating. the articles are designed to get pupils talking about science, helping to develop important discussion and argumentation skills about the nature of science. the activities are easy to use and are helpful in keeping up to date with breaking science.

bush wakes up? or does he?

woodchurchscience — Thu, 31 May 2007 18:53:47 +0000

george bush, finally alert to the threat of climate change, has come up with a brilliant solution – or is it? certainly mr blair thinks so, calling it a ‘triumph’. this just in from the white house.

global warming report ‘watered down’

woodchurchscience — Fri, 06 Apr 2007 18:33:25 +0000

the latest hard-hitting report on the impact of global warming from the UN is released today, with evidence that key findings were ‘watered down’ to suit the americans, russians, chinese and saudi arabians. surely these governments don’t have an agenda? anyway the ipcc (250 top scientists) have issued further stark warnings about the future of the environment.

channel four have an excellent five minute guide to global warming on their news site.

new element discovered? (well, made actually)

woodchurchscience — Wed, 18 Oct 2006 15:45:06 +0000

a team of russian and american scientists has claimed the discovery of element 118, the newest and heaviest addition to the periodic table. three atoms (is that all!) of the element were produced in dubna, russia. the new element is the heaviest ever created, with a relative atomic mass of 294, made by bombarding a californium target with a beam of calcium ions. [more info here]

how healthy are we?

woodchurchscience — Thu, 12 Oct 2006 12:44:48 +0000

there’s been a lot of this in the news lately. how healthy are we? is there a north-south divide? check your area of the wirral in this document. scroll to page 4 and look at those red dots: they’re the bad ones. note that there are only 3 yellows (good things).

if you want to look at other areas (other than the wirral) then click here and search.

hamster injured in rocket car

woodchurchscience — Thu, 21 Sep 2006 07:57:33 +0000

richard hammond the popular presenter of top gear and the science program brainiac on sky one has been seriously injured in a land speed record attempt. read more here.

that new ‘planet’ gets a name: eris

woodchurchscience — Thu, 14 Sep 2006 17:56:06 +0000

astronomers have decided to call what was originally xena or snappily 2003 ub313, ‘eris’. in greek mythology, eris caused a quarrel among goddesses sparking one of the trojan wars. in astronomy circles, eris has also caused strife, forcing scientists to produce a strict definition of the term planet – and has led to pluto losing its planet status that it had held since its discovery in 1930. both eris and pluto (together with the largest asteroid, ceres) are now classified as ‘dwarf planets.

back to the moon

woodchurchscience — Fri, 01 Sep 2006 13:12:11 +0000

[listen to this blog entry!]

nasa has selected lockheed martin as the prime contractor to design, develop, and build orion, america’s spacecraft for a new generation of explorers.

the orion crew capsule will carry astronauts back to the moon and later to mars. the first flight with astronauts aboard is planned for no later than 2014. orion’s first flight to the moon is planned for no later than 2020.
orion improves on the best features of the apollo project and the space shuttle program, increasing the likelihood of success. orion is being designed to fly to the moon, but could also be used to service the international space station in low-earth orbit. more information together with simulated video clips here

hawking awarded copley medal

woodchurchscience — Sat, 26 Aug 2006 19:54:03 +0000

professor stephen hawking is to receive the world’s oldest award for scientific achievement – the royal society’s prestigious copley medal – for his outstanding contribution to theoretical physics and theoretical cosmology.
the medal was first awarded 1731, and it pre-dates the nobel prize by 170 years. it is awarded for outstanding achievements in scientific research and during its 275 year history, has been awarded to such scientific luminaries as charles darwin, michael faraday, albert einstein and louis pasteur.