woodchurch science

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

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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]

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.

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.

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.