A team of scientists at Rutgers University has found a material in which an electric field can control the overall magnetic properties of the material. If the magnetoelectric effect discovered by the Rutgers group can be extended to higher temperatures, it could be useful for manipulating small-scale magnetic bits in ultra high-density data storage. The research appears in the current issue of Physical Review Letters.
Earth
Some of the nation's most historic buildings and monuments may be better protected from decay in future, following a development by engineers.
Researchers at the University of Edinburgh have devised a method of forecasting damage caused by the weather to stone buildings – including statues, monuments and other historic sites, as well as modern masonry buildings.
The development allows conservationists to estimate the likely impact of long-term climate change on stonework and brickwork to determine the most suitable plan for preservation.
Irvine, Calif., Aug. 20, 2010 – Earthquakes have rocked the powerful San Andreas fault that splits California far more often than previously thought, according to UC Irvine and Arizona State University researchers who have charted temblors there stretching back 700 years.
The findings, to be published in the Sept. 1 issue of Geology, conclude that large ruptures have occurred on the Carrizo Plain portion of the fault – about 100 miles northwest of Los Angeles – as often as every 45 to 144 years. But the last big quake was in 1857, more than 150 years ago.
Emissions of carbon dioxide are causing ocean acidification as well as global warming. Scientists have previously used computer simulations to quantify how curbing of carbon dioxide emissions would mitigate climate impacts. New computer simulations have now examined the likely effects of mitigation scenarios on ocean acidification trends. They show that both the peak year of emissions and post-peak reduction rates influence how much ocean acidity increases by 2100.
In "The Sign of the Four" Sherlock Holmes tells Watson he has written a monograph on 140 forms of cigar-, cigarette-, and pipe-tobacco, "with colored plates illustrating the difference in the ash." He finds the ash invaluable for the identification of miscreants who happen to smoke during the commission of a crime.
WASHINGTON— A new simulation of oil and methane leaked into the Gulf of Mexico suggests that deep hypoxic zones or "dead zones" could form near the source of the pollution. The research investigates five scenarios of oil and methane plumes at different depths and incorporates an estimated rate of flow from the Deepwater Horizon spill, which released oil and methane gas into the Gulf from April to mid July of this year.
A scientific paper on the research has been accepted for publication by Geophysical Research Letters, a journal of the American Geophysical Union,
A magnitude-8.1 earthquake and tsunami that killed 192 people last year in Samoa, American Samoa and Tonga was in fact a triple-whammy.
The 8.1 "great earthquake" concealed and triggered two major quakes of magnitude 7.8, seismologists report in a paper in this week's issue of the journal Nature.
Scientists can now study climate change in far more detail with powerful new computer software released by the National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR) in Boulder, Colo.
The Community Earth System Model will be one of the primary climate models used for the next assessment by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC).
fire thought of as the quintessential human invention. Now scientists have found that emerging, more energy efficient lighting technologies could be the key to a better quality of life.
New research published today, Thursday, 19 August, in a special issue of IOP Publishing's Journal of Physics D: Applied Physics shows that solid-state lighting (SSL), a new technology based on semiconductor light-emitting diodes (LEDs), has the potential to increase our consumption of light and therefore our quality of life.
BOULDER--Scientists can now study climate change in far more detail with powerful new computer software released by the National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR).
SALT LAKE CITY, Aug. 18, 2010 – A magnitude-8.1 earthquake and tsunami that killed 192 people last year in Samoa, American Samoa and Tonga actually was a triple whammy: The 8.1 "great earthquake" concealed and triggered two major quakes of magnitude 7.8, seismologists report in the Thursday, Aug. 19, issue of the journal Nature.
Scientists studying the massive earthquake that struck the South Pacific on September 29, 2009, have found that it actually involved two great earthquakes: an initial one with magnitude 8.1, which then triggered another magnitude 8 earthquake seconds later on a different fault. The details of this rare event, called a "triggered doublet," are unlike anything seismologists have seen before.
ITHACA, N.Y. — It's the Clark Kent of oxide compounds, and – on its own – it is pretty boring. But slice europium titanate nanometers thin and physically stretch it, and then it takes on super hero-like properties that could revolutionize electronics, according to new Cornell research. (Nature, Aug. 19, 2010.)