Climate change IS happening and WE are causing it. Here’s a great video that sums up ‘what you need to know’ in 24 simple steps. Check it out, and share!
How to kill an introvert
Very funny comic…but only funny because it’s true. 🙂 Click the thumbnail for the full size image. From jhallcomics.com.
51 foot long, walking, fire breathing mechanical dragon
Now this is cool…a walking, fire breathing robot dragon that’s 51 feet long (would that count as ‘life size’?). Created by the Zollner Group in Germany, its purpose seems to have been a fun publicity stunt (it was a part of some folk play), but hey, nothing wrong with that if this is the result! The stats are impressive. Weight is around 11 tons, and it’s powered by a diesel engine generator to drive the massive hydraulic system, with a top speed of 1.8km/h. Ok, so it’s slow, but it *walks* and breathes *fire*! How cool is that. Check out this video:
If you’d like more technical details and history of the project, the best place to go is Zollner’s website here. Or, for those of you with short attention spans, check out the video below.
You’ll notice a cart-like dolly under its belly in many shots. This is to assist with moving this monster around, though it CAN fully walk on its own as shown in this video:
Graphene body armor
I love graphene…this is truly a super material and I can’t wait until production methods are able to mass product it! The latest potential application is in the construction of body armor, where it’s shown to have 8-10 times the stopping power of steel. Pretty cool for just plain carbon! Add this to graphene’s already impressive resume of, among other things, transparency, flexible, strong, able to create super-batteries, highly electrically conductive, etc. Cool stuff (you can read more about the body armor study here).
Speaking of graphene, though…I was disappointed to see my daughter’s third grade spelling test recently. One of the words was ‘grapheme‘…which I had to Google to find out what it was (it’s the smallest semantically distinguishing unit in a written language). What a completely useless word that the kids will quickly forget. The same spelling challenge could have been taught by asking them to spell graphene instead…and THAT is a word that will undoubtedly become as much of a part of their lives as ‘plastic’ is in mine!
Big GMO study about to start
What is being called the ‘world’s first ever comprehensive and independent study on the safety of GMOs and their associated pesticides’ is expected to launch in 2015. At a cost of around $25 million, this international effort will be an approximately three year study of rats with the goal of answering these questions:
- Are GMOs (or their associated pesticides) toxic to organ systems over the long-term?
- Do GMOs (or their associated pesticides) cause cancer?
- Do GMOs (or their associated pesticides) reduce fertility or cause birth defects?
- Is the mixture of chemicals present in Roundup herbicide more or less toxic than its active ingredient glyphosate?
This is a BIG deal. Monsanto had used a 90 day study which showed no ill effects, while a two year study by others showed tumors in the rats (only detected after around 18 months) – source. A three year study will help address the concerns raised by that two year study, and may also lead to regulators requiring long term studies for future GM products (currently, long term studies are not required in any country).
So, great news…but we’ll have to wait three or four years to hear the results. Read more about it here.