In the News

Gary sent in this one - Surprise! Venus may have auroras - yet it is not supposed to have a magnetic field (see www.space.com/15171-venus-auroras-magnetic-field.html). Apparently,

At http://cosmictusk.com/Sand-sheets-from-michigan-davias-presentation-to-a... ... Michael Davias is placing a date around 40,000 years ago on the Carolina Bay formation. George Howard makes the point that no

At www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-17611404 ... we are told, with a trifle of Auntie's biased glee, rising co2 may have been, in part, responsible for the end of

'Cosmic Dust in the Terrestrial Atlmosphere' was the focus of a meeting at the National Academy in Manchester on March 30th. An EU research grant

There are some fascinating posts on the blog of Tall Bloke over the last few days - see http://tallbloke.wordpress.com or Tall Bloke's Talkshop. For example,

At www.physorg.com/print252575011.html ... sun quakes can be produced from eruptions of magnetic field and charged particles, according to the National Academy Meeting 2012, which is

At http://news.discovery.com/space/mars-dark-spots-120402.html ... a piece on the discovery of glass on the surface of Mars - and explanations offered. Dark patches visible across much of

At www.physorg.com/print252580354.html ... the South Pole Telescope is being used to explain the mystery of dark energy. The paper is in the Astrophysical Journal and

Excellent TV programme this evening, 4th April 2012, on BBC 2, 'Woolly Mammoth:Secrets from the Ice' .... although Alice Roberts bows to the BBC doctrine

Coral off Tahiti shows a dramatic and rapid rise in sea level of around 14m at 14,600 years ago - at the onset of the

At www.physorg.com/print252331686.html ... computer simulation of the July of 2009 impact event, picked up by an amateur astronomer the following day, has tried to find

The Italian physicist at the head of the team that made the unwelcome claim neutrinos may travel faster than the speed of light, thereby upsetting

Poetry and climate science pragmatism ... see www.bishop-hill.net/blog/2012/3/31/scaring-the-proles.html is the piece that comes from Sleepalot, the pseudonym of one of the commenters at the site.

At http://chiefio.wordpress.com/2012/03/31/1866-odd-coincidence/ ... in 1866 the winter solstice coincided with a Full Moon and the Moon was also at perigree - its closest point to

At http://io9.com/5897169/dna-reveals-that-cows-were-almost-impossible-to-d... ... there are over a billion cows in the world today but a paper in Molecular Biology and Evolution claims there were just

At Pierre Gosselin's blog http://notrickszone.com/2012/03/29/coral-reef-growth-found-to-be-in-sync... ... scientists from Japan's Okayama Univerity claim the Sun influences coral reefs while at http://tallbloke.wordpress.com/2012.03/29/the-gulf-stream-today/ ... claims that low activity

The unlikely web site, Small Business Newswire, www.sbwire.com/press-releases/print/133733 ... has a Harvard archaeologist say that he had obsered during excavations in the Levant many foot

At http://today.ucla.edu/portal/ut/PRN-archaeologist-sets-out-to-validate-2...    the legend of Naymlap, founder of a dynasty in ancient Peru, begins with his arrival in a fleet of balse rafts. He

The Sun is still active and that large sunspot cluster will rotate towards the Earth later during April. It is still spitting CMEs apparently -

At www.physorg.com/print252078480.html ... Cassini looks at Saturn's nightside aurora and its electric current system (with images) while at www.physorg.com/print252074030.html ... news that the West Antarctic