M.J. Rose

Anything that helps bring the issue of global warming to the forefront of human thought is a wonderful idea…

 Chasing Ice: Could Time-Lapse Photography Save the Planet?

By Lily Rothman (time.com)

“The Extreme Ice Survey, an artistic and scientific project founded by award-winning photographer James Balog, has 27 cameras pointed at 18 glaciers around the world. Together, they snap 8,000 frames worth of time-lapse footage per year. Thus the Extreme Ice Survey (EIS) is able to capture alterations to the arctic environment—changes that might seem to be slow, glacially so, are rendered dramatic. Almost equally dramatic was the organization’s beginning, which is documented in a film called Chasing Ice, now screening at South by Southwest.

Rappelling into Survey Canyon, looking down at moulin channel dropping meltwater 2,000 vertical feet into crevasses through the Greenland Ice Sheet. EIS director James Balog is shown.

Between equipment unable to withstand the icy conditions and a faulty timer in an early camera, the project had a difficult start. “I thought I was going to buy off-the-shelf parts and I was naïve about the hardware. I ended up designing custom stuff,” Balog says. “We had a lot of money on the line, we had a lot of plans on the line, a lot of people on the line…”

Read the complete article here.

Watch a video –

© 2010 Extreme Ice Survey

“…A NASA spacecraft has just beamed back a beautiful song sung by our own planet…”

NASA spacecraft records ‘Earthsong’

by Dr. Tony Phillips

“It’s called chorus,” explains Craig Kletzing of the University of Iowa. “This is one of the clearest examples we’ve ever heard.” Chorus is an electromagnetic phenomenon caused by plasma waves in Earth’s radiation belts. For years, ham radio operators on Earth have been listening to them from afar. Now, NASA’s twin Radiation Belt Storm Probes are traveling through the region of space where chorus actually comes from—and the recordings are out of this world…”

Read more and listen here.

Ah, what they would have done in the ancient world to have this secret in their pocket…

Superman-Strength Bacteria Produce 24-Karat Gold

“At a time when the value of gold has reached an all-time high, Michigan State University researchers have discovered a bacterium’s ability to withstand incredible amounts of toxicity is key to creating 24-karat gold.

“Microbial alchemy is what we’re doing — transforming gold from something that has no value into a solid, precious metal that’s valuable,” said Kazem Kashefi, assistant professor of microbiology and molecular genetics.

He and Adam Brown, associate professor of electronic art and intermedia, found the metal-tolerant bacteria Cupriavidus metallidurans can grow on massive concentrations of gold chloride — or liquid gold, a toxic chemical compound found in nature…”

For the complete article click here to go to ScienceDaily.