On Pole #2, ready to ROCK YOUR NUTS OFF, is Wilma Wingnut!

Oh, yeah, shake it, honey. Shake those servos. Let me see some of that sweet, sweet axle grease. Yeah, press those headlamps together. You know you want it.
[[SMACK]]
Huh? “USER TILT?” Why you filthy little tramp, I oughta…

 I Am Tortoise. Hear Me ROAR!

The span of history a giant tortoise can live through is vividly illustrated in a remarkable picture on the British island colony of St Helena in the year 1900.
One of the men behind them (in the second picture) is believed to be an Afrikaner captured during the Boer War, which [...]

 
 A tough ceramic’s structure mimics that of abalone shells.
Ceramics are lightweight and hard, but you can’t make jet engines out of them because they’d shatter like dinner plates. So, materials scientists have been trying to mimic natural materials that combine strength (a measure of resistance to deformation) with toughness (a measure of resistance to fracture). [...]

 
A train passenger’s single sneeze can infect 150 commuters with a cold, warn medical experts after studying 1300 commuters.

 
Happiness is contagious, researchers reported on Thursday.

 
This beautiful Solar Paper Lantern is made out of 36 miniature solar panels. Each panels is connected to an electroluminescent diode, meaning the entire thing is powered by the sun. It’s not only lovely, but it’s environmentally friendly, too. It can remain on for as long as it’s near the sun.

 
Marcus Tremento is has an original lighting idea here. He’s created LD Sconces, intriguing lighting fixtures that conjure up uncanny 3D effects with glowing wire. Bending neon-like pieces of cool-running electroluminescent wire into familiar shapes and then combining them with a mirror-like backdrop, the artist proves himself to be quite the illusionista.

Orbits Fast-rotating Hot Star
Three undergraduate students, from Leiden University in the Netherlands, have discovered an extrasolar planet. The extraordinary find, which turned up during their research project, is about five times as massive as Jupiter. This is also the first planet discovered orbiting a fast-rotating hot star.

Dogs chase efficiently, but nothing as “sly as a cat”
A Duke University study suggests that evolution can behave as differently as dogs and cats. While the dogs depend on an energy-efficient style of four-footed running over long distances to catch their prey, cats seem to have evolved a profoundly inefficient gait, tailor-made to creep up [...]

Laboratory Study on genes

Using a harmless virus to insert a corrective gene into mouse blood cells, scientists at St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital have alleviated sickle cell disease pathology. In their studies, the researchers found that the treated mice showed essentially no difference from normal mice. Although the scientists caution that applying the gene therapy [...]

Submillimeter Array 
Astronomers have uncovered strong evidence that brown dwarfs form like stars.