Hemigraphis alternata, or purple waffle plant, one of the highest ratedornamentals for removing indoor air pollutants.

Air quality in homes, offices, and other indoor spaces is becoming a major health concern, particularly in developed countries where people often spend more than 90% of their time indoors. Surprisingly, indoor air has been reported to be as much [...]

New data from rats with head-mounted microscopes shed light on how we put the world together seamlessly while we move around.
By building a tiny microscope small enough to be carried around on a rats` head, scientists at the Max Planck Institute for Biological Cybernetics in Tübingen, Germany, have found a way to study the complex [...]

Body maps in our brain may influence how we perceive our physical bodies — for example, if there is a lot of brain area associated with our right arm, we will view it being as longer compared to our left arm.
There are areas in the brain devoted to our arms, legs, and various parts of [...]

Eating a meal quickly, as compared to slowly, curtails the release of hormones in the gut that induce feelings of being full, according to new research.
According to a new study accepted for publication in The Endocrine Society’s Journal of Clinical Endocrinology & Metabolism (JCEM), eating a meal quickly, as compared to slowly, curtails the release [...]

Royal Raymond Rife Microscope #2

Royal Raymond Rife, “genius scientist”, trained for six years at the Carl Zeiss Optical Company in Germany and became the inventor of powerful microscopes, leading to the discovery of a revolutionary therapy for viral diseases.
 
Pictured above is his second microscope which will be included as lot 113 in the Bonhams sale 10th [...]

Power that literally ROCKS!

Rochus Jacob designed and built the Murakami Chair. As the user rocks back and forth during the day, the chair charges a battery that powers the lamp. Jacob writes: I was looking for opportunities to generate energy through activities we naturally do. The final result is a rocking chair that enables the [...]

Several winners were announced as top inventors for 2009
The DaVinci Institute, a futurist think tank and host of the 5th annual Colorado Inventor Showcase announced the award winners at the event held November 3rd at the Denver University Cable Center. Winners in the six categories accepted their honors as the evening came to a close.  [...]

New research confirms that the volcanic processes at work beneath the Ethiopian rift are nearly identical to those at the bottom of the world’s oceans, and the rift is indeed likely the beginning of a new sea.

In 2005, a gigantic, 35-mile-long rift broke open the desert ground in Ethiopia. At the time, some geologists believed [...]

Nazca Lines in the Peruvian Desert.
An ancient South American civilisation which disappeared around 1,500 years ago helped to cause its own demise by damaging the fragile ecosystem that held it in place, a study has found.

Fermi’s Large Area Telescope (LAT) shows that an intense star-forming region in the Large Magellanic Cloud named 30 Doradus is also a source of diffuse gamma rays.
Nearby galaxies undergoing a furious pace of star formation also emit lots of gamma rays, say astronomers using NASA’s Fermi Gamma-ray Space Telescope. Two so-called “starburst” galaxies, plus a [...]

Young tyrannosaurs did serious battle against each other.
We all know adolescents get testy from time to time. Thank goodness we don’t have young tyrannosaurs running around the neighborhood.

The Irish accent has beaten its French counterpart as the world’s sexiest.
Men with an Emerald Isle brogue came top in a poll of 5,000 women worldwide, while the French accent only came fourth, just ahead of Australian.
Italian was second. In third place was the Scottish burr. English was sixth and Swedish was seventh, with Spanish, [...]

New research finds that a quick glance at someone’s facial structure may be enough for us to predict their tendency towards aggression.
Angry words and gestures are not the only way to get a sense of how temperamental a person is. According to new findings in Psychological Science, a quick glance at someone’s facial structure may [...]

Mark Tuszynski, MD, PhD.
Scientists at the University of California, San Diego School of Medicine report that regeneration of central nervous system axons can be achieved in rats even when treatment delayed is more than a year after the original spinal cord injury.

This thin-section transmission electron micrograph (TEM) depicted the ultrastructural details of a number of human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) virus particles, or virions.
Researchers have shown how an antiviral protein produced by the immune system, dubbed tetherin, tames HIV and other viruses by literally putting them on a leash, to prevent their escape from infected cells. The [...]

The world is indeed changing with the acceptance of married priests
The Vatican said Saturday that married Anglican priests will be admitted to the Catholic priesthood on a case-by-case basis as Rome makes it easier for disillusioned conservative Anglicans to convert.
A surprise Vatican decision, announced 10 days earlier to make it easier for Anglicans to become [...]

Daylight Saving Time ends in most of the United States a 2AM on Sunday, November 1st (Hawaii and Arizona have been on standard time all summer). We remember which way to set our clocks by thinking “spring forward, fall back.” It makes you wonder how we ever got our clocks coordinated in the first place. [...]

 
Apple’s iPhone has officially gone on sale in China. Despite the country being the world’s largest mobile market, there wasn’t any frenzy like the iPhone launches in other countries. While you might suggest it’s a cultural difference or other reasons, it’s most likely caused by 2 factors. The first being that the iPhone in China [...]

Don’t you think a lot more people need to be aware of this?
Kevin Poulsen at Threat Level has a great item up about the growing menace of “money mules.” The term refers to bank customers who’ve been conned into unwittingly laundering cash that hackers have stolen from business bank accounts. The con and the funny [...]

DARPA is holding a competition to find ten large weather balloons. Winner gets $40,000!

To mark the 40th anniversary of the Internet, DARPA has announced the DARPA Network Challenge, a competition that will explore the role the Internet and social networking plays in the timely communication, wide area team-building and urgent mobilization required to solve broad [...]

Nymphaea lotus.
Approximately 120-130 million years ago, one of the most significant events in the history of the Earth occurred: the first flowering plants, or angiosperms, arose. In the late 1800s, Darwin referred to their development as an “abominable mystery.” To this day, scientists are still challenged by this “mystery” of how angiosperms originated, rapidly diversified, [...]

New research shows that even one cigarette has serious adverse effects on young adults.
Even one cigarette has serious adverse effects on young adults, according to research presented by Dr. Stella Daskalopoulou at the Canadian Cardiovascular Congress 2009, co-hosted by the Heart and Stroke Foundation and the Canadian Cardiovascular Society.

Staphylococcus aureus.
Globalisation and industrialisation are causing diseases to spread from humans to animals, a study has shown.

Researchers have identified a cellular pathway that may explain the link between alcohol consumption and cancer.

Alcohol consumption has long been linked to cancer and its spread, but the underlying mechanism has never been clear. Now, researchers at Rush University Medical Center have identified a cellular pathway that may explain the link.

When two populations of a species become geographically isolated from each other, their genes diverge from one another over time.
Cornell researchers have discovered a genetic mechanism in fruit flies that prevents two closely related species from reproducing, a finding that offers clues to how species evolve.