Free Republic

About 709,000 years ago, someone butchered a rhinoceros using stone tools on the Philippine island of Luzon. That may not seem remarkable -- except that humans weren't supposed to be in the Philippines so long ago. Before this discovery, the earliest indicator that early humans, or hominins, were even on those islands had been a single foot bone from 67,000 years ago, uncovered in the Callao Cave on Luzon. That's quite a time jump. Research says that the new findings push back the date for humans inhabiting the Philippines by hundreds of thousands of years. A study published Wednesday in...

Kilopower is a small, lightweight fission power system capable of providing up to 10 kilowatts of electrical power—enough to run several average households—continuously for at least 10 years. Four Kilopower units would provide enough power to establish an outpost. A video explains how kilopower works. The prototype power system uses a solid, cast uranium-235 reactor core, about the size of a paper towel roll. Passive sodium heat pipes transfer reactor heat to high-efficiency Stirling engines, which convert the heat to electricity.

The loss of a human limb is a tragedy. We know that once they’re gone, mammalian arms and legs can't ever be restored. But if you cut off a salamander's leg - or tail - it will reappear in just a few weeks. The enigma of amphibian organ regeneration has puzzled scientists since it was first recorded by Aristotle, reaching its strangest and most scientifically-accepted heights in the 1700’s, when Voltaire decapitated a snail just to see if the head would grow back. (It did.) Now, a new generation of longevity-seekers hopes to apply the power of amphibians like the...

Scientists at Howard Hughes Medical Institute (HHMI) have combined two advanced imaging technologies to provide a view of subcellular events—such as immune cells maneuvering, and organelles remodeling during mitosis—in unprecedented 3-D detail. “The results offer an electrifying new look at biology,” wrote HHMI’s Meghan Rosen regarding the work that was reported in Science on April 19. The results “reveal a bustling metropolis in action at the subcellular level,” Rosen said. In the clip below, fiery orange immune cells are shown moving rapidly within the inner ear of a zebrafish, as they gather blue morsels of sugar. Some of HHMI'S other...

Concrete is one of the most widely used building materials in the world, but it also is responsible for about 5% of all global carbon dioxide emissions according to the Earth Institute at Columbia University. Those emissions result directly from the conversion of limestone into cement and indirectly by burning fuel to heat the limestone to 1400º C, the temperature required to initiate the conversion process. “Cement manufacturing is highly energy and emissions intensive because of the extreme heat required to produce it. Producing a ton of cement requires 4.7 million BTU of energy, equivalent to about 400 pounds of...

Aether, the biotechnology company behind the multi-tool Aether 1 3D bioprinter, is developing an artificially intelligent (AI) program for 3D printing organ models. Described as the “missing piece” in the wider, 3D bioprinting puzzle, Aether’s Automatic Segmentation and Reconstruction (ASAR) process will be capable of identifying different tissues in CT Scan data and converting the results into a mutlimaterial, 3D printable file.(VIDEO-AT-LINK)According to Aether CEO Ryan Franks, “AI is the only way bioprinting can reach its full potential.” With AI, the file preparation process is automated, bringing 3D printing closer to the “click of a button” usability which is essential...

"Meridani Planum is located on the equator due east of the giant canyons of Valles Marineris. It is a subsection region inside Arabia Terra, the largest of the transition zones between the lower elevation vast plains of the northern hemisphere and the higher elevation crater southern highlands."

In March our supplier of energy was more inactive than in the previous months. The sunspot number was only 2,5, which is only 8% of what is normal for this month into the average cycle (month 112).Only solar cycles 5 and 6 were weaker. A sunspot was detected only on 6 of 31 days. An observation made on April 10, 2018, allowed us to say that at approximately 30° southern heliospheric latitude the SDO solar research satellite saw a tiny spot (it was too small to be officially counted as a sunspot) that certainly belonged to the next approaching solar...

I did it. I descended into the heart of liberal darkness, Berkeley, California and attended the Tenth International Conference on Climate Change: Impacts & Responses. As you may have guessed, I’m a climate change skeptic. And while this conference was interesting and gratifying for a number of reasons, it did not change my view as a climate change skeptic, but in fact, reinforced it. My own presentation (for solving climate change while making a huge profit – i.e., the Republican way) was not widely attended, but the conversation was lively and I gained some allies. Without further ado here are...

 THE RED CHIEF AS TOLD BY THE LAST OF HIS TRIBE by Ion L. Idriess,  ANGUS AND ROBERTSON SYDNEY - LONDON, 1953 226 pages. The Red Chief by Ion L. Idriess is about a legendary Australian aboriginal chief that lived from about 1650 to 1745, long before any European presence. His life and times were passed down in oral history, from what may have been the last full blood of his tribe, to Senior Sargent John P. Ewing, mentioned in Gunneday in 1886.  (1829-1911) The recounting of the stories about Cumbo Gunnerah were conscientiously written down from about a...

Summary: Curiosity’s exploration of Vera Rubin Ridge is extended, while an attempt by Opportunity to climb back up Perseverance Valley to reach an interesting rock outcrop fails.

Segment 1 mp3 podcast [13:27 total]; "Europe’s Trace Gas Orbiter has released its first image after reaching its planned science orbit...Martian geology from the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter... moving-images from the surface of Comet 67P...simulating super-nova explosions--are neutrino's the key?"

"House passes new law to reform space licensing rules, Russians deal with yellow-water on ISS, Moscow contemplates banning rocket-engine sales to USA, Russia agrees to replace lost Angolan communications satellite, Indian Space Agency pulls back on launch over quality-issues, and...is Sierra Nevada still in the Game?"

Keeps on Telling — What Is It Saying? Photo credit: US Government Printing Office / Wikimedia and The White House / JFK Library Researchers are now analyzing newly released documents concerning the assassination of President John F. Kennedy, but many extraordinary facts have been in plain sight for decades — and yet unseen. This report concerns one of those facts, and how, to this day, the story around it is being concealed.The Tell-Tale Brain . Within minutes of Kennedy’s murder, witnesses were pointing at areas where they said they heard shots — and many pointed to a place in front...

The House yesterday passed a new law to reform the commercial space licensing rules...Essentially, the bill shifts a majority of commercial space regulation to the Department of Commerce, and matches somewhat closely the recommendations being put forth by the Trump administration. The bill appears to be almost identical to the version I analyzed in great detail in an op-ed for The Federalist last year.

Perhaps you could call it a coda to an outstanding symphony of audio/videophile tech. Oppo Digital, the company whose products have won it many awards over the years – and which deserved them – has announced it's winding down its operations. Say it isn't so, Oppo! The announcement on the company's website as of April 2, came as a big surprise to me. I've been reviewing the company's products since they first appeared on the North American scene and have yet to find one that wasn't a great addition to whichever market niche it was invading. From TV's to DAC...

Rocket Lab, SpaceX takes over Los Angeles, Putin surrenders to Elon Musk, DJT and the National Space Council, the FCC whines about Space Regulation, and Long March 5 failure announced...

Updates on the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter, diamonds inside a planet, the Environmental Defense Fund is up to no good (again), and cleaning up Caves...

.... Above is a global map of Mars, showing its largest and well known geological features...smaller than Earth, its lack of oceans means that Mars’ actual dry surface has about the same square footage as the continents of Earth. It is a vast place. Getting a close look at every spot is going to take many decades of work, and probably won’t be finished until humans are actually walking its surface... ...let’s pick a spot to the west of Olympus Mons, the solar system’s largest volcano, and between Tharsis Montes, the string of only slightly smaller giant volcanoes to the...

"SpaceX launched NASA’s Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite (TESS) on Wednesday, April 18 from Space Launch Complex 40 (SLC-40) at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station, Florida. The launch occurred at 6:51 p.m. EDT, or 22:51 UTC. TESS was deployed into a highly elliptical orbit approximately 49 minutes after launch. Following stage separation, SpaceX successfully landed Falcon 9’s first stage on the “Of Course I Still Love You” drone ship in the Atlantic Ocean.