The Daily Galaxy: News from Planet Earth & Beyond

Reboot Your Brain -The Scientific Secrets of Brain Regeneration

Contrary to popular belief, recent studies have found that there are probably ways to regenerate brain matter.

Animal studies conducted at the National Institute on Aging Gerontology Research Center and the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, for example, have shown that both calorie restriction and intermittent fasting along with vitamin and mineral intake, increase resistance to disease, extend lifespan, and stimulate production of neurons from stem cells.

DARPA’s Urban Grand Challenge: The Ultimate Smart Car

Cars are getting pretty smart these days…maybe event too smart. No one will argue that having your own Kit (of Knighrider fame) would be a bad thing. You’d never be lonely again- always someone …er some car there for you when you need someone to exchange light witty banter with. But at the end of the day do you really want you car to be smarter than you, and a better driver? According to the experts, that’s where things are heading… and quickly.

Extinction of the Dinosaurs -New Research May Have Solved One of the World’s Biggest Mysteries

Apparently, even killing dinosaurs was a job outsourced to India. New research suggests that a series of monumental volcanic eruptions in India may have killed off the dinosaurs 65 million years ago. Previously it was believed that the likely suspect was a meteor impact in the Gulf of Mexico. However, the volcanic eruptions in India, which created the gigantic Deccan Traps lava beds, are now the prime suspect in the most famous and persistent paleontological murder mystery. Scientists have recently conducted several new investigations and were able to hone in on the eruptions timing.

Mars Time or Earth Time?

What day is it? Do days exist without calendars? Does time pass when there are no human hands left to wind the clocks?

- Howard Koch, Invasion from Mars, the 1938 radio play based on H. G. Wells' The War of the Worlds

Ha!

MIT Team Creates "Star-Trek Gadget" for Cell Research

MIT researchers have found a way to use a “tractor beam” of light to pick up, hold, and move around individual cells and other objects on the surface of a microchip like a scene out of a Star Trek sequel.

The idea of using light beams as tweezers to manipulate cells and tiny objects has been around for at least 30 years. But the MIT researchers have found a way to combine this powerful tool for moving, controlling and measuring objects with the highly versatile world of microchip design and manufacturing.

Create Your Google Homepage with a Cool, Illustrated "Daily Galaxy" Gadget (10/31)

Starting today you can place an attractive "Daily Galaxy" gadget on your Google homepage. You can customize your iGoogle page with our beautifully illustrated gadget to deliver the exact number of story links you'd like to receive as well as the type size of your choice for easy reading. Sign up today and get the Galaxy delivered to you via Google each day.

Checkout the New Google/Daily Galaxy Delivery

Species: "B" Film Cult Classic -Collector's Edition DVD

For three million years, the human race has been at the top of the evolutionary ladder. Nothing lasts forever...

If you're a fan of truly bad "B" film classics and have never picked up a copy for whatever reason, go with this one. For those of you that have never checked out Species before, try a rental first and see if you join the cult following.

Deadly Companions: Animal-born Microbes Pose Threat of Global Pandemic

“Microbes are always going to be one step ahead of us. Their generation time is 24 hours, ours is 30 years. They mutate, they change, they will find a way. They are amazing opportunists.”

Dorothy Crawford -Professor of Medical Microbiology at the University of Edinburgh and author Deadly Companions.

Scientist Brings 50-Million-Year-Old Spider 'Back to Life' in 3-D

A 53-million-year-old fossilized spider found preserved in amber in an area of France known as the Paris Basin has been digitally dissected in stunning 3D using VHR-CT technique by a scientist at The University of Manchester.

"Twine" - The Semantic Web Comes to Life

There's been a lot of talk over the last few years about the "Next Big Thing" in Internet search -the semantic web. While Google and Yahoo and other search engines do a good job of ranking web pages and providing relevant results to keyword searches, the truth is that they doesn't really understand what you're asking it in plain language.

Artifacts from Space Find New Homes in World’s First Meteorite Auction

The world’s first meteorite auction was held in New York’s Bonhams auction house over the weekend. Among the purchases was an iron meteorite from Siberia which fetched $123,000 (£60,000). Even famous meteorite memorabilia was sold, such as Carutha Barnard's private mailbox in Claxton, Georgia, which was hit by a meteorite in 1984. The mailbox alone fetched an impressive $83,000 (£40,000).

Create Your Google Homepage with a Cool, Illustrated "Daily Galaxy" Gadget

Create your Google homepage today and customize with our beautifully illustrated Daily Galaxy gadget to deliver the exact number of story links you'd like to receive as well as the type size of your choice for easy reading. Sign up today and get the Galaxy delivered to you via Google each day.

Checkout the New Google/Daily Galaxy Delivery

Galactic Review -Stargazing Software for Amateur Astronomers

See the Universe as never before as Starry Night Screensaver takes you on a hypnotic tour of planets, galaxies, and other space exotica. Hitch a ride on a comet as it streaks past amazingly realistic 3D planets. Hop off at Mars for the red dawn; experience Pluto's perpetual twilight.

Read the entire post at our new companion site, The Galactic Emporium, the web's first science/space/tech focused gadget blog.

Google Maps' X-Files

You've heard of the human face on Mars. Stretching two miles, from end-to-end, it's a rock formation in the Cydonia region of the red planet that looks like the head of an Egyptian Pharaoh. First photographed from orbit by NASA's Viking 1 spacecraft in 1976, the image captured the public's imagination, becoming fodder for supermarket tabloids and convincing conspiracy theorists that NASA was actively covering up the existence of an ancient civilization on Mars.

Supermassive Black Holes Discovered Billions of Light Years Away

"Active, supermassive black holes were everywhere in the early universe, we had seen the tip of the iceberg before in our search for these objects. Now, we can see the iceberg itself."

Mark Dickinson of the National Optical Astronomy Observatory in Tucson, Ariz.

Ultimate Extreme Sport: The Art of Spacewalking

The big story of the latest space shuttle mission (STS-120) is Discovery's delivery of the a new module called 'Harmony' to the International Space Station. The Italian-built addition will connect to some of the ISS's existing components: America's 'Destiny', Japan's 'Kibo', and the European Space Agency's 'Columbus'. Construction projects of this intricacy require approaches from many angles-- namely, spacewalks. A 'record-tying' five are planned for the mission, and I found myself wondering: does that figure seem high or low?

The ET Question: Is Mainstream Media Looking the Other Way?

"I think the significance – and they are probably exaggerating it – but the significance is that I'm the first person of cabinet rank in the G8 to have come out openly and unequivocally and said the extra-terrestrial presence is real.”

~ Paul Hellyer, former Canadian Federal Defense Minister

A new group is pushing for full government disclosure about extra-terrestrials. For some, the first instinct is to call them another band of nutty conspiracists were it not for the fact that a former Federal Defense Minister is backing them up.

All -Time Awesomely Failed Tech Predictions

Some people think they know everything, and it’s usually those people who have to eat their ridiculous statements a few years later.

1. “There is no reason anyone would want a computer in their home.” — Ken Olson, president, chairman and founder of Digital Equipment Corporation, maker of big business mainframe computers, arguing against the PC in 1977.

The World's Top 10 Most Liveable Cities Named

While nothing in the continental US made the cut, a lot of lovely international cities (mostly European) found favor on Monocle magazine’s snobby & exclusive 2007 list.

#1 MUNICH, Germany won first spot after much data-sifting and deliberation. Munich beat out the combination with it’s winning combination of investment in infrastructure, high-quality housing, low crime, strong media and good old fashion charm.

Colbert Campaign Roars to Life on Facebook -Buries Obama- But Can He Win South Carolina?

South Carolina homeboy and comedian Stephen Colbert's announcement that he plans to run for president of the U.S. may have struck some as a joke, but his 1,000,000 Strong For Stephen T. Colbert group formed by Raj Vachhani, a high school student in Montgomery, Ala., may have the last laugh.

You Create the Caption

Mona Lisa by "Train"

Employees of the Takashimaya department store in Japan created this Mona Lisa is made entirely of recycled train tickets. Over 320,000 old tickets were used to recreate the Da Vinci masterpiece The Birth Of Venus, and Renoir’s Dance At The Moulin De La Galette.

Best of The Daily Galaxy: 10/19 -26

Mystery of the "Great Attractor" & Beyond

Did Neanderthals Share the "Language Gene" with Homo Sapiens?

Ancient “Eyes” of Early Earth Are Key to Biggest Sex Event on the Planet

China's New Moon Mission Blasts Off -Is Mining Helium 3 the Ultimate Goal?

Harvard-Smithsonian Scientists Zero In On Key Sign of Habitable Worlds

Scientists Find that All Plants Live and Die According A Precise Scale

The Ultimate Mystery: What Do Our Brains Do While Sleeping?

Neil Peart's Roadshow: Landscape with Drums & PowerBook

Astronomers Searching for the "Neptune" of the Universe

The planet Neptune was once "dark matter," University of Michigan Astronomy professor Mario Mateo says. Before the term was even coined, astronomers predicted its existence based on an anomaly in the orbit of Neptune's neighbor Uranus. They knew just where to look for Neptune. For the past quarter century, astronomers have been looking for the Neptune of the universe, so to speak. Mateo believes this "Neptune" may exist in the form of dwarf galaxies.