Australian Researchers Brew Recipe For Long Life Beer

Australian beer drinkers will soon have the option of buying a beer with a much longer shelf life, a new type of malt barley, developed by Adelaide researchers and a Japanese brewer, can curb beers propensity of tasting stale when left on the shelf.

The new barley variety ‘SouthernStar’ is the results of collaboration between the University of Adelaide and Sapporo Breweries. Importantly this new barley is not genetically modified, it’s been produced using conventional – albeit high tech – breeding techniques, utilising data from the recently completed Barley Genome Project .

South Australian farmers are to begin commercial production of the barley this year. Commercial crops grown in 2013 will be harvested in November/December, processed into malt in the first half of 2014 and used for commercial beer production in the later part of 2014 :: Read the full article »»»»

Sir Robert Edwards,Test-tube Baby Pioneer Dies at 87

British scientist Sir Robert Edwards, who was awarded a Nobel prize for his pioneering work in developing in vitro fertilisation (IVF), died on Wednesday aged 87. The British professor spent his career making the dream of having a baby come true for millions of people worldwide, running into conflict with the Catholic Church and fellow scientists on his way.

He was awarded the Nobel prize for medicine in 2010, five decades after he began experimenting and long after the birth of the world’s first test-tube baby, Louise Brown, in 1978. Sir Robert was too frail to pick up his Nobel prize in Stockholm in 2010, leaving that to his wife Ruth, with whom he had five daughters. However, he remained a fellow of Churchill College at Cambridge until his death.

Born in Yorkshire in northern England on September 27, 1925, into a working-class family, Sir Robert served in the British army during World War II before returning home to study first agricultural sciences and then animal genetics :: Read the full article »»»»

Chromodoris Reticulata Regrows It’s Penis

I’m not so sure this would work for human men, who tend to have a problem finding one good name, let alone three, Scientists have spruiked the bizarre sex life of a sea slug that discards its penis after copulation, and then grows a new one.

Dubbed Chromodoris Reticulata – Latin, the red-and-white slug – the clever little creature is technically a shell-less mollusc that inhabits the warm waters of – where else but – South East Asia.

These thumb-sized creatures are hermaphrodites, they have both male and female sexual organs, allowing the creatures to perform dual sexual roles during copulation. Eeek alert! While giving sperm to a mating partner they simultaneously receive sperm, which they store for later insemination :: Read the full article »»»»

There’s GOLD in Them There Hills, Termite Hills That Is…

Those superneat boffins at Australia’s science-factory – The CSIRO –  have found that termite mounds could indicate where gold or other mineral deposits lie beneath the surface.

Researchers believe that even small termite mounds could be reliable markers, and that termites themselves may be a cost-effective and environmentally friendly means of finding new mineral deposits.

Termite mounds are abundant across Australia’s north, and the largest ones can stand up to five metres tall. The research was published in science journals PLoS ONE and Geochemistry: Exploration, Environment, Analysis, found that at a test site in the West Australian goldfields termite mounds contained high concentrations of gold. This gold indicates there is a larger deposit underneath :: Read the full article »»»»

China Plans on Expanding Market Gardens, Mars and the Moon!?

Our most favourite behemoth – China – and the worlds second largest economy, are planning on expanding rural production much farther than their earthly borders. The worlds most populous nation is preparing to grow fresh vegetables on Mars and the Moon after researchers completed a preliminary test in Beijing.

Chinese state media has reported that researchers are currently testing their wild theory here on earth, four kinds of vegetables were grown in an Ecological Life Support System, a 300 cubic metre cabin which will allow astronauts to develop their own stocks of air, water and food while on space missions.

The system, which relies on plants and algae, is “expected to be used in extra-terrestrial bases on the Moon or Mars”, Xinhua news agency. Participants in the experiment could “harvest fresh vegetables for meals”, Xinhua quoted Deng Yibing, a researcher at Beijing’s Chinese Astronaut Research and Training Centre, as saying :: Read the full article »»»»

Kiss Kiss Kiss, Reeking What You’ve Eaten!?

It’s no secret, I’ve dated a stinker, a wonderfilled woman – full of talent and wit – who had the misfortune of suffering from halitosis, a condition that turned my bog-standard-bipolarized-blond-bird into a slinky-stink-bomb. Brooksy’s condition was initiated by a specific combination of food, give this girl a combo of  garlic and red wine and you’d have to stand five feet away to avoid the pong, no joke, possibly THE most rancid smell my nose has ever been exposed to!

Most of us have had a similar experience, an outwardly gorgeous buddy who turns our nose. So were does the stink come from; diet, perspiration or bad personal hygiene, are we truly what we eat? ::

Alternative medicines like Ayurveda and Homeopathy reckon that toxins in our body – from impure or improperly digested food – can cause our body odour and breath to pong. According to mainstream medicine and science however, the causes of bad body odour are not yet fully understood.

Modern medicine says that bodily smells are caused by numerous factors working in combination, including the chemicals in sweat reacting with bacteria that have made a home on our skin. And while science is busily looking at our diet, conclusions are currently sparse. It’s easy to imagine that what we eat might sneak out through perspiration :: Read the full article »»»»

Whale Attempts To Make Contact By Speaking Human

Marine biologists say a beluga whale which was recorded making human-like noises in a US aquarium may have been trying to communicate with its keepers. The whale, known as NOC, had lived among dolphins and other beluga whales in an aquarium in San Diego, California, and was often in the presence of humans.

Scientists who were puzzled by the human-like utterances coming from his pool concluded they were actually coming from the whale himself. An acoustic analysis of the sounds showed a rhythm similar to that of human speech, Sam Ridgway, of the National Marine Mammal Foundation, said. The frequencies were also several octaves lower than typical whale sounds.

The whale seems to have made an extraordinary effort to imitate humans. Experts say he would have had to modify his vocal mechanics by varying pressure in his nasal tract to produce this remarkable sound… youtube video :: Read the full article »»»»