Good news for potheads making their annual trek to Black Rock, Nev., this week to celebrate Burning Man: A new study says that marijuana appears to fight infections. According to research published in the Journal of Natural Products, the five most common cannabinoid compounds in weed—tetrahydrocannabinol (THC), cannabidiol, cannabigerol, cannabinol and cannabichromene—can kill antibiotic-resistant bacteria. Think MRSA (methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus), which claimed more lives than AIDS in 2007 or, more recently, extensively drug-resistant mycobacterium tuberculosis (XDR-TB.)

CONTINUE READING >

Computer viruses—the scourge of technology on Earth—have now become a problem in space, too. NASA has confirmed that the malevolent programs have also posed problems in computers that astronauts bring with them on missions, the latest occurring when laptops infected with the Gammima.AG virus were ferried to the International Space Station (ISS) last month. The possible source, according to SpaceRef.com: a software download, a personal flash card or USB storage device. The site also reports that some laptops used in the ISS  lack virus protection and detection software.

CONTINUE READING >

For the second year in a row, the fabled Northwest Passage has opened in the Arctic—thanks to a sea-ice melt that has already shrunk the polar cap to the second smallest extent ever recorded. And with a few more weeks to go in the summer thaw season, 2008 could surpass 2007 as the smallest amount of sea ice on record, according to the National Snow and Ice Data Center (NSIDC).

This year's record-breaking melt was, to some extent, set up by the 2007 season—also a record-breaker. More open ocean means more trapped heat in the water, which means that thinner ice forms during the long Arctic winter. Thinner ice melts more readily when temperatures rise. So, despite a relatively cool summer this year, the sea ice is just melting away.

CONTINUE READING >

Do you have an affinity for technology? Did you do well in civics class? Are you free on November 4? If you meet all of these criteria, then you might feel compelled to take a temporary job on Election Day this year as a volunteer election site worker or an electronic voting machine technician.

That's the message being sent out by groups concerned about the integrity of the upcoming presidential election as well as the e-voting technology that some states will rely on to cast votes. Election watchdog, Black Box Voting, based in Renton, Wash., this week issued a press release pointing out that voting machine vendors—including Election Systems & Software, Premier Election Solutions, Sequoia Voting Systems and Hart Intercivic—will hire and train thousands of technicians staffed around the country.

CONTINUE READING >

This hurricane season's seventh storm, Gustav, has already had a bigger impact than all the storms that preceded it. It hasn't killed anyone or done any damage—though it may unleash flooding and mudslides in Haiti—except to drive oil prices above $117 a barrel (a feat the recent war in Georgia did not even accomplish).

The storm is strengthening, having reached Category 1 status—above 74 mile-per-hour winds—and the warm waters of the Gulf could give it a further boost. Forecasters are predicting it could be as strong as Category 4 by the time it churns through the heart of the oil and natural gas producing platforms in the Gulf—responsible for 20 percent of present U.S. oil production.

CONTINUE READING >

The use of microchips to track people (such as those embedded in hospital wristbands) and products (those uncomfortable tags on clothing that have to be cut off prior to wearing) has come under fire from civil rights groups who claim that big corporations are using this technology as a tool for spying. But what about when these tags are embedded in people themselves, rather than the things they wear?

That's what Mexican security firm Xega SA, which sells technology for tracking people, wants to do, particularly in cases when people are held for ransom. For about $3,700, the company will implant a chip the size of a grain of rice (it costs another $1,800 per year for monitoring), reports the Telegraph. Although it is unclear where the chip is likely to be implanted in a person's body its customers carry with them a panic button that can be pressed if a person feels he or she is in danger. A transmitter then sends signals via satellite to pinpoint the location of a person in distress, reports Reuters. (Xega did not respond to requests from Scientific American Online for an interview).

CONTINUE READING >

By picking Joe Biden as a running mate, Barack Obama may have reassured the electorate about his lack of experience and foreign policy bona fides, according to some pundits. But the coal-state senator may have also taken a step toward shoring up his enviro cred.

The Delaware senator is as serious as a heart attack about energy policy—a point The Wall Street Journal's Jeffrey Ball made this weekend.

Biden has been harping on the need for a new energy initiatives for years. When he sat on a Real Time with Bill Maher panel in the spring of 2006, he called 9/11 a "squandered opportunity" for enacting new socialized energy programs. The American public at that point, he claims, was uniquely united in acting for the greater public good.

CONTINUE READING >

The Pentagon's hope of having a squadron of unmanned aerial vehicles (UAV) capable of staying in the air and performing surveillance for years rather than hours recently took a small step forward. Working with U.K.-based idea factory QinetiQ Group PLC, researchers from the U.S. Defense Advanced Research Project Agency (DARPA) managed to keep the solar-powered Zephyr high-altitude, long-endurance aircraft in the air over the Arizona desert for 82 hours 37 minutes, beating the 54-hour flight completed last year by an earlier version of the aircraft, the company reports on its Web site.

Launched by hand, the 66-pound (30-kilogram) Zephyr is an ultra-lightweight carbon-fiber aircraft that during the day flies on solar power generated by silicon solar arrays no thicker than sheets of paper that cover the aircraft's wings. At night it's powered by SION Power Inc. rechargeable lithium-sulfur batteries (recharged during the day using solar power), according to the company.

CONTINUE READING >

Last week, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control announced that the U.S. has seen more cases of measles than at any time since 1996 in the last six months—and its stories like that that have caught the attention of Amanda Peet, among others concerned about the resurgence. In Europe and the U.K., children are dying of measles. Declared eliminated in the U.S. in 2000, as recently as the early 1960s, as many as 500 children in this country died every year from the viral disease, characterized by a red rash and highly infectious cough.

The first outbreak of 2008 came via a 7-year-old boy from San Diego, who traveled to Switzerland with his family. He had not been vaccinated and contracted measles, which he subsequently passed on to schoolmates, infants at his doctor's office and children around him in the hospital.

CONTINUE READING >

A new study from the Earth Institute at Columbia University says there’s more seismic activity around the Big Apple than previously thought. Researchers also say they discovered a new active fault line running from Stamford, Conn., 25 miles (40.2 kilometers) west toward the Hudson River. There, this underground fault intersects with another fault line.

Sitting on top of that intersection is the Indian Point nuclear power plant.

Scary stuff perhaps? Maybe—but big earthquakes still remain geologically unlikely around New York City.

CONTINUE READING >