Hi all,
I promised I'd try to go back and get the articles for the 2nd and 3rd. Here are the articles for the 2nd. :) Hope you enjoy!
Today's Top 5:
1. 4th Grade Student Names New Species of Gecko (Red Orbit)
2. New Experiment Empowers Students to Help Save the Environment One Snack at a Time (Yahoo News)
3. Quadriplegic Rescued After Rolling into Lake (The Rocky Mountain News)
4. Newly Discovered Extrasolar Planet is the Smallest Known, and has Smallest Host Star (Physorg.com)
5. Idaho Student Accepted for NASA Goddard Earth Science Internship (Space Ref)
Honorable Mention:
Ancient Greek Women Equal to Men (Manchester Evening News)
Today's Top 5:
1. 4th Grade Student Names New Species of Gecko
http://www.redorbit.com/news/science/1411835/4th_grade_student_names_new_species_of_gecko/index.html?source=r_science
Posted on: Monday, 2 June 2008, 06:00 CDT
After its discovery by Dr. Aaron Bauer on the South Pacific island of New Caledonia, a new gecko species remained nameless, until now. New Jersey fourth grader, Gemma Farquhar has given the once nameless species of gecko an identity. As the grand prize winner of the nationwide contest, Project Gecko presented by Zilla, Farquhar's name Bavayia periclitata will be given to the new species.
"Bavayia periclitata was chosen for its accurate and artistic description. Gemma was able to combine scientific language with creative intellect forming a name that depicts the importance of taking care of the animals that share our world with us," said Dr. Aaron Bauer, Villanova professor of biology.
In her contest submission, Farquhar, a student at Oaklyn Elementary School in Oaklyn, NJ, dared to be different and strayed away from using typical Latin names that describe the gecko's habitat or physical features. Bavayia periclitata means "endangered" in Latin. Farquhar says she chose this name to help emphasize the importance of taking care of geckos, other endangered species as well as our environment in general.
"I chose this name because it means endangered and it will make people think about how our geckos are disappearing and are on the endangered list. I hope people will try harder to protect our geckos," said Farquhar. "Winning Project Gecko means a lot to me because I named a whole new species of gecko for eternity and giving the gecko this name may mean there's a better chance to help other species."
The contest organizers Zilla, manufacturer of reptile products, believe Farquhar's name is perfect for the new species. "We were thrilled to read about why Gemma chose this name for the gecko," said Daniel Lorica, Zilla brand manager. "She recognizes that we all have a responsibility to preserve the endangered species of animals with whom we share our world. And her appreciation for the environment is what made her entry stand out from the others."
Farquhar, her teacher Linda Hess, and fellow students were honored at a celebration at PETCO in Sewell, NJ. They were given a party with food, a reptile show and a Q&A session with Dr. Bauer on Saturday, May 31.
A panel consisting of three judges - educators and reptile experts - evaluated each entry submitted in the contest. The entries were judged based on creativity, explanation of name, adherence to rules, grammar and spelling.
As the grand prize winner, Farquhar was presented with a $1,000 savings bond from NARBC (North American Reptile Breeders Conference & Trade Show). Plus, she and her family received a trip to Busch Gardens and Adventure Island in Tampa, FL. Linda Hess, Farquhar's teacher at Oaklyn Elementary School, received a Lenovo Laptop and reptile books for the class. REPTILES Magazine also donated subscriptions to the students.
In addition to Farquhar, the panel of judges for Project Gecko also selected individual grade student winners Madilyn Bragg of West Monroe, LA for the fifth grade and Daniel Carr of Tampa, FL for the sixth grade.
About Zilla(TM)
Zilla(TM) products are produced by Central Garden & Pet (NASDAQ:CENT), a company that innovates, markets and manufactures quality branded aquarium and terrarium equipment. For more information, please visit www.zilla-rules.com.
2. New Experiment Empowers Students to Help Save the Environment One Snack at a Time
http://biz.yahoo.com/bw/080602/20080602006537.html?.v=1
Monday June 2, 5:14 pm ET
IXG Education Foundation kicks off "Green School Experiment", educates students and families on how to reduce waste at school and home
WALPOLE, Mass.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--IXG Education Foundation, an organization dedicated to promoting sustainable, impactful pro-green behaviors in children, families and communities, today announces the official launch of its “Green School Experiment” educational program. Using grade-appropriate, standards-based activities and materials, the “Experiment” is designed to help students at participating schools adopt eco-friendly behaviors while saving money for families and communities by understanding the impact of waste on our environment and our wallets.
Beginning tomorrow, Fisher Elementary School in North Walpole, Mass., will kick off the first official Green School Experiment. Over the next two weeks, Fisher Elementary’s more than 500 students and staff will take part in the educational program to discover how they can personally make a measurable difference in reducing the volume of trash generated by their school.
According to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), since 1960, the amount of waste produced in the United States annually has tripled, from 88.1 million tons in 1960 to 251 million tons in 2006. The per-capita generation of waste per-year has doubled from 2.7 pounds per-person/per-day to 4.6 pounds per-person/per-day. An astounding 33.9 percent of this trash results from paper or paper products associated with packaging.
“The environment simply cannot sustain the increasing waste generated by individual packaging. By helping our children adopt very simple pro-green behaviors we can make a dramatic impact on the volume of waste produced within our communities, while at the same time helping families save money by reducing the need to purchase more expensive individually packaged foods,” said Victoria Waters, founder, IXG Education Foundation. “The IXG Education Foundation is committed to helping children make a positive impact on the environment through education. Through generous support of sponsor companies like Stop & Shop, donors, and the students, parents and staff involved, our goal is to take the Green Experiment to communities across the country.”
IXG Education Foundation will provide each Fisher Elementary student and staff member with an IXG Green Pack — reusable water bottle, drink thermos, bottle brush cleaner, snack containers, organic cotton tee shirt, reusable shopping bag and instructional insert — to help make it easy for students and their families to achieve the Experiment’s goal of reducing school trash by 50 percent. During the two-week Experiment, students will be encouraged to:
1) Bring snacks in their reusable snack pack containers to eliminate individual snack packaging.
2) Use their thermoses to pack the right amount of milk they need for the day to reduce waste from milk cartons and left-over milk.
3) Shop for bulk-packaged snacks and drinks with their reusable shopping bags to reduce plastic and paper bag waste.
4) Participate in home-based activities that reinforce green education principles.
5) Use water bottles during and after school to eliminate waste from throwaway beverage containers and unconsumed drinks.
6) Calculate with their families the value of purchasing drinks and snacks in bulk rather than in individually-packaged containers.
The Experiment concludes on June 16, at which time IXG Education Foundation will work with school and community officials to measure the success of the program. Measurement criteria will include volume of trash for the two-week period before and the two-week period during the experiment; cost of trash removal for the two-week period before and the two-week period during the experiment; and the financial impact it would have for the town over a year if these green practices were sustained at all of its schools. Results from the Experiment will be available on the IXG Education Foundation website at www.ixgef.org.
About IXG Education Foundation
The IXG Education Foundation's mission is to provide educational resources to promote sustainable, impactful pro-green habits and practices in children, families, and communities. Because IXG Education Foundation believes children are in the best position to impact the future with habitually green behaviors, the IXG Green Schools Experiment, one of the Foundation’s educational programs, demonstrates how simple, eco-friendly decisions can significantly reduce the mountains of trash regularly produced in schools. This experiment will be replicated in elementary schools nationwide to demonstrate how students, parents, and communities working together can institute personal and systemic environmentally-sound practices that have measurable and sustainable impact on global environmental issues. Using grade-appropriate, standards-based educational resources, the experiment helps students at participating schools adopt eco-friendly behaviors while saving money for families and communities by understanding the impact of waste on our environment and our wallets. For more information, please visit www.ixgef.org.
What does IXG stand for? I Live Green, I Play Green, I Work Green, I X Green, IXG.
Contact:
PAN Communications
Jeff Dillow/Shannon Palmer, 978-474-1900
ixg@pancomm.com
Source: IXG Education Foundation
3. Quadriplegic Rescued After Rolling into Lake
http://www.rockymountainnews.com/news/2008/jun/02/quadriplegic-rescued-after-falling-lake/
Rocky Mountain News
Originally published 01:52 p.m., June 2, 2008
Updated 01:57 p.m., June 2, 2008
A quadriplegic was rescued from a northwest Denver lake Monday after his wheelchair rolled down the embankment and left him helpless in five feet of water.
The man, whose age and name were not immediately released, was on a group excursion to Berkeley Lake Park, 4501 W 46th Ave., when he asked to be moved near to the water to look at some fish.
As an aide from Laradon Hall maneuvered him closer, one of the handles of the chair came loose and the wheelchair rolled down the slope.
The aide, whose name was not available, jumped into the lake and held the man's head above the water. Shortly thereafter, Capt. Dave Hart of the Denver Fire Department, who was performing routine duties in there area, responded to the call. Hart also jumped in the water to help the aide.
"The chair was like an anchor," and they felt they were losing ground, he said.
At this point, a Denver Public Works driver ipulled up. He climbed a fence and entered the lake. He and Hart were able to lift the chair and the man out of the water.
The man was sent to an area hospital. His injuries were not believed to be life threatening.
4. Newly Discovered Extrasolar Planet is the Smallest Known and has Smallest Host Star
http://www.physorg.com/news131631686.html
Published: 13:21 EST, June 02, 2008
Astronomers have discovered an extrasolar planet only three times more massive than our own, the smallest yet observed orbiting a normal star. The star itself is not large, perhaps as little as one twentieth the mass of our Sun, suggesting to the research team that relatively common low-mass stars may present good candidates for hosting Earth-like planets.
Led by David Bennett of the University of Notre Dame, the international research team presents its findings in a press conference Monday, June 2, 2008 at the American Astronomical Society Meeting in St. Louis, Mo.
"Our discovery indicates that that even the lowest mass stars can host planets," says Bennett. "No planets have previously been found to orbit stars with masses less than about 20 percent that of the Sun, but this finding indicates that even the smallest stars can host planets."
The astronomers used a technique called gravitational microlensing to find the planet, a method that can potentially find planets one-tenth the mass of our own.
The gravitational microlensing technique, which came from Einstein's General Theory of Relativity, relies upon observations of stars that brighten when an object such as another star passes directly in front of them (relative to an observer, in this case on Earth). The gravity of the passing star acts as a lens, much like a giant magnifying glass. If a planet is orbiting the passing star, its presence is revealed in the way the background star brightens. A full explanation of the technique follows this release.
"This discovery demonstrates the sensitivity of the microlensing method for finding low-mass planets, and we are hoping to discover the first Earth-mass planet in the near future," said Bennett.
Using standard nomenclature, the star hosting the newly discovered planet is dubbed MOA-2007-BLG-192L with MOA indicating the observatory, 2007 designating the year the microlensing event occurred, BLG standing for bulge, 192 indicating the 192nd microlensing observation by MOA in that year and the L indicating the lens star as opposed to the background star further in the distance. The planet maintains the name but adds a letter designating it as an additional object in the star's solar system, so it is called MOA-2007-BLG-192Lb.
MOA-2007-BLG-192L resides 3,000 light years away and is classified as either a low-mass hydrogen burning star, one that sustains nuclear reactions in its core as our Sun does, or a brown dwarf, an object like a star yet without the mass to sustain nuclear reactions in its core. The researchers were unable to confirm which category the star fits into due to the nature of the observations and the margin of error.
With support from the National Science Foundation (NSF), Bennett has been one of the pioneers in using gravitational microlensing for detecting low mass planets. He has been working with collaborators around the world to find a number of planets that are ever closer in size to our own.
For the most recent discovery, the research collaborators took advantage of two international telescope collaborations: Microlensing Observations in Astrophysics (MOA), which includes Bennett, and the Optical Gravitational Lensing Experiment (OGLE).
Researchers in New Zealand made the initial measurements of the new planet and its star using the new MOA-II telescope at the Mt. John Observatory. The observatory's MOA-cam3 camera, in one observation, can capture an image of the sky 13 times larger than the area of the full moon. Researchers in Chile made follow-up observations using high angular resolution adaptive optics images at the Very Large Telescope at the European Southern Observatory. Data from the observations was analyzed by scientists around the world hailing from five continents.
"This discovery is very exciting because it implies Earth-mass planets can form around low-mass stars, which are very common," said Michael Briley, NSF astronomer and the officer who oversees Bennett's grant. "It is another important step in the search for terrestrial planets in the habitable zones of other stars, and it would not have been possible without the international collaboration of professional and amateur astronomers devoted to measuring these signals."
A paper describing this result has been accepted for publication in the Astrophysical Journal and is scheduled for publication in the Sept. 1 edition.
Source: National Science Foundation
5. Idaho Student Accepted for NASA Goddard Earth Science Internship
http://www.spaceref.com/news/viewpr.html?pid=25566
Date Released: Monday, June 2, 2008
Source: Goddard Space Flight Center - Comments
Ryan Sheridan, a student from Moscow, Idaho, will spend this summer at NASA Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Md. as a participant of the NASA Undergraduate Student Research Program (USRP). Sheridan is an engineering student at the University of Idaho.
NASA-USRP is a 15-week program designed to provide undergraduate students hands-on experience within a NASA environment. While at Goddard Sheridan will be surrounded by some of the world's premier scientists and engineers devoted to research in Earth science, space science, technology and space communications. He will be able to gain valuable research experience under the supervision of a NASA mentor.
"I have always thought that working for NASA would be a great job," Sheridan said. "It is ideal for me because of my interest in remote sensing and how the Earth or other planets can be studied."
Competitively selected students must have at least a 3.0 grade-point- average and major in engineering, science (physics, chemistry, biology) math, computer science or other areas of interest to the aerospace program.
"This is a wonderful experience for a student," said Dr. Vigdor Tepiltz, chief of Higher Education for NASA Goddard Space Flight Center. "NASA's space program is just about the greatest show on Earth if you are a technical person and having young eager people with fresh points-of-view and questions is good for NASA. It makes for a productive summer for all."
The summer program begins today and runs through Aug. 8.
"This internship will give me valuable 'real world' experience," Sheridan said. "I feel that I will be better prepared to apply to graduate school and begin work on a research thesis."
Interested media should contact Dewayne Washington at the phone number listed above.
For more information visit: http://education.nasa.gov/home/index.html
Honorable Mention:
Ancient Greek Women Equal to Men
http://www.manchestereveningnews.co.uk/news/s/1052109_greek_women_equal_to_men?rss=yes
2/ 6/2008
WOMEN in Ancient Greece had as much power as men, say Manchester historians.
Although home to the world's earliest democracy, the 4,000-year-old society was previously believed to be rigidly male-dominated, with only men having the right to vote.
But researchers at Manchester University have uncovered evidence that high-born women had the same status as men.
They have been studying a 3,600-year-old burial site at Mycenae and discovered that one body in a richly-decorated grave was that of a woman.
The team also used forensic techniques to reconstruct the faces of seven bodies found on the site, including those of a brother and sister, which are now on view at Manchester Museum.
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