Science Made Cool

Windy City Report

Earlier this month we put on our pith helmets and flew to Chicago to launch BONE WARS at the Chicago International Toy and Game Fair.

The CHITAG organizers were very helpful and supportive.  Mary Couzin and her team of interns did a lot to make our convention enjoyable.  The only thing they couldn't control was the weather, and attendance at the show was lower than previous years because lots of Chicagoans were out enjoying a stunningly beautiful Labor Day weekend. Fewer people passing our booth meant we didn’t sell as many games as we’d hoped to, but our demos showed us that people who like BONE WARS like it a LOT and get very excited about it.

We also learned that lots of children make "eww" faces when told they can sign up to win dinosaur droppings.  Then they sign up anyway.

We met a lot of nice people showing their own toys and games at the convention.  Erik Smith of On The Line was across the aisle from us, and was very helpful and friendly. At times he was joined by his wife and adorable baby.

We didn’t make it to the BodyWorlds exhibit at the Museum of Science and Industry because it was sold out for 30 hours straight! So we drowned our sorrows in sushi. You can get a lot of sushi for a very reasonable price in Chicago if you know where to look.

Uber Mice

Wouldn't it be wonderful if you could regenerate any injury?  Regrow lost limbs and organs?  Well, if you're a mouse, you're in luck.  A team of British researchers have developed a genetically modified mouse strain which can do just that.  They can even recover from heart injuries! 

It gets better:  mice without the super-regeneration gene can be injected with cells from the modified mice, giving them the regenerative ability, too! 

Humans with this ability could recover from any injury, including heart attacks, cancerous organs, and arthritis -- just to name the most obvious.  Dying has suddenly become optional.

(But you do still need to worry about men with swords yelling "There can be only one!")

Watch the Skies!

Now that fall has arrived, conditions are ideal for watching the aurora borealis.  If you're located north of about 45 degrees latitude, use the University of Alaska's Aurora Forecast page to see when there's something going on overhead. 

Really, we're part virus

Here's a post from science writer Carl Zimmer about research showing that human's are really part virus. As he notes about this research, "All this may not make you any fonder of the chickenpox you may have had as a kid, but it may at least give you a feeling of kinship."

One Big Engine

Think you've got a big engine?  You don't have a big engine.  The people in Wigan have a big engine.  All other engines are little engines.  Got it?

The Sound of Saturn

Here's an interesting sound file, courtesy of the Jet Propulsion Laboratory.  It's the electromagnetic emissions of the planet Saturn translated into sound.  This is what they're listening to beneath the rings. 

A Parasite, A Parasite, a Most Intriguing Parasite . . .

A brain-controlling worm eats out your insides and then makes you commit suicide!  It's a real horror story -- if you're a grasshopper, that is.

Parasites rule the Earth; we're just moving buffet tables and housing.

Super-Soldiers from DARPA

Coming Soon:  Super-Soldiers!
Most comic-book superheroes are scientifically impossible.  One of the types which actually could exist in the real world are heroes who get their superpowers from a suit of powered armor.  Examples in the literature are Marvel Comics's Iron Man, and DC's Steel.

Now DARPA wants to make every soldier a superhero. 

Powered exoskeletons plus advanced body armor equals something a lot like Iron Man, or Robert Heinlein's Mobile Infantry from Starship Troopers (the novel, not the awful movie).
We live in an age of terrorist leaders who act like comic-book supervillains.  Soon we'll have an army of soldiers with superpowers.  Life is becoming a Stan Lee title.