colossal squid- run away! run away!

In New Zealand, a couple of days ago, fishermen caught the largest squid ever lived: the colossal squid. The colossal squid was at least 39' long and weighed and estimated half ton. The fishermen were catching Patagonian tooth fish, sold under the name of Chilean sea bass, when the squid appeared. The colossal squid was eating the tooth fish in the net when they [the fishermen] pulled it up. If estimated correctly, then then the Mesonychoteuthis hamiltoni [the latin name for the colossus squid] would be 330 pounds heavier than the next largest creature, the name unbeknownst to me. The colossal squid is a different species than the giant squid and that they would grow up to 46 feet long, for now. These enormous creatures dive up to 6500 feet and are extremly aggressive hunters. The squid was frozen and was transported to the New Zealand national museum, Te Papa, in Wellington, for study. For more on this, go to http://www.livescience.com/animalworld/070222_ap_colossal_squid.html

gentics assessment!

The genetics assessment started a few days ago and the students of OMEGA had been placed into the following categories: Therapeutic cloning, the cloning of a healthy organ, genetically modified food, food that has been, well, genetically modified, and designer babies, the babies that design things (actually, the parents get to decide which genes go to the child so they could decide to make their child a literal designer baby). My topic for the genetics assessment is therapeutic cloning, and I have to describe what it is, when and why it was introduced. I have also been helping a new student, Man Ying, out by translating and asking her if she understands.

NASCAR and the "Car of Tomorrow"

On Sunday, February 18, 2007, the fourty ninth Daytona 500 took place, revealing slightly altered cars. Aerodynamics is important to stock car, jungle, and desert racing because it makes you faster, right? Probably not because the faster you go, the more air friction works against you. In racing, there are three D's: drag, downforce, and drafting. There are two types of drag: friction drag and pressure drag. Friction drag is due to the wind breaking over the cars surface. Pressure friction, however, is from the low pressure wake coming from the back of the car and sucks it backwards. Teams make tiny adjustments to make air flow smoothly, therefore reducing friction and pressure. NASCAR drivers say they need more downforce. Downforce is the " negative lift" that makes you go faster on hairpin turns. The physics for this is pretty much the same for an airplane wing, except backwards. Drafting, the third and final "D", the most common situation for drafting is when the lead car blocks much of the incoming wind, reducing the friction drag for a trailing car. This year, NASCAR will allow the " Car of tomorrow" in certain races, but which, are not known... yet. The design is primarily meant to improve the saftey, but it also alters the way air flows over the car. For more information on this, go to http://www.livescience.com/technology/070215_nascar_aero.html