Voila! Nanotechs Turn Gold Red and Green

It's not exactly alchemy, but it's close,— maybe the modern equivalent.

Scientists in the U.K. have used nanotechnology to change the color of gold. What once had a gold tint now links red and green, to an extent.

Using principles of nanophotonics, the scientists embossed minuscule raised patterns on the surface of the gold, fundamentally altering the way the metal reacts to light. The trick is in how we perceive it, of course. To the human eye, the gold now looks like it has a reddish or greenish appearance.

The embossing was done on the magical metal of gold, but the scientists said that they could have just as easily used other more boring metals like silver or aluminum. The type of metal isn't a hindrance because the same technique would be used. It's not just red or green, either.

All of the colors of the rainbow are possible. As for the real world, the lead scientist is hopping to market the idea to those wanting to make jewelry or secure banknotes.

Family Heirloom a 4-billion-year-old Meteorite

It's not often that you find an ancient space artifact is propping up your homescape, but that's what has happened to a Kentucky couple, George and Donna Lewis. Turns out the 33-pound rock that they've been using as a doorstop is a rare meteorite estimated at 4.5 billion years old.

The date and material have been confirmed by testing done at Eastern Kentucky University. The rock is thought to be part of a known meteorite strike that created similar debris in Tazewell, Tenn., in the 1850s. Indeed, the doorstop in question was found in a cow pasture near the town of Tazewell in the 1930s and passed down two generations to Donna Lewis. Her grandfather, Tilmon Brooks, isn't around anymore to discuss the findings, or his find, but he would surely be pleased to know that he held onto something that could have great value, and not just of the sentimental kind.

The meteorite has not survived untouched. Somewhere along the way, someone painted it green. (It had been a garden ornament before the Lewises turned it into a doorstop.) That paint job hasn't diminished the rock's radioactivity, however, as George Lewis discovered when he did a hover with a metal detector.

The rock, weighing in at 33 pounds, is the second-largest known find from that Tazewell strike. The largest known meteorite from the strike weighs 100 pounds.

The Lewises' piece of space debris was on display at a recent Eastern Kentucky science fair, where several students were notably excited by the rock and its origin. The meteorite will remain in the public domain.

Bacon Barter Rolls Across the Country

Have bacon, will travel. That's the motto of a guy who seems to need a bit more publicity. He's an actor and a comedian, and I can't help but think that this just another publicity stunt, no matter how much I like the subject matter.

I have to be honest here: I love bacon. I love the smell of it, the taste of it, and the aftertaste of it. It's one of Nature's perfect foods. The fact that it is slightly less good for me than other foods I eat troubles me a tiny bit but not enough to keep me from munching on bacon strips on occasion.

But back to the traveler: So this guy has vowed to go from coast to coast on a "bacon barter," using bacon as currency to get accommodation along the way. It's working for him so far, and it will probably work for him the rest of the way because he left with more bacon than he would ever need. 

It puts me in mind of similar ventures that other brave souls could make: What about a "barnyard barter," with eggs as the currency? How about a "soda barter," with Coke or Pepsi or root better or any number of other sodas as the currency? It doesn't have to be food, after all; the currency could certainly be liquid in nature, although I would definitely draw the line at alcohol. (I could see the appeal of olive oil, but that might be a hard sell for people who aren't avid cooks or health nuts (or both).

This guy may be on to something, actually, because he's making do without money and that can be good practice for when the money runs out and the banks close and the stock market crashes and people start hoarding water and bread and … 

Sally Ride, Pioneering Astronaut, Dies at 61

"More than anything else, our venturing into space has taught us to appreciate Earth — it’s revolutionized our view of our planet and our understanding of its complexity, and made us see the impact that we’re having on it."

That was Sally Ride, reflecting on the famous Earthrise photo and what it meant to her. Sally Ride was like that herself, in the way that she taught us to look at ourselves. 

The first American woman in space, Ride was a media darling when she blasted into space in 1983 aboard Challenger, itself now gone except in the annals of space exploration history. 

One longtime observer went so far as to say that Ride was "to the shuttle era what Neil Armstrong is to Apollo."

She was a top-rate scientist (with her specialties including laser physics), and her expertise with the robotic arm was in part why she was chosen to fly on that 1983 mission. She operated the arm in a satellite retrieval mission.

At 32, she was the youngest American in space. When she and the rest of the Challenger crew took off on June 18, 1983, she was just five years removed from answering a newspaper ad for astronauts. She rose through the ranks to become one of the industry's most-respected and pioneering figures.

She flew again in 1984 and then retired after Challenger exploded. Ride was on the panel that investigated the Challenger disaster and, indeed, was the only person to be on both disaster panels, taking part in the Columbia investigation as well.

Many photos of her aboard the two spaceflights show her smiling. Ride had a sense of humor as well. She good-naturedly answered the loads of silly questions forced on her by journalists who couldn't wait to find out what color shoes she would be wearing in space. A keen athlete, she considered a career in tennis before deciding to focus more on physics (and English – she also claimed an English degree with a specialty in Shakespeare). No less a champion than Billie Jean King urged Ride to go pro, but she chose science instead and, when asked years later why she made the choice, said, "A bad forehand."

She accepted her role in life, as a role model for other young girls, and continued to promote science education, especially for girls, throughout the rest of her life. 

In her post-NASA days, Ride was a science fellow, a physics professor, a director of the California Space Institute, and the founder of a company. This last was Sally Ride Science, which provides science-oriented programs and materials to schools.

And yet the one thing that she wanted to do above all else, and the reason that she doggedly pursued a career as an astronaut, was fly. Trained as a pilot, she dreamed of going into space. She got her wish, twice.

Not even 30 years after her historic flight, Sally Ride is dead, the victim of pancreatic cancer. She will be missed but remembered, for her spirit, her smile, and her part in making history.

Monitor Your Home Through the Cloud

A big home improvement company will soon offer computerized home security systems via the Cloud. It's the latest innovation in technology for your smartphone or tablet or (Remember these?) computer.

The system is apparently called Iris (Isn't that Siri backwards?), but it doesn't require you to scan your eye or anything as a password. That's too bad, actually, because that could be a clever ad slogan if somebody could find a way to tie it in with idea of keeping an eye on your home.

At any rate, you soon could be able to monitor and change settings on your home alarm system, your home thermostat, and even your home lights (inside and out). It all works via a cloud-based system that you control through cloud access. Nominally, it's an opportunity to get a smartphone alert if something activates your home alarm system. But it also should allow you to switch the lights on from the garage or turn on the heater while you're on the way (if you've forgotten to set the timer). Presumably, you could also turn off lights that you've left on. This kind of thing could also come in handy if you had access to individual electrical outlets — so you could turn off the iron that you happened to leave on when you rushed out of the house.

But I'm also thinking that this could be an opportunity to have a bit of fun with your housemates or your family or your kids or your pets or whoever else lives in the house with you. If you can access all of these systems from the cloud, then all you need is a Cloud connection. So conceivably, you could be sitting in the home office, door closed, fire up the home computer, and dim the lights in the room where the kids are playing — things like that. Surely that's only the beginning of all kinds of fun. The downside of that, of course, is that you don't want to repeat the experience of the Boy Who Cried Wolf.

Seriously, though, this is a good step forward in our ability to monitor home security and use technology to improve our lives.

Pluto Still a Planet, as This New Moon Proves

If Pluto isn't a planet, then why does it have so many moons?


The Hubble Space Telescope has provided evidence of yet another satellite orbiting the erstwhile Ninth Planet in our Solar System. This one is unimaginatively titled P5, presumably an abbreviation for Pluto's 5th Satellite. It follows by a year the discovery of another moon, P4, also discovered by Hubble.


Pluto was discovered by Clyde Tombaugh way back in 1930. Its largest moon, Charon, was discovered in 1978. For many years, the one planet-one moon tradition was accepted worldwide. But some dastardly elements of the astronomical community got together, got enough funding and influence, and got Pluto downsized.


Pluto, you'll remember, was demoted to dwarf planet status in 2006, to the hue and cry of science teachers bemoaning the impending purchase of new eight-planet Solar System models for their classrooms. Oddly, in the same year, Hubble found two other moons orbiting Pluto. These were given the names Nix and Hydra. 


Now that Hubble has found even more satellites, surely the promotion of Pluto can't be far behind. These should be big times for the Little Planet That Used to Be. A NASA spacecraft will finally reach flyby status in 2015. That's just three short years away. Surely in that year, we will discover enough evidence to prove that Pluto is indeed a planet. Just because it's smaller than other objects orbiting the Sun doesn't mean it isn't still a planet. The Pluto nay-sayers would be hard-pressed to come up a comet or some other form of heavenly body that has so many things orbiting it. 


Pluto the Planet in 2015!

Cooperstown's 'Mona Lisa' Found in Ohio Attic

Talk about not knowing what you have.

In a dusty cardboard box stored under a wooden dollhouse for decades was a treasure trove of extremely rare and valuable baseball cards, so much so that estimates are that the collection in total could bring $3 million at auction.

The cards now belong to a Ohio guy who knows a bit about baseball, but it was his grandfather who collected about 700 cards and kept them all in pristine condition. And pristine they are, part of the E98 series, one of the more famous of the card series in baseball's less recent past, with half of the 30 players appearing on plaques on walls in the Baseball Hall of Fame. Unlike other, more dog-eared members of this series, these are mint. Among the shining lights in this newly discovered Ohio collection are cards representing Christy Mathewson, Connie Mack, Cy Young, Ty Cobb, and Honus Wagner.

One enthusiast compared it to finding the Mona Lisa in your attic.

The cards originally belonged to a man who died in the 1940s. When the man's wife died, one of their daughters continued to live in the house. When she died last year, she left everything to her 20 nieces and nephews, the youngest of which was put in charge of the estate. It was during a recent clean-out that the guy found the gems.

Once the guy and the family figured out that they had something valuable on their hands, they sent some of the cards off to a professional authentication company, which rated the cards very highly indeed. On a scale of 1 to 10, the company rated the Ty Cobb card a 9 — and there were 16 in the collection. And, for the first time ever, the company gave out a 10, a rating of perfect condition, to a Honus Wagner card. Wagner, of course, is the Holy Grail of baseball players, having used his considerable influence to get his cards pulled from the market. The biggest price ever paid for a baseball card was for a Honus Wagner: $2.8 million, in 2007. Honus was also a hit for some nuns, who gained the system for more than $200,000 in 2010.

As for the owners, they are dividing everything among equally, with all but a few vowing to sell the cards and take the money.