Climate Change Cancelled?

Today we have an article in PhysOrg that reads …

New calculations suggest more than one in ten chance of colder UK winters.

As the Sun enters a period of low solar activity over the next 50 years, new research has calculated the probability of unusually cold winter temperatures occurring in the UK.

Last year, the same group of researchers, from the University of Reading, linked colder winters in Europe to low solar activity and predicted that the Sun is moving into a particularly low period of activity, meaning the UK will experience more cold winters in the future – potentially similar to those experienced in the Maunder minimum at the end of the 17th century.

The new research, published today in Environmental Research Letters, supports recent suggestions that sunspot activity is waning, and goes further, using the behaviour of the Sun over the last 9300 years to predict the probabilities of future solar changes.

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Mobile Phones – Safe or not safe?

No doubt you heard about  the recent press release from the World Health Organization, saying there is a “possible” link between cell phones and brain cancer. Wow, the WHO and not just some crank, so it must be true … yes?

But wait, what about all the studies showing no link at all between cell phones and health issues … confused yet – perhaps some doubt lingers in your mind? Well, the latest news is that you are quite safe. The UK’s NHS (National Health Service) has a nice summary.

Here is a quick outline:

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(BBC) Antimatter Tevatron mystery gains ground

US particle physicists are inching closer to determining why the Universe exists in its current form, made overwhelmingly of matter.

Physics suggests equal amounts of matter and antimatter should have been made in the Big Bang.

In 2010, researchers at the Tevatron accelerator claimed preliminary results showing a small excess of matter over antimatter as particles decayed.

The team has submitted a paper showing those results are on a firmer footing.

Each of the fundamental particles known has an antimatter cousin, with identical properties but opposite electric charge.

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(Book Review) – The Origin of Our Species

New Scientist has a great review of Chris Stringer’s latest book, “The Origin of Our Species” (no prize for spotting the hat-tip to a rather more famous publication by a certian Mr Darwin). … The book is the first popular treatment to take on board the recent sequencing of the Neanderthal genome and the discovery … Read more

Facebook = $50 Billion? – Apparently not if you look at the data

Damian Thompson writes today on the telegraph with data that appears to show that anyone who has bought into Goldman Sachs’ $50 billion valuation of Facebook, which is based on projections of revenue growth that seem ludicrously optimistic in the light of the data now available … Here’s a chart showing year-on-year growth (again, click … Read more

Neutrino Transformation Could Help Explain Mystery of Matter

Cool story in Wired today … Two research teams have found new evidence of transformations in elusive elementary particles called neutrinos. The findings may finally help explain why the universe didn’t vanish shortly after its birth. “These results are just the beginning of the story for neutrinos,” said physicist Robert Plunkett of Fermilab in Chicago. … Read more