Extra Credit Report Science

December 6, 2007

Two of Saturn's smaller moons look almost like a UFO. The moons, which lie within the giant planet's rings, may have come by their strange shape by gradually accumulating ring particles in a ridge around their equators. The two moons in question are called Pan and Atlas.

Here is a picture of what both the moons look like.

December 5th 2007

Large gas planet can get twice as close to there stars as Mercury is to the sun, without evaporation. Many stars have been record to get as close as 6% closer to there star then Mercury is to the sun.

Here is Mercury and the sun.

December 5th 2007

The blind, deep ocean-dwelling hagfish certainly lives up to its name. But its vestigial "eye" might explain how vertebrate vision evolved. It's eye has no lens, no pupil and only primitive photoreceptors. Trevor Lamb at the Australian National University in Canberra and colleagues have reassessed DNA evidence on the origin of vertebrates and concluded that the hagfish is in a sister, and not daughter, group to lampreys.

Here is a hagfish.

December 4th 2007

Electric and hybrid cars could act as energy stores for the power grid while not being driven. Scientists from the University of Delaware are using a new prototype to store or supply grid electricity when required. The average car is only driven 1 out of every 24 hours. Hybrid vehicles could act as backups to the grid while idle, using a system developed by Kempton and colleagues called V2G