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Biomimetics

See Like a Bee, Fly Like a Fly
March 11, 2009
An aerospace engineer in Australia was inspired by insects to design a better way for missiles to find their targets.  Aviation Week reported on work announced by the Australian Government Department of Defense.  “Bioseeker,” a new guidance system for smarter weapons, was inspired by insect navigation.  The Hon. Warren Snowdon, on his website as Minister […]
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Dumb Ideas

Using Engineering to Prove Evolution
March 3, 2009
David Deamer smiling at a tide pool: is there an evolutionary connection?  The picture accompanies an article on Science Daily about Deamer’s latest thinking on the origin of life.  He’s going to share his ideas at a symposium in Oakland, California, organized by Eugenie Scott of the NCSE. According to Deamer, life began with complex […]
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Biomimetics

Can Evolution Keep You Safe?
February 25, 2009
A new practical use for Darwinism has come to light: natural security.  Two recent articles claim that we can learn from evolution how best to protect ourselves. Natural security:  Darwinism can be practical, thinks Rafe Sagarin, an ecologist at Duke University.  Science Daily reported that he is using Darwinian principles to write and speak about […]
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Amazing Facts

Songbirds Sing on a Fast Wing
February 17, 2009
Purple martins and wood thrushes are common songbirds of the eastern United States.  Until recently, it has not been possible to follow their movements accurately.  Now, a team of biologists in Toronto, Erie and Cambridge was able to track them with tiny geolocators.  They found that the little birds fly farther and faster than previously […]
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Amazing Facts

The Uses of Wood Rot
February 16, 2009
Wood rot fungus doesn’t sound like a useful thing.  Most people would rather get rid of it – especially those who have seen their houses decay because of it.  Some scientists, however, are intrigued by it.  It may have properties that could some day help power your car.     Science Daily reported that the […]
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Amazing Facts

Modeling Solar Cells on Butterflies
February 7, 2009
Sunlight is free – if we could just learn how to use it better.  For decades, engineers have been trying to improve the efficiency of solar cells.  Why not look at nature?  Science Daily reported on work going on in China and Japan: “The discovery that butterfly wings have scales that act as tiny solar […]
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Fossils

A Tale of Two Sites: Moby Dog and The Claw
February 6, 2009
Discoveries portrayed as major evolutionary missing links were announced this week.  One is a putative transitional form from land animal to whale, and one is a Cambrian trilobite-like creature said to be evolving the first claw. Moby dog:  The current evolutionary scenario for the origin of whales is that they evolved from dog-like hoofed animals […]
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Early Man

What Mean These Observations?
February 5, 2009
Science news outlets report many interesting findings every week.  It’s not always clear, though, whether the conclusions drawn from them are warranted by the data.  Here are some recent cases: Jaws of steel:  A skull labeled Australopithecus robustus was studied for the force its jaws could generate.  Interpretation: “Early humans had jaws of steel.”  With […]
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Birds

The Early Bird Gets the Just-So Story
February 3, 2009
If a catastrophic world event wiped out the dinosaurs, why did birds survive?  They’re smaller and more delicate, it seems.  National Geographic published a new hypothesis: they out-thought the doomed dinosaurs.  “Birds survived the global catastrophe that wiped out their dinosaur relatives due to superior brainpower, a new study suggests.”     A couple of […]
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Amazing Facts

Corn Is Fuel in More Ways than One
February 3, 2009
There’s been controversy lately about the diversion of corn crops from food for humans to ethanol for engines.  Why not both?  A new pilot program announced by Fraunhofer-Gesellschaft saves the corn cobs for eating but makes ethanol out of the straw.  If so, this would make the whole plant an energy factory for the human […]
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Birds

Is Natural Selection Losing its Appeal?
January 28, 2009
Some recent science reports sound like they are ready to cast Darwin’s key phrase natural selection overboard, or at least demote it from its leading role in evolution.  These articles each hint that long-held beliefs are being challenged. Make room:  Science Daily asked, “Natural Selection Not The Only Process That Drives Evolution?”  Scientists at Uppsala […]
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Birds

Feather Evolution Proved?
January 21, 2009
Another claim of feather evolution was reported in PNAS.1  Creationists have long claimed that the evolution of feathers from reptilian scales is an intractable problem for Darwinists (example: 1994 article from Creation magazine).  Does the paper provide incontrovertible proof that feathers had evolved in dinosaurs before birds took flight in the air?     Beipiaosaurus, […]
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Biomimetics

Minerals Can Fool Astrobiologists
January 21, 2009
Look at this picture on National Geographic News.  Looks alive, doesn’t it?  It’s only a mineral.  The article contains a gallery of five micrographs of minerals that form curvy crystals.  They’re called biomorphs (a word simply meaning life-like shapes).     “Until now scientists had thought rounded crystals, such as those found in seashells and […]
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Amazing Facts

Biology Now Includes Fluid Dynamic Construction
January 13, 2009
There’s an old legend that Tibetan monks built a wall by levitating heavy stones with sound by beating their drums and gongs.  Something not quite so fantastic but still amazing is done by cells in the embryo.  Scientists have filmed zebrafish embryos using beating cilia to build little stone structures that they use for balance. […]
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Amazing Facts

Watch for Flying Giraffes (and Convergent Evolutionists)
January 9, 2009
Imagine giraffe-sized animals that could fly.  They lived.  National Geographic News has an illustration of an extinct pterosaur, tall as a giraffe, that was able to leap into the air and flap its wings for sustained powered flight.     Live Science discussed work by Michael Habib [Johns Hopkins U School of Medicine] on the […]
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