Saturday, October 18, 2008
Tuesday, October 14, 2008
what do you think of this creature?
Desert worm
The most feared animal of the Gobi desert is the legendary allghoi khorkhoi which is also known as the Mongolian death worm. The name is descriptive: it means "intestine worm", because it is supposed to resemble a four-feet-long animated piece of intestine. It surfaces after rain and sprays anyone who gets too close with an acid-like substance that kills instantly. It also radiates a killer electrical charge. The existence of the worm is unproven, despite four research teams having tried to find it since 1990. Many scientists believe it is a snake: the venom-spitting death adder or king cobra are the most likely candidates. One problem is that Mongolians believe that mentioning the worm is unlucky, so reliable first-hand accounts are hard to come by.
The most feared animal of the Gobi desert is the legendary allghoi khorkhoi which is also known as the Mongolian death worm. The name is descriptive: it means "intestine worm", because it is supposed to resemble a four-feet-long animated piece of intestine. It surfaces after rain and sprays anyone who gets too close with an acid-like substance that kills instantly. It also radiates a killer electrical charge. The existence of the worm is unproven, despite four research teams having tried to find it since 1990. Many scientists believe it is a snake: the venom-spitting death adder or king cobra are the most likely candidates. One problem is that Mongolians believe that mentioning the worm is unlucky, so reliable first-hand accounts are hard to come by.
Monday, September 22, 2008
If you love Nessie, you'll be happy to know...
Sweden's Loch Ness monster possibly caught on camera
Aug 29, 2008
STOCKHOLM (AFP) — Sweden's own version of the Loch Ness monster, the Storsjoe or Great Lake monster, has been caught on film by surveillance videos, an association that installed the cameras said Friday.
The legend of the Swedish beast has swirled for nearly four centuries, with some 200 sightings reported in the lake in central Sweden.
"On Thursday at 12:21 pm, we filmed the movements of a live being. And it was not a pike, nor a perch, we're sure of that," Gunnar Nilsson, the head of a shopkeepers' association in Svenstavik, told AFP.
The association, together with the Jaemtland province and local municipality of Berg, installed six surveillance cameras in the lake in June, including two underwater devices.
The project, which has so far cost some 400,000 kronor (43,000 euros, 62,500 dollars), is aimed at resolving the mystery of the Swedish Nessie.
The first sighting dates back to 1635 and the most recent to July 2007, with most speaking of a long, serpent-like beast with humps, a small cat or dog-like head, and ears or fins pressed against the neck.
The association employs one person full-time to review the recorded video footage each day.
In the images filmed Thursday and posted on a website dedicated to the Storsjoe monster (www.storsjoodjuret.nu), a long serpent-like being is seen swimming in the murky waters.
"A highly-advanced system on one of the cameras detected heat produced by the cells," indicating that it was a live being, Nilsson said.
"It's very exciting and quite spectacular," he said.
He readily admitted however that the project was also "aimed at improving business around the lake."
"The monster has helped us," he added.
Some 20 more cameras are due to be installed soon, including one at a depth of 30 metres (100 feet) to catch any movements under the winter ice
Aug 29, 2008
STOCKHOLM (AFP) — Sweden's own version of the Loch Ness monster, the Storsjoe or Great Lake monster, has been caught on film by surveillance videos, an association that installed the cameras said Friday.
The legend of the Swedish beast has swirled for nearly four centuries, with some 200 sightings reported in the lake in central Sweden.
"On Thursday at 12:21 pm, we filmed the movements of a live being. And it was not a pike, nor a perch, we're sure of that," Gunnar Nilsson, the head of a shopkeepers' association in Svenstavik, told AFP.
The association, together with the Jaemtland province and local municipality of Berg, installed six surveillance cameras in the lake in June, including two underwater devices.
The project, which has so far cost some 400,000 kronor (43,000 euros, 62,500 dollars), is aimed at resolving the mystery of the Swedish Nessie.
The first sighting dates back to 1635 and the most recent to July 2007, with most speaking of a long, serpent-like beast with humps, a small cat or dog-like head, and ears or fins pressed against the neck.
The association employs one person full-time to review the recorded video footage each day.
In the images filmed Thursday and posted on a website dedicated to the Storsjoe monster (www.storsjoodjuret.nu), a long serpent-like being is seen swimming in the murky waters.
"A highly-advanced system on one of the cameras detected heat produced by the cells," indicating that it was a live being, Nilsson said.
"It's very exciting and quite spectacular," he said.
He readily admitted however that the project was also "aimed at improving business around the lake."
"The monster has helped us," he added.
Some 20 more cameras are due to be installed soon, including one at a depth of 30 metres (100 feet) to catch any movements under the winter ice
Wednesday, May 28, 2008
Great Visit to North Buncombe Elementary School
I haven't posted anything recently because I have been busy working on a new book (about the bogeyman) and preparing for my visit to North Buncombe. Last Friday was the date of my visit and it was terrific! I spoke with 700 students! They were wonderfully attentive and fun to be with.
I DO have something new to share with you. One of the most interesting extinct animals I have learned about is the Thylacine tiger from New Zealand. It was thought to be extinct. Actually, it still is. But look at what the scientists have done with a bit of its DNA. It's surprising.
Extinct tiger gene 'resurrected'
5:00AM Wednesday May 21, 2008
By Greg Ansley
The world thought it had seen the last of the Tasmanian tiger in 1936 when Benjamin, the sole surviving member of Australia's lost packs of big marsupial carnivores, died in Hobart Zoo.
But a team of Australian and American scientists have brought at least a trace of the extinct animals back to life in a world-beating experiment that activated thylacine genes from museum specimens in the embryo of a mouse.
Tiger DNA introduced into the embryo resumed biological activity - the first time genes from an extinct species have triggered a response in another living organism.
In time, and with a great deal more work, researchers believe the breakthrough could ultimately enable the resurrection of not only the tiger but also of other extinct species.
In the meantime, they said their work could help scientists unlock and understand many of the secrets still surrounding dinosaurs and other animals lost to the world, and further the development of biomedicines.
The publication of the team's work yesterday in the international science journal PLoS ONE followed earlier, disappointing attempts to resurrect the tiger using DNA from museums.
Plans announced in 1999 were dropped three years later after scientists at Sydney's Australian Museum could not find thylacine DNA of sufficient quality, although one of the key researchers, Professor Mike Archer, later said it was still hoped that the project could be renewed using new techniques.
Archer, now Dean of Science at the University of New South Wales, told ABC radio that the reactivation of the thylacine DNA in a mouse embryo was a significant step forward, and that he believed extinct species could be brought back to life.
"I'm personally convinced this is going to happen," he said.
"We are working on a number of projects like this.
"I've got another group working on another extinct Australian animal and we think this is highly probable,"he said.
Researchers who achieved the new tiger DNA breakthrough are far more cautious, and said yesterday that there was no way the technique could be used to bring back an entire thylacine, or any other extinct creature.
Dr Andrew Pask, R.D. Wright Fellow at the University of Melbourne's zoology department, who led the research, said the work in Melbourne and at the University of Texas had established proof of principle that could help discover the unique qualities that defined a species.
Previously researchers could only examine the gene sequences from extinct species - but now they would be able to examine the functioning genes of a vast range of lost creatures, from dinosaurs to mammoths and Neanderthals.
And the future could bring incredible new advances, with rapid advancement in gene sequencing likely to produce the entire thylacine genome within a few years.
To bring an extinct species back to life would require a vastly more complex and difficult programme matching tens of thousands of genes to their correct positions in chromosomal packages.
Professor Marilyn Renfree, Federation Fellow and Laureate Professor at Melbourne University's zoology department, said the pace of scientific discovery was advancing at such a pace that it was conceivable that extinct animals could one day be brought back to life.
She said that the DNA used in the project had been taken from 100-year-old specimens from Melbourne's Museum Victoria, and had been inserted into the mouse embryo with a "reporter" gene, which produced a blue colour indicating the thylacine DNA was functioning biologically.
The tiger gene used in the experiment has a similar function in developing cartilage and bone as its counterpart has in the mouse.
"We were very, very excited when we saw it working," Renfree said.
As well as allowing researchers new access to previously lost genetic biodiversity, Renfree said the team's discovery was critical in a time when extinction rates - especially of mammals - were increasing at an alarming pace.
I DO have something new to share with you. One of the most interesting extinct animals I have learned about is the Thylacine tiger from New Zealand. It was thought to be extinct. Actually, it still is. But look at what the scientists have done with a bit of its DNA. It's surprising.
Extinct tiger gene 'resurrected'
5:00AM Wednesday May 21, 2008
By Greg Ansley
The world thought it had seen the last of the Tasmanian tiger in 1936 when Benjamin, the sole surviving member of Australia's lost packs of big marsupial carnivores, died in Hobart Zoo.
But a team of Australian and American scientists have brought at least a trace of the extinct animals back to life in a world-beating experiment that activated thylacine genes from museum specimens in the embryo of a mouse.
Tiger DNA introduced into the embryo resumed biological activity - the first time genes from an extinct species have triggered a response in another living organism.
In time, and with a great deal more work, researchers believe the breakthrough could ultimately enable the resurrection of not only the tiger but also of other extinct species.
In the meantime, they said their work could help scientists unlock and understand many of the secrets still surrounding dinosaurs and other animals lost to the world, and further the development of biomedicines.
The publication of the team's work yesterday in the international science journal PLoS ONE followed earlier, disappointing attempts to resurrect the tiger using DNA from museums.
Plans announced in 1999 were dropped three years later after scientists at Sydney's Australian Museum could not find thylacine DNA of sufficient quality, although one of the key researchers, Professor Mike Archer, later said it was still hoped that the project could be renewed using new techniques.
Archer, now Dean of Science at the University of New South Wales, told ABC radio that the reactivation of the thylacine DNA in a mouse embryo was a significant step forward, and that he believed extinct species could be brought back to life.
"I'm personally convinced this is going to happen," he said.
"We are working on a number of projects like this.
"I've got another group working on another extinct Australian animal and we think this is highly probable,"he said.
Researchers who achieved the new tiger DNA breakthrough are far more cautious, and said yesterday that there was no way the technique could be used to bring back an entire thylacine, or any other extinct creature.
Dr Andrew Pask, R.D. Wright Fellow at the University of Melbourne's zoology department, who led the research, said the work in Melbourne and at the University of Texas had established proof of principle that could help discover the unique qualities that defined a species.
Previously researchers could only examine the gene sequences from extinct species - but now they would be able to examine the functioning genes of a vast range of lost creatures, from dinosaurs to mammoths and Neanderthals.
And the future could bring incredible new advances, with rapid advancement in gene sequencing likely to produce the entire thylacine genome within a few years.
To bring an extinct species back to life would require a vastly more complex and difficult programme matching tens of thousands of genes to their correct positions in chromosomal packages.
Professor Marilyn Renfree, Federation Fellow and Laureate Professor at Melbourne University's zoology department, said the pace of scientific discovery was advancing at such a pace that it was conceivable that extinct animals could one day be brought back to life.
She said that the DNA used in the project had been taken from 100-year-old specimens from Melbourne's Museum Victoria, and had been inserted into the mouse embryo with a "reporter" gene, which produced a blue colour indicating the thylacine DNA was functioning biologically.
The tiger gene used in the experiment has a similar function in developing cartilage and bone as its counterpart has in the mouse.
"We were very, very excited when we saw it working," Renfree said.
As well as allowing researchers new access to previously lost genetic biodiversity, Renfree said the team's discovery was critical in a time when extinction rates - especially of mammals - were increasing at an alarming pace.
Thursday, May 1, 2008
Jeremy from Prairie School-one of the best schools in Illinois!
Jeremy Ahn to me
that's pretty cool. and no. i don't need any more. Just as long as you visit Prairie School again!!!
that's pretty cool. and no. i don't need any more. Just as long as you visit Prairie School again!!!
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