No one who grew up in the Pioneer Valley will be surprised that this is a Hampshire College study. Hey, if you can design your own curriculum, why not robot squirrels?

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080503/ap_on_sc/robotic_squirrel

( in case the story goes away, or you don't want to follow the link )

I'm about a quarter the way through Bill Bryson's A Short History of Nearly Everything. Does anyone else think that Bryson spends an inordinate amount of time and ink scrutinizing the warts of scientists?

Everyone, especially fans of evolution, marine biology, and the Alien movies, and especially especially my brother, needs to go look at this page right now.

Thanks to drhoz for the link.

Wild speculation worded as if it were science, published in a "science journal," proves wacky theory of panspermia.

I especially like the figure of "one trillion trillion times more likely" that life originated in the non-frozen heart clay-and water filled of a comet than on earth. Not that anyone has proven that any comets contain liquid water, or clay. That's a big number. It must be true.

If someone can mine a comet, and produce the building blocks of life from it, then we can talk about comets "seeding life." But in the meanwhile, Panspermia is just a way of saying that Earth isn't special enough to have produced life--it's just the telescope owner's version of Special Creation or Intelligent Design. Magic Man Comet done it.

Recently I was asked if birds get Lyme disease, and I answered "No, because birds don't get bitten by deer ticks." I was wrong. Not only do some birds get deer ticks, but in one study 32 species of birds were found to be carrying 9 different species of ticks, including ticks that predominantly feed on rabbits, and mice. There is some anxiety in the scientific and medical communities that migratory birds may spread Lyme disease carrying ticks. Here are a few articles to look at:

MIGRATORY SONGBIRDS DISPERSE TICKS ACROSS CANADA, AND FIRST ISOLATION OF THE LYME DISEASE SPIROCHETE, BORRELIA BURGDORFERI, FROM THE AVIAN TICK, IXODES AURITULUS

Migration may reawaken Lyme disease

White-tailed Deer, White-footed Mice, and Deer Ticks Support Lyme Disease Spread – So Do Birds.

Birds, Migration and Emerging Zoonoses: West Nile Virus, Lyme Disease, Influenza A and Enteropathogens

It's not clear to me how common it is for birds to suffer from the disease, but--apparently--they can indeed get it.

Thanks to bunrab for this story (I'm paying attention!)

I shan't debate the "usefulness" of ticks here today, but pigeons are yet again proving themselves to be very useful. Historic uses for pigeons have included food, amusement, and communication--now they're going to be used as scientific probes.

( article text here )

Here are my questions: How many times can you use the word "blog" in a 250 word article? (This is one of the things I hate about a lot of science writing for the public--there's a need to be "grabby," to use some pop culture phrase that is part of the zeitgeist to lure the otherwise uninterested into reading the article--"blogs are hip right now, emphasize that aspect of the story!" 1/37th of the story is the word "blog." This article will be the most dated piece of writing in the world in 5 years.)

That aside, I'm actually much more interested in the photos the pigeons will be taking than the air pollution data. One of my fantasy projects is a movie filmed from the point of view of a pigeon. With this technology, plus rc helecopters, and some cgi, you could do a real convicing job. The tough part would be writing a script that anyone besides me would want to see. After all, I liked "Falken's Oga."

Another question--whose pigeons are these? I assume they didn't trap wild pigeons from San Jose, they must be using someone's captive flock. If so, are they protected at night in a dovecote? Or were they released, fully? (I doubt that's legal--but I don't know the laws regarding pigeon-keeping...hmm, how come pigeon keepers can release their birds into the city but if you did it with, say, goats, you'd get in trouble?)

The potential for using pigeons as scientific probes and spying devices I think is enormous. I can't wait to find out what happens.

That's right, I said "shan't."