Dec 30, 2008
USB Belt - Modern Fashion Statement
I'm going to teach you how to make a modern fashion statement. It's a belt made out of USB cables! Hi-Tech computer art as clothing? Make one yourself!
Dec 27, 2008
New Hi Tech A-V Equipment
At Audio-Video-Connection.com we offer most exciting new Hi Tech Audio Video equipment and products available. HDTV, home theater, home security systems, business security systems.
Dec 25, 2008
Dec 24, 2008
Hearing Aids Go Hi-Tech
Everyone knows that bigger doesn’t always mean better. Waistlines, bills and gas prices are just a few examples. Now hearing aid manufacturers are taking this sentiment to heart, with new devices that are both discreet and hi-tech.
The new PURE hearing aid is designed for users who want the best in hearing technology, while staying connected to the latest electronic devices. An extra small device that boasts the latest in amplification and single processing technologies, it can handle any listening environment. And with the addition of the new TEK interface, wearers can now connect wirelessly with Bluetooth enabled devices, TVs, computers and MP3 players.
Dec 23, 2008
Dec 22, 2008
Dec 20, 2008
Dec 18, 2008
Dec 17, 2008
Robot Violinist
Talent 2008 Robot Dancers
Dec 16, 2008
Dec 15, 2008
Dec 14, 2008
Ghost creation ~ ~ cool trick !
Dec 13, 2008
The Large Hadron Collider - First Beam
The £5bn Large Hadron Collider was powered up without a hitch at Cern, the European nuclear research organisation in Geneva.
After a tense first hour researchers announced they had achieved "full beam", meaning that a stream of sub-atomic particles was racing round the LHC's 27 kilometre-long circular tunnel at just under the speed of light. The next stage will be to fire a beam in the opposite direction.
The Large Hadron Collider - First Beam ( EXCLUSIVE VIDEO ) - Click here for more free videos
Big Bang Experiment Simulation
Big Bang Experiment Simulation - Funny bloopers R us
BIG BANG EXPERIMENT
Dec 12, 2008
Anvil Crawler Lightning
July 3, 2008 Anvil Crawler Lightning - More free videos are here
Recycle Cans Into Ashtrays
Recycle Cans Into Ashtrays - Click here for more amazing videos
This project will amaze friends with its simplicity and efficiency. Make a trendy ashtray out of an empty coke can
Mini Airplane
Mini Airplane - Watch the best video clips here
very easy to make, motor, wire and battery..a flying airplane
New 007 Laser Pistol Revealed!
New 007 Laser Pistol Revealed! - Celebrity bloopers here
The world's first look at James Bond's new blu-ray burning laser weapon! Learn how to make your own!
Dec 11, 2008
event in USA on 11-09-2001
44 Clips of the 2 Planes Crashing into the WTC Towers on 911 - Click here for the most popular videos
44 Clips of the 2 Planes Crashing into the WTC Towers on 911 - Click here for the most popular videos
This could have been Bin Laden, Mossad, the CIA, or anoyone else.
We will NEVER know the truth, and will ALWAYS be indanger of this happening again, unless we sort otu govt at ALL levels.
We the people, for some reason, have ot OBEY govt departments, at ALL levels, and this is what leads to dirtier and more vile corruption.
There are literally hundreds of MILLIONS of people in this world who NEVER have to work, while the rest of us are brinking on slavery.
Missile Strike
Close up look at the amount of earth this missile displaces
Missile Strike - For more of the funniest videos, click here
Dec 10, 2008
Atomic Test Compilation
Atomic Test Compilation - Click here for more blooper videos
A bunch of Atomic test clips that I've stuck together with one of my DragonForce favourites
Atomic Bomb - Up Close
See what an atomic bomb looks like up close and personal. Bombs, blast, devastation
Amazing Billiard Tricks
TOMAHAWKSBRA@HOTMAIL.FR
Amazing Billiard Tricks - The funniest videos are a click away
Cigarette Magic - Very Cool !!
Cigarette Magic - Very Cool !! - The most amazing home videos are here
Magic Bar Trick - Truly Amazing!!
Magic Bar Trick - Truly Amazing!! - The top video clips of the week are here
Hard to believe!! Make a match move inside a glass without touching anything!! My best trick so far!
David Copperfield Revealed
David Copperfield Revealed - Click here for the funniest movie of the week
David Copperfield changing illusion revealed
Dec 9, 2008
Win A Bet Using Magic Skills
Win A Bet Using Magic Skills - Click here for the most popular videos
Google Tricks, Hacks and Easter Eggs
Google Tricks, Hacks and Easter Eggs - The funniest bloopers are right here
Dec 8, 2008
Super Flashlight
Super Flashlight - These bloopers are hilarious
Worlds Brightest Led Flashlight Tags: Maglite Hacks Mag Light Worlds Bright Brightest
Worlds Brightest Led Flashlight - The top video clips of the week are here
Hack A Flashlight To Power Your...Cellphone.PDA!
Hack A Flashlight To Power Your...! - Watch today’s top amazing videos here
Dec 7, 2008
100 Ping Pong Ball Smoke Bomb
100 Ping Pong Ball Smoke Bomb - The funniest videos are a click away
Homemade Smoke (half Beer Can)
Homemade Smoke Bomb (half Beer Can) - Click here for funny video clips
Use 3 parts Potassium Nitrate and 2 parts Sugar, mix on low flame in pan and wait until it melts down to peanut butter. Ratio 2:3
A smoke bomb is a firework designed to produce smoke upon ignition. While there are smoke-generating devices that are dropped from airplanes, the term "smoke bomb" is used to describe the three types of devices:
A smoke ball is a hollow, cherry-sized sphere of brightly colored clay filled with a smoke-generating composition that produces a forceful jet of colored smoke for 10 to 15 seconds.
A smoke candle (also called a smoke generator or smoke canister) is a cylindrical cardboard tube with a fuse, usually 1½ inches (37 mm) in diameter and several inches long and resembling a giant firecracker. Such a device creates a thick cloud of smoke for up to several minutes. Uses include providing smoke for smoke testing and creating a smoke-screen for paintball and airsoft games.
A smoke canister (or smoke grenade) is a metal can that releases smoke when a pin is pulled. Used for signalling by military personnel.
Colored smoke devices use a formula that consists of an oxidizer (typically potassium chlorate, KClO3), a fuel (generally sugar), a moderant (such as sodium bicarbonate) to keep the reaction from getting too hot, and a powdered organic dye. The burning of this mixture evaporates the dye and forces it out of the device, where it condenses in the atmosphere to form a "smoke" of finely dispersed particles.
A simple smoke powder can be made by gently mixing saltpeter (potassium nitrate, KNO3) and sugar in roughly a ratio of 60% saltpeter to 40% sugar; add more sugar for a slower burn and more KNO3 for a faster burn. The more finely ground the saltpeter and sucrose, the better the smoke bomb. The mixture can be used as a loose powder or consolidated by adding enough water to make a thick paste, making a small lump of about a tablespoon in size, and letting it dry overnight. This is much safer than heating such a mixture, which has resulted in too many cases of accidental ignition. "Smoke Bomb gone awry", New York Times.
This formula has a variant in which the ingredients are left in powder form and the granulated sugar is replaced with powdered sugar.
More success could potentially be enjoyed when one adds another flammable substance to the mixture without "cooking" it. The best choice for this is melted paraffin. [1]
Devices or cartridges containing only the dye are used with an external heat source in a smoke machine.
In the military, smoke bombs are a means for creating smoke-screens.
Smoke bombs are often sold as consumer fireworks, but smoke grenades (with pins rather than external fuses) are not considered fireworks and are usually not sold at fireworks shops. The military-style smoke grenades also cost much more than smoke bomb fireworks. Military-style smoke grenades often cost for around $40 USD, while smoke bombs often cost a few cents.
The smoke bomb you would purchase from a fireworks store usually is made from potassium chlorate (KClO3 - oxidizer), sugar (sucrose or dextrin - fuel), sodium bicarbonate (otherwise known as baking soda - to moderate the rate of the reaction and keep it from getting too hot), and a powdered organic dye (for colored smoke). When a commercial smoke bomb is burned, the reaction makes white smoke and the heat evaporates the organic dye. Commercial smoke bombs have small holes through which the smoke and dye are ejected, to create a jet of finely dispersed particles. Crafting this type of smoke bomb is beyond most of us, but you can make an effective smoke bomb quite easily. There are even colorants you can add if you want to make colored smoke. Let's start out with instructions for the easiest/safest type of smoke bomb you can make:
Smoke Bomb Materials
sugar (sucrose or table sugar)
potassium nitrate, KNO3, also known as saltpeter (you can find this at some garden supply stores in the fertilizer section, some pharmacies carry it too)
skillet or pan
aluminum foil
Once you've gathered your smoke bomb materials, it's easy to make the smoke bomb...
Recent Chemistry Features
Index: How to Make a Smoke Bomb
Smoke Bomb Materials
How to Make a Smoke Bomb
How to Use a Smoke Bomb
Additional Smoke Bomb Recipes
Make Colored Smoke Bombs
White Smoke Bomb with Colored Flames
Home Made Bomb [13+] -- EDUCATION PURPOSE ONLY
Home Made Bomb - The funniest videos are a click away
BURSTED by the rising of gas pressure !
Dec 6, 2008
Ten Amazing Brain Facts ...DOnt surprise!

What part of you is only 1% to 3% of your body's mass, yet uses 20% of all the oxygen you breathe? Your brain! Here are ten more brain facts.
- Your brain needs a continuous supply of oxygen. A 10 minute loss of oxygen will usually cause significant neural damage. Cold can lengthen this time, which is why cold-water drowning victims have been revived after as nuch as 40 minutes - without brain damage.
- Your brain uses a fifth of all your blood. It needs it to keep up with the heavy metabolic demands of its neurons. It needs not only the glucose that is delivered, but of course, the oxygen.
- Your brain feels no pain. There are no nerves that register pain within the brain itself. Because of this, neurosurgeons can probe the brain while a patient is conscious (what fun!). By doing this, they can use feedback from the patient to identify important regions, such as those used for speech, or visualization.
- The cerebellum is sometimes called the "little brain," and weighs about 150 grams (a little over five ounces). Found at the lower back side of your brain, you need your cerebellum to maintain posture, to walk, and to perform any coordinated movements. It may also play a role in your sense of smell.
- The human brain weighs an average of a little over three pounds, or 1.4 kilograms. Albert Einstein's brain may have been smaller than yours, because he was smaller than average. There is a general correlation between body size and the size of our brains.
- An elephant's brain is huge - about six times as large as a human brain. However, in relation to body size, humans have the largest brain of all the animals, averaging about 2% of body weight. A cat's brain? It weighs about one ounce, a little over 1% of body weight.
- There are about 100,000 miles of blood vessels in the brain. If they were stretched out (there's a nice thought!) they would circle the earth more than four times.
- If you have an average sized brain, you have about 100 billion neurons up there. You'll be happy about that after reading the next item.
- Approximately 85,000 neocortical neurons are lost each day in your brain. Fortunately, his goes unnoticed due to the built-in redundancies and the fact that even after three years this loss adds up to less than 1% of the total. Oh, and look at the next item.
- Recent research proves that your brain continues to produce new neurons throughout your life. It also proves that it does so in response to stimulation (do those brainpower exercises). Scientists refer to this as brain plasticity or neuro-plasticity. You may find this one the most encouraging of these brain facts.
Easy Invention Ideas - How To Have Them

Want easy invention ideas? Dreaming up new products and inventions is fun, and it can be easy too. Try the following two techniques and soon you'll have a list of new ideas.
Easy Invention Ideas - Start With What's There
One of the easiest ways to create new ideas for inventions is to look at what already exists and find a way to make it better. You can start with things in your own home. These may even be the most marketable ideas - consider how many new kitchen gadgets are sold every year.
Look at the toaster, for example. How could it be improved, replaced, or the need for it eliminated? You could eliminate the need for it if you designed a stove with a toaster built into it. You could replace it with something like a waffle iron. You could improve it by making it faster, perhaps with a combination toasting element and microwave heater.
Look around the room and pick out any item you see. Imagine how it would be if it was bigger, smaller, faster, slower, or different in some way. As I write this, I am looking at a calculator. I would like to be able to talk to it. I could just say, "Mortgage payment, $140,000 loan, fifteen-year amortization, six point five percent interest rate," and it would announce, "$1219.56 per month." With all the latest voice-recognition technology out there, this is possible.
Want an easy way to create a lot of new invention ideas fast? Make a list of everything in your house. Then work your way down the list, thinking of some way to improve or re-invent each item. If nothing comes to mind, move on to the next item on the list after a minute or two.
Easy Invention Ideas - Use What Irritates
What irritates you? Do you hate the way the ice builds up on the edge of your roof? Do you get annoyed with the way the dog slops his water and food all over the kitchen floor? Annoyances and irritating things are not just problems, but excellent opportunities for easy invention ideas.
Suppose you are tired of burning your tongue on hot coffee. What could save you from this irritation? Perhaps a cup with a built-in thermometer that shows green once the coffee has cooled enough? Maybe a cooling device to set a coffee cup in, like a small fan that blows across the coffee when the cup is set on the device?
Annoyed with the necessity of brushing your teeth so often? Maybe there is a Teflon-like coating that could be applied, so food wouldn't stick. If it was anti-bacterial as well, you might avoid plaque even after days without brushing.
Looking at what is around you and imagining small or large improvements is easy. It also isn't too difficult to train yourself to look at problems as opportunities. There are dozens of other techniques that will give you easy invention ideas, but start with these two simple ones and you can have a hundred new ideas today.
Magic Trick with a bottle of coke
i dont know how to do :(( !
Magic Trick - The most amazing bloopers are here
Which One Burns First?
Cool way to bet and win $10 from friends!
Which One Burns First? - The most popular videos are a click away
Chill A Coke In 2 Minutes!
SUPER TRICK ^^
Chill A Coke In 2 Minutes! - Funny bloopers R us
Radar Gun Hacked! - More amazing videos are a click away
Dec 5, 2008
Underwater Camcorder Mod! $10!
Build a waterproof camcorder housing for about $10! It works great! See it work underwater!
Ant navigation

Next time you find yourself lost despite having a map and satellite navigation, spare a thought for the unfortunate ant that must take regular trips home to avoid losing its way. Dr Markus Knaden, from the University of Zurich, will report that a visit back to the nest is essential for ants to reset their navigation equipment and avoid getting lost on foraging trips. "Knowledge about path integration and landmark learning gained from our experiments with ants has already been incorporated in autonomous robots. Including a 'reset' of the path integrator at a significant position could make the orientation of the robot even more reliable", says Dr Knaden who will speak on Tuesday 4th April at the Society for Experimental Biology's Main Annual Meeting in Canterbury, Kent [session A4]
Ants that return from foraging journeys can use landmarks to find their way home, but in addition they have an internal backup system that allows them to create straight shortcuts back to the nest even when the outbound part of the forage run was very winding. This backup system is called the 'path integrator' and constantly reassesses the ant's position using an internal compass and measure of distance travelled. Knaden and his colleagues hypothesised that because the path integrator is a function of the ant's brain, it is prone to accumulate mistakes with time. That is, unless it is regularly reset to the original error-free template; which is exactly what the researchers have found.
When they moved ants from a feeder back to a position either within the nest or next to the nest, they found that only those ants that were placed in the nest were able to set off again in the right direction to the feeder. Those left outside the nest set off in a feeder-to-home direction (i.e. away from the nest in completely the opposite direction to the source of food) as if they still had the idea of 'heading home' in their brains. "We think that it must be the specific behaviour of entering the nest and releasing the food crumb that is necessary to reset the path integrator", says Knaden. "We have designed artificial nests where we can observe the ants after they return from their foraging trips in order to test this."
What next? The group plan to study other ant species that live in landmark rich areas. "Maybe we will find that such ants rate landmarks more highly and use them, not the nest, to reset the path integrator", explains Knaden.
Ant navigation
Ant navigation

Next time you find yourself lost despite having a map and satellite navigation, spare a thought for the unfortunate ant that must take regular trips home to avoid losing its way. Dr Markus Knaden, from the University of Zurich, will report that a visit back to the nest is essential for ants to reset their navigation equipment and avoid getting lost on foraging trips. "Knowledge about path integration and landmark learning gained from our experiments with ants has already been incorporated in autonomous robots. Including a 'reset' of the path integrator at a significant position could make the orientation of the robot even more reliable", says Dr Knaden who will speak on Tuesday 4th April at the Society for Experimental Biology's Main Annual Meeting in Canterbury, Kent [session A4]
Ants that return from foraging journeys can use landmarks to find their way home, but in addition they have an internal backup system that allows them to create straight shortcuts back to the nest even when the outbound part of the forage run was very winding. This backup system is called the 'path integrator' and constantly reassesses the ant's position using an internal compass and measure of distance travelled. Knaden and his colleagues hypothesised that because the path integrator is a function of the ant's brain, it is prone to accumulate mistakes with time. That is, unless it is regularly reset to the original error-free template; which is exactly what the researchers have found.
When they moved ants from a feeder back to a position either within the nest or next to the nest, they found that only those ants that were placed in the nest were able to set off again in the right direction to the feeder. Those left outside the nest set off in a feeder-to-home direction (i.e. away from the nest in completely the opposite direction to the source of food) as if they still had the idea of 'heading home' in their brains. "We think that it must be the specific behaviour of entering the nest and releasing the food crumb that is necessary to reset the path integrator", says Knaden. "We have designed artificial nests where we can observe the ants after they return from their foraging trips in order to test this."
What next? The group plan to study other ant species that live in landmark rich areas. "Maybe we will find that such ants rate landmarks more highly and use them, not the nest, to reset the path integrator", explains Knaden
Recycle Junk Cd's - Make A Disco Ball!
Recycle Junk Cd's - Make A Disco Ball! - The top video clips of the week are here
USB Toaster! Real Or Fake?
Revolutionary new device for those on the go...or is it?
USB Toaster! Real Or Fake? - Watch today’s top amazing videos here
Double Your Gas Mileage! 2X
DO U WANT THAT ???????????????
Double Your Gas Mileage! 2X - The top video clips of the week are here
Laptop Battery Hack! Don't Buy A New One!
KNOW HOW TO DO ... SAVE OUR MONEY
Laptop Battery Hack! Don't Buy A New One! - Watch the best video clips here
Laser Flashlight Hack! *( change laser burn in DVD into super lazer beam )
Laser Flashlight Hack! - For more funny movies, click here
Astrobiology - where are we in the universe ??? !

The Whirlpool Galaxy. Image credit: Hubble.
With this essay by Steven Soter, Astrobiology Magazine presents the first in our series of 'Gedanken', or thought, experiments - musings by noted scientists on scientific mysteries in a series of "what if" scenarios. Gedanken experiments, which have been used for hundreds of years by scientists and philosophers to ponder thorny problems, rely on the power of one's imagination to project these scenarios to logical conclusions. They do not involve lab equipment or, often, even experimental data. They can be thought of as focused daydreams. Yet, as in the famous case of Einstein's Gedanken experiments about what it would be like to hitch a ride on a light wave, they have often led to important scientific breakthroughs.
Soter is Scientist-in-Residence in the Center for Ancient Studies at New York University, where he teaches a seminar on Scientific Thinking and Speculation, and a Research Associate in the Department of Astrophysics at the American Museum of Natural History.
In this essay, Soter examines the Drake Equation, which asks how many technically advanced civilizations exist in our galaxy. He also looks at the Fermi Paradox, which questions why, if there are other technological civilizations nearby, we haven't heard from them.
If civilizations exist in our galaxy with levels of technology at least equal to our own, we might be able to detect some of them using radio telescopes. And if civilizations exist with technologies far in advance of our own, we might expect them to have colonized millions of habitable worlds in the Milky Way, and even to have visited our own planet. Yet there is no evidence in the astronomical, geological, archaeological, or historical records that extraterrestrial civilizations exist or that visitors from other worlds have ever been to Earth. Does that mean, as some have concluded, that ours is the only civilization in the galaxy? Or could there be a natural self-regulating mechanism that limits the intensive colonization of other worlds?
In 1961 radio astronomer Frank Drake devised an equation to express how the hypothetical number of observable civilizations in our galaxy should depend on a wide range of astronomical and biological factors, such as the number of habitable planets per star, and the fraction of inhabited worlds that give rise to intelligent life. The Drake Equation has led to serious studies and encouraged the search for extraterrestrial intelligence (SETI). It has also provoked ridicule and hostility. Novelist Michael Crichton recently denounced the equation as "literally meaningless," incapable of being tested, and therefore "not science." The Drake equation, he said, also opened the door to other forms of what he called "pernicious garbage" in the name of science, including the use of mathematical climate models to characterize global warming.
Crichton rightly pointed out that any numerical "answers" produced by the Drake Equation can be no more than guesses, since most of the terms in the equation are quantitatively unknown by many orders of magnitude. But he is utterly wrong to claim that the equation is "meaningless." An equation describes how the elements of a problem are logically related, whether or not we know their numerical values. Astronomers understand perfectly well that the Drake Equation cannot prove anything. Instead, we regard it as the most useful way to organize our ignorance of a difficult subject by breaking it down into manageable parts. This kind of analysis is standard, and a valued technique in scientific thinking. As new observations and insights emerge, the Drake Equation can be modified as needed or even replaced altogether. But it provides the necessary place to start.
When Drake first proposed his equation, we had no way to estimate any of its terms beyond the first one, representing the rate of star formation in our galaxy. Then in 1995, astronomers began to discover planets in orbits around other stars. These results now promise to sharpen our estimates for the second term in the equation, denoting the number of habitable worlds per star. Who knows what unforeseen discoveries will tell us about the other terms in the equation?
In Classical antiquity, when Aristarchus conceived the heliocentric view of the solar system and Democritus developed an atomic theory of matter, they had no possible way to test their ideas. The necessary observational tools and data would not exist for another two thousand years. Of course, the Crichtons of antiquity denounced such speculations as pernicious. But when the time finally came, the ancient ideas were still there, quietly waiting to inspire and encourage Copernicus and Galileo, and the pioneers of modern atomic theory, who took the first steps to test the theories. It may take centuries, but eventually the Drake Equation and all its elements will be testable.
We can express the Drake Equation in several ways, all of which are more or less equivalent. Here is one form:
N = Rs nh fl fi fc L
where N is the number of civilizations in our galaxy, expressed as the product of six factors: Rs is the rate of star formation, nh is the number of habitable worlds per star, fl is the fraction of habitable worlds on which life arises, fi is the fraction of inhabited worlds with intelligent life, fc is the fraction of intelligent life forms that produce civilizations, and L is the average lifetime of such civilizations.
The rate of star formation in our galaxy is roughly ten per year. We can define habitable worlds conservatively as those with liquid water on the surface. Many more worlds probably have liquid water only below the surface, but any subterranean life on such worlds would not be likely to produce an observable civilization. Recent discoveries of other planetary systems suggest that habitable worlds are common and that nh is at least one such planet in a hundred stars.
The remaining terms in the equation depend on the biology and social development of other worlds, and here we are profoundly ignorant. Our local experience may provide some guidance, however. We know that life on Earth arose almost as soon as conditions allowed - as soon as the crust cooled enough for liquid water to persist. This fact suggests that conditions for the origin of life on other habitable worlds are not restrictive, and that the value of fl is closer to one than to one in a thousand. But that is merely a guess. No one knows how life began on Earth, and we cannot generalize from a single case.
The conditions for intelligent life are probably more restrictive. On Earth this step first required the evolution of complex animals, which began about three billion years after the origin of life, and then the development of brains capable of abstract thought, which took another half billion years. Among the millions of animal species that have lived on Earth, probably only one ever had intelligence sufficient to understand the Drake Equation. This suggests that fi might be a small fraction.
The probability that intelligent life develops a civilization depends on the evolution of organs to manipulate the environment. On Earth, whales and dolphins may well have intelligence sufficient for abstract thought, but they lack the means to make tools. Humans, with dexterous hands, began making tools over a million years ago. Starting about ten thousand years ago, civilizations based on agriculture arose several times independently, in Mesopotamia, Egypt, China, Mexico, Peru, and New Guinea. This suggests that the value of fc is large, but again we should not generalize from the experience of only one intelligent and manipulative species.
We now come to the most intriguing term, the average lifetime L of a civilization. The Drake Equation assumes that, whatever the other factors, the number of civilizations presently in our galaxy is simply proportional to their average lifetime. The longer they live, the more civilizations exist at any given time. But what is the life expectancy of a civilization? On Earth, dozens of major civilizations have flourished and died within the last ten thousand years. Their average lifetime is about four centuries. Few if any civilizations on Earth have ever lasted as long as two thousand years.
History and archaeology show that the collapse of any given civilization causes only a temporary gap in the record of civilizations on Earth. Other civilizations eventually arise, either from the ruins of the collapsed one or independently and elsewhere. Those civilizations also eventually collapse, but new ones continue to emerge.
For example, in the eastern Mediterranean at the end of the Bronze Age, the prevailing Mycenaean civilization suffered widespread catastrophic collapse around 1100 BC. During a few centuries of "darkness" that followed, the population was illiterate, impoverished and relatively small -- but not extinct. Classical civilization gradually arose and flourished, and gave rise to the Roman Empire, which itself collapsed in the fifth century AD. Another period of impoverished Dark Ages followed, but eventually trade and literacy revived, leading to the Renaissance. Each revival of civilization was stimulated in part by the survival of relics from the past.
Our global technological civilization, with its roots in the Mediterranean Bronze Age, is now arguably headed for collapse. But that will not be the end of civilization on Earth -- not as long as the human species survives. And the biological lifetime of our species is likely to be several million years, even if we do our worst.
We should therefore distinguish between the longevity of a single occurrence of civilization and the aggregate lifetime of a sequence of civilizations. Almost all discussions of the Drake Equation have overlooked this distinction and therefore significantly underestimated L.
The proper value of L is not the average duration of a single episode of civilization on a planet, which for Earth is about 400 years. Rather, L is much larger, being the sum of recurrent episodes of civilization, and constitutes a substantial fraction of the biological lifetime of the intelligent species. The average species lifetime for mammals is a few million years. Suppose the human species lasts another million years and our descendants have recurrent episodes of civilization for more than 10 percent of that time. Then the average effective lifetime of civilization on Earth will exceed 100,000 years, or 250 times the duration of a single episode. Other factors being the same, this generally neglected consideration should increase the expected number of civilizations in our galaxy by at least a hundredfold.
While the aggregate lifetime of civilization on a planet may be only a hundred thousand years, we should allow the possibility that a small minority of intelligent life forms, say one in a thousand, has managed to use their intelligence and technology to survive for stellar evolutionary timescales -- that is, on the order of a billion years. In that case, the average effective lifetime of civilizations in our galaxy would be about a million years.
If we now insert numbers in the Drake Equation that represent the wide range of plausible estimates for the various terms, we find that the number N of civilizations in our galaxy could range anywhere from a few thousand to about one in ten thousand. The latter (pessimistic) case is equivalent to finding no more than one civilization in ten thousand galaxies, so that ours would be the only one in the Milky Way. In the former (optimistic) case, the nearest civilization might be close enough for us to detect its radio signals. Estimates for N thus range all over the map. While this exasperates critics who demand concrete answers from science, it does not invalidate the conceptual power of the Drake Equation.
If many civilizations have arisen in our galaxy, we might expect that some of them sent out colonies, and some of those colonies sent out still more colonies. The resulting waves of colonization would have spread out across the Milky Way in a time less than the age of our galaxy. So where are all those alien civilizations? Why haven't we seen them? The physicist Enrico Fermi first posed the question in 1950. Many answers have since been proposed, including (1) ours is the first and only civilization to arise in the Milky Way, (2) the aliens exist but are hiding, and (3) they have already been here and we are their descendants. In his book Where is Everybody? Stephen Webb considers fifty proposed solutions to the so-called "Fermi Paradox" but he leaves out the most thought-provoking explanation of all, one that I call the Cosmic Quarantine Hypothesis.
In 1981, cosmologist Edward Harrison suggested a powerful self-regulating mechanism that would neatly resolve the paradox. Any civilization bent on the intensive colonization of other worlds would be driven by an expansive territorial impulse. But such an aggressive nature would be unstable in combination with the immense technological powers required for interstellar travel. Such a civilization would self-destruct long before it could reach for the stars.
The unrestrained territorial drive that served biological evolution so well for millions of years becomes a severe liability for a species once it acquires powers more than sufficient for its self-destruction. The Milky Way may well contain civilizations more advanced than ours, but they must have passed through a filter of natural selection that eliminates, by war or other self-inflicted environmental catastrophes, those civilizations driven by aggressive expansion. That is, the acquisition of powerful technology ultimately selects for wisdom.
However, suppose an alien civilization somehow finds a way to launch the aggressive colonization of other planetary systems while avoiding self-destruction. It would only take one such case, and our galaxy would have been overrun by the reproducing colonies of the civilization. But Harrison proposed a plausible backup mechanism that comes into play in the event that the self-regulating control mechanism fails. The most evolved civilizations in the galaxy, he suggested, would notice any upstart world that showed signs of launching a campaign of galactic conquest, and they would nip it in the bud. Advanced intelligence might regard any prospect of the exponential diffusion throughout the Milky Way of self-replicating colonies very much as we regard the outbreak of a deadly viral epidemic. They would have good reason, and presumably the ability, to suppress it as a measure of galactic hygiene.
There may be many highly evolved civilizations in our galaxy, and some of them may even be the interstellar colonies of others. They may control technologies vastly more powerful than ours, applied to purposes we can scarcely imagine. But Harrison's regulatory mechanisms should preclude any relentless wave of colonization from overrunning and cannibalizing the Milky Way.
By most appearances, the dominant civilization on our planet is of the expansive territorial type, and is thus headed for self-destruction. Only if we can intelligently regulate our growth-obsessed and self-destructive tendencies is our civilization likely to survive long enough to achieve interstellar communication.
Steven Soter is Scientist-in-Residence in the Center for Ancient Studies at New York University, where he teaches a seminar on Scientific Thinking and Speculation, and a Research Associate in the Department of Astrophysics at the American Museum of Natural History.
Male-killing bacteria provide a surprise benefit
Like an overprotective father, a bacterium known for controlling the reproductive patterns of the insects it infects turns out also to shield fruit flies from deadly viral infections.
New research shows that Drosophila flies infected with Wolbachia bacteria fare better than uninfected flies against several killer viruses.
Wolbachia - which plagues two-thirds of all insect species - is best known for its gender-bending effects. The bacteria are transmitted in eggs but not sperm, and males are therefore a reproductive dead-end from their point of view.
In some insects, Wolbachia kills males and converts developing males to females. The bacteria can also ensure that matings between infected males and uninfected females produce no offspring, causing the "destruction of uninfected lineages", says John Jaenike, an evolutionary geneticist at the University of Rochester, New York.
The upside of infection
But evolution cannot tolerate such a one-sided relationship for long. For Drosophila, there has to be some positive effect of being infected with Wolbachia, says Karyn Johnson, an insect virologist at the University of Queensland in Brisbane, Australia, who led the new study.
While hunting for genes that protected Drosophila from viral infection in general, she found a virus-resistant fly strain that turned out to be infected with Wolbachia. The tainted fly strain was supplied by a colleague, Scott O'Neill, who studies the bacteria in his lab. "We didn't go looking for Wolbachia," Johnson says.
Following up on the serendipitous discovery, her team found that flies not infected with Wolbachia lasted less than a week when exposed to a Drosophila virus, while flies carrying Wolbachia lived up to two weeks. For two other insect viruses, the difference was even starker, with Wolbachia-infected flies lasting weeks longer.
This extra lease of life is critical to the flies, occurring when they are at the peak of the reproductive cycle, says Jaenike, who was not involved in the study. He wonders whether other insects experience the same benefit from Wolbachia infection, noting that the bacteria's effect on most insect species remains unknown.
Journal reference: Science (DOI: 10.1126/science.1162418)
Would eating heavy atoms lengthen our lives? (Life enhacing)

A sip a day of heavy water could reduce damage to ageing tissue that is caused by oxygen free radicals (Image: John Sann/Stone/Getty)
VIEW THIS VIDEO TO HAVE FUTHER INFORMATION
In a back room of New Scientist's offices in London, I sit down at a table with the Russian biochemist Mikhail Shchepinov. In front of us are two teaspoons and a brown glass bottle. Shchepinov opens the bottle, pours out a teaspoon of clear liquid and drinks it down. He smiles. It's my turn.
I put a spoonful of the liquid in my mouth and swallow. It tastes slightly sweet, which is a surprise. I was expecting it to be exactly like water since that, in fact, is what it is - heavy water to be precise, chemical formula D2O. The D stands for deuterium, an isotope of hydrogen with an atomic mass of 2 instead of 1. Deuterium is what puts the heavy in heavy water. An ice cube made out of it would sink in normal water.
My sip of heavy water is the culmination of a long journey trying to get to the bottom of a remarkable claim that Shchepinov first made around 18 months ago. He believes he has discovered an elixir of youth, a way to drink (or more likely eat) your way to a longer life. You may think that makes Shchepinov sound like a snake-oil salesman. I thought so too, but the more I found out about his idea, the more it began to make sense.
The story began two years ago, while Shchepinov was working at a biotechology company in Oxford, UK, and using his spare time to read up on the latest ideas about what causes us to age.
The most widely accepted idea is the free-radical theory. This holds that our slide into decrepitude is the result of irreversible damage to the biomolecules that make up our bodies. The main agents of this destruction are oxygen free radicals, aggressive chemical compounds that are an unavoidable by-product of metabolism.
The reason oxygen radicals are so dangerous is that they have a voracious appetite for electrons, which they rip out of anything they can lay their hands on - water, proteins, fats, DNA - leaving a trail of destruction in their wake. This damage gradually builds up over a lifetime and eventually leads the body's basic biochemical processes to fail.
One of the worst types of damage is something called protein carbonylation, in which an oxygen radical attacks vulnerable carbon-hydrogen bonds in a protein
The human body produces legions of antioxidants, including vitamins and enzymes, that quench free radicals before they can do any harm. But over a lifetime these defence systems eventually fall victim to oxidative attack too, leading to an inevitable decline.
Many anti-ageing medications are based on supplementing the body's own defences with antioxidant compounds such as vitamin C and beta-carotene, though there is scant evidence that this does any good (New Scientist, 5 August 2006, p 40).
Shchepinov realised there was another way to defeat free radicals. While he was familiarising himself with research on ageing, his day job involved a well-established - if slightly obscure - bit of chemistry called the isotope effect. On Christmas day 2006, it dawned on him that putting the two together could lead to a new way of postponing the ravages of time.
The basic concept of the isotope effect is that the presence of heavy isotopes in a molecule can slow down its chemical reactions. This is because heavy isotopes form stronger covalent bonds than their lighter counterparts; for example, a carbon-deuterium bond is stronger than a carbon-hydrogen bond. While the effect applies to all heavy isotopes, including carbon-13, nitrogen-15 and oxygen-18
All of this is conventional chemistry: the isotope effect was discovered back in the 1930s and its mechanism explained in the 1940s. The effect has a long pedigree as a research tool in basic chemistry for probing the mechanisms of complex reactions.
Shchepinov, however, is the first researcher to link the effect with ageing. It dawned on him that if ageing is caused by free radicals trashing covalent bonds, and if those same bonds can be strengthened using the isotope effect, why not use it to make vulnerable biomolecules more resistant to attack? All you would have to do is judiciously place deuterium or carbon-13 in the bonds that are most vulnerable to attack, and chemistry should take care of the rest.
In early 2007 Shchepinov wrote up his idea and submitted it to a journal called Rejuvenation Research. Unbeknown to him, the journal's editor is controversial gerontologist Aubrey de Grey of the Methuselah Foundation in Lorton, Virginia, who is well known for supporting ideas other gerontologists consider outlandish. De Grey sent the paper out for review and eventually accepted it (Rejuvenation Research, vol 10, p 47).
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