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6 May
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Posted by AnaKhouri
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All right, all you slutty little catgirl kawai neko wannabes, here’s your chance to be really freaky.
I always wondered if those extra ears were functional. Now I know: they’re useless for conducting sound, but you can twitch them around and stuff. I would only wear them f I could always keep them pointing backward, like my cat does when she’s listening to something behind her. That looks evil.
| Category: Uncategorized | Tag: cat ears, pointless, science, weird |
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17 Jan
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Posted by Musashi
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Japanese scientists at Kyoto University plan to have a fully functional mammoth up and running within 5 years. Those things don’t eat meat, do they? Just sayin’…
For the cloning to go forward, Dr. Iritani will need a number of relatively hard-to-get things. First and foremost, he’ll need a piece of frozen mammoth tissue at least three centimeters square from a Russian lab. He’ll need the ova of an African elephant to inject the tissue into, and the elephant itself to carry the little mammoth baby to maturity.
He’ll also need a great deal of research done. The mammoth isn’t around anymore for a reason, and if that reason includes environmental reasons, it will be a challenge to keep a baby mammoth alive. There will also be plenty of debate about whether or not to display it, keep it in a private facility, or even figure out how to breed it.
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2 Sep
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Posted by Musashi
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My wife swears that MSG gives her headaches. Frankly, my wife gives me headaches when she starts whining about the level of MSG in her Chinese food…because for all the noise generated about MSG’s supposedly harmful effects, nobody has been able to definitively determine that MSG – eaten in normal amounts – causes any physiological problems.
Despite this, many people persist in the belief that MSG causes everything from headaches to muscle weakness.
What is MSG?
MSG is short for monosodium glutamate. According to Wikipedia, monosodium glutamate is “…a sodium salt of the naturally occurring non-essential amino acid glutamic acid.” This is probably as Greek to you as it is to me, but what’s important is that MSG stimulates the ‘fifth taste’, or umami. While you’re probably familiar with the first four taste sensations (bitter, salty, sweet, and sour) – many taste authorities have begun to refer to a fifth taste sensation called umami, a Japanese word roughly meaning ‘good flavor’. A more accurate interpretation would be ‘savory’. When you eat a steak, it’s this fifth taste sense that is being triggered.
MSG was discovered in 1907 in Japan by researcher Kikunae Ikeda and is a common flavor enhancer in many fast- and processed foods. Potato chips and flavored tortilla chips contain MSG as do packaged barbecue sauces and salad dressings. As you can see, even if you avoid Chinese food altogether, it’s very likely that you already ingest a fair amount of MSG without realizing it.
What do the experts say about MSG?
The Food and Drug Administration officially ruled that MSG is safe for consumption in 1959. The actual term is ‘Generally Recognized As Safe‘ or GRAS. Essentially what this means is that it can be safely added to food. The FDA is careful to define such usage as ‘intended use’, meaning don’t go around eating bowls full of MSG and you’ll be fine. Since then multiple reports and studies have concluded that, while a small percentage of the population may suffer minor problems when ingesting MSG, it is otherwise safe. Some side-effects were noted in lab rats being fed diets that were 20% MSG, but trust me – you could eat Chinese take-away every night of the week and not consume that much MSG.
One study conducted in the 70′s concluded that MSG can potentially be linked to obesity, but given that MSG is used in fast foods and snack foods, one wonders if the link goes the other way around.
So, if MSG is safe – why does everyone make such a big fuss about it?
Well – again…a small percentage of the population does seem to be susceptible to MSG-related side effects…no doubt about it. Insofar as Chinese restaurants are concerned, it’s notable that in 1968 a researcher actually coined a term for Chinese-food-related ickyness: ‘Chinese Restaurant Syndrome’ (or CRS). Robert Ho Man Kwok wrote:
I have experienced a strange syndrome whenever I have eaten out in a Chinese restaurant, especially one that served northern Chinese food. The syndrome, which usually begins 15 to 20 minutes after I have eaten the first dish, lasts for about two hours, without hangover effect. The most prominent symptoms are numbness at the back of the neck, gradually radiating to both arms and the back, general weakness and palpitations…
A following article entitled Monosodium L-glutamate: its pharmacology and role in the Chinese Restaurant Syndrome directly linked the syndrome with MSG, but repeated double-blind studies showed no conclusive link between either Chinese food or MSG and the symptoms being reported as CRS.
Like many such beliefs, its’ a lot easier to spread the panic than it is to stamp it out. The fact of the matter remains: MSG is unlikely to cause any discomfort. Often times reports of this nature are highly subjective, and susceptible to post hoc ergo propter hoc thinking. In my wife’s case, I think she’s simply the victim of a self-fulfilling prophecy. If you worry unduly about your dinner causing headaches – that’s likely to cause you a headache.
As with many such problems, a little critical thinking goes a long way.
| Category: Featured, food, News | Tag: china, food, msg. chinese food, rationality, science |
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21 Jun
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Posted by Musashi
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Increased radiation levels detected by South Korean researchers lent a smidge of evidence to North Korea’s claim to have made a breakthrough in nuclear fusion technology. I say a smidge, because nuclear fusion is something of a holy grail for energy researchers – a viable nuclear fusion reactor would create tremendous amounts of energy at little cost or harm to the environment…but scientists in the West have been banging their collective head against the wall for the better part of three decades trying to get a nuclear fusion reactor off the ground.
So what about a nuclear bomb test? Unlikely, considering that the radiation spike was not accompanied by any seismic activity.
South Korea subsequently looked for signs of a powerful, artificially induced earthquake — something that should have been detected if North Korea had conducted a nuclear test. Experts, however, found no signs of a such a quake in North Korea, a ministry statement said.
“We determined that there was no possibility of an underground nuclear test,” it said. The ministry did not mention any possible health hazard from the release.
Earlier Monday, South Korea’s mass-circulation Chosun Ilbo newspaper reported that North Korea may have conducted a small-sized nuclear test, citing the abnormal radioactivity. The paper cited an atomic expert it did not identify.
A science and education ministry official told the AFP news agency that experts could not determine the reason for the abnormally high level of xenon, a gas that occurs in the atmosphere in trace amounts.
North Korea — which is believed to have enough weaponized plutonium for at least a half-dozen nuclear weapons, conducted two underground nuclear tests in 2006 and 2009, drawing international condemnation and U.N. sanctions.
| Category: News | Tag: north korea, nuclear fusion, science |
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7 Apr
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Posted by Musashi
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Biologists have located a species of monitor lizard on Luzon in the Philippines. Dubbed ‘Varanus bitatawa’, the critter sports gold spots and is apparently a vegetarian. Yeah, I was disappointed when I heard that last bit too…though probably not as disappointed as Roger Corman.
The Agta and Ilongot tribes call the reptile “bitatawa,” which the new scientific name for it reflects, and rely on the animal for its meat.
“I have not tasted it myself — the specimen we caught was too important for us to just try,” Brown said. “I only know the hunters report it as better tasting and less smelly than the other monitor lizard in the area, a scavenger.”
And hey, what do you know – there’s already a wiki entry for the Varanus bitatawa. The internets work fast.
| Category: News | Tag: biology, lizards, Philippines, roger corman, science |
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28 Oct
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Posted by AnaKhouri
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If anyone in the world could make clothing that repels the H1N1 virus, it’s the Japanese. And they have, or at least they claim they have.
An added bonus is that when you put it on, you turn into a sharply-dressed Japanese man with pop idol hair.
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18 Sep
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Posted by Musashi
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My son will be thrilled when he hears about this – a team of paleontologists have discovered the T-Rex ‘missing link’, a 125-million-year-old miniature dino now dubbed ‘Raptorex kriegsteini’. Of course – ‘miniature’ in this case still equates to a 10-foot-long lizard armed with razor-sharp teeth. The really exciting thing about this find is that it bears out evolutionary extrapolations based on tyrannosauroids found in other parts of the world.
If you will allow me a brief aside: I’ve been listening to an audiobook of Richard Dawkins’ latest offering The Greatest Show on Earth and marveled at Dawkins’ description of Darwin’s Hawk Moth, whose existence was likewise extrapolated by the presence of orchids with especially deep nectar pockets. Darwin predicted that a moth would one day be found with a 12 inch proboscis, necessary to enable the orchid to reproduce. Twenty years after Darwin died, just such a specimen was found – the xanthopan morgani. The moth’s subspecies name is praedicta, in honor of Darwin’s foresight.
The beauty of the natural world, seen through the lens of evolutionary theory, never ceases to amaze me.
| Category: News | Tag: dionsaurs, evolution, fossils, paleontology, richard dawkins, science, t-rex |
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16 Sep
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Posted by AnaKhouri
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So someone gave us this little Fisher-Price mirror for Gohan that plays music. The music is nursery-rhyme stuff, and the tones are pretty damn strident, so I only turned it on once. And it drove our cat batshit insane. She attacked the mirror, claws out, fangs bared. I have no idea why; maybe the awful music hit a note only she could hear and it told her to kill.
Guess I should have popped in The Black Album to chill her fat ass out:
So monkeys like Metallica. I wonder how they’d react to Agalloch or Wolves in the Throne Room or Immortal or one of the other serious black metal bands my husband likes? Can we teach them to throw up the horns?
(And yeah, I realize the research was done in America but the news is on a Chinese media website…so there!)
| Category: Uncategorized | Tag: heavy metal, metalliza, monkeys, music, research, science |
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21 Jul
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Posted by Musashi
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Wednesday marks the longest solar eclipse of the 21st century when a large swathe of Asia, including parts of China and Japan, will be without sunlight for over 5 minutes.
The eclipse will appear first at dawn in India’s Gulf of Khambhat just north of of Mumbai.
It will move east across India, Nepal, Myanmar, Bangladesh, Bhutan and China before hitting the Pacific. The eclipse will cross some southern Japanese islands and be last visible from land at Nikumaroro Island in the South Pacific nation of Kiribati. Elsewhere, a partial eclipse will be visible in much of Asia.
For astronomers, it will be a chance for a prolonged view of the sun’s corona, a white ring 600,000 miles (1 million kilometers) from the sun’s surface. The previous total eclipse, in August 2008, was two minutes and 27 seconds. This one will last 6 minutes and 39 seconds at its maximum point.
Solar scientist Lucie Green is aboard an American cruise ship heading for that point near the Japanese island of Iwo Jima, where the axis of the moon’s shadow will pass closest to earth.
I’m jealous…
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20 Jul
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Posted by Musashi
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…well, cloned dogs, actually.
Incheon International Airport is now home to six cloned drug-sniffing dogs; their genetic stock was culled from a cham-peen Canadian narco-hound, and Korean fuzz claims that they all have their predecessors talents.
“They showed better performances in detecting illegal drugs during the training than other naturally born sniffer dogs that we have,” said Park Jeong-Heon, a customs spokesman at Seoul’s Incheon International Airport, during an interview with Agence France-Presse.
The clone siblings all share the name Toppy, a 1930s-esque word play on “tomorrow” and “puppy.”
‘Toppy‘? Not likely to strike fear into the hearts of drug-runners. I would have called them Dob, which is an acronym for ‘Devourer of Balls’.
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20 Jul
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Posted by Musashi
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Japanese eggheads have determined that a 2007 dust storm that sprang up in China circled the globe in a mere 13 days – which is impressive, moreseo when you consider that a single concentrated mass of dust particles was able to stay airborne long enough to travel around the freaking planet.
The dust cloud measured about 3 km (1.9 miles) vertically and up to 2,000 km horizontally and it stayed that way even after one full trip around the globe.
“The reason why the cloud structure was very well maintained was because the dust was uplifted … where the atmosphere is very stable,” Uno said.
Researchers believe dust particles trigger the formation of high-altitude cirrus clouds — although experts have no idea whether such clouds warm or cool the earth.
| Category: News | Tag: china, dust storm, eggheads, geoscience, science |
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1 Jul
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Posted by Musashi
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Huh. After decades of scientific research pinpointing Africa as the so-called ‘Cradle of Life’, one scientist now points to Asia as the home of humanity’s common ancestor…which should do wonders for the demographics of this site, if you catch my drift.
If Myanmar, formerly called Burma, is confirmed as being the ancestral homeland of higher primates, or close to it, the discovery points to a circuitous migration route for some early primates, which must have gone to Africa and then come back to Asia.
Christopher Beard, lead author of the study, told Discovery News that the common ancestor to today’s humans, monkeys and apes “would have lived in Asia.”
“At some point later in time, probably only a few million years after Ganlea was alive, one or more primitive anthropoid primates, which would have been descendants of an earlier Asian ancestor, made their way from Asia to Africa,” explained Beard, a Carnegie Museum of Natural History paleontologist.
“There, they continued to evolve, and some of them eventually became modern Old World monkeys, apes and humans,” he added. “Living monkeys and apes like the orangutan that inhabit Asia returned there after evolving for millions of years in Africa.”
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28 May
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Posted by Musashi
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12-year-old Clara Ma, who attends sixth grade in Lenexa, KS submitted the winning entry to name NASA’s new Mars rover. Her choice? Curiosity.
Here’s the winning essay in question:
Curiosity is an everlasting flame that burns in everyone’s mind. It makes me get out of bed in the morning and wonder what surprises life will throw at me that day. Curiosity is such a powerful force. Without it, we wouldn’t be who we are today. When I was younger, I wondered, ‘Why is the sky blue?’, ‘Why do the stars twinkle?’, ‘Why am I me?’, and I still do. I had so many questions, and America is the place where I want to find my answers. Curiosity is the passion that drives us through our everyday lives. We have become explorers and scientists with our need to ask questions and to wonder. Sure, there are many risks and dangers, but despite that, we still continue to wonder and dream and create and hope. We have discovered so much about the world, but still so little. We will never know everything there is to know, but with our burning curiosity, we have learned so much.
I have to admit, I’m a little disappointed. I would have gone with RoboPenetrator 3000 or Musashi’s Sexy Meat Machine. Guess that’s just the way my mind works.
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29 Apr
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Posted by Musashi
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They taste like chicken. Glowing chicken.
Why glowing dogs, you ask? Well – it seems that this is really just a proof-of-concept test drive, if you will – proving that genes can be successfully impanted to produce ‘transgenic’ offspring…presumably with traits that are a little more useful than finding your car keys at night.
A South Korean scientist who created glowing cats in 2007 based on a similar cloning technique said that Lee’s puppies are genuine clones, saying he had seen them and had read about them in the journal.
“We can appraise this is a step forward” toward finding cures for human diseases, said veterinary professor Kong Il-keun at South Korea’s Gyeongsang National University. “What is important now is on what specific diseases (Lee’s team) will focus on.”
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12 Feb
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Posted by Musashi
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Nothing to do with Asian Pop Culture, but I thought it worth noting the 200th anniversary of the birth of Charles Darwin, father of evolutionary theory! Happy birthday, Chuck…!
Watch the rest after the jump…
Click to continue »
