Scientists Find Source of Cosmic Dust

PASADENA, Calif. (AP) -- Scientists in California have uncovered the best evidence yet that cosmic dust in the early universe mostly came from the explosions of giant stars.

The Spitzer Space Telescope recently detected large amounts of space dust, 10,000 Earth masses worth, in the supernova remnant Cassiopeia A located 11,000 light-years away.

The discovery comes two months after Spitzer found freshly made dust in the wind bursting out of super-massive black holes.

Astronomers believe both supernovae and quasars are responsible for the dust that helped seed early stars. Dust is essential in the cooling process to make stars, which are predominantly gas.

Researchers at NASA's Spitzer Science Center at the California Institute of Technology used a telescope instrument to analyze infrared light from the supernova and construct maps of the dust to determine the quantity and composition.

Results will be published in the Jan. 20 issue of the Astrophysical Journal.

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Video: South Korea Clones "Glow In The Dark" Cats

I am struck by the recollection that only recently the news was made that you just can't clone a calico cat. That being said, it would seem that once again our poor benighted felines are doing their part in the advancement of cloning science. Check this video for more:

The reasoning behind this act was that it was meant as a proof-of-concept for the breeding of cats, which are supposedly genetically quite similar to humans, with specific genetic disorders unique to human beings. This would qualify, then, as quite the genetic-science breakthrough.

Yes, it's unfortunate that animals need to be used for such research, but there reaches a point where you can only study genetic functions in a functioning genetic machine -- that is, an animal. Here's to hoping that the Green-Peaces and Animal Liberation Fronts of the world don't stop this vital and fundamentally important work.

Nanosolar Press Release

Nanosolar Ships First Panels
December 18, 2007

After five years of product development – including aggressively pipelined science, research and development, manufacturing process development, product testing, manufacturing engineering and tool development, and factory construction – we now have shipped first product and received our first check of product revenue.

We are grateful to everyone who supported us through all these years and the many occasions where there appeared to be mile-high concrete walls in our path; the unusual intensity and creativity of our team deserves all the credit for achieving this major milestone today.

Our product is defining in more ways I can enumerate here but includes:

- the world's first printed thin-film solar cell in a commercial panel product;

- the world's first thin-film solar cell with a low-cost back-contact capability;

- the world's lowest-cost solar panel – which we believe will make us the first solar manufacturer capable of profitably selling solar panels at as little as $.99/Watt;

- the world's highest-current thin-film solar panel – delivering five times the current of any other thin-film panel on the market today and thus simplifying system deployment;

- an intensely systems-optimized product with the lowest balance-of-system cost of any thin-film panel – due to innovations in design we have included.

Today we are announcing that we have begun shipping panels for freefield deployment in Eastern Germany and that the first Megawatt of our panels will go into a power plant installation there.

As far as the first three of our commercial panels are concerned:

Panel #1 will remain at Nanosolar for exhibit.

Panel #2 can be purchased by you in an auction on eBay starting today.

Panel #3 has been donated to the Tech Museum in San Jose.

[These are obviously not the first three we ever produced – we have produced loads for testing – but these are the first three of what we consider our commercial panels.]

Take that, you vapor-ware claiming bastards!