Hi there, and welcome to our first edition of the Science Weekend Warrior! Wait a moment, is that a sarcastic voice I hear? "Aren't you a video game site? What's a science blog doing in QJ.NET?" Because we're geeks, and we like science.

QJ.NET is, primarily, a video game news blog, so the Science blog is automatically regarded as an off-topic blog. But seeing as a lot of gamers are geeks - me included - science is a point of interest for a lot of us, and makes for an interesting read. This is why, somewhere in QJ.NET's history, we put this blog up just to add to the mix.

Here, we talk about the cutting edge of science, from the latest technological advancements, to the latest discoveries on Mars. Though sometimes we just like to talk about something interesting, like how Mars (the chocolate company, not the planet) wants to decode the DNA of chocolate. Basically, stuff to geek over.

This blog is about sharing knowledge, and sharing the love for science. Because the subject of this blog is broader in scope than most of the other blogs, we can't cover everything that's happening in the world of science, so it'd be fun if you guys also participate in what gets published here.

If you guys like, you can become a contributing writer for the science blog. I'll set up a way for you to send your own articles to get published on our site, just to share it with others. If you like the idea, just give a yell in the comments.

Now, on to the news.

---

 

You guys know about the Large Hadron Collider? It's this big piece of machinery that CERN (the company that gave us the World Wide Web) built near Switzerland. It's the largest and most powerful particle accelerator to date, and is meant to produce mini-versions of the Big Bang. Some fear it may produce more than that though.

Some scientists, who have reason to be paranoid about this, believe that the LHC might create a black hole, or something just as dangerous, and destroy the world. Maybe rip open spacetime and make us all into monkeys or glow in the dark kittens. A recent study, however, says that any strange phenomena the LHC might produce will be harmless.

Not that I disagree with the scientists of course. I just hope they're right and I don't wake up one morning to find myself in an alternate dimension full of walking chocolate bars. No wait, that's not such a bad thing...

Link: Will Earth's largest particle accelerator create a black hole?

Also this week is a huge discovery from the Phoenix Lander, the one that NASA sent to Mars (the planet, not the... oh forget it.) Phoenix found evidence of ice on the Red Planet when it found dice-sized clumps of bright material in the trench that scientists have named "Dodo-Goldilocks" (I can't stop snickering at that name).

Don't know if it's really ice or not, but hey, they're the scientists. However, this discovery does enforce another discovery from Phoenix, which found that Mars used to have enough water in its atmosphere to provide rain. Enough to foster life? Well, Phoenix did find that Martian soil is good enough to grow asparagus in. Perhaps in the distant past, Mars did harbor life. Or micro-organisms at least. Phoenix is currently looking for any evidence of this.

Speaking of aliens, Japan has renewed interest in little green-or-gray men, and is scouring the skies for signs of alien life. And toasters.

Link: Phoenix Lander finds evidence of ice on Mars
Link: Mars used to be like Earth deserts, had moisture in air
Link: You can grow asparagus in Martian soil
Link: The Autobot Matrix is out there: Japan's hunt for aliens renewed

---

To end our very first Science Weekend Warrior, I give you a comment from Lunisneko. It was given when ShadeyProphet, rpgpro001, and leq were talking about the Large Hadron Collider and how it might destroy the world (or not). They talked about Hawking's radiation, the singularity phenomenon, and... well, you get the picture. To quote Lunisneko:

More readers chipped in their thoughts on the topic. It's quite an interesting conversation too so you might want to check it out. Hope to hear more from our rocket scientist readers! May the Force be with you, and keep looking to the skies and all that.