A few months ago, we reported that bees have been mysteriously disappearing and its reasons are still unknown. There has been a lot of speculation as to why this is happening - some thinkers believe that sunspots are the culprit, while there are others who think that a particular fungus is to blame. Now a Cornell University expert is revealing his findings about this occurrence.

According to Nicholas Calderone, the Cornell entomology professor, finding the cause of the problem is vital for U.S. agriculture as many fruits and crops rely on honeybees for pollination. He explains that "just like in the immediate aftermath of a natural disaster there are a lot of conflicting and inaccurate reports circulating in the media. What we do know is that there are an awful lot of dead bees. We are looking for patterns."

Among the possible causes of the bee deaths are genetically modified food, mites, pathogens, pesticides, and even electromagnetic radiation from cell phones. Calderone clarifies that actual causes are still unknown. A possible culprit pointed out by scientists is a class of insecticides called neonicotinoids - they are widely detected on pollen at low concentrations in other countries experiencing the same thing.

Apparently, neonicotinoids at certain levels may impair the bees' abilities to learn; scientists hypothesize that, due to this, bees may leave their hives and get lost. Calderone believes that this study could use more research. Another reason could be miticides used to combat mites. It has been hypothesized that miticides can accumulate in the bees' wax combs to levels that could harm the bees.

It's a good thing that a lot of people seem to care about this problem. As of now, Cornell and other universities are putting together funding plans to research and investigate the cause of the bee deaths. The federal government is thinking of allotting millions of dollars for long-term programs aimed at improving the honeybees' health.

Obesity studies have abound nowadays - there was one study that said obesity is in the genes and Konami has recently revealed Dance Dance Revolution's health results and months back, there were some British scientists who claimed to have invented a anti-obesity chewing gum. But now, a study conducted by researchers from London's Imperial College have found out that there might be a lot of thin people who may be fat inside. See, it really is what's on the inside that counts.

Apparently, some doctors now thing that the internal fat surrounding vital organs like our heart, liver, and pancreas may be as dangerous than its more obvious counterparts. According to the researchers, people who maintain their weight through diet rather than exercising are likely to have major deposits of internal fat even if they have a slim physique.

Dr. Jimmy Bell added that "being thin doesn't automatically mean you're not fat...The whole concept of being fat needs to be redefined". This study was funded by the Britain's Medical Research Council and since 1994, the researchers have scanned 800 people with MRI machines to create "fat maps".

So this means that thin people who are fat inside are also more prone to sicknesses like diabetes or other risk factors for heart disease. And if you think that having normal Body Mass Index scores ought to do the trick, well think again. Dr. Bell mentioned that 45% of their study's women-participants with normal BMI scores have excessive levels of internal fat.

So if you're thinking of paying a visit to your friendly-neighborhood plastic surgeon to suck the internal fat away, step away from the door for now. The good news is that internal fat can be easily burned-off through exercise and diet-improvement.

From the same people who found out that schoolyard taunts are the least of obese children's worries, University of Michigan researchers have found out that people with high-testosterone levels may feel rewarded by other people's anger. Most people may feel uncomfortable when somebody gives them an angry look, but to some, an angered face may just be their fixer-upper. These findings could explain why some people like to tease others a lot.

According to University of Michigan's Associate Professor, Oliver Schultheiss, "perhaps teasers are reinforced by that fleeting 'annoyed look' on someone else's face and therefore will continue to heckle that person to get that look again and again... As long as it does not stay there for long, it's not perceived as a threat, but as a reward".

Here's how the researchers conducted this study - the researchers took saliva sample from the participants to measure testosterone, which is the hormone usually associated with dominance motivation. Then, the participants worked on a certain "learning task" - one complex sequence of keypresses was followed by an angry face on the screen. Another sequence was followed by a neutral, expressionless face. Finally, a third sequence was followed with no face.

Participants with high testosterone relative to other members of their sex, learned the complex sequence with an angry face better than the other two sequences. On the other hand, those with low testosterone did not show this kind of behavior. They are all not aware of the patterns in the sequences as they learned them. Lead author of the study, Michelle Wirth explained this by saying:

Better learning of a task associated with anger faces indicates that the anger faces were rewarding, as in a rat that learns to press a lever in order to receive a tasty treat. In that sense, anger faces seemed to be rewarding for high-testosterone people, but aversive for low-testosterone people.

After four days of talks in Bangkok, Thailand - government officials from more than a hundred countries, economists, and scientists all agreed that the world needs to reduce harmful emissions to limit centuries of rising temperature and seas caused by the buildup of heat-trapping emissions in the air.

The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change released their final report which stated that the slowing of emissions in the soonest possible time could lead to a stabilization of the concentration of carbon dioxide later in the century. Currently, the concentration of CO2 is at 380 parts per million - which has increased by more than a third since the start of the industrial revolution. If we don't act now, this figure could easily double within decades.

The panel agreed that drastic changes in technologies and policies should be implemented in the next 25 years. Two and a half decades aren't enough as a century-long transition to new energy sources that come with no climate impacts should also be done. Panel member Adil Najam said that:

We can no longer make the excuse that we need to wait for more science, or the excuse that we need to wait for more technologies and policy knowledge...To me the big message is that we now have both and we do not need to wait any longer.

Greenhouse gas emissions have risen 70% since 1970 while carbon dioxide production is now at 25 billion tons each year. William Moomaw, a Environmental Policy professor at Tufts University, had this to say:

Here in the early years of the 21st century, we’re looking for an energy revolution that’s as comprehensive as the one that occurred at the beginning of the 20th century when we went from gaslight and horse-drawn carriages to light bulbs and automobiles. In 1905, only 3 percent of homes had electricity. Right now, 3 percent is about the same range as the amount of renewable energy we have today. None of us can predict the future any more than we could in 1905, but that suggests to me it may not be impossible to make that kind of revolution again.

Last August, we talked about NASA's newest project (at that time), the Solar Terrestrial Relations Observatory, aka, STEREO. Fast forward to the present, NASA scientists divulges that they would be releasing 3D images of the Sun taken by STEREO so as to expand our understanding of solar physics.

Monday is the day to mark if you wanna get up close and personal with the Sun. The images will be released on the Internet, television, and on some museums. The STEREO observatory is part of a two-year mission, NASA's Solar Terrestrial Probes program. This involves two almost identical observatories, one ahead of Earth in its orbit, the other trailing behind. The latter will trace the flow of energy and matter from the Sun to Earth.

The 3D images would give us a view of violent eruptions of matter from the Sun that is said to cause possible disruptions in satellites and power grids. These would also help scientists figure out why these occur.

So, what would you do if you're an architect who never has to worry about money (counting 'em perhaps, but not running out of it)? Build a palatial estate of course! That's just what renowned architect Rolf Disch did. He built a Heliotrop house which tracks the Sun. Now, that's something! Disch must really love sunrises and sunsets.

But the house isn't all about looks and aesthetics - it's environment friendly too. Something that would make Al Gore and other environmentalists green with envy. The balcony rail is actually a solar vacuum tube that is used to heat water. The roof is equipped with Photovoltaics that rotate independently to track the Sun - this generate four to six times the energy needed for the house.

Aside from all that, there is on-site composting, chemical free sewage treatment and rainwater catchment in Rolf's estate. This Green house has been Disch's personal residence since 1994.

March 30 may have just been an ordinary Friday to most, but did you know that an asteroid passed near our Earth last Friday night? Well, it wasn't really near; the asteroid named 2006 W2 passed Earth last Friday about two million miles away. Can't picture two million miles? Well, let's just say that that's about nine times farther away than the Moon.

Although there was no danger of collision, that thing is huge! The asteroid is more than a mile wide and if it did hit Earth, it would have destroyed everything for hundreds of miles around. It would also most likely upset global commerce and create drastic climate change that Richard Branson's US$ 25 million contest couldn't fix. The rock directly passed Southern California at around 11 p.m. last Friday.

Astronomers have filed hundred of asteroids larger than a half-mile which sometimes passed by the Earth's orbit. One asteroid, Apophis, will pass very close to Earth in the year 2029 and has a minor chance of hitting our planet in 2036. We sure do hope that NASA and other space agencies have already concocted a solution for Earth-bound asteroids when that time comes.

The largest map of the universe ever created revealed that the universe is filled with dark energy. Then reports sprouted that dark energy and dark matter could be the result of incorrect gravitational theory. Now, physicists from Geneva, Switzerland are saying that we might not need dark energy after all and that it may just be an illusion.

The quickening pace of the universe's expansion may not be caused by dark energy, but by the collapse of matter in small regions of space. This is according to Syksy Rasanen of CERN in Geneva. He adds that the overall expansion of the universe isn't affected by the properties of small regions inside it, but in any given region of space, the force of gravity between bits of matter acts as a brake on expansion.

So with that, expansion should slow down quickly in regions with lots of matter but it will go on without changes and glitches in mostly empty regions. This difference produces the illusion of dark energy according to him. He also points out that even if the expansion rate decreases or stays about the same in every region, the average rate of expansion for the universe as a whole can increase. But Harvard-Smithsonian's Niafesh Ashfordi says that the idea is very unlikely but it is an attractive possibility.

To that, Rasanen mentions that the reason for the accelerating expansion of the universe is still open for speculation. He adds that this is just a tip of the iceberg and that more studies about dark energy (or the illusion of it) is still needed for astronomers to come up with a concrete answer.

Lots of scientifically exciting things are happening in Peru nowadays - there was that discovery of a dog cemetery, the discovery of an ancient Peruvian solar observatory, and of course their is that brain museum you could visit once the Peruvian tour gets a tad too boring. Now, an extremely rare species of a tiny owl has been seen in the wild for the first time. This was confirmed by the American Bird Conservancy.

The owlet which has long whiskers and dubbed as Xenoglaux, is said to be one of the world's smallest owls (no bigger than your fist) and was first discovered in 1976. It was re-spotted in the wild last February by researchers, in fact, they encountered the owlet three times during the day and they recorded its calls frequently at night.

According to David Geale of the Association of Andean Ecosystems, "seeing the long-whiskered owlet is a huge thrill...Its population is estimated to be less than 1,000 birds and possibly as few as 250". He further explained that Xenoglaux is threatened by the rapid destruction of its forest habitat.

University of Portsmouth scientists are currently testing new and high-tech thermal vests that could be used by soldiers to cope with the heat of the battle in the almost four-year-old Second Gulf War. The vests use a combination of air, liquid, and new applications of older technologies. One of those older technologies is the convertion of paraffin wax into liquid in chambers within the vest to absorb body heat.

These thermal vests are manufactured by an undisclosed U.S.-based military contractor and are expected to be used within two years. Soldiers stationed in Iraq do not wear thermal cooling vests and that may be a problem as temperatures there could reach as high as 50 degrees Celsius. Heat-illness could seriously impair decision making and could even result to death. Mark Newton, a University of Portsmouth thermal physiology said,

I can't reveal too much as we don't own the vests - they belong to an undisclosed military contractor. But what I can say is that the cooling power generated by these garments will make a difference for soldiers operating in extreme climates such as those experienced in Iraq.

Currently, the thermal vests are being tested on subjects wearing full combat fatigues at Portsmouth's Spinnaker Building.