-- "Mars-orbiting probes have spied hundreds of mounds, some up to 500 meters across and dozens of meters tall, inside an ancient crater near the planet's equator. In the 15 April issue of Earth and Planetary Science Letters, researchers make the case that these enigmatic features (depicted in blue in the main image) are mud volcanoes. For one thing, the near-circular mounds weren't formed by molten-rock volcanoes because there are no deposits of volcanic ash or lava nearby. Instead, the mounds contain boulders and other chunks of material apparently stripped from underlying layers of sediments (depicted in yellow-green), which range from 200 to 500 meters thick. Also, most of the mounds inside the 90-kilometer-wide Firsoff crater (inset) are found on slopes inside the crater rim and were likely created when mud under high pressure—which likely formed during a warmer, wetter phase on the Red Planet—oozed to the surface through a network of cracks there. Other teams have claimed finding mud volcanoes elsewhere on Mars, but the researchers contend that the new finds are the first that definitively link material in the mounds to underlying sediments. "

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-- Check this out! It's not limited to just the solar system either.

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"James Mollison traveled around the globe and took some incredibly eye-opening photos of children's bedrooms. He then compiled them into a book, titled Where Children Sleep. Each pair of photographs is accompanied by an extended caption that tells the child's story. The differences between each sleeping space is striking.

Mollison was born in Kenya in 1973 and grew up in England. After studying art and design at Oxford Brookes, and later film and photography at Newport School of Art and Design, he moved to Italy to work at Benetton's creative lab, Fabrica.

"The project became a vehicle to think about poverty and wealth, about the relationship of children to their possessions, and the power of children – or lack of it – to make decisions about their lives," says Mollison. "I traveled where I could, and many of the pictures result from chance encounters. I hope these images help other children to think about inequality around the world, and perhaps start to figure out how they may respond.""

-- Kaya, four, lives with her parents in a small apartment in Tokyo, Japan. Her bedroom is lined from floor to ceiling with clothes and dolls. Kaya’s mother makes all her dresses – Kaya has 30 dresses and coats, 30 pairs of shoes, and numerous wigs. When she goes to school, she has to wear a school uniform. Her favorite foods are meat, potatoes, strawberries, and peaches. She wants to be a cartoonist when she grows up.

-- Indira, seven, lives with her parents, brother, and sister near Kathmandu in Nepal. Her house has only one room, with one bed, and one mattress. At bedtime, the children share the mattress on the floor. Indira has worked at the local granite quarry since she was three. The family is very poor so everyone has to work. There are 150 other children working at the quarry. Indira works six hours a day and then helps her mother with household chores. She also attends school, a 30-minute walk away. Her favorite food is noodles. She would like to be a dancer when she grows up.

-- Jamie, nine, lives with his parents and younger twin brother and sister in a penthouse on 5th Avenue, New York. Jamie goes to a prestigious school and is a good student. In his spare time, he takes judo and goes swimming. He loves to study finance. When he grows up, he wants to become a lawyer like his father.

-- Follow the link to see more of this amazing project!

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-- Hahaha... WHAT?! Watch this now.

"Google has chipped in a US$168 million investment in what will be the world's largest solar power tower plant. To be located on 3,600 acres of land in the Mojave Desert in southeastern California, the Ivanpah Solar Electric Generating System (ISEGS) will boast 173,000 heliostats that will concentrate the sun's rays onto a solar tower standing approximately 450 feet (137 m) tall. The plant commenced construction in October 2010 and is expected to generate 392 MW of solar energy following its projected completion in 2013.

Although solar power tower development is currently less advanced than the more common trough systems, they offer higher efficiency and better energy storage capabilities. Parabolic trough systems consist of parabolic mirrors that concentrate sunlight onto a Dewar tube running the length of the mirror through which a heat transfer fluid runs that is then used to heat steam in a standard turbine.

Solar power tower systems such as the ISEGS on the other hand focus a large area of sunlight into a single solar receiver on top of a tower to produce steam at high pressure and temperatures of up to 550 ° C (over 1,000° F) to drive a standard turbine and generator. The ISEGS also uses a dry-cooling technology that reduces water consumption by 90 percent and uses 95 percent less water than competing solar thermal technologies. Water is also recirculated during energy before being reused to clean the plant's mirrors..."

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-- Crayzay!

-- Cutest clip ever! Watch it, it'll put a smile on your face.

0:02 "Who are you???... DAAAADYYYY!!!!!"

"NEW ORLEANS -- In the year since the Gulf oil spill, officials along the coast have gone on a spending spree with BP money, dropping tens of millions of dollars on gadgets, vehicles and gear – much of which had little to do with the cleanup, an Associated Press investigation shows.

The oil giant opened its checkbook while the crisis was still unfolding last spring and poured hundreds of millions of dollars into Gulf Coast communities with few strings attached.

In sleepy Ocean Springs, Miss., reserve police officers got Tasers. The sewer department in nearby Gulfport bought a $300,000 vacuum truck that never sucked up a drop of oil. Biloxi, Miss., bought a dozen SUVS. A parish president in Louisiana got herself a top-of-the-line iPad, her spokesman a $3,100 laptop. And a county in Florida spent $560,000 on rock concerts to promote its oil-free beaches.

In every case, communities said the new, more powerful equipment was needed to deal at least indirectly with the spill.

In many cases, though, the connection between the spill and the expenditures was remote, and lots of money wound up in cities and towns little touched by the goo that washed up on shore, the AP found in records requested from more than 150 communities and dozens of interviews.

Florida's tourism agency sent chunks of a $32 million BP grant as far away as Miami-Dade and Broward counties on the state's east coast, which never saw oil from the disaster.

Some officials also lavished campaign donors and others with lucrative contracts. A Florida county commissioner's girlfriend, for instance, opened up a public relations firm a few weeks after the spill and soon landed more than $14,000 of the tiny county's $236,000 cut of BP cash for a month's work.

The April 20 explosion on the Deepwater Horizon rig in the Gulf of Mexico killed 11 workers and spawned the nation's worst offshore oil spill. As BP spent months trying to cap the well and contain the spill, cities and towns along the coast from Louisiana to Florida worried about the toll on their economies – primarily tourism and the fishing industry – as well as the environmental impact.

All told, BP PLC says it has paid state and local governments more than $754 million as of March 31, and has reimbursed the federal government for another $694 million..."

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-- This shot captures a layer of low clouds covers the alpine valleys of northern Italy, just south of Lake Como. The clouds are just dense enough to hide uniformly the valley, but also filter the artificial lights below like they were an opaque transparent blanket. Above the layer, moonlight and high cirrus clouds make the night less dark. You can easily recognize the round shape of Lago di Olginate (Olginate Lake) and the lights of the villages all around its banks.

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"NASA announced Tuesday the new retirement homes for the four remaining space shuttles -- three historic orbiters and the program's test vehicle.

The space shuttle Atlantis will be displayed at the Kennedy Space Center Visitor Complex in Florida; the Endeavour, at the California Science Center in Los Angeles; the Discovery, at the Smithsonian's National Air and Space Museum Steven F. Udvar-Hazy Center in Virginia; and the test shuttle, Enterprise, at the Intrepid Sea, Air & Space Museum in New York, NASA Administrator Charles F. Bolden Jr. said during a ceremony at the Kennedy Center.

The announcement was made on the 30th anniversary of the space shuttle program's first flight, made by the subsequently ill-fated Columbia orbiter, and the 50th anniversary of Soviet Cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin becoming the first human in space.

More than 20 locations around the country sought one of the orbiters because of the potential tourist draw. The drama mirrored the bidding to host an Olympic games.

Supporters of sites that were rejected expressed disappointment.

U.S. Sen. John Cornyn, R-Texas, said the Johnson Space Center in Houston should have been one of the retirement homes for an orbiter, "but it is clear political favors trumped common sense and fairness in the selection of the final locations for the orbiter fleet," he said in a statement.

He noted that Houston "played a critical role throughout the life of the space shuttle."

"Like many Texans, I am disappointed with NASA's decision to slight the Johnson Space Center as a permanent home for one of the space shuttle orbiters," Cornyn said.

"There is no question Houston should have been selected as a final home for one of the orbiters -- even Administrator Bolden stated as much. Today's announcement is an affront to the thousands of dedicated men and women at Johnson Space Center, the greater Houston community and the state of Texas, and I'm deeply disappointed with the administration's misguided decision," Cornyn said..."

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