-- "AE Aurigae is the bright star below and left of center in this evocative portrait of IC 405, also known as the Flaming Star Nebula. Embedded in the cosmic cloud, the hot, variable O-type star energizes the glow of hydrogen along convoluted filaments of atomic gas, its blue starlight scattered by interstellar dust. But AE Aurigae wasn't formed in the nebula it illuminates. Retracing the star's motion through space, astronomers conclude that AE Aurigae was probably born in the Orion Nebula. Close gravitational encounters with other stars ejected it from the region, along with another O star, Mu Columbae, over two million years ago. The runaway stars have drifted in opposite directions ever since, separating at about 200 kilometers per second. This sharp, detailed image of IC 405 spans over 5 light-years at the nebula's estimated distance of 1,500 light-years in the northern constellation Auriga, the Charioteer."

SEE HERE

“Next time you head down to your local supermarket, you may be taking your health into own hands — literally.

New research shows that nearly three out of four shopping cart handles are rife with fecal bacteria, including some that can cause severe illness.

Dr. Victoria Millett, a local infectious disease specialist, tells KFWB’s Maggie McKay researchers actually found more fecal bacteria on grocery cart handles than you would typically find in a bathroom.

Professor Charles Gerba, the lead researcher in the University of Arizona study, took samples from the handles of 85 carts across four states for bacterial contamination.

Gerba says 72 percent of the carts tested positive for fecal bacteria, with up to half the samples containing Escherichia coli, otherwise known as E. coli.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention website says some strains of E. coli are harmless, but others can cause serious and potentially lethal illnesses.

There are an estimated 70,000 infections with an especially virulent strain E. coli, and a similar number of people who experience diarrhea as a result of infection with a less virulent strain.

Since most stores disinfect their bathrooms much more thoroughly than their shopping carts — if ever — researchers say it’s up to the shopper to take precautions.

While experts have a number of different theories as to what’s to blame, all are unanimous in their advice for avoiding contact with even the dirtiest of handles: wash your hands early and often.”

-- Aw man! They changed the stock photo they had up the first time I read this article... It was a photo of a toddler eating some brown poo-like substance, which I hope was actually chocolate ice cream.

READ HERE

“Abu Yahya al-Libi urges anti-Gaddafi forces not to retreat; reports of mutiny among Gaddafi forces slowing attack on rebel-held Misrata.

A senior member of al Qaida urged Libyan rebels to continue their fight against Muammar Gaddafi and warned of the consequences of defeat, in a videotaped message posted on Jihadi websites, the Qatar-based Gulf News reported on Sunday.

The message from Libya native, Abu Yahya al-Libi, marked the first time a top ranked al Qaida commander had commented on the uprising in Libya. Gaddafi has repeatedly blamed al Qaida for inciting the unrest against him.

“The Libyan people have suffered at the hands of Gaddafi for more than 40 years ... He used the Libyans as a testing ground for his violent, rambling and disgusting thoughts,” Abu Yahya stated.

He warned that "Retreating will mean decades of harsher oppression and greater injustices than what you have endured.”

Abu Yahya also accused the West, and the US in particular, of having supported oppresive Arab regimes at the expense of the people…”

-- And the party don't start till...! I'm cleaning up the millions of browser tabs that I have open, so some things will not be as recent, but still very relevant. I promise.

READ HERE

-- In February 1984, Mission Specialist Bruce McCandless II went further away from the confines and safety of his ship than any previous astronaut had ever been. This space first was made possible by the Manned Manuevering Unit or MMU, a nitrogen jet propelled backpack. After a series of test maneuvers inside and above Challenger's payload bay, McCandless went "free-flying" to a distance of 320 feet away from the Orbiter. This stunning orbital panorama view shows McCandless out there amongst the black and blue of Earth and space.

Image Credit: NASA

SEE HERE

-- This guy is crayzay good!

-- Home of the real news. Well much better than what you get on TV anyway.

-- Gorgeous camera work and a good four and a half minutes of car porn. 5D MKII + 24-70mm L

-- If you read the story below you probably were thinking the same thing... So here it is.

Also if you've been following my blog you'll remember me posting a song and a music video that was inspired by exactly the events like the one described below, - well worth a listen and a look, - Wolf Parade - Yulia.

“So there's a cosmonaut up in space, circling the globe, convinced he will never make it back to Earth; he's on the phone with Alexei Kosygin — then a high official of the Soviet Union — who is crying because he, too, thinks the cosmonaut will die.

The space vehicle is shoddily constructed, running dangerously low on fuel; its parachutes — though no one knows this — won't work and the cosmonaut, Vladimir Komarov, is about to, literally, crash full speed into Earth, his body turning molten on impact. As he heads to his doom, U.S. listening posts in Turkey hear him crying in rage, "cursing the people who had put him inside a botched spaceship."

This extraordinarily intimate account of the 1967 death of a Russian cosmonaut appears in a new book, Starman, by Jamie Doran and Piers Bizony, to be published next month. The authors base their narrative principally on revelations from a KGB officer, Venymin Ivanovich Russayev, and previous reporting by Yaroslav Golovanov in Pravda. This version — if it's true — is beyond shocking.

In 1967, both men were assigned to the same Earth-orbiting mission, and both knew the space capsule was not safe to fly. Komarov told friends he knew he would probably die. But he wouldn't back out because he didn't want Gagarin to die. Gagarin would have been his replacement.

The story begins around 1967, when Leonid Brezhnev, leader of the Soviet Union, decided to stage a spectacular midspace rendezvous between two Soviet spaceships...”

-- Can you even begin to imagine how he must have felt? Going on the mission? The hopelessness of his situation once in space? I've been forgetting to post this, please follow the link for the rest of the article and for audio!

A fascinating and sad story, but the not exactly surprising. Although most do not know this, Russia is rumored to have had two space programs, one for the public and world's eye and the other, "black" one, for the sake of winning the space at any cost, where all they cared about was getting results, everything else be damned.

READ HERE

“Are kids slipping through the cracks in Facebook's just-ask age screening approach?

The social networking site kicks off around 20,000 underage users per day, its chief privacy adviser, Mozelle Thompson, told Australia's parliament this week.

He admitted that the site's way of weeding out those who don't meet the 13-and-up age requirement -- essentially a user-entry honor system -- is "not perfect," because there's no mechanism for detecting kids who simply enter a false age.

"There are people who lie. There are people who are under 13," Thompson said.

A recent Pew study found that nearly half of all U.S. 12-year-olds use social networking sites -- and privacy concerns in regard to Facebook's younger members have been growing of late. This month, Sen. Al Franken, a Minnesota Democrat, wrote to Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg (pictured) to argue for reforms in the site's privacy measures. "Under Facebook's policy, 13 million users under the age of 18 may be allowed to share their personal information just like adult users," Franken wrote. "These younger users are the most vulnerable to predators on Facebook and the rest of the Internet and it should be impossible for them to inadvertently share their phone numbers and home addresses with anyone."But Franken's figures don't factor in the unknown number of Facebook users under 13.

Other sites that are popular with kids handle the issue in differing ways. MySpace also requires users to be at least 13, but like Facebook, it has no practical way to verify that information. Disney.com allows children 12 and under to surf the site, and collects some personal information from them before they're eligible to participate in competitions, for example. Yahoo! doesn't allow kids 12 and under to register without the consent of a parent. Like Disney, it collects some limited idenifying information for participation in competitions and similar interactive features.”

READ HERE

-- Dance, Android, Dance! Faster!

-- Haven't heard this song in awhile.