Last weekend saw the return of Weird Science, which barely snuck on to our list of the top stories. It faced fierce competition from a number of stories on energy—the cost of coal, efficient LEDs, the displacement of fossil fuels, and a new method of making solar panels. Our most detailed look yet at the planet Mercury also proved to be very popular.
Counting the cost: the hidden price of coal power: It's difficult to put a price on things like taking a mountain completely off the map or putting a ton of mercury into the atmosphere. But that hasn't stopped researchers from trying.
A MESSENGER to Mercury reveals a strange little planet: New results from the MESSENGER space probe in orbit around the planet Mercury reveal a few surprises. Mercury's surface exhibits signs of tectonic and volcanic activity past the era when the planet was thought to be dead, and mapping the gravitational field has revealed the possible presence of a mysterious solid shell outside Mercury's core.
Getting out more than you put in: an overly efficient LED: A recent edition of Physical Review Letters describes on a LED setup that actually puts out more optical energy than it takes in from electricity powering it, thanks to its ability to harvest heat from the environment.
Ion-beam manufacturing halves production cost of PV panels: A small Mississippi solar panel factory that, until this week, had been working in semi-secrecy, claims that its unique manufacturing process allows photovoltaic panels to be produced at almost half the cost of conventional methods.
New detector weighs in: neutrinos don't exceed light speed: After controversial results suggesting that neutrinos move faster than light, a separate detector in Italy listened in on the same CERN neutrino beam used in the first experiment. It found that the neutrinos were travelling at or below light speed.
Not just the weather: climate change acceptance nosedives with the economy: A study of polls across the start of the great recession reveals that there's a strong correlation between a rise in the unemployment rate and a drop in the public's acceptance of climate change.
Quantum optics may remove the uncertainty about quantum gravity: Quantum gravity is commonly understood to be inaccessible to current technology, since the energies involved are prohibitively high. However, with sophisticated modern quantum optics experiments, it may be possible to bypass the huge energies and look for deviations from the Heisenberg uncertainty principle in the laboratory.
A cloaking device from off-the-shelf superconductors and magnetic tape: Exploiting the complimentary ways ferromagnetic materials and superconductors respond to magnetism, researchers have created a cylinder that perfectly masks itself in the presence of a uniform magnetic field.
Study: alternative energy has barely displaced fossil fuels: A new study has found that alternative energy sources barely outpaced rising demand, and have done little to displace fossil fuels.
When the going gets tough, Weird Science fakes its empathy: This week in weird science: Daylight savings lost to cyberloafing, the ethics of narcissism, and one reason that couples may never be satisfied are subject to the scientific treatment.