Research funding in Australia Vicki Sara argues the Australian Research Council needs to have its funding quadrupled. She says the ARC´s situation is similar to it´s position a decade ago. Australia is losing people to better paying positions aborad. Post doctoral fellowships and PhD scholarships are offered at $20,000. This compares with marketplace positions easily 5 times this level. The result is people leave universities and move away from research. Tertiary education is in decline. Vicki Sara says education is an investment which protects against economic downturn. Platypus genome revealed Elizabeth Finkel reports on the worldwide effort to sequence the genetic code of the playtus. Amateur astronomy Space scientists are using amateurs to help analyse astronomical data. Chris Smith talks to professional astronomer Pamela Gay and amateur Jerry Semolik. The amateurs assist by measuring and plotting the change in light output of variable stars. This allow data to be collected over data over 24-hour periods. Imaging tools in astronomy and medicine Both astronomy and medicine have high-dimensional imaging data. In medicine it´s X-rays and CT scans and MRIs. In astronomy it´s optical data, X-ray data and radio data. The tools from one field can be used in the other. Climate policy needed to reduce risks of the unknowns in future climate Is it possible that natural fluctuations of the Earth´s climate could have caused the temperature record since 1880? Steven Schneider says there is overwhelming evidence that the change is due to human activity. Don Aitkin recently criticised the Kyoto process and the need for climate policy (Ockham´s Razor April 17 and May 4 see links below). Stephen Schneider says climate policy is needed for cooperative solutions. Flacco - Parthenogenesis The Science Show presents another in this continuing series of short lectures. The Loh down on science - Fine wine More expensive wine tastes better Antonio Rangel ran an experiment having participants taste the same wine labelled with a range of prices. His subjects, from the Stanford wine club, preferred the samples with the higher price tags.

[ Sat, 10 May 2008 00:00:00 +1000 ]

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