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A visually stunning trip through the known universe by the American Museum of Natural History. You never knew how small the Earth is, how beautiful, how singular and alone.
 

Another visual stunning trip through the Universe is the introductory scene from the movie, "Contact" with Jody Foster and Matthew McConaughey. A Must Buy movie, by the way...

From Youtube:

"The Known Universe takes viewers from the Himalayas through our atmosphere and the inky black of space to the afterglow of the Big Bang. Every star, planet, and quasar seen in the film is possible because of the world's most complete four-dimensional map of the universe, the Digital Universe Atlas that is maintained and updated by astrophysicists at the American Museum of Natural History. The new film, created by the Museum, is part of an exhibition, Visions of the Cosmos: From the Milky Ocean to an Evolving Universe, at the Rubin Museum of Art in Manhattan through May 2010."

"Data: Digital Universe, American Museum of Natural History
http://www.haydenplanetarium.org/univ...

Visualization Software: Uniview by SCISS

Director: Carter Emmart
Curator: Ben R. Oppenheimer
Producer: Michael Hoffman
Executive Producer: Ro Kinzler
Co-Executive Producer: Martin Brauen
Manager, Digital Universe Atlas: Brian Abbott

Music: Suke Cerulo

For more information visit http://www.amnh.org
Category:  Science & Technology"

New endless possibilities... Growing new body parts is becoming a reality. One man grew a new esophagus lining, another man grew new muscle tissue. Ears, fingers, bladders, livers, kidneys, hearts, heart valves, more.

Morley Safer interviews several doctors, one whose name is Dr. Badylak, pronounced "Battleax." Among other things, Dr. Badylak’s team has found that extracellular matrix (ECM) can help create a biologic scaffold for tissue repair and regeneration.

Here's another more indepth article:
Medicine's Cutting Edge: Re-Growing Organs

SCARY GLOBS OF MUCUS SLIME BLOBS INCREASING
These blog globs are growing. There's more of them, and they're getting bigger. If you are unlucky enough to get caught and swim inside their soupier members, their slime doesn't wash off. The thick mucasoid globs are more solid, white gelatinous collection of germy bacterial infested soup. Gross!

These mucus sea blobs are growing in the ocean. Some are huge.

More Information

"But the new study found that Mediterranean mucilages harbor bacteria and viruses, including potentially deadly E. coli, Danovaro said. Those pathogens threaten human swimmers as well as fish and other sea creatures, according to the report, published September 16 in the journal PloS One. "

"The noxious masses can also trap animals, coating their gills and suffocating them, Danovaro said.

And the biggest blobs can sink to the bottom, acting like a huge blanket that smothers life on the seafloor.

Mucilages Going Global?

Mucilages aren't a concern for just the Mediterranean, Danovaro added. Recent studies tentatively suggest that mucus may be spreading throughout oceans from the North Sea (map) to Australia, perhaps because of rising temperatures, he said.

"It's a good example [of what will happen if] we don't do something to stop climate warming," Danovaro said. "There are consequences [if] we continue to deny the scientific evidence."

Beyond warm temperatures, it's still not exactly clear what drives the blobs' formation, Scripps' Azam pointed out. For instance, no one knows why the dead marine matter in the blobs doesn't decompose.
"
Giant, Mucus-Like Sea Blobs on the Rise, Pose Danger
http://news.nationalgeographic.com...giant-sea-mucus-blobs_2.html