Science Portal

Goddard Space Researches Center scientists assert that can forecast the color of plants on planets outside the Solar system. According to the researchers` conclusions, plants can be not only green, but yellow or red.
It is known that solar spectrum contains different colors. The atmosphere of the Earth as an optical filter absorbs different colors of a spectrum in a different degree. As a result more red light particles reach terrestrial surface, rather than blue or green. Consequently during photosynthesis the chlorophyll of plants absorbs mainly red color of a solar spectrum and a little bit blue. So plants on the Earth have green color which is not absorbed but is reflected by leaves of plants. And the human eye sees the reflected color.
Studying the light, which is absorbed and reflected by plants on the Earth, researchers came to a conclusion, that if we find plants on the planets revolving around remote stars, we shall see not green plants mainly.
Not all stars have the same color spectrum as the Sun, and characteristics of the atmosphere on planets outside Solar system can considerably differ from Earth atmosphere. Scientists came to a conclusion that photosynthesis on far planets can considerably differ from that on the Earth.

For the first time Astronomers have found water on a planet located outside the Solar system.
Water steam traces have been found by the American scientists in an atmosphere of Jupiter-like planet HD 209458b in Pegasus constellation.
According to one of the scientists who have made these opening, the find has confirmed the assumption of water presence on planets of this type.
Planet HD 209458b is on 150 light years distance from the Earth. It has very short - only three and a half Earth days - orbital period, therefore it was very easy for scientist to observe it.
The question of water existence on other planets always excited scientists greatly, as its presence is one of the vital conditions of an organic life.
Let’s remind, that long searches of water on Mars have not resolved yet a question about the presence of this substance on a Red Planet.

A spokesman for a St. Petersburg-based ship-construction company informed that the world’s largest nuclear-powered icebreaker has been launched and left St. Petersburg for Murmansk.
The 50 Years of Victory nuclear icebreaker was successfully tested this February. Vessel has been under construction since 1989 and was built at the Baltiisky Zavod ship factory.
The icebreaker will follow a Northern Sea route to make ice channeling for other vessels during the 2007 spring navigation period.
An upgraded Arktika-class icebreaker is designed to break through ice up to 9.2 feet. This is 522-foot long and 100-foot wide vessel, with deadweight of 25,000 metric tons, and meant for a 138-person crew.
The Russian nuclear-powered icebreaker fleet managed by the Murmansk Shipping Company, includes today five Arktika-class icebreakers (Arktika, Sibir, Rossiya, Sovetskiy Soyuz and Yamal), and two Taymyr-class river icebreakers (Taymyr and Vaygach).
Taking into account development of the Arctic shelf and increased traffic along the Northern Sea route, Russia will need 6 to 10 such icebreakers in the next 20 years, experts consider.

According to Mission control center (Moscow), April 10, the International Space Station (ISS) 15th crew has begun settling on the board of the station after successful docking with the ISS on board Soyuz TMA-10 space carrier Monday.
The Russian space carrier was launched from the Baikonur space center in Kazakhstan on April 7 carrying the 15th ISS expedition, including Commander Fyodor Yurchikhin and Flight engineer Oleg Kotov, and, Hungarian-born U.S. software engineer Charles Simonyi, who is now the fifth space tourist
Simonyi has currently in force licenses in jets and helicopters and more than 2,000 hours of flying time under his belt. He is a trained pilot in multi-engine aircraft. Before his orbital spaceflight scientific cruise, he underwent comprehensive training at Russia’s Gagarin Center.
He will spend in space 13 days and during this time on the ISS will conduct some biomedical experiments returning back to the Earth with the 14th ISS expedition. The scientist took worms to the station to conduct his scientific experiments. He wants to observe the process of regeneration of cut off segments under conditions of zero gravity.
Two Russian astronauts plan to stay at the station for 189 days and will do three spacewalks, one in U.S.-made spacesuits and the other two in Russian-made sets of equipment.

The development of genetically modified crops could be nice opportunity for lawyers to persuade the prudent public that GM is not such good idea after all.
Recently two GM food projects had become the newspaper headlines that gave a new twist to the GM debate. California-based Ventria Bioscience received preliminary approval from the US government to cultivate over 1,21 hectares of rice engineered with human genes to produce lactiva and lysomin, proteins that occur in breast milk that had shown potential in quick recovery of children with diarrhea.
Then Monsanto and The Solae Company announced about joining their projects to genetically modify soybeans as a source of omega-3s with the purpose of giving food industry a new source of the healthy component within next five years.
But studies have shown that keeping GM crops completely detached from non-GM makes no sense, as the US authorities recently revealed that GM traces had been found in samples of non-GM rice.
The new events show that both supporters and their opponents are talking about all the same impact on human health. But the result of a dispute should be determined by the scientific evidences of benefits and proved absence of harmful effects of food consumption.

A new speed record of a train movement on a rail way is set In France. Train TGV has reached a plane speed in 574,8 km an hour on specially prepared railway lines connecting Paris and Strasbourg.
The new record of a rail train has been established by TGV modified version which had wheels of the greater diameter than the previous ones and two locomotives with three two-storied carriages between them. The voltage in a trolley line has been increased from 25 up to 31 thousand volt.
Usual speed of the TGV passenger trains between Paris and Strasbourg makes about 320 kilometers an hour. Such speed is reached due to the construction of special railroad lines without quick turns, and also to the special equipment of electric trains.
The manufacturer of a train, Alstom Company, and the management of the French railways assert, that this record is not simply achievement in the field of speed which is valuable in itself, but this is also an infrastructure testing in extreme conditions which cannot be reproduced in conditions of laboratory.
For the present day the most important clients for the high-speed trains manufacturers are China, South Korea and Taiwan.

NASA researchers managed to find out the process of Sun explosions. That was informed at the press conference in NASA headquarters in Washington by the representative of US Navy research laboratory Judith Karpen.
“We really have seen much for the first time, for example, as the magnetic field distributes energy in different areas of the Sun and as it leads to explosions “, - said Karpen.
To receive the information the scientist managed by means of a spacecraft Khinoo which was launched in September, 2006 for Sun magnetic field study.
“Now we can create Sun three-dimensional high resolution model. It leaves no place for theories, it will be revolution, we will have to reconsider many theories and even to refuse some of them “, - said Karpen.
Besides she said that scientists have received confirmations that the Sun atmosphere is considerably hotter, than its surface that is a fundamental astrophysical phenomenon.
“We don’t understand how colder surface can warm a hot atmosphere. However, most likely, the received data will allow to approach to a solution of heating the mechanism”.

American scientists have bred first-ever sheep who 15 % consisted of human cells, thus having created the first humanized sheep. Professor Esmail Sandzani from university of Nevada has spent about 7 years for work and 9,8 million dollars on perfection of the given technology, informs agency Sinhua.
The scientist used marrow stem cells of the donor which were located in peritoneum of sheep fetus. The given research, to the author’s opinion, has a great importance for medicine as it will allow to transplant hybrid sheep organs to people. 2 months later after such injection a lamb was born. It has a liver, heart, lungs and a brain which partly consist of human cells and are suitable for transplantation.
Animals rights protection activists are afraid, that if cells are mixed together, it may end in cellular alloying, having created a hybrid which would have features and characteristics of the person, and a sheep. But Professor Sandzani assured: “Cells transplantation to embryonic sheep in this early stage does not lead to alloying in general”.

France became the first country which has opened access to confidential materials about contacts with UFO, states AFP agency. On Thursday, March, 22, on a site of the National space research center (CNES) 400 files containing the detailed information about the cases of meetings with UFO have been placed.
They make the one fourth of the total amount of contacts with UFOs fixed in France during the last 50 years. Up to the end of the current year CNES experts hope to place all available information.
“It is world premiere “, - commented promulgation of Х-files the representative of Group on studying and gathering of the information on the unidentified space phenomena (GEIPAN) Jacque Patene.
The basic reason which has pushed CNES to promulgate “secret materials” is more frequent accusation in conscious concealment of the information, concerning UFO meeting. Basically the promulgated materials are reports of police and gendarmerie with removed names of witnesses. In due course photos and video materials will also appear in the Internet.
But already now CNES site is overloaded with users’ inquiries.

In the south of Portugal, in Serpa city, one of the world’s largest solar power stations began its work – its solar panels occupy the area almost of 60 hectares.
Solar power station capacity - 11 megawatt. According to inventors, its potential will allow to provide about 8 thousand houses with the electric power.
Creation of this object became possible due to the efforts of the Portuguese authorities to reduce imported energy carriers and also emissions of harmful industrial gases to the atmosphere.
In February 2007 it became known that the United Arab Emirates will construct the first in Persian Gulf solar power station. Construction of the object will cost for the government of Abu-Dhabi emirate $350 million. Capacity of the power station will make 500 МВт. Start of the power station is planned for 2009.
In the autumn 2006 two countries at once have declared to construct the largest on planet solar power stations.
In October the government of Australia has declared about the beginning of works on construction of the power station in Victoria. Cost of the project - $375 million.
In November 2006 China has also declared about the construction of the station with capacity of 100 megawatt. Construction will cost approximately $766 million and will take about five years.