New launch date set for GOCE satellite
PARIS, Oct. 2 (UPI) -- The European Space Agency says it has set a revised launch date for its GOCE -- Gravity Field and steady-state Ocean Circulations Explorer -- satellite.
The ESA said the satellite is scheduled to lift off Oct. 27.
The 16-foot-long satellite was to have been launched Sept. 10 from the Plesetsk Cosmodrome in northern Russia and placed into orbit about 175 miles above the Earth. That launch was scrubbed when an anomaly was identified in one of the launcher's guidance and navigation systems.
The satellite is designed to map Earth's gravity field in unprecedented detail.
"Russian launcher authorities are completing the investigation of the Breeze KM (launcher's) failure and implementing the related corrective measures," the ESA said in a statement. "Awaiting the final outcome of the failure investigations and the replacement of the affected units, the GOCE team has begun preparatory activities in line with the proposed launch date."
Pine beetles carry antibiotic molecule
CHAMPAIGN, Ill., Oct. 2 (UPI) -- U.S. scientists say they've discovered pine beetles carry an antibiotic molecule that can destroy pathogenic fungi -- something no drugs can yet achieve.
A team led by Harvard Medical School Professor John Clardy and University of Wisconsin Professor Cameron Curie say the findings suggest a potential new source of pharmaceuticals and also demonstrate how symbiotic relationships are essential for the diversification of life and evolution of organisms.
The scientists say a pine beetle about to go into labor carries a few hundred eggs, as well as spores for Entomocorticium -- a nourishing fungal baby food for the beetle's gestating larvae.
At the same time, mites attached to the beetle's shell carry a supply of Ophiostoma minus, a pathogenic fungus that can wipe out the entire supply of fungal larvae food. The mite releases the toxin but, at the same time, the beetle releases actinomycetes, a bacterium that neutralizes the toxic fungi.
The discovery of that process has added a molecular dimension to the chemical ecology of a complex multilateral system, Clardy said.
The research that also included Jarrod Scott, Dong-Chan Oh, M. Cetin Yuceer and Kier Klepzig appears in the journal Science.
Study finds the sun is not perfectly round
WASHINGTON, Oct. 2 (UPI) -- U.S. space agency scientists say they have discovered the sun is not a perfect sphere.
The scientists said they used the National Aeronautics and Space Administration's RHESSI spacecraft -- the Reuven Ramaty High Energy Solar Spectroscopid Imager -- to measure the roundness of the sun with unprecedented precision. They discovered that it's not only not perfectly round, but during years of high solar activity the sun develops a thin "cantaloupe skin" that significantly increases its apparent oblateness -- the sun's equatorial radius becomes slightly larger than its polar radius.
"The sun is the biggest and therefore smoothest object in the solar system, perfect at the 0.001 percent level because of its extremely strong gravity," said study co-author Hugh Hudson of the University of California-Berkeley. "Measuring its exact shape is no easy task."
The scientists said further analysis of the data might help researchers detect a long-sought type of seismic wave echoing through the sun's interior: gravitational oscillation or "g-mode." The researchers said detecting g-modes would open a new frontier in solar physics -- the study of the sun's internal core.
The research is reported in the online journal Science Express.
Safe bacterium found to kill zebra mussels
WASHINGTON, Oct. 2 (UPI) -- U.S. scientists say they've created an environmentally safe bacterial toxin to control invasive zebra and quagga mussels.
The new bio-pesticide was derived from a common soil bacterium by researchers at the New York State Museum Field Research Laboratory in Cambridge, N.Y. Scientists in the U.S. Department of Energy-funded study said that when ingested in large quantities, the bacterium is lethal to zebra and quagga mussels but harmless to non-target organisms, including native freshwater mollusks.
Officials said the bio-pesticide achieved a 98 percent kill rate of zebra and quagga mussels in water systems at a New York power plant. Officials said the addition of the bacterium to the plant's water supply showed no effects on humans.
The two non-native species have found their way into the waterways of 25 states during the past two decades, fouling the aquatic environment.
The project was funded by Energy Department's Office of Fossil Energy and managed by the National Energy Technology Laboratory.
The New York State Museum's laboratory and Marrone Organic Innovations Inc., a private laboratory in Davis, Calif., will share a $500,000 grant from the National Science Foundation to improve the bio-pesticide for an even higher mussel kill rate.
