Scientists at the University of Leicester’s Space Research Centre are recreating the hostile environment found on Mars in their laboratory, with a device known as the Martian Environment Simulator (MES). The machine reproduces the temperature, air pressure and unbreathable atmosphere known to exist on Mars. The MES is currently being used to test equipment on the Beagle 2 lander, part of the European Space Agency’s Mars Express Spacecraft and due to arrive on Mars during Christmas 2003. The chance o

An Australian research team has solved one of the world’s big industrial waste headaches – what to do with spent pot lining (SPL) from aluminium smelters.
In a major advance for sustainable mineral production, the “Alcoa Portland SPL Process” developed jointly by Portland Aluminium, Alcoa, Ausmelt and CSIRO renders the hazardous waste harmless and at the same time produces two commercial by-products.

Aluminium smelters worldwide produce about half a million tones a year of the tox

A tiny methane-producing microbe has revealed the existence of a new amino acid, researchers report. Two studies published in the current issue of the journal Science describe pyrrolysine, a nonstandard amino acid encoded in the RNA of bacteria-like members of the group Archaea. The findings suggest that the genetic code may be more adaptable than previously believed.

When scientists first began to unravel the genetic code more than four decades ago, they determined that the four DNA bases

Is life a highly improbable event, or is it rather the inevitable consequence of a rich chemical soup available everywhere in the cosmos? Scientists have recently found new evidence that amino acids, the `building-blocks` of life, can form not only in comets and asteroids, but also in the interstellar space. This result is consistent with (although of course does not prove) the theory that the main ingredients for life came from outer space, and therefore that chemical processes leading to life are l

Plymouth researchers will be presenting new research findings at an international conference they are hosting in the city next month.

Professor Paul Worsfold, Co-director of Plymouth Environmental Research Centre (PERC), heads the Plymouth team working on a three-year research project which investigates the role of iron in ocean productivity and climate change. Plymouth is one of 12 European universities taking part in this ‘IRONAGES’ project.

Professor Worsfold commented: “We are

Dry valleys, channels, and networks of gullies scar the arid Martian landscape. Along with other evidence, these physical vestiges of conditions on ancient Mars suggest a planet once saturated with liquid water. Where is this water now? Scientists have posited that a portion of it evaporated into the atmosphere, but that the rest lies beneath the surface. Findings announced today offer the strongest support yet to that hypothesis: according to new data, large deposits of water ice may in fact exist u