Heavens

Few synthetic materials are able to mimic the human body's ability to regulate itself—until now. In the July 12 issue of Nature, a team of engineers from the University of Pittsburgh and Harvard University has presented a strategy for building self-regulating microscopic materials, ultimately paving the way toward so-called smart buildings with more energy-saving features and smarter biomedical engineering applications.

In the name of science, but with aim of saving lives, preventing injuries and reducing property losses, members of the New York City Fire Department (FDNY) spent much of the first two weeks in July setting fire to 20 abandoned townhouses on Governors Island, about a kilometer from the southern tip of Manhattan.

Next-generation "smart" electrical meters for residential and commercial buildings will have computerized operating systems just as laptops or mobile devices do. On July 10, 2012, the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) published its first-ever draft guidelines* to help utility companies test their procedures for upgrading meters securely from a remote location.

Tropical Storm Daniel was once a hurricane and now a rapidly weakening tropical storm as a result of moving over cooler waters. NASA's Tropical Rainfall Measuring Mission (TRMM) satellite provided a look at just how cool the waters are that have sapped Daniel's strength.

The TRMM satellite flew above weakening tropical storm Daniel on July 10, 2012 at 0003 UTC. TRMM's Microwave Imager (TMI) and Precipitation Radar (PR) data from that pass showed that only light to moderate rainfall (.0.78 to 1.57 inches/20 to 40 mm/hour) was occurring with the weakening storm.

Cambridge, Mass. – July 11, 2012 – Living organisms have developed sophisticated ways to maintain stability in a changing environment, withstanding fluctuations in temperature, pH, pressure, and the presence or absence of crucial molecules. The integration of similar features in artificial materials, however, has remained a challenge—until now.

A team of astronomers using NASA's Hubble Space Telescope is reporting the discovery of another moon orbiting the icy dwarf planet Pluto.

The moon is estimated to be irregular in shape and 6 to 15 miles across. It is in a 58,000-mile-diameter circular orbit around Pluto that is assumed to be co-planar with the other satellites in the system.

"The moons form a series of neatly nested orbits, a bit like Russian dolls," said team lead Mark Showalter of the SETI Institute in Mountain View, Calif.

The discovery increases the number of known moons orbiting Pluto to five.

Pluto's new-found moon, visible as a speck of light in Hubble images, is estimated to be irregular in shape and between 10 and 25 kilometres across. It is in a 95 000 kilometre-diameter circular orbit around Pluto that is assumed to lie in the same plane as Pluto's other known moons.

"The moons form a series of neatly nested orbits, a bit like Russian dolls," said Mark Showalter of the SETI Institute in Mountain View, USA, leader of the scientific team that discovered the new moon.

Hurricane Emilia reached peak intensity yesterday, July 10, when its maximum sustained winds hit 140 mph (220 kmh). Today, July 11, Emilia has weakened to a Category 2 hurricane. NASA's Aqua satellite passed over Emilia during its weakening phase.

The Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) instrument that flies onboard NASA's Aqua satellite captured a visible image of Hurricane Emilia on July 10, 2012 at 2035 UTC / 4:35 p.m. EDT when its winds had weakened down to 125 mph (205 kmh). Emilia continued weakening after Aqua passed by.

ARLINGTON, Va.—An Office of Naval Research (ONR) universal gateway that gives Sailors access to more accurate, secure, real-time information will be delivered to the fleet in just three years from the project's inception at ONR officials announced July 11.

Dark galaxies are small, gas-rich galaxies in the early Universe that are very inefficient at forming stars. They are predicted by theories of galaxy formation and are thought to be the building blocks of today's bright, star-filled galaxies. Astronomers think that they may have fed large galaxies with much of the gas that later formed into the stars that exist today.

In this week's PLoS Medicine, Julia Hussein from the University of Aberdeen in Scotland and colleagues assess the evidence for the effectiveness of interventions that aim to help pregnant women reach health facilities during an emergency in developing country settings. In a systematic review of the literature they found that the level of evidence for emergency obstetric referral interventions was poor and that limitations in the design of individual studies made determining the effect of referral interventions on outcomes difficult.

In a new article published this week that forms part of the PLoS Medicine series on Global Mental Health Practice, Shoba Raja and colleagues report their case study of implementing the "BasicNeeds" model of mental health and development in Nepal, which emphasizes user empowerment, community development, strengthening of health systems, and policy influencing.

Until now, scientists who study air pollution using satellite imagery have been limited by weather. Clouds, in particular, provide much less information than a sunny day.

Astronomers have puzzled over why some puny, extremely faint dwarf galaxies spotted in our Milky Way galaxy's back yard contain so few stars.

These ghost-like galaxies are thought to be some of the tiniest, oldest, and most pristine galaxies in the universe. They have been discovered over the past decade by astronomers using automated computer techniques to search through the images of the Sloan Digital Sky Survey. But astronomers needed NASA's Hubble Space Telescope to help solve the mystery of these star-starved galaxies.

NASA's Aqua satellite got a cold stare from Emilia. Infrared satellite data revealed that cloud top temperatures around Hurricane Emilia's eye were bitter cold.

The Atmospheric Infrared Sounder (AIRS) instrument that flies onboard NASA's Aqua satellite measured cloud top temperatures in the powerful thunderstorms surrounding Emilia's eye to be colder than -94 Fahrenheit (-70 Celsius). That indicates that they're very high in the troposphere, and very powerful (which would coincide with Emilia being a major hurricane).