Explorations
August 2005
Week of August 23 - August 29
MIT scientist predicts global warming will make hurricanes worse.
There is some controversy over the newly discovered 10th planet. Is it a planet or a comet?
A smart "nanobomb" is used to destroy cancer cells.
Whole body CT scans may be dangerous. (cf Explorations September 7, 2004)
GUEST: Dr. Frederick Zugibe is interviewed by Dr. Kaku. A recent book, Dissecting Death, by Dr. Zugibe is about forensic medicine.
Archive #PZ0604.47
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Week of August 16 - August 22
The Post Shuttle Era dawns. The space shuttle landed safely at Edwards AFB; future launches are canceled.
Iran opens it nuclear facility, defying Europe and the U.S.
Big Oil to be granted huge subsidies under energy bill recently passed by congress.
U.S. Environmental Protection Agency says nuclear waste must be isolated for a million years.
GUEST: Dr. Simon Mitton, the author of the book, Conflict in the Cosmos, is today's special guest.
Archive #PZ0604.46
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Week of August 9 - August 15
UK kids' cells off market - UK tops US in enviro advances - MTBE poisons Northeast water - lead falls
Are cell phones dangerous? Cell phones for children are being taken off the market in the UK because of potential dangers.
US and UK take diverging paths on global warming. US energy bill says nothing about fuel efficiency or global warming, while UK advances on the environment.
New chemical polluting northeast aquifers. MTBE contamination found in the Northeast.
Lead levels in Americans have been dropping.
GUEST: Jeanie Clark, of Defenders of Wildlife talks about defense of wildlife.
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Week of August 2 - August 8
NASA's latest space shot was successful, but flawed by flying debris. NASA also announces a new Mars orbiter which will have the ability to probe beneath Mars's surface.
Baldness research is progressing in Germany. The possibly responsible genes have been isolated.
Mad King George was made so by arsenic poisoning perhaps. King George III's behavior arguably was responsible for the thirteen American colonies' break with Britain. Rasputin,similarly afflicted, affected Russian history.
GUEST: Dr.Fred Watson, a director of the Anglo Australian Observatory, the author of Stargazer, and the author of an earlier book published by Shire Books, Binoculars, Opera Glasses and Field Glasses, enlarges upon lens history, a story that visits Copernicus,Tycho Brahe, Isaac Newton, John Frederick William Herschel, and Edwin Hubble.
Archive #PZ0604.44
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Week of July 26 - August 1
Manned space exploration continuation is endorsed by House of Representatives. Canibalization of scientific missions is forseen in President Bush's plan.
MIT scientists, having re-analysed Mars' meteorites, now say Mars is far less hospitable than previously thought. Having been frozen for the last four billion years, Mars is now thought not to be able to have sustained life.
Japanese women continue, for the 20th year, to be the longest living Earthlings. Dr. Kaku explores the possible reasons.
New Scientist magazine reports that there could be unexpected health effects from a new microwave beam weapon to be used for crowd control next year in Iraq.
On global warming, it is human activity that is heating up the Earth, not a natural cycle. So says the incoming president of the National Academy of Sciences, the U.S. Congress's highest science advisory body.
GUEST: Richard Heinberg, the author of Powerdown: Options and Actions for a Post-Carbon World, talks with Dr. K about the collapse of governments, the collapse of empires, food riots, and other likely effects of the coming end of the oil era.
Archive #PZ0604.43
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