The Alaska Volcano Observatory (AVO) has elevated the level-of-concern color code for Mt. Spurr Volcano to yellow in reponse to recent restlessness, including shallow seismic activity, emissions of gas and steam, and the widening of the summit pit, where hot magma beneath the surface of the crater has melted the ice and snow cover above. The pictures at right from the AVO show the summit of Mt. Spurr on July 7 (above) and August 1, 2005. According to a report (pdf) released by the AVO on October 10, "[T]he observations indicate that new molten rock (magma) has intruded deep beneath Mount Spurr. In response, AVO raised the level-of-concern color code to yellow. Eruptions, however, do not always follow such activity. Most times the magma never reaches the surface but instead harmlessly cools miles beneath the ground. At this time, it is impossible to forecast whether the current activity will culminate in an eruption or slowly diminish."

An international team of scientists has reported in the journal Nature that rising carbon dioxide (CO2) in the oceans is making the ocean waters more acidic and corrosive to the shells of tiny marine organisms. One major effect could be to threaten the food chain by damaging the shells of pteropods. "The demise of polar pteropods could provoke a chain reaction of events through complex ocean ecosystems," says a report released by the Max Planck Institute for Meterology. "It is known for instance that pteropods are eaten by organisms ranging in size from zooplankton to whales and including fish. For instance, North Pacific salmon include pteropods as part of their diet." The scientists compiled global ocean carbon data and input the data into numerical models to predict changes in ocean CO2 as the ocean absorbs excess CO2 from the atmosphere. Yes, your drive to work in the morning is not only a threat to pteropods, but to that grilled filet of salmon that you like so much. The lead author of the Nature article, Dr. James Orr, said, "Basic chemistry tells us that many folks alive today will live to see the polar oceans becoming inhospitable to key organisms, and unlike climate predictions, the uncertainties here are small."

Mac-loving scientists take note, there is now a website dedicated to you and your love of all things Mac. [Room fills with applause.] The site has the incredibly original name "MacResearcher" (why not iResearcher or iGeek?) and has dedicated itself to "cultivat[ing] [a] knowledgeable and vibrant community of Mac researchers who can collectively escalate the prominence [of] Apple technologies in the scientific research community." Believe it or not, there's not one single advertisement for Apple products, unless you miss the fact that the ENTIRE site is one big advertisement for Apple products. Then again, if you don't already own an Apple G4 or better, an iPod, an airport, and if, heaven forbid, you haven't already upgraded your operating system to Tiger ... well, then, you probably use a Dell. We particularly liked the latest post on scientific widgets for OS X Tiger (v10.4). There are several handy Periodic Table widgets of course, but also a NASA widget with space headlines, a Moon Atlas, a Genetic Code widget, a PubMed MEDLINE search widget, and an Earthquake Alert for the state of California from the USGS. The list goes on and on, and some of these are actually useful.

A large earthquake shook Pakistan at 8:50 am local time. The epicenter has been calculated by the USGS as being 95 km (60 miles) north-northeast of Islamabad. The earthquake was felt across northern India, Pakistan, and Afghanistan, with deaths and damage being reported. The event was a thrust-type earthquake on a southeastward trending fault plane. The fault lies along an ancient subduction zone in the Pir Panjal Mountains, where the Indian Plate is colliding with the Eurasian Plate at a rate of 5 cm per year. In addition to the USGS website, the ASC India website contains up-to-date information about the quake as well as historical and geological information about the region.

• Vaccine Prevents Most Cervical Cancer [NY Times (registration required)]
• Google Adds Molecular Biologist to Board of Directors [Bioinformatics]
• The Original Nuclear Nightmare (PDF) [The Bulletin of Atomic Scientists]
  
• Evangelical Scientists Refute Gravity With New 'Intelligent Falling' Theory [The Onion]
  

The famous Ig Nobel Prizes will be announced tonight from Harvard University's Sanders Theatre at 7:30 PM eastern time. The prizes, which are a humorous spoof of the Nobel Prizes, are awarded to people who have "done something that first makes people laugh, then makes them think" by the science humor magazine Annals of Improbable Research. The prizes are awarded by genuine Nobel Laureates in front of an audience of 1200 spectators. You can watch a QuickTime internet broadcast of the event tonight beginning at 7:15 PM. Pictured right: 2004 Ig Nobel Peace Prize winner Daisuke Inoue -- the inventor of karaoke -- is serenaded by Nobel Laureates Dudley Herschbach (left), Richard Roberts and William Lipscomb, and by Karen Hopkin. Dr. Hopkin is, among other things, famed for creating the Studmuffins of Science Calendar. [Ed. note: The event is archived on the website for those who missed the live broadcast.]

• Deadly 1918 Epidemic Linked to Bird Flu, Scientists Say [NY Times (registration required)]
  
• Judging Einstein [American Scientist]
  
• Cholera Epidemic Spreads in West Africa [Climate Information Digest]
  
• Practical Climate Financing - Using Markets to Drive Cleaner Energy Production [EurekAlert]
  
• Killer Maps [MIT Technology Review]

"Current knowledge of Mars suggests that it is possible to transform that planet into one that would be habitable by plants and microorganisms from Earth. This could be done over time-scales of a hundred years or so using technologies that we are already demonstrating, probably to our detriment, on the Earth. Should we do so?" That's not science fiction. That's astrobiologist Christopher P. McKay of the NASA Ames Research Center writing inThe Environmental Ethics of Bringing Mars to Life. NASA scientists are studying the possibility of altering the Martian atmosphere to make it habitable much like Earth. NASA has even created a website called Digital Dashboard: Build a Virtual World that allows you to practice making your own habitable planet on Mars by changing several climate forcing factors including light-dark albedo, incoming solar radiation, and greenhouse gases like methane. The website is based on global climate models developed for Martian atmospheric conditions by McKay and others at NASA. The calculations are relatively simplified, but it's not bad for conducting your own at-home experiments in terraforming. According to the NASA website, " [T]he basic Martian ingredients for plant life are available.... The three reservoirs of carbon dioxide on Mars - the atmosphere, the dry ice in the polar caps, and gas adsorbed in the soil - provide a positive feedback, since warming will outgas or melt this greenhouse gas, thickening the atmosphere further to trap more sunlight and thus dramatically accelerating Martian habitability."

The U.S. Department of Energy Office of Fossil Energy reported today that it has delivered the first crude oil from the Strategic Petroleum Reserve as promised by President Bush to offset shortages resulting from Hurricane Katrina. A total of 30 million barrels were offered and 11 million barrels were sold to five companies in a competitive bidding process. An additional loan of 13.2 million barrels of crude oil has been made to refiners whose deliveries were interrupted. But where is all the oil coming from? Are we going to run out? The DOE website contains a long list of online resources that describe various efforts to ensure reliable supplies in the future, from methane hydrates to the use of CO2 injections to recover previously unattainable resources in the ground. According to the DOE site, "If only one percent of the methane hydrate resource could be made technically and economically recoverable, the United States could more than double its domestic natural gas resource base."

Drs. John Delaney and Debbie Kelley from the University of Washington are leading the VISIONS '05 expedition on the research vessel R/V Thompson and have been at sea since September 1. Live broadcasts from the ship and from the seafloor, using a high-definition underwater video camera mounted on the arm of the Jason II remotely operated vehicle (ROV), are scheduled for today, Wednesday, and Thursday. You may watch these broadcasts on the web or via cable TV. For directions on how to connect and for the complete broadcast schedule, click here. Pre-taped footage will air whenever live broadcasts are not available.

Image credit: NOAA.

As of Wednesday afternoon, Sept. 21, Rita has reached Category 5 hurricane status with 165 mile per hour winds. By comparison, Hurricane Katrina, which hit New Orleans over three weeks ago, was a Category 4 hurricane. You can find the latest Rita NOAA Public Advisory here and follow Rita through the latest Hurricane Rita Satellite Pictures from NOAA over the Gulf of Mexico.

The Senate voted on September 15 to provide the U.S. National Science Foundation (NSF) with $5.5 billion for fiscal year 2006 (10/1/05 - 9/30/06) in its approval by a 91-4 vote of the Commerce-Justice-Science Appropriations Act. According to a statement released by NSF, "Congress will not be able to finish its work on the measure before the end of the current fiscal year, on September 30. Until a final bill is signed by the President, temporary funding for the NSF and the other included agencies will have to be provided by short term extensions of their current budgets." Many programs received very modest 0.30% increases over 2005 levels. The Education and Human Resources account was funded 11% below current levels but 1% above the request. The Major Research Equipment and Facilities Construction (MREFC) account was funded 11% above current levels but 23% below the budget request. The NSF FY 2006 Budget Request document can be found here.

The New York City Office of Emergency Management (OEM) has begun an ad campaign to alert New Yorkers about the possibility of strong hurricanes and what to do in case evacuation becomes necessary. OEM designed the city's coastal storm plan, which includes potential evacuation measures. The city has also created a Hurricane Evacuation website that allows city residents to find out if they live in a hurricane evacuation zone by typing in their address. "Historically, New York City is most vulnerable to coastal storms and hurricanes from August to October, when water temperatures along the east coast warm up," OEM Commissioner Joseph F. Bruno said. "Hurricanes do not only affect Florida and the Gulf Coast. We hope this new ad campaign will encourage New Yorkers to find out if they live in a hurricane evacuation zone, and make sure they address hurricanes as part of their disaster plans." Photo by J. Floyd.

Tired of graduating from school before seeing their missions launched into space, students from the European Student Space Exploration and Technology Inititative (SSETI) will launch the first European Student Earth Orbiter (ESEO) satellite "SSETI Express" (pictured right) scheduled for September 27, 5005. The satellite consists of three small CubeSat satellites developed by Japan, Germany, and Norway and will be launched from Plesetsk Cosmodrome, Russia. The mini-satellite will orbit the Earth at an altitude of 686 km, conduct a radiation experiment, send pictures back to Earth, and function as a radio transponder. The project is sponsored by the European Space Agency. You can follow the progress of SSETI Express from the official mission website. Eds. Note: As of 9/18, the launch date has been changed to Sept. 30.