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Science In Action: 22/10/2010

22/10/2010

BBC World Service - Science In Action, 22/10/2010

The LCROSS mission looking for lunar water finds precious metals at the Moon's South Pole

LCROSS mission searching for water finds Moon treasures; Did Neanderthals make jewellery?; Biodiversity Conference; Why the leopard has spots?

LCROSS finds Moon treasures
Last year NASA deliberately crashed two spacecraft into the moon to shake up the surface and hunt for water.  It had long been thought that some dark, deep craters at the South Pole could hold reserves of water ice. 

The LCROSS or Lunar Crater Observation and Sensing Satellite mission threw up a few surprises, which are detailed in the journal Science this week.  Silver and other precious metals may hold a clue to the Moon's and even the Earth's history.


Did Neanderthals make jewellery?
It is a hotly debated topic among paleoanthropologists – just how advanced and aesthetic were our ancient cousins, the Neanderthals?  New dating techniques used at an ancient settlement in France, has thrown up possible doubt that decorative artefacts, which were thought to be associated with ancient Neanderthal remains.  They could be from some of our early human ancestors who also settled in the area.  It is a tricky subject, as around 35,000 to 40,000 years ago – both were thought to be in the vicinity.


Biodiversity Conference
This is the International Year of Biodiversity.  It was hoped that at a conference in Nagoya in Japan this week, delegates would be celebrating the success of the Convention on Biodiversity which was set to halt the rate of decrease of species on our planet by 2010.  But the convention has failed and now conservationists, policy makers and scientists are trying to work out what’s next?  One plan is to copy something from the climate change community by creating an international umbrella organisation covering the policy, economics and science.  It is very similar to what the IPCC (Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change) is to climate science.  The International Science Policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services or IPBES is the plan.  If it is accepted at the conference, the United Nation's Environment Programme will vote on before the end of the year.


Leopard Spots and tiger stripes
One of the wonderful things about biodiversity is its diversity!  Take wild cats for example, they are not just different sizes and shapes, they come in a range of colours and more specifically patterns.  But just how did the leopard get its distinctive spots?  In one of his Just So stories in 1902 Rudyard Kipling thought it was because the leopard moved from the bright plain to dense forest.  According to researchers at the University of Bristol in the UK, he was probably correct.

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