[bio.blog] Blue sea slugs are heroes, slime molds are farmers, and quantum entanglement is awesome.

[redroanchronicles]

Here's something remarkable to start your day: Birds can maintain quantum entanglement in their eyes for longer than the best laboratory microsystems. Now, you might be thinking to yourself, "Wow, that's amazing, nature trumps human effort once again," or "Gee, I didn't realize we even had laboratory systems for creating quantum entanglement" or even, "wtf is quantum entanglement and why does it sound like what might happen if you get high and try to read a Neal Stephenson novel?" But then you'll go back and realize that what they're saying is that birds have quantum entanglement going all the time in their freaking eyeballs. Well, in theory, but apparently it's a compelling theory with some solid evidence behind it. So the theory is that birds actually navigate with a quantum "compass" -- they can see the earth's magnetic field.

I just blew my own mind merely by typing that sentence.

In other news, humans are really crappy neighbors, like the kind that party at 3am with their stereo turned up to eleven, and animals are finding ways to continue communicating despite the racket. But it'd still be nice if we'd tone it down or they might adapt by figuring out how to call the cops.

Here's an article about a survey that shows a ridiculous number of science teachers in America avoid the subject of evolution, and 13% of those surveyed actively advocated creationism. In related news, I just wept a little right then for the future of humanity.

At Harvard, scientists are working on perfecting mind control for worms. This is a totally slippery slope because I'm fairly certain this research was funded by a supervillain whose ultimately goal is to produce an army of mind-controlled zombie sharks. With lasers on their heads.

A British engineer saved his own life by designing his own heart valve implant, which just goes to show you that "keep calm and carry on" really would make a marvelous motto for the people of the UK.

For the first time ever (er, that we know of), Antarctic Minke whales and Northern Minke whales have interbred and produced hybrids, which will undoubtedly be known as "sort of in the middle minke whales." I'll bet a lot of more of this sort of unusual interbreeding -- not to mention the freaking polar bears making with the freaking grizzly bears to produce terrifying polar-grizzly-bear killing machines -- will become a lot more common as climate change prompts animals to expand their usual habitats and alter their usual behavioral patterns.

Robots are better at walking if they learn to crawl first, but I'm guessing this news story is just propaganda released by Skynet to make us think that we're safe from the Terminators.

China has finally stepped up to the proverbial plate and put new rules in place for Chinese zoos. What kind of rules could Chinese zoos possibly need, you ask?

"Firstly, the zoos will be forced to stop pulling the teeth of tiger cubs so that zoo visitors can hold them. Zoos will also have to put a halt to the selling of animal parts in their shops, and the zoo restaurants will have to refrain form serving dishes made using rare animals. On top of this, zoos will need to end the attractions in which live animals are sold to visitors and then thrown to the wild cats, allowing the visitors to watch the cats rip the defenseless animals to shreds."

Good lord, China.

In other news of parasites, this one turns its host red in order to protect itself. I would consider that to be a super-cool party trick, but the part where it liquifies the host's insides and gorges itself on them isn't as cool of it.

Also, slime molds! Man, are slime molds ever exciting. They can do something awesome that only human beings have been observed doing: They farm their own food.

I'm in love with blue sea slugs, and I will tell you why. Firstly, because they look incredibly awesome, like maybe they came here from another planet and want to be our alien super best-friends. Secondly, because they eat jellyfish. And thirdly, because when they eat the jellyfish, they are so bad-ass that they even eat the stingers. And then they store them in special pouches, so they can use them against their own enemies.

This awesome time-lapse video takes you inside a Russian Antarctic expedition, and it's pretty much epic.

And finally, because after some of those stories I feel it's necessary to restore your faith in humanity, science, and the awesomeness of life, you should know that a US company has developed a genetically engineered cyanobacterium (I don't know what that means, but it makes me sound smart) that can create fossil fuels on demand. And furthermore, it doesn't require massive amounts of inputs -- like all the corn that has to be grown for that complete waste of resources we call "ethanol" -- but instead requires just carbon dioxide, sunlight, and water -- even brackish or sea water. The only problem with this, of course, is that if fossil fuels become abundant again, breaking our dependence on them becomes that much harder.

Okay, I know I said "and finally" on that last one, but I didn't want to end it on a total downer note there. So here's a bionic dog.

(By the by, did you know I'm on Facebook, despite my many reservations about its soulless and evil approach to privacy? It's true! I also post these and a great many more interesting science links there on a regular basis, so if you also are a slave of the system and enthralled by the "like" button, you should friend me. I've always wanted to be your friend, anyway.)