Brunswick ME May 18, 2012, 4:47 am  38°F wind speed: 0 mph N |
Here’s another smart reason to get your feet moving. Japanese researches have determined that regular exercise provides the brain with a “supercompensation” of fuel that especially benefits the cortex and the hippocampus, the parts of the brain vital to learning and memory formation. (With thanks to Jan Pierson ’74 for the heads up on this article.)
A team of Newcastle University scientists in the United Kingdom have found that bacteria in the Earth’s stratosphere can generate enough current to power a lightbulb. This breakthrough might mean that Bacillus stratosphericus, which live 10 to 30 miles above the Earth, could be harnessed in the future to produce a cheap, portable source of green energy. The authors of new study titled “Should People Pursue Feelings That Feel Good or Feelings That Do Good? Emotional Preferences and Well-Being” that used particular songs as a way to understand how people make use of emotion have determined that trying to be happy all the time can make you unhappy. Before a role-playing confrontation in one part of the study, researches allowed subjects to choose music that had previously been deemed to provoke confrontation, happiness, or something in between (like Yo-Yo Ma’s “Indecision”).
 John Glenn, Cape Canaveral, February 1962. Photo courtesy of NASA.
On February 20, 1962, astronaut John Glenn became the first American in orbit. On the fifty-year anniversary, Glenn, now 90, reflects on of that historical mission and on the future of the American space program.
The Research Corporation for Science Advancement is celebrating its centennial this year, making it the oldest foundation in the United States devoted to science. Over the decades, Bowdoin College has played a key role in the foundation’s history and been greatly enriched by it, receiving grants topping $1.25 million. Only two other liberal arts colleges have received more: Hope College in Michigan and Denison University in Ohio. In addition, Bowdoin’s ninth president, James Stacy “Spike” Coles, served as the foundation’s president from 1968 to 1982. He was president of Bowdoin from 1952 to 1967, and earned his PhD in chemistry from Columbia University in 1941. RCSA supports the research of faculty members in the physical sciences—mainly astronomy, chemistry and physics—at U.S. colleges and universities. RCSA was founded by Frederick Gardner Cottrell, a physical chemist who helped fund the foundation’s endowment from the proceeds of a smokestack pollution-control device he invented called the electrostatic precipitator.
Life’s complexities often have simple solutions; as proof, check out the elegant equations that enabling the foundation of our increasingly high-tech lives.
Working in Silicon Valley doesn’t just net you an average salary of $100,000 these days. In the race for the best employees, companies like Google are going to great lengths to create remarkable workplaces with unusual perks. As a Google employee, you not only get fed three meals a day for free, you have access to onsite doctors, haircuts, laundry facilities, car washes, dry cleaning, an outdoor volley ball court and a lap pool.
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