Here’s a candidate for the next round of the Darwin Awards (courtesy of today’s edition of What’s New by Bob Park)

According to a Reuters story out of Kiev, on Sunday evening when the zoo was crowded with visitors, a man lowered himself by rope into the lion enclosure and walked up to the lions shouting,”God will save me if he exists,” thus proving himself to be a man of faith. Without hesitation, a lioness severed his carotid artery.

Keep in mind that the spirit of the Darwin Awards is to salute the improvement of the human genome by honoring those who remove themselves from it. I can’t think of a more appropriate nominee.

PS: The subject of this post is named Ogtay Mahmudov and it is clear that he led a tragic life, right down to the circumstances of his death. I certainly meant no disrespect to Mr. Mahmudov in writing this post. The number of people on this planet who lead sad, troubled, tortured or tragic lives is certainly astromonical. If we can’t keep some sort of perspective, or sense of humor, or poke some fun, then how do we cope without going mad ourselves?

At least in Illinois. Illinois governor Rod Blagojevich declared today as Particle Accelerator Day in recognition of the state’s federal laboratories (Fermilab and Argonne) as world leaders in accelerator technology. The goal of this recognition is to help bring particle accelerator projects, such as the multi-billion dollar International Linear Collider, to Illinois. The governor’s proposed budget for the next fiscal year includes $13 million for projects at Argonne and Fermilab, with $3 million to support the construction of an Illinois Accelerator Research Center. This will strengthen the case for Fermilab to be a possible host for the Linear Collider project. The details are here. The $13 million investment is sizeable for a state’s contribution and will certainly help develop advanced accelerator technology. It’s great to see this commitment to science from the state of Illinois!

A noteworthy event for folks interested in numerology, or just plain odd things, occured in the U.S. last night. At 1:02 AM and three seconds on April 5, 2006, the time and date on digital clocks read 01-02-03-04-05-06. Cool, huh. Happens once a century. The world’s atomic clock timekeepers got all excited. I must confess that I slept through it nonetheless. The rest of the world, which uses the day/month/year format, can enjoy the event on the 4th of May.

You can check out the USNO master clock here - home of the Official source of time for the U.S. Department of Defense.

The day after President’s Day, the Harvard University Gazette announced the resignation of Harvard University President Larry Summers. He will return to the professorial ranks on 1 July, 2007. Perhaps it was something he said…

I’ve been locked in a windowless room full of physicists all day, and yet we still heard the news. None of us were surprised, and I think we all secretly wondered how he managed to stay in his position for a full year after the infamous speech. A confidence vote on Mr. Summers was to be held by the Harvard faculty later this week. Of course, a no confidence vote did not deter him in the past, but perhaps he decided not to face a secound round. In my mind, this is a clear-cut example of the importance of keeping a significant issue alive in the news. It also signals that people take the issue of representation of women in the sciences, and heck, the fact that women can do science, as being important.

It’s happened! A $13 million donation from the private sector has been given to continue operation of the Relativisitc Heavy Ion Collider at Brookhaven National Laboratory. The press release is here. RHIC’s generous benefactors are the Renaissance Technologies Corporation ( an investment firm dedicated to the use of mathematical methods) and members of the Board of Directors of Brookhaven Science Associates. Jim Simons, a member of the Board and President of Renaissance Technologies, initiated and led the drive to raise the money. Simons is a mathematician by training and is a rather famous one at that - physicists know him from his work with Shiin-Shen Chern. This boost in funds allows RHIC to operate a full schedule of 20 weeks this fiscal year.

Discoveries at RHIC were named the Top Physics Story of 2005 by the American Institute of Physics. The RHIC detectors discovered the long-sought-after quark-gluon plasma, but found that it behaves as a quark-gluon liquid instead. They have a list of important measurements yet to be performed to determine the properties of this liquid.

I have written a few posts (such as here and here) whining about the dearth of funding in the United States for basic research in the physical sciences. (OK, my whining usually focuses on particle physics, but that’s only because I’m closest to my own field.) I do so because I want to ensure that the public is aware that US science is hurting. A common thread in the discussion to these posts (pardon my paraphrasing here) is that if the science is really all that important and interesting, then why doesn’t the general public pony-up? Well, it is and they have. Today, Jim Simmons joined the Kavli Foundation in making substantial contributions to basic physical sciences research. I firmly believe that the majority of US citizens support a strong Federally-funded science program - this belief is generated from the number of cab-drivers, shop-owners, people sitting on airplanes, etc, that I have found to be genuinely excited about how the universe works. This donation should increase public awareness and I hope the Federal government takes note.

This is the best news I’ve heard in a long time. RHIC is making fundamental discoveries, and now they can continue to do so. At least for one more year.

A recent study in Britain has found some startling results regarding how the public views murder victims. Here is part of the breakdown:

• One in three people think that if the victim disagreed with things that the murderer said, and debated with them, that they were at least partially responsible for being murdered.
• About the same proportion of people think that victims are partially or wholly responsible for being murdered if they are drunk.
• More than a quarter believe victims are responsible if they wear clothing that hints at violence, such as camouflage jackets or trousers, or jackboots.
• Nearly 15% of respondents thought a victim would be partly responsible for being murdered if he or she was known to take part in boxing, wrestling or kick-boxing as a hobby; and 8% thought that this would make a victim totally responsible.

OK, I’m lying - these statistics aren’t true. I made them up. What a relief; because if they were true, they would be deeply disturbing, painting an unflattering, backward image of society’s attitudes to those people who, through no fault of their own, end up stripped of their human rights by violent predators.

Now take a look at this Guardian article detailing the results of a recent Amnesty International report on rape.

I don’t see any difference and am truly disgusted. We all know that there is the occasional sociopath out there who holds views like this. Heck, some of them have blogs. But the sheer magnitudes of the numbers here amaze me, particularly since there doesn’t seem to be a marked difference between the responses of men and women to the survey questions. I don’t know what’s wrong with people, but it’s serious!

I just never know if it’s acceptable to say “old wives’ tales” any more.

The Guardian has an article about the scientific basis for what it calls “granny’s nostrums” about activities that can increase one’s chances of catching a cold; in particular not wrapping up warm.

The experiment itself sounds pretty funny, since it involved getting ninety volunteers to spend 20 minutes with their bare feet in iced water. You can read about the details and numbers in the articles, but the possible explanations for a connection are described as:

“When colds are circulating, many people are mildly infected but show no symptoms,” said Professor Eccles [Ron Eccles, of the Common Cold Centre at Cardiff University], whose findings are published in today’s issue of Family Practice magazine.

“But if they become chilled, this causes a pronounced constriction of the blood vessels in the nose and shuts off the warm blood that supplies the white cells that fight infection.

“Although the chilled subject believes they have ‘caught a cold’, what has in fact happened is that the dormant infection has taken hold.”

But they also suggested that another explanation could be that our noses are colder in the winter. Prof Eccles said: “A cold nose may be one of the major factors that causes common colds to be seasonal.

“When the cold weather comes we wrap ourselves up in winter coats to keep warm but our nose is directly exposed to the cold air.

“Cooling of the nose slows down clearance of viruses from the nose and slows down the white cells that fight infection.”

This is what leads to the following sage advice

Parents should feel confident in telling children to wrap up warmly this winter, the researchers say - though a nose-protecting garment, possibly like the one worn by Harry Potter, would be a useful fashion accessory.

Being a charter member of the LSGNA Collaboration, I just can’t pass this one up! The Americas Summit (34 nations, including the US) is convening this weekend in Mar del Plata, Argentina. And the security force has been waylaid by a rabid lasagna….70 members, and counting, of the armed security team are down. What a great tactic! I am surprsied more people throughout history have not thought of mass quantities of lasagna as a weapon of mass destruction. The hotel serving the questionable lasagna used to be a favorite dining haunt for the local police squad. Wanna bet they’re busy right now checking the local guide for other places? Who knows, perhaps “W” will have a hankering for Argentinian lasagna and follow in his father’s footsteps.

PS: LSGNA = Large Super Giant New Accelerator. The collaboration formed in 1992. It meets sporadically, and ingests its favorite food along with large quantities of wine. We have our own theme song and enjoy pink flamingoes.

Correction: A collaboration member has reminded me that my memory is failing….the LSGNA collaboration formed in June 1993, not 1992. Being a major lifetime event, you would think I’d remember it correctly.

Apparently the White House has a beef with The Onion, a news parody previously mentioned on this blog. Seems they are not happy when The Onion uses the Presidential seal in its satirical spoofs. They claim it is a violation of regulations. Looks like lawyers are getting invovled.

Excuse me, but doesn’t The White House have more important things to think about?

Breaking news, very serious, hot off the email. A technician was killed in the ATLAS pit at CERN today. Apparently a crane dropped a load on him. It happened at 17:30 local time. All underground areas were closed immediately. There will be an investigation.

ATLAS (technical home page, public home page) is one of the two very large high energy physics detectors being built for the Large Hadron Collider. It is being built in a large cavernous collider hall far underground where collisions at the LHC will take place. This hall is located just outside of the main gate at CERN.

This is a tragedy for everyone involved. My deepest sympathies for the technician’s family.