Innholdsfortegnelse for July/August 2016 i Muse: The magazine of science, culture, and smart laughs for kids and children

Three Huge Coincidences There is a group of Greek gods called the Muses, which is coincidence #1. Polyhymnia, mentioned in one Muse Mail, is the Muse of hymns, while Urania is the Muse of astronomy. That is coincidence #2. The Muses were the daughters of Zeus and Mnemosyne, which is supposed to be the name of the school in Parallel U, which is coincidence #3. I think there should be an article about Greek mythology, because there are so many stories, even though there are only 14 gods and a bunch of other characters. Like others always do, I’ll put in a warning for what will happen if my letter doesn’t get published. If you don’t publish this, I’ll, um . . . send the Greek gods Dionysus and Poseidon…

YOU MIGHT say that the future looks good “on paper.” By updating the ancient art of origami (paper folding), engineer Glaucio Paulino has invented a remarkable new construction system that promises to revolutionize the way tomorrow’s cities are built. Or more correctly, build themselves. THE ZIPPER TUBE “Origami is already used in many areas of science and engineering,” Paulino notes. He’s a professor of engineering at the Georgia Institute of Technology. Thanks to origami-inspired science, tomorrow’s surgical devices will require smaller cuts. They’ll unfold once they’re inside the body. NASA researchers are working on a special kind of origami called Muira folding. Huge, folding solar sails will “bloom” open in space, like giant flowers. Paulino’s take on scientific origami is the zipper tube. It’s a long, thin, zig-zag shape that…

My sister and I have been getting Muse since 2009. When the November / December 2015 issue came, I was happy! I love parallel universes. . . universi? Universus? I’m writing a trilogy of novels about a girl who gets trapped in a parallel universe where zeppelins are powered by solar electricity and the world wars never happened . . . it’s set in 2115! I love all futuristic and sci-fi stuff. Well, not all, maybe, since Star Wars isn’t very popular in my household. Abbey H. in the aforementioned issue: I used to code, and I don’t know what got into me to stop! Probably some evil, code-hating, non-corporeal alien villain. I love Star Trek and Doctor Who! —RIKA B.-W. / Wisconsin, USA, the World,…

NASA plans to send humans to Mars in the 2030s, and several private companies aim to send settlers to live on Mars permanently. There are several reasons to create an off-planet colony. One is survival of our species. “We never know what will happen to threaten the habitat. This could be our life raft,” says Darby Dyar, an astronomy professor at Mount Holyoke College and a member of the Mars Curiosity rover team. “There’s also the ‘cool factor’,” she says. “Who would not want to live on Mars?” Scientists living on Mars can study the planet up close better than rovers can. They can compare it to Earth and other planets. They can study its atmosphere—and humans’ effect on that atmosphere. If they find evidence for life on Mars, whether…

Q: Why do redheads have red hair, and why are they rare? —Caleb W. A: The first Homo sapiens didn’t have red hair. Our species evolved in Africa, where dark hair and dark skin provided important protection from the tropical sun. But more than 50,000 years ago, some human ancestors started to move out of Africa, on their way to settling the rest of the world. When they got to Europe, they met another type of human that had already lived there for hundreds of thousands of years: Homo neanderthalensis, better known as Neanderthals. With short arms and legs, small chins, and foreheads that sloped backward, they looked different from early Homo sapiens. And some Neanderthals had red hair. Neanderthals went extinct about 40,000 years ago, so everything we know…

One of these stories is false. Can you spot which one? The answer is hidden in this issue. PHYSICS Gravitational Wave Discovery Makes a Splash A CENTURY AGO, Albert Einstein described an idea he had about waves in space. He thought that when massive objects collide or explode, the impact should send little ripples of gravity outward through the universe. These waves would be extremely hard to measure. But in February 2016, scientists announced that they had finally found them—proving Einstein right yet again. The experiment required two detectors. One is in Louisiana and the other is in Washington State. Together the detectors are called the Laser Interferometer Gravitational-Wave Observatory, or LIGO. Each detector is shaped like a giant “L” made from two tubes, both 2.5 miles (4 km) long.…

“With the advent of global warming we are one of the last places in the world with snow, so people flock to our city for recreational activities . . .”— “Waste Not, Want Not” by New Lebanon Junior-Senior High School’s Future City team It’s 2150 and you’re off to visit Marhielo, an island city in Antarctica. Because of climate change, Marhielo has become a top tourist attraction as one of the last places with snow in the world. Here you can still ski, snowboard, or ice fish, while you escape the high temperatures elsewhere. PACK YOUR BAGS Well, here’s the thing: you can’t really visit Marhielo. The city exists only in the minds of students from the New Lebanon Junior-Senior High School in New Lebanon, New York. They created Marhielo…

It’s great to imagine a future with high-tech conveniences and awesome innovations. Yet the future won’t be much fun without the underlying framework that helps communities hum along. Our gadgets and other machines need power. People and things need to go from place to place. Clean, drinkable water is essential for life. Waste must be recycled or disposed of safely. All these things and other basic services make up society’s infrastructure. Today most of us probably take infrastructure for granted. That’s okay, because ours has been pretty reliable so far. Unfortunately, that could change—and sooner than many people think. Some parts of our infrastructure are already in trouble. Plus, the future will bring new challenges, particularly those due to climate change. If our future is going to be everything we…

CITIES ARE noisy, dirty, and full of traffic jams. But they don’t have to be that way. In a “smart" city, electronic sensors collect data on everything from traffic patterns and electricity usage to noise and light levels. Computer programs continuously analyze this data to find patterns and report important information. If you lived in a place like this, youd be able to find out what’s happening at any location, right now. You might want to know how many people are at the local park. Or how windy it is at the beach. Or whether you’ll run into any construction projects as you bike to school. A smart city could deliver instant answers via an app on your mobile device. Singapore, a city in Southeast Asia, already uses sensor systems.…