Funny :D

Hallucigenia

 http://burgess-shale.rom.on.ca/en/fossil-gallery/view-species.php?id=60

Today our professor mentioned the species called Hallucigenia Sparsa for the second time since the beginning of the semester. This perked my interest so I looked it up. There has been many different thoughts to what genus this animal belongs to. Because of its mysteriousness, it still isn't 100% decided what genus this animal belongs to. It is part of the Animalia kingdom, Onychophora (Lobopodia) Phylum, and Xenusia class. It's name originates from the Latin word hallucinatio meaning "wondering of the mind" and the Latin word sparsus meaning "rare or scattered." The fossil is from the Middle Cambrian period about 505 million years ago. It is a carnivorous animal that fed off of sponges and possibly scavenged decaying animals in the ocean. It was a bottom dweller. It had a worm like body with seven pairs of spines and seven pairs of legs. They were only about 30 mm.

Photo 1 is picture of the fossil and the following photos are what scientist believe the Hallucigenia Sparsa may have looked like.

Ancient Tectonic Plates Close to Home

First of all I found this article interesting because occurs close to home. Secondly, if these theories are further tested and accepted it may change some of what we learn in the class we are in. I think this article is a great example of the scientific method at use which we learned at the beginning of class. This is proof that there is always more to learn when it comes to science. Further testing and research never hurt anyone.

The article is about the Faralon plate, so I did further research to learn more about this plate. The Faralon plate is an ancient oceanic plate that subducted under the North American Plate when Pangea was breaking apart durning the Jurassic Period. Subduction continued on into the Teritary The pieces of the plate that remain are called Juan de Fuca, Explorer, Gorda, Cocos, and Nazca plates. The subduction zone on the northern coast of the US and the Faralon plate is thought to be the cause of the San Andreas Fault. The subduction of the Faralon plate is also believed to have caused the Rocky Mountains because the plate subducted at a shallow angle. The Farallon Islands west of San Fransisco are all that are left of the plate and are predicted to slide completely under America in the next 5 million years or so.

 http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2013-03/bu-soa031813.php

 http://www.howitworksdaily.com/q-and-a/what-is-the-farallon-plate/

 http://whatonearth.olehnielsen.dk/plates/farallon.asp

 http://www.sjvgeology.org/geology/tectonics.html

 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Farallon_Plate

45 million year old beer? Poor me a pitcher!

http://www.sanluisobispo.com/2011/01/18/1447061/poly-professor-brews-beer-with.html

Okay, so the beer isn't actually 45 million years old, but the yeast used to make it is! After ready this post, I immediately thought of Jurassic park. Pulling an organism from AMBER and recreating it in the present day? Seems all too familiar. I thought, how could this be possible? I didn't think we had the technology to do this. The difference between Jurassic park and this situation is the yeast the is being made is a microorganism that is able to lay dormant for years (45 million in this case) without food or air. To reconstruct the DNA from a dinosaur would be almost impossible because DNA is so complicated. I learned of this beer about 2 years ago and I would love to try, but still haven't had the opportunity. I hope to try it sometime in the future. It apparently has a very distinct flavor because the make-up of the yeast is so different then present day yeast.