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Fun with science — physicists have just managed to (very briefly) stop light in its tracks!

The research differs from work published in 2001 that was hailed at the time as having brought light to standstill. In that work, light pulses were technically “stored” briefly when individual particles of light, or photons, were taken up by atoms in a gas.

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Harvard University researchers have now topped that feat by truly holding light and its energy in its tracks – if only for a few hundred-thousandths of a second. “We have succeeded in holding a light pulse still without taking all the energy away from it,” said Mikhail D. Lukin, a Harvard physicist.

(via Prairie)

If you live in the Seattle/Portland/Pacific Northwest — or Japan — you might want to think about moving. At least, think about it if you have plans to be in the area in about 200 years. ;)

Geologists have discovered evidence of a massively powerful earthquake zone beneath the Pacific Northwest just offshore from the Seattle area.

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They made the discovery by piecing together ancient accounts of a giant Japanese tsunami and a computer simulation of a huge trembler in the 17th century.

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Thought to be inactive, the earthquake zone runs 600 miles up the Pacific Coast from Northern California to southern British Columbia. It appears to be subject to monster quakes every 500 years.

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[…]

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In Japan, Satake created a detailed computer model showing how the tsunami crossed the Pacific before crashing into Japan.

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Atwood said the geological record indicates the fault ruptures about once every 500 years and is capable of unleashing “truly giant earthquakes.”

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He said only three quakes this century compare in magnitude — a 9.0 quake in Kamchatka in 1952, a 9.5 quake in Chile in 1960 and a 9.2 trembler in Alaska in 1964.

Well, okay, so maybe there’s not great reason to panic just yet. Alaskans have been expecting a repeat of the ’64 quake “real soon now” for years without it happening, and this one isn’t due for another two centuries. Still, it’s nice to be able to plan ahead sometimes, isn’t it?

From The Guardian: the top 10 scientific hoaxes of all time. A very interesting list, some of which I’d heard of, some of which I hadn’t, and one that I’d never heard was a hoax.

2. The amazing Tasaday tribe

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In 1971 Manuel Elizalde, a Philippine government minister, discovered a small stone age tribe living in utter isolation on the island of Mindanao. These people, the Tasaday, spoke a strange language, gathered wild food, used stone tools, lived in caves, wore leaves for clothes, and settled matters by gentle persuasion. They made love, not war, and became icons of innocence; reminders of a vanished Eden.

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They also made the television news headlines, the cover of National Geographic, were the subject of a bestselling book, and were visited by Charles A Lindbergh and Gina Lollobrigida. Anthropologists tried to get a more sustained look, but President Marcos declared a 45,000-acre Tasaday reserve and closed it to all visitors.

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After Marcos was deposed in 1986, two journalists got in and found that the Tasaday lived in houses, traded smoked meat with local farmers, wore Levi’s T-shirts and spoke a recognisable local dialect. The Tasadays explained that they had only moved into caves, donned leaves and performed for cameras under pressure from Elizalde – who had fled the country in 1983 along with millions from a foundation set up to protect the Tasaday. Elizalde died in 1997.

I remember reading about the Tasaday tribe in National Geographic (though as the issue was printed in 1972, the year before my birth, it must have been much later when I found it) and being absolutely fascinated that they’d been able to survive unchanged for so long. A bit of a bummer that it was a hoax, but not terribly surprising.

(via MeFi)