Every year, an epidemic of the cold and flu viruses hits the Colorado School of Mines Campus. When devastated by such illnesses, the best idea is to feel as good as possible so as to avoid missing any class because of the illness. Simply put, this school is hard enough without being sick.
Benjamin Franklin famously said that “beer is living proof that God loves us and wants us to be happy.” Not only did he enjoy a beverage or two, but the founding father also wrote a recipe for beer flavored with spruce tree needles, which is still being made in several breweries today. The Alaskan Brewing Co. offers an original and tasty take on spruce beer with their Winter Ale, using Sitka spruce tips to flavor this special seasonal brew.
Above ground fuel tanks and steel pipelines may be at risk of corrosion due to new fuel grade ethanol (FGE). Doctorate student Luke Jain has been investigating how fuel tanks corrode with new and ever more common ethanol-based automotive fuels. In Jain’s study, it was found that the ethanol in the new fuels is providing an environment where microbes can corrode the metal. Initially, it was thought that ethanol-gasoline fuels would circumvent the problem by locking up the ethanol in the gasoline. In the field, however, it has been noted that the ethanol will fall out of the gasoline and dissolve in any water that may be present in the storage tank. This mixture of ethanol and water provides an environment capable of producing microbes that “eat” the metal.
Vienna, Austria – Killer whales may mimic each other when they’re socializing. Brigitte Weiss of the University of Vienna in Vienna, Austria, has been studying the behavior of Orca Whales near Vancouver Island in British Columbia, Canada. Weiss has noticed that the whales seem to imitate calls that are similar to the calls of whales from another pod. Vocal mimicry among mammals is very uncommon, which is why Weiss took notice when she was analyzing the sonograms of Orca calls and noticed that about one in every 500 calls was a clear imitation. It is as yet unclear why killer whales imitate each other.
The economy seems to have a case of ADD, as the fewer jobs then expected were added for November. Economists forecasted an increase of 144,000 jobs over through November, with the an actual increase of 50,000. The unemployment rate climbed back to 9.8%, an increase from 9.6% in October.
