The  projections of warming temperatures, melting ice and sea level rise made by climate models can be a little abstract and hard to imagine. But a new Google Earth feature provides two new animations that can help visualize the effects of global warming over the next century.

One animation shows how world temperatures will change over the next hundred years, assuming a mid-range increase in greenhouse gas emissions, with projections from the United Kingdom’s Met Office Hadley Centre. The other shows the retreat of Antarctic ice caps since the 1950s, courtesy of the British Antarctic Survey.

The tool also links to stories of how people are already being affected by changing weather patterns, especially in poor countries, and provides information on ways to take action.

Hopefully people can see just what kind of impact climate change could have if we don’t take more notice and make a few changes.

While poking around Google Earth’s Outreach Web site, I also spotted a couple of other interesting tools, such as one that shows Earth’s disappearing forests.

Physics may not be the most obvious subject of a rap song (in fact, it’s probably the least), but that’s exactly what inspired Katherine McAlpine over at the CERN (the acronym in French for the European Organization for Nuclear Research) press office.

In a, well frankly, hilarious video (courtesy of the New Scientist) the scientists working on the Large Hadron Collider can be seen doing their best rapper impressions as they put together the parts of the enormous particle accelerator.

While the rapping isn’t exactly up to P. Diddy’s (or whatever he’s calling himself these days) standards, it’s certainly a pretty entertaining explanation of what some of the LHC’s components will be doing once it switches on this month: namely, smashing together very tiny particles at very high speeds to see what happens. Its experiments could yield insights into some of the big mysteries of the universe, perhaps providing a glimpse of the elusive Higgs boson or answering the question of just what exactly dark matter is made up of.

Like sunscreen and ocean air, the scent of a freshly mowed lawn is one of those quintessential summer smells in America.  And there is a lot of lawn in America.

An article by Elizabeth Kolbert in last week’s New Yorker traces the evolution of the American lawn from the days when only the wealthy could afford to keep such a luxurious expanse of green to today, when Americans spend an estimated $40 billion on keeping up their grass. According to satellite data from the Department of Defense, Kolbert writes, turfgrasses take up an area of the United States the size of New York State.

The most interesting part of the article covers the burgeoning “anti-lawn movement,” a rag-tag assortment of individuals and groups who are calling for an end to the lawn as we know it, favoring replacing it with trees, gardens or more natural meadow.

How is grass not natural, you might ask? Well, as Kolbert discusses in the article, most of the grasses covering American lawns, including Kentucky bluegrass and Bermuda grass, are not native to North America. They’re also effectively grown as a monoculture (like so many other plants and crops), which makes them more vulnerable to pests.

Herbicides and synthetic fertilizers make it possible to grow the grasses into the intensely green expanses we see today, by boosting their growth and keeping out “weed” species. Of course, these chemicals have side-effects: Herbicides and other pesticides can kill birds and other native species, while excess fertilizer can run off of lawns into streams and rivers, and eventually into the sea, where it creates a “dead” zone where marine species can’t survive.

Lawns also require water; a third of all residential water use in the United States goes to landscaping, according to the Environmental Protection Agency. Another study cited by Kolbert estimated that watering lawns in the United States uses up 200 gallons of water per person per day.

What proponents of the anti-lawn movement suggest is ditching all the chemicals and mowers and maintenance and just letting nature take over — whatever nature happens to be in any particular region of the country, be it prairie, forest or scrub. This is already done to a certain extent in the Southwest. On my trip to Tucson to cover NASA’s Phoenix Mars Lander mission earlier this summer, the lack of lawns in favor of pebbles and desert flora certainly stood out. It stood as an example for me of how normal we consider lawns in the eastern United States, and how arresting it can be to see anything else in front of a house.

Others propose using the lawn space for more productive purposes, such as growing food in the space that now supports grass. Kolbert cites a book, “Food Not Lawns,” that says that the average yard could yield several hundred pounds of fruits and vegetables per year. (Growing food in our front yards would also do a lot to localize food production, though that’s a blog for another day.)

While the anti-lawn ideas are intriguing, and personally, I think, preferable, to the large lawns prevalent in some suburbs now, I doubt the green is going away anytime soon. I think Kolbert’s article gives pause for thought though – it might be worth pulling up a little of that sod and planting a vegetable garden, or letting nature reclaim a little of the lawn.

It was 150 years ago today that papers of Charles Darwin and Alfred Russell Wallace’s explaining the theory of natural selection - now recognized as the main driver of evolution - were presented to the Linnean Society of London.

This post at The Beagle Project Blog gives an excellent and interesting account of the momentous occasion. Here are they key moments in the story:

Wallace spent much of the late 1840’s and early 1850’s on expeditions in tropical locales, hunting for the mechanism behind the evolutionary change in species. Wallace wrote a paper on the subject in 1855, prompting the eminent geologist Charles Lyell to pay a visit to Darwin, who then spilled the beans on his theory of natural selection that he’d spent the last 20 years mulling over.

Lyell urged Darwin to publish his theory, lest someone else beat him to it. As it happened, in February 1858, Wallace thought of natural selection while stricken by a fever in Indonesia. Wallace even sent an essay to Darwin, who he knew to be interested in the subject, explaining his theory.

Darwin appealed to Lyell and another friend, Jospeh Hooker, who decided to present papers from both Wallace and Darwin to the Linnean Society on July 1, 1858. They were published in the Society’s journal a month later. Fifteen months later Darwin’s semincal “On the Origin of Species” was published.

And such were the beginnings of the most fundamental theory in biology.

There’s been a (somewhat slowly) growing trend in recent years to revamp small things in our lives to make a little bit greener, for example, compact fluorescent bulbs are gradually replacing their more inefficient cousins, incandescent lights.

Companies are jumping on the band wagon as well. Poland Springs, for example, recently debuted their new “eco-shape” bottle that has 30 percent less plastic than the old bottle. Apparently, Sam’s Club is also getting in on the act with brand-new rectangular-shaped milk jugs, according to this article in today’s online version of The New York Times.

The jugs are easier to stack and therefore to ship, cheaper to make and ship (bringing down the cost of milk in the store) and more environmentally-friendly. But to change-resistant consumers, they’re also, well, different.

The new shape just isn’t want people are used to seeing in the diary section. And though the milk in these containers is fresher (because it ships out faster) and cheaper, it’s also apparently harder to pour. The tried-and-true “life, tip and pour” method doesn’t work these jugs, instead resulting in a lot of spilled milk. No need to cry though, because just resting the jug on a counter and tipping it will get all the milk into your glass, Sams Club employees say.

Such reinventions of basic parts of the American way of life are going to become more commonplace, according to experts quote in the article:

“This is a key strategy as a path forward,” said Anne Johnson, the director of the Sustainable Packaging Coalition, a project of the nonprofit group GreenBlue. “Re-examining, ‘What are the materials we are using? How are we using them? And where to they go ultimately?”

Sam’s Club is already expanding the number of stores that feature the new milk jugs and Wal-Mart is considering following suit.

Who knows what product will eco-ified next…

In a recent, excellent New York Times op-ed, physicist Brian Green (author of “The Elegant Universe”) explained why science is such an important part of our lives. And not just for the obvious reasons — the technology it has led to and may lead to in the future, as well as the issues it helps us understand now, such as climate change and global pandemics — but for the impact it can have on us in our everyday life.

As Greene wrote, “Science is a way of life. Science is a perspective. Science is the process that takes us from confusion to understanding in a manner that’s precise, predictive and reliable — a transformation, for those lucky enough to experience it, that is empowering and emotional.”

You may be aware of this transformation if you’re a scientist (or a science writer), but rarely does any of the wonder of science, the miracle of discovery ever make it into the classroom. (It certainly didn’t when I was in school.)

Science classes tend to emphasize the technical aspects of science, the equations and the facts, without ever presenting the inspirational aspects of it – they leave out the drama. Fortunately, I was able to find some of those inspirational stories on my own, reading about the “big questions” in science and how the answers to those questions shape the world we live in. In Greene’s view, this is exactly what needs to be injected into science education because it may make a child actually want to learn all those equations and fact.

After all, Greene notes, what makes someone want to learn how to play the piano, learning their scales or hearing the beautiful music they can make once they learn the skill?

“We must embark on a cultural shift that places science in its rightful place alongside music, art and literature as an indispensible part of what makes life worth living,” Greene says.

All of this is part of what we do at LiveScience and SPACE.com - we try to communicate science in a way that captures some of that drama, that can relate science to its larger meaning in our lives.

Robert Bonitz of NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory has been working on the Phoenix Mars Lander’s robotic arm for a long time — the arm was originally created for the ill-fated Mars Polar Lander in fact.

When the Phoenix Mars Lander was raised from the ashes of that failure, Bonitz began working on the arm again, this time for the lander to use to dig through the permafrost believed to underlie Mars’ arctic regions.

Phoenix project manager Barry Goldstein made a deal with Bonitz, who is an expert parachutist, in the early stages of the mission, about four-and-a-half years ago, that if Phoenix landed safely on the surface and completed its 90-day mission, he would do a tandem jump with Bonitz.

A few days after the bet, a meeting for Sept. 14, 2008 showed up on Goldstein’s network calendar, courtesy of Bonitz. But Goldstein didn’t think too much of it, considering how far away the date was at the time, he told reporters after a press briefing at JPL today.

Needless to say, after Sunday’s picture-perfect landing and the excellent performance of the spacecraft so far, Goldstein is becoming a little apprehensive about making that deal (personally, I can’t blame him). Whether Goldstein is going to follow-through on the deal hasn’t been decided yet — after all, the lander is only three sols (or Martian days) into its mission. So stay tuned come September though, for news of parachuting NASA scientists. And make sure never to enter into bets with expert jumpers.

NASA’s Phoenix Mars Lander has now been on the surface of Mars for over a day, and mission scientists have wasted no time in getting to work.

Phoenix’s science team at the University of Arizona went straight to work last night, as soon as the news came in that Phoenix had safely landed and had power from its solar arrays. They sent up a set of instructions for Phoenix to follow overnight, which the lander should carry out today. If everything goes according to plan, mission scientists should be hearing back from the spacecraft anytime now. The craft will likely send back more images of itself, so that scientists can make sure everything is working properly, and the Martian surface.

Now that mission control has switched over to the science team, the atmosphere at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory is much more subdued today, as weary engineers go to get some rest after the excitement of Phoenix’s “picture perfect” landing.

“I’m going to sleep,” said JPL Phoenix project manager Barry Goldstein after this morning’s press briefing.

Live coverage of NASA’s Phoenix Mars Lander has officially begun. So far NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory’s mission control looks fairly subdued, with just a few people milling about a talking to one another.

Mission controllers are wearing their Phoenix polo shirts, which are bright blue with the mission logo on the front, for the occasion.

Controllers have been working all night, said JPL Phoenix mission manager Barry Goldstein at a press briefing earlier today, adding they were tired, but excited for the big day.

Goldstein said he is starting to feel the butterflies himself, because he’s been working constantly up until the last communication with Phoenix this morning. But now that that’s done, “that means that means we have nothing to do but watch… and that means I’m a heck of a lot more tense today,” he told reporters.

Humans may not be able to travel to Mars yet, but we our names can.

The Planetary Society, co-founded by the legendary Carl Sagan, has assembled a list of 250,000 names on a DVD that is now attached to NASA’s Phoenix Mars Lander, set to touch down on the red planet later today.

The DVD, entitled “Visions of Mars,” also features images of Mars from both pop culture (for example, Marvin the Martian) and science, a collections of stories and other works about Mars, Orson Welles’ famous “War of the Worlds” radio broadcast, and greetings to future human explorers to Mars from several people, including Sagan.

Sagan cites the many reasons that the humans listening to him in the future might be there, from impending catastrophe, to simple curiosity, adding that whatever the reason is that they are there, “I wish I was with you.”

The DVD is intended as something of a time capsule from Earth on all things Mars related to let future generations of humans know how the red planet has inspired both science and science fiction. Stories from Isaac Asimov, Ray Bradbury and Arthur C. Clarke are included on the disk to show the “dance” between science and science fiction, as Sagan says in his greeting on the disk.

The disk was originally strapped to Russia’s Mars ‘96 spacecraft, which failed shortly after launch. Planetary Society members updated the DVD for the Phoenix mission. They also sent disks with names up on the two Mars Exploration Rovers, Spirit and Opportunity, which are still scuttling around the Martian surface.

If Phoenix makes it safely to the surface of Mars, it will use its stereo camera to image and check its systems. These pictures could show the disk attached to the craft. (The disk is made of a hardy silica glass and has been tested to withstand the vibrations of travel and entry, as well as weathering from wind-blown dust and sand on Mars.)

For those who want to catch a live showing of the Phoenix landing, The Planetary Society is also holding a series of events in cities around the country that will show the mission control live on a big screen. The main event, here in Pasadena (called Planetfest ‘08) that will include speakers such as Bill Nye the Science Guy, Ray Bradbury, and Phoenix principal investigator Peter Smith. You can find a list of cities with events here.

Whether the Society’s disk will be recovered in a matter of decades or centuries is a matter of debate amongst Planetary Society members. One member is betting on the later, and says that he hopes it never comes back to Earth.