Sea-Doo Introduces Low-Cost, Hybrid Scooter

Diver Propulsion Vehicles (DPV's) are not only flat out fun but can impact an underwater detectorist's success rate. They don't take up much space and will cover more search area with less effort than swimming.

However, there are drawbacks. They are heavy (40 to 70 pounds), they want to head for the bottom, which is why they are called, Diver vehicles, they usually aren't snorkeler friendly and they are costly.

Expanding on its experience with the original 12-volt battery-powered "scooter," introduced several years ago, Kaka Development, under license to Sea-Doo, blended the best of its original features with some remarkable new ones. The happy result is Model SZ05 (GTI). Rated to a depth of 100 feet, it will run 90 minutes on a battery charge with speeds up to 2 1/2 mph, but weighs a scant 18 pounds, including the battery. The battery compartment is well sealed with double O-rings. To access the chamber a little hand pump is provided to apply internal pressure. No erosion to O-rings; no leaks.

What sets it apart from other DPV's, besides its manageable weight, is an ingeniously simple "adjustable ballast." A hollow chamber in the nose cone keeps it positively buoyant for snorkeling. Read that as "safe for the kids." Add a small amount of weight, however, and it instantly becomes a true recreational dive machine. Total up the features and the sum amounts to a best-of-all-worlds water toy that's easy to care for and, one you'll actually use.

The full package consists of the DPV, battery with charger, pump, O-ring silicone grease and a 2000 denier, Cordura and custom bag. Maybe best of all: a sensible price in the low $400.

See the GTI at: www.airlinebyjsink.com or call (877) 207-3235.

A coffin of the Lady Ta-Di-Ni-Nefer from 200 B.C., the same period as those recently discovered.

Egypt -- French and Egyptian archeologists said Monday they had found more than 50 mummies buried in deep shafts south of Cairo dating from the first millennium BC.

Some of the mummies, wrapped in linen and sealed inside stone or wooden sarcophagi, are in an excellent state of preservation for the period, said Zahi Hawass, head of Egypt's Supreme Antiquities Council.

Hawass said Egyptians had used the network of shafts and corridors over several centuries, starting from the 26th dynasty (664-525 BC) and continuing into the Ptolemaic period, which ended with the death of Cleopatra in 30 BC.

"It's a maze of corridors with mummies everywhere, right and left, up and down. When people came, there was no more space so they put the coffins in the wall, or they cut another shaft, or they put a mummy above a mummy," he told Reuters.

The shafts are in Saqqara, 15 miles south of Cairo and the main cemetery for the nearby city of Memphis.

Guy Lecuyot, an Egyptologist at France's Center National de la Recherche Scientifique, said one of the Ptolemaic mummies was exceptional for its state of preservation and its style.

"I hope that next week we will have a chance to open other sarcophaguses and find other mummies in this state, and the elements which will enable us to understand Pharaonic civilization better," he added.

Hawass said: "I have never seen ... a mummy from the Ptolemaic period that is so unique, that is well-preserved. The linen is covering it in a beautiful way."

He said some of the mummy wrappings could well contain hundreds of gold amulets, which are typical of the period.

Story courtesy of Reuters

Dinosaurs may have been wiped out by a mighty underground explosion with the energy of seven million atom bombs.

A team of scientists claims the Earth-shaking blast, called a Verneshot, is the best explanation for the death of the dinosaurs 65 million years ago.

Most experts believe the extinction was caused by a huge asteroid or comet that smashed into the Earth off the coast of Mexico. Others have blamed a mega-volcanic episode, called a continental flood basalt, which resulted in numerous vents pouring poisonous gas into the atmosphere.

According to the new theory, a Verneshot could explain the effects of both and also provide the answer to a long-standing mystery.

Mass extinctions always seem to coincide with both continental flood basalts and meteorite impacts, even though the odds against this happening are huge. In the past 400 million years there have been four major mass extinctions, including the one which killed off the dinosaurs.

But the German scientists behind the Verneshot theory point out that the chances of all of them coinciding with an impact and a continental flood basalt is one in 3,500.

The name Verneshot comes from Jules Verne's book From the Earth to the Moon in which a huge cannon shoots astronauts into space. The theory suggests what might happen if a mantle plume, a stream of lava welling up from deep within the Earth, builds up beneath a thick chunk of immovable continent called a craton.

If the craton started splitting or "rifting", which could occur every 100 million years, the release of pressure would produce a catastrophic gas explosion. Gases would surge up and burst out at the surface, poisoning the atmosphere and causing severe environmental stress around the world.

The blast would trigger a magnitude 11 earthquake, bigger than any quake ever recorded - but with the main event yet to come. Immediately after the explosion, pressure would plummet in the pipe that carried the gases, causing it to cave in from the bottom upwards.

The scientists claim the idea can account for all the impact signatures associated with mass extinctions.

Courtesy of Ananova

Hot curries can guard against the deterioration of the brain and help keep Alzheimer's at bay.

The news comes after a study into the health benefits of curcumin, found it has power to protect against the onset of Alzheimer's disease.

Curcumin is found in everything from the mildest korma to the hottest vindaloo and scientists in Italy and the US say the oil is a chemical trigger that enhances enzyme activity.

They add it protects the brain against the progression of neurodegenerative disease, reports The Times.

Studies on rats found that curcumin induces an enzyme, hemeoxygenase (HO-1), which operates as a defence mechanism against "free radicals", rogue molecules that cause cells to function abnormally and die.

The damage done by free radicals to intracellular targets such as DNA or proteins has been shown to be a major cause of diseases such as Alzheimer's and are thought to be a major factor in the way people age.

The work by researchers from the University of Catania, Italy, and New York Medical College, presented to the American Physiological Society, showed rat neurons exposed to higher concentrations of curcumin were less affected by cell damage due to increased levels of HO-1.

The team described the findings as "an important first step" in determining curry's role as a preventive agent against neurodegenerative conditions such as Alzheimer's, and its possible benefits for slowing the progression of the disease.

Tumeric is used in powder form in curries, and is prepared by boiling the root for several hours, then drying it for a long-period before crushing.

India, which produces and consumes most of the world's tumeric, has much lower rates of Alzheimer's among the elderly than Western countries, dropping to as little as one per cent of over-65s in some areas.

Courtesy of Ananova