Sci/tech tidbits in and around New Hampshire
Do cell phones belong in the wilderness?
The Appalachian Mountain Club has an excellent piece online (right here) debating the role of cell phones when hiking in the White Mountains and wilderness areas of the Northeast. It's well worth a full read. The story includes an interview with Lt. Jim Kneeland of NH...
In Boston, a material not found on Earth is being made
Researchers in Northeastern University in Boston and Cambridge in the UK have figuring out how to atomically manipulate iron and nickle to create tetrataenite, a material known only from meteorite samples that isn't known to exist on Earth. That's a potentially big...
Methane-leaking landfills dominate map of NH greenhouse gas emitters
Two of New Hampshire's landfills, in Rochester and Bethlehem, are by far the biggest emitters of greenhouse gas in the state according to a just-released global survey. The Bethlehem landfill, North Country Environmental Service, emitted 212.29 kilotons of greenhouse...
‘Burnt out’ N.H. publisher turns over reins of ‘Amazing Stories’ magazine
Steve Davidson, the New Hampshire man who owned the trademark of the name "Amazing Stories" and in 2012 brought back the classic science fiction magazine, first digitally and then in print (erratically), has stepped down: In straightforward terms, I’m burnt out, I’m...
N.H. patents through Nov. 6
(Note: The US Patent Service has changed the way it reports patents and as a result, we can no longer include direct links to each patent. You can find them here, using the patent number. Sorry for the inconvenience.) By Targeted News Service WASHINGTON – The...
Ballot-counting machine using Linux was tested in NH
Voters in three small New Hampshire towns will be putting their ballots into a new type of counting machine Tuesday – one that runs on open-source software rather than company-controlled software – in a pilot project to see whether digital transparency can increase...
A drone’s look at that reflect-heat-from-Earth experiment in Plymouth
In October I wrote about an interest experiment to see if reflecting heat upwards via mirrors could be a climate mitigation strategy. (The story is here.) Test patterns are being set near Plymouth State University and at NHTI, Concord's community college, to see what...
‘Compostable’ plastic doesn’t, usually
CNN reports: "A new study conducted in the UK found that 60% of products labeled as compostable do not fully break down in home compost." And unlike conventional plastics, these alternatives are largely unregulated, despite their advertised benefits." (The story is...
Big investment bucks flow toward … culverts?
Body Here’s a sentence I didn’t expect to hear during an interview: “That’s why, all of a sudden, people are talking about culverts.” This might be a bit of an exaggeration – OK, it’s a wild exaggeration – but the statement from Rachel Rouillard, director of...
Why does New Hampshire send hundreds of wild animal teeth to a Montana laboratory every year?
Firearms deer season starts next week, so I get to rerun this piece from 2019. (I was reminded of it because Vermont just sent out a notice asking hunters to help collect deer teeth for their assessment program.) When it comes to corporate bragging points, it’s hard...
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