Among the creatures that survived the trans-Pacific trek aboard the Japanese dock was this sea star, which was found inside the float.
Credit Oregon Department of Parks and Recreation / AP
A large dock washed ashore early Tuesday on Agate Beach in Oregon. The nearly 70-foot-long dock was torn loose from a fishing port in northern Japan by last year's tsunami and drifted across thousands of miles of Pacific Ocean. Marine scientists are worried that invasive species may be among the 100 tons of marine life that traveled aboard the dock.
Credit Oregon State University's Hatfield Marine Science Center
Workers from the Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife remove marine organisms from the dock. Marine biologist John Chapman says the dock may have carried hundreds of species and millions of organisms across the ocean.
Credit Edward Backus / flickr
The dock was encrusted with mussels, barnacles and other marine life from Asia. Marine biologists were surprised to see that coastal creatures survived the trip in the open ocean.
A bizarre event has drawn scientists to a beach in Oregon — a floating concrete dock from Japan has washed ashore. It had been ripped from its moorings by last year's tsunami and floated across the Pacific.
The dock is encrusted with mussels, barnacles and other marine life from Asia. Scientists are amazed these organisms survived the 14-month voyage, but they're also worried some of these organisms could become pests in U.S. waters.
This is SCIENCE FRIDAY. I'm Ira Flatow. Last week, the SpaceX Dragon capsule splashed down in the Pacific, wrapping up a glitch-free journey to the International Space Station. It was an historic first. The Dragon is really the only private spacecraft to have made the trip. This time there was only cargo aboard. But it will be - not be long before astronauts are hitching rides on the Dragon? That's what SpaceX is planning for next, and they hope to have seats ready for travelers by 2015. So you can mark that in your calendar.
You're listening to SCIENCE FRIDAY. I'm Ira Flatow. Our next story is about one person's garbage being another person's treasure. You know how that works. Well, this one is a very interesting story. Last year, the National Reconnaissance Office, they operate America's spy satellites, well, the National Reconnaissance Office called up NASA with an offer: Would NASA like a couple of old spy telescopes? We don't need them. Could you do anything useful with them? We'll give them to you.
This is SCIENCE FRIDAY. I'm Ira Flatow. If you look up in the sky at night, especially later this year, you can spot the Andromeda Galaxy, it's a small cloudy smudge in space. It's our galaxy, the Milky Way's closest galactic neighbor, about two and a half million light years away.
President Obama opened himself up to withering Republican attacks Friday via an off-hand statement he made in a brief White House news conference.
Obama seemed to suggest that matters were going swimmingly for the private-sector part of the economy and that it was the reduction of government jobs that was the real problem.
Asked to respond to Republican charges that he was blaming Europe's economic policies for the alleged failure of his own domestic economic policies, Obama said:
This is SCIENCE FRIDAY. I'm Ira Flatow. Meet Flame, every PC owner's worst nightmare. This newly discovered malware gives an attacker remote access to your computer. It can listen in on your conversations, look through your webcam. It was first detected in the Middle East and has been infecting computers for at least two years.
Reporting in the journal Nature Communications,researchers write that they were able to track down the cells causing clogged arteries. Dr. Jill Helms, co-author on the study, discusses why stem cells are to blame and how the study could lead to more effective treatments.
Alan Alda challenged scientists to explain what a flame is to an 11-year-old. Three months and more than 800 entries later he is back with the winner of the contest. Ira Flatow and guests discuss the winning entry and why the contest was an effective exercise in science communication.
The days are getting longer, and the kids are getting antsier.
Summer must be right around the corner.
So earlier this week, we led a chat on Twitter with Dr. Robert Block, a pediatrician who is president of the American Academy of Pediatrics, about some tips for a healthier summer.
In an action-packed half-hour, he tackled questions ranging from how to pick a sunscreen to how to get kids to eat better.
Here are some highlights from the chat, which was tagged #nprkids, on Twitter.
It could very well end up being the song of this summer. Carly Rae Jepsen's "Call Me Maybe," a sunny pop song about a nascent crush, is No. 2 on the pop charts and No. 1 on iTunes.
But, perhaps the bigger sign that it has just crept everywhere is when someone on the Internet mashes up a President Obama remix.
First Lady Michelle Obama, here with students from Bancroft Elementary School and Kimball Elementary School, has done a lot to promote healthy family dinners and garden-fresh food.
More than 10,000 of you took our recent survey about how your family meals stack up against the Obamas'. And it turns out, you're a pretty healthy bunch.
And today's last word in business is: Don't drive like my brother. That's the sign off heard each week at the end of NPR's most popular program. Were talking, of course, about CAR TALK. Brothers Tom and Ray Magliozzi have been dispensing humorous auto advice on the radio for more than 25 years. But today, the duo said they're putting the breaks on the program. In October they'll call it quits and no longer record new episodes.
An operation by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement's (ICE) Homeland Security Investigations (HSI) has led to the arrest of 190 people accused of producing, distributing or possessing child pornography.
"Let this operation be a warning to anyone who would think they can use the Internet to exploit children: we are out there looking for you, we will find you, and you will be prosecuted," ICE director John Morton said in a statement.
In Dark Horse, Abe (Jordan Gelber) and Miranda (Selma Blair) meet at a wedding and start a relationship soon after, though not for the most romantic reasons.
Credit Jojo Whilden /
Abe's father, played by Christopher Walken, is angry at the world — and his only son. He consoles himself through buying mom-and-pop businesses and watching lots of TV.
It's tough to get on Todd Solondz's wavelength, but boy is it worth the emotional gyrations. Just when you've decided he has too much contempt for his characters to do more than take cheap shots, he'll shock you with flashes of empathy, insights that cast a revelatory light over what came before. You could never call Solondz a humanist, but he achieves something I've never seen elsewhere: compassionate revulsion.
"I'd like to come back every 50 years and see how we can use certain technological advantages to our advantage," said science-fiction author Ray Bradbury. He died Tuesday at age 91.
Ray Bradbury didn't like negative people. The science-fiction writer and author of Fahrenheit 451 told Terry Gross in 1988 that he found out about negative people in fourth grade, shortly after his classmates started making fun of him for collecting Buck Rogers comic strips.
This week, the Library of Congress announced that Natasha Trethewey, the Pulitzer Prize-winning author of Native Guard, will be the next poet laureate of the United States.
I'll Have Another, which was set to run for racing glory in Saturday's Belmont Stakes, will not be racing for the Triple Crown.
"History is going to have to wait for another day," owner J. Paul Reddam said during a press conference at Belmont Park, today. Reddam said I'll Have Another, who had good odds of becoming the first winner of a Triple Crown since 1978, was suffering from tendinitis in his left, front tendon and that the colt's racing career was over.
I'm Michel Martin, and this is TELL ME MORE, from NPR News. Later in the program, we're going to check in with the leader of a group of Catholic nuns who are heading out on a bus tour to protest budget cuts to programs that help the poor - this, even as the Vatican singled them out for paying too much attention to social justice issues, and not enough to social issues like abortion and same-sex marriage. We'll ask why they're doing it, and what they say about the Vatican's rebuke. That's our Faith Matters conversation in just a few minutes.
One thing about the economic pain Spain, and other EU countries, are now experiencing - it's offering something of a break to President Obama in this campaign season, where he's trying to fend off Republican attacks on his handling of the sluggish American economy. In a White House press conference this morning, the president was able to point to Europe's financial woes as a drag on the economy here in the U.S.
This just in from NPR's communications department:
June 8, 2012; Our Fair City – Tom and Ray Magliozzi, aka Click and Clack the Tappet Brothers, the comedian mechanics who host NPR's Car Talk, will tell their listeners this afternoon that as of this fall, they'll no longer record new programs. But their weekly call-in series will continue to be distributed by NPR drawing on material from their 25 years of show archives.
All the interpretations you ever wanted to hear about the Wisconsin recall results are in this week's podcast: what it means for labor, what it means for November, and, most importantly, what it means for NPR's Ron Elving and Ken Rudin. Plus, a look at Tuesday's primaries in California and New Jersey. And what is Bill Clinton up to, anyway?
NPR's Ron Elving and Ken Rudin bring you the latest in this week's roundup.
President Obama used the White House press briefing room this morning to again make the case that Congress — and in particular the Republican-controlled House — needs to take up more of his ideas about how to boost job growth.
He also said it's "offensive" to suggest "my White House" may have leaked some secrets to gain political advantage.
We updated with highlights, so hit your "refresh" button to be sure you're seeing our latest.
Update at 12:15 p.m. ET. Romney Says Obama Is 'Out Of Touch':
The NBA finals aren't the only big news in Oklahoma City.
This morning, shareholders of Chesapeake Energy, the natural gas driller at the center of the nation's hydraulic fracturing controversies, are meeting in Oklahoma City, where the company is headquartered. But the buzz at this gathering won't be about fracking or basketball. It will be about Aubrey McClendon, Chesapeake's controversial CEO.
One day after seeing its sovereign debt downgraded to just above junk status, Spain is dealing with reports that it's about to ask the other eurozone nations for help in bailing out its beleaguered banks.
Good morning, I'm David Greene. High school students graduating in Prince George's County, Maryland, got a surprise on their diplomas: a typo. The diplomas celebrated that each of the 8,000 students had completed an approved "progam" of study.
The Washington Post reports that the school system has ordered new diplomas, and apologized. School officials had a pretty good excuse; they blamed vendor error. No word yet on whether a dog was somehow involved.
There was "blood on the floor ... pieces of flesh ... a tablecloth filled with gore" when U.N. monitors and journalists got to one home today in a tiny central Syrian village where activists say dozens of people were killed by pro-Assad forces this week.
That's the report from NPR's Deborah Amos, one of the journalists traveling with those U.N. monitors. She spoke with our Newscast Desk just after 9 a.m. ET, from that village.
Lizzie Skurnick writes the "That Should Be a Word" column for the New York Times Magazine.
England has always reveled in its drawing-room dramas, from Jane Austen's social minefields to E.M. Forster's Howards End to Upstairs, Downstairs — and yes, the blockbuster Downton Abbey.
Our MORNING EDITION colleague Steve Inskeep is in the midst of a revolutionary road trip: a journey through North African nations at the center of the Arab Spring. Now, as Steve was preparing for his trip from Tunisia through Libya and to Cairo, he spoke with a journalist who has covered Libya for years.
STEVE INSKEEP, HOST:
Her name is Lindsey Hilsum, author of the new book, "Sandstorm," about last year's revolution that overthrew Libyan ruler Moammar Gadhafi. Hilsum pays particular attention to that country's women.