November 2018

Femora from Basturs Poble bonebed (Image Víctor Fondevilla et. al.)

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An article published in the journal “PLOS ONE” offers an ontogeny and taxonomy of the remains of hadrosaurids discovered in the Basturs Poble site, Spain. A team of researchers led by Víctor Fondevilla of the Institut Català de Paleontologia Miquel Crusafont (ICP) and the Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona (UAB) examined 270 fossils that could all belong to the same species, Pararhabdodon isonensis, and lived about 70 million years ago. The presence of very different specimens offered a lot of information on the life cycle of this duck-billed dinosaur.

Multilayer graphene has interesting electronic properties

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Two articles, one published in the journal “Carbon” and one in the journal “Nano Letters”, describe research on the electronic properties of graphene. Two teams of researchers coordinated by the University of Linköping (LiU), Sweden, focused on the possibilities of multilayer graphene for a range of applications connected to electronics, for the possibility of using it as a superconductor and in the production of sustainable fuels.

The Web of Easter Island by Donald Wandrei (Italian Edition)

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The novel “The Web of Easter Island” by Donald Wandrei was published for the first time in 1948.

When Willy brings home an object found in Isling’s old cemetery, his mother harshly tells him to bring it back but the kid wants to keep it. In the night, a strange fire kills Willy and drives his mother to madness. His parents die some time later in what’s officially considered an accident caused by lightning.

When Carter Graham discovers the events of Isling, he’s reminded of research he did around the world even if he can’t really see similarities. Intrigued by the existence of the mysterious object discovered by Willy, he decides to investigate and in Isling’s cemetery he discovers an artifact but during his return journey his train derails. The artifact seems lost but a trail of death offers a new trace.

Artist's reconstruction of Elephant Birds (Image courtesy John Maisano for the University of Texas at Austin Jackson School of Geosciences)

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An article published in the journal “Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences” describes a digital reconstruction of the brain of two species belonging to the family of what are called elephant birds. Christopher Torres of the University of Texas at Austin and his colleague Julia Clarke subjected skulls belonging to the species Aepyornis maximus and Aepyornis hildebrandti to CT scans to analyze the structure of their brains concluding that they were nocturnal and perhaps blind animals.

Robert Patrick in 2016

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Robert Hammond Patrick Jr. was born on November 6, 1958 in Marietta, Georgia, USA. After playing mostly small roles for some years, Robert Patrick’s career changed completely when the director James Cameron chose him to play the T-1000 shapeshifter Terminator in the movie “Terminator 2” (1991). The movie also marked his life because during filming he married his girlfriend Barbara, with whom he had two sons.

Robert Patrick’s career made considerable progress also with television productions. After lending his voice to a character in the animated show “The Real Adventures of Jonny Quest” between 1996 and 1997 and being guest star in various TV shows, he joined the cast of “The X-Files” playing agent John Doggett in the show’s last two seasons between 2000 and 2002.