In this Starbucks era where coffee is frequently a dessert-like confection full of caramel, chocolate syrup, or other exotic flavors, people may have lost their ability to enjoy a plain cup of coffee. But great coffee doesn’t need adulteration. On December 6, learn how the bean, the roast, the water, and other ingredients combine to create a cup of the good stuff at a lecture by Andrea Illy, Chairman of illycafe, S.p.A. and coauthor and publisher of Espresso Coffee: the Chemistry of Quality. At this first event in the Science & the City Food Series, discuss the science of coffee and enjoy an espresso or cappuccino at the post-event reception.

Click here for more information about the event.

In their new book, Lois Gresh and her coauthor Robert Weinberg use the stories of horror master Stephen King as a jumping-off point to share principles of science. The mayhem caused by psychic abilities in Carrie, Firestarter, and The Dead Zone paves the way for a discussion of human consciousness and modern neuroscience; The Stand provokes a look at fictional and real plagues; while the parallel worlds and alternate histories at the heart of The Dark Tower bring up theoretical physics from relativity to wormholes.

Gresh will sign copies of her book and talk about the “science” in science fiction at a Science & the City @ NYAS event on November 29.

Click here for more information about the event.

“The best wars finish fast. Nearly forty years and more than forty billion dollars since the official launch of the War on Cancer in 1971, that effort shows no signs of ending,” writes Devra Davis. In her new book, The Secret History of the War on Cancer, Davis describes how the cancer-research community focused on detecting and treating cancer while neglecting to thoroughly investigate the many things known to cause cancer including tobacco, the workplace, radiation, or the global environment.

In a note to readers Davis writes:

The hubris of the formal war on cancer is clear today. President Nixon in 1971 declared war on the disease itself, but left untouched the things known at the time to cause it, including tobacco and synthetic hormones. From the start, the cancer effort has made astonishing advances in treating and finding the disease, but failed to tackle known carcinogens like radiation, benzene, asbestos and other toxic materials, including tobacco until quite recently. The enterprise has virtually ignored the incompletely tested 80,000 industrial chemicals found—in infinite combinations—in everything from cosmetics to carpet glue.

Friday November 16, as part of the Science & the City @ NYAS event series, Davis will read from her book and discuss how the War on Cancer was influenced by leaders of industries that made cancer-causing products or that profited from drugs and technologies designed to find and treat the disease.

Click here for more information about the event.

A paper just published in The Lancet reports on an encouraging result in a clinical trial of an experimental malaria vaccine called RTS,S. Previous trials had shown that the vaccine provides protection for children aged 1-4, but this new trial showed that it is both safe and effective in very young infants. Although further investigation remains to be done, the result is heartening because these babies are among the most vulnerable to infection with malaria. According to Nature magazine, “The latest trial raises hopes that the malaria vaccine riddle has been cracked, and that babies can now be protected for the first two years of their lives: a strategy that could prevent millions of deaths.”

On Wednesday October 24, the New York Academy of Sciences will host a symposium organized in cooperation with the Johns Hopkins University Bloomberg School of Public Health titled Progress Against Malaria: Developments on the Horizon. Among presentations by nearly a dozen top malaria researchers, the event will feature a talk by Christian Loucq, director of the PATH Malaria Vaccine Initiative, which sponsored the successful trial of RTS,S. The meeting will also include discussion of new diagnostic tests, prevention and treatment strategies, and malaria-resistant mosquitoes, as well as recent work in Macha, Zambia, where malaria research is conducted in a unique rural setting. To register or to learn more about the event, visit the NYAS Web site.

Click here to listen to a Science & the City podcast with Angelique Corthals, a biological anthropologist who—in addition to her work on the genetics of ancient mummies—studies the social and landscape processes underlying endemism of malaria in the peruvian Amazon.

Have you ever been plagued by an earworm—an insidiously catchy tune trapped in your head? The pervasive and distracting way that the Jeopardy theme song can permeate consciousness demonstrates the powerful influence of music on the human brain. In his new book Musicophilia: Tales of Music and the Brain, neurologist Oliver Sacks, the author of Awakenings, The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat, and many other books, shares his patients’ experiences with music. From the man who was suddenly inspired to become a pianist at the age of forty-two after being struck by lightning, to the way in which music can calm and organize people whose memories are ravaged by Alzheimer’s or amnesia, Sacks will discuss how music can be both a neurological symptom and a tool for healing.

Listen to Science & the City’s podcast interview with Oliver Sacks or read an interview with him in the current edition of the New York Academy of Sciences Member Magazine.

Sacks will speak Tuesday, October 16, at 6 pm at The New York Academy of Sciences, 250 Greenwich St., 7 World Trade Center, in lower Manhattan. The event is part of the Science & the City Author Series.

For the past three summers, the rich, the powerful, and the just plain curious have converged on the former mining town of Aspen, Colorado for a weeklong bit of intellectual prospecting. In between informal conversations with celebrities like Bill Clinton, Richard Branson, Karl Rove, Lance Armstrong, and Jessye Norman, this year’s Aspen Ideas Festival featured a special program track focusing on some exciting recent developments in neuroscience.

Invited by the William A. Haseltine Foundation for Medical Sciences and the Arts, prominent researchers explained why technologies like positron emission tomography (PET) and functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) have not only revolutionized how scientists gather information about how the brain works, but also call into question some very fundamental ways in which we understand ourselves and organize our society. The New York Academy of Sciences was there, and has just published an online eBriefing documenting the event.

Perhaps the most startling presentation on the program came from Miguel Nicolelis, a Brazilian neurophysiologist now based at Duke University. He and his team are developing brain–machine interfaces consisting of electrodes implanted in the brain connected to sophisticated computer programs that can analyze firing patterns of individual neurons. In one series of experiments, Nicolelis used this approach to teach monkeys to play a video game purely by thinking. His work won’t just benefit couch potatoes, though. Nicolelis hopes one day that such a technology could enable people with paralysis to move and to physically manipulate their environments.

Jeffrey Rosen, a legal scholar at George Washington University, and Michael Gazzaniga, a neuroscientist at the University of California, Santa Barbara both focused on the approaching collision between neuroscience and the law. They pointed out that lawyers are already invoking information from brain scans in defense of criminal behavior, arguing in effect that abnormalities like brain lesions can cause certain antisocial behaviors. Although juries have been skeptical, it is clear that new knowledge about how the brain works could have important implications for basic concepts of free will and responsibility upon which American legal practice relies. Gazzaniga is now helping to direct the Law and Neuroscience Project, a new initiative sponsored by the MacArthur Foundation that is bringing neuroscientists, judges, philosophers, and other scholars together to explore when neuroscience belongs in the courtroom, and when it doesn’t.

The conference also included a personal talk by Bob Woodruff of ABC News, who suffered traumatic brain injury when he was struck by a bomb while covering the war in Iraq in January 2006. He described the experience in harrowing detail, including his long recovery and how the experience has changed him. Other participants included National Medal of Science award-winner Nancy Andreasen on what imaging technologies tell us about individual differences, PET pioneer Marcus Raichle on some vast unexplored areas of brain activity, and former Disney Imagineer Eric Haseltine on some experiments you can do to catch your brain tricking you.

In addition to a meeting summary, the eBriefing also includes complete audio/slides/video of the speakers’ talks, a video introduction with interviews, and a printable e-book consisting of edited transcripts.

Steven Pinker’s new book, The Stuff of Thought: Language as a Window into Human Nature, is a 500-page exploration of the way the mind negotiates reality. Pinker, who conducts research on language and cognition as a psychology professor at Harvard, exposes how language reveals the way humans perceive space, time, and causality.

William Saletan writes in the New York Times Book Review:

“The Stuff of Thought explores the duality of human cognition: the modesty of its construction and the majesty of its constructive power. Pinker weaves this paradox from a series of opposing theories. Philosophical realists, for instance, think perception comes from reality. Idealists think it’s all in our heads. Pinker says it comes from reality but is organized and reorganized by the mind. That’s why you can look at the same thing in different ways.”

NYAS members can read an excerpt from the book in the current edition of the New York Academy of Sciences Member Magazine. Or buy a signed copy of the book this week at the Academy:

Pinker will speak Friday, October 5, at 6 pm at The New York Academy of Sciences, 250 Greenwich St., 7 World Trade Center, in lower Manhattan. The event marks the launch of the Science & the City Author Series.

While going green is sometimes seen as an economic inconvenience, many companies are thriving and making hefty profits while helping the environment. Each year Inc. magazine names the Green 50—a group of entrepreneurial companies that have committed to green initiatives and environmental sustainability.

Five of the 50 companies named on the 2006 list are based in New York. One company, Verdant Power, was in the news this week because of the underwater turbines they installed to convert currents in the East River to household electricity last December. The New York Times reported that after preliminary maintenance, the company has great expectations for the new technology that allows Verdant to foresee exactly when the turbines will generate power by monitoring current activity.

Another New York company on Inc.’s list, Voltaic Systems, has transformed environmentalism into a fashion accessory with the creation of solar powered backpacks made from recycled plastic products that are capable of charging electronics on the go.

Josh Dorfman, author of The Lazy Environmentalist and producer of a nationally broadcast radio show of the same name, also made the list with his Brooklyn-based company, Vivavi, which offers modern, eco-friendly home furnishings and a way for consumers to use the web to find green homes to rent or buy. Other New York area Green 50 companies are IceStone building products and Green Order sustainability consulting.

Just how much impact can one green idea have? CNN reported financial group Credit Suisse’s cooling system that uses blocks of ice to channel cool air throughout their Manhattan office building reduces greenhouse gases equivalent to “taking 223 cars off the streets and planting 1.9 million acres of trees.”

These companies demonstrate business savvy can turn green ideas into greenbacks. To help translate ideas from the laboratory to the marketplace, the New York Science Alliance is hosting a 12 week Technology Venture Course at the New York Academy of Sciences beginning September 4.

More advice for aspiring tech entrepreneurs is on offer at Financial Research Associates’ Green Building & Technology- Finance, Construction and Investment summit on September 24-25.

To learn more about Trey Taylor, the president and co-founder of Verdant Power visit the archives of the New York Academy of Sciences Magazine. To sign up for the Technology Venture Course visit Science & the City.

*Image above of Vivavi’s tonecoon chair

Image courtesy of John Pazmino

If you’ve received an e-mail touting the appearance of two moons in the August sky, you have been deceived.

The Mars Hoax reappears every summer in a pesky e-mail chain letter designed to mislead gullible readers and stargazers. The spam missive claims that the red planet will come abnormally close to Earth on August 27 and appear the size of the moon in the night sky. As a result, astronomers throughout the country find themselves explaining how this event is utterly impossible to those who have fallen for the scam.

These are the facts: When Mars is closest to Earth, it is 56 million kilometers away. On August 27, 2003, when the red planet came as close to the earth as it will for another several thousand years, it appeared six times larger and 85 times brighter than usual—although nowhere near the size and brilliance of the moon.

Even when the moon is farthest from the Earth—some 405,503 kilometers away—Mars is still too far away to appear the size of the moon to the naked eye.

The hoax stirred up in 2003 may be especially compelling this year, says John Pazmino of NYSkies Astronomy, because a lunar eclipse will occur at 4:51 AM on August 28. If observers go out that night they may actually see the large red ball they expect.

“They are bamboozled by the eclipsed moon, believing it is Mars!” he said.

In reality, the red planet will appear low in the northeast sky during the eclipse, says Pazmino. “Look at the moon, then do an about-face. You’ll be looking right at Mars.”

However, contrary to what you may have heard, Mars will actually be closest to Earth in December this year.

Join NYSkies on August 16 for the next lecture in their seminar series which is held the first and third Thursday of every month.

Next Friday, August 17, the Columbia Department of Astronomy will open its roof for a stargazing session at the Rutherford Observatory. Stargazers will be able to see the craters on the moon and Saturn’s rings through an assortment of telescopes, and volunteers will be available to offer insight on the night sky.

According to a study conducted at Johns Hopkins University, students in the U.S. lose on average approximately 2.6 months of grade level equivalency in math computation over the summer months, while loss in reading varies depending on family income.

The study also found that students who attend summer camps and enrichment programs displayed increased self-esteem, leadership skills, and improved peer relationships. Luckily, you can fight the summertime learning lull by bringing your child to some of the many science-related activities happening this month.

Rather than hire a babysitter, working parents can enroll their child in drop-off programs this August at the New York Hall of Science, Brooklyn Children’s Museum, and many more.

Week-long camps are still open for registration, including two at the New York Aquarium that start August 13: Aquatic Adventures for ages 6 to 8 and Marine Explorers for ages 9 to 12.

The Brooklyn Botanical Garden offers children’s summer classes that look at nature through poetry, painting, and even culinary arts.

This Saturday, children as young as pre-K and kindergarten can learn about animals and their adaptations at the Staten Island Zoo’s Kids and Critters program, which explores a new topic each month.

Or, families can join the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation for nature walks, environmental games, crafts, and cake in celebration of Smokey Bear’s 63rd birthday this Saturday.

Check out more science events for kids going on this week including Family Science Workshop: Volcanoes Rock!, Greenhouse Exploration, and Larry Cat in Space by searching for “Kids & Families” events in the Science and the City Events Calendar.

The annual late summer Perseid Meteor Shower can be seen for several weeks but the best night to catch a glimpse of shooting stars may be the weekend of August 11th — the peak of the event when as many as 60 meteors per hour will streak the skies over New York.

The Perseid shower occurs each year when the Swift-Tuttle Comet crosses earth’s orbit. The meteor shower reaches its peak when the earth passes through the dustiest part of the comet’s tail.

Shooting stars will radiate from the constellation Perseus from which the meteor shower gets its name. Although the moon will be close to new during the shower’s peak, light pollution will make it hard to see the star show from the city itself.

Luckily, on Saturday August 11th, the Amateur Astronomers Association of New York (AAA) is hosting three free observing events in dark sky locations: the Anthony Wayne Recreational Area, Great Kills, and Inwood Hill Park.

However, August 13th might actually be the best evening to go outside and look up. Not only will the meteor shower reach its peak that morning but Neptune will emerge as it reaches opposition in Capricornus later that day.

Just how enthusiastic are New Yorkers about stargazing? Some residents are choosing their homes based on their fascination with watching the stars. Arc Development, a New York-based real estate company, has created Solaria, the city’s first residential building with an exclusive stargazing deck and rooftop observatory. Residents can watch the stars through a top-of-the-line Meade telescope and receive stargazing sessions and educational astronomy programs through AAA as well as a one-year-complimentary membership to the association.

For those of us unable to invest in real estate to satisfy our interest in astronomy, we can still learn more about the heavens at a handful of events that will be held throughout the city this week.

On August 2, the NYSkies Astronomy Seminar series will host Lyman Page from Princeton University who will discuss the first half million years after the Big Bang in a lecture entitled Observing the Birth of the Universe.

The Hudson River museum will also hold their weekly Friday Star Night planetarium show.

On August 7, The Hayden Planetarium at the American Museum of Natural History will show Virtual Universe: The Dark Side, a presentation in which viewers will explore the world’s largest cosmic atlas that extends from Earth to the furthest points charted by NASA.

For maps of the August sky visit www.aaa.org

New innovations in technology and communication have sparked a generation-defining activist movement — mostly advertised in the color green. While the “going green” revolution often focuses on what we can individually do to narrow our ecological footprint, the New York State Energy Research and Development Authority (NYSERDA) has taken a responsible statewide approach with the Leading the Way in Energy Innovation initiative released in June.

The initiative was developed to address three main themes: climate change, economic development, and energy infrastructure reliability. Among many goals, by 2010 NYSERDA hopes to lessen the environmental impacts of energy use by “encouraging the development of support services for renewable energy resources and optimizing the energy performance of buildings and products.”

The New York legislature hopes to create a framework to encourage environmentally efficient technology and education to its residents and businesses. Next month, construction will be complete on the Saratoga Technology and Energy Park (STEP), a 280-acre complex of office and manufacturing space for the new energy industry. STEP will also house the new Department of Environmental Conservation’s Alternative Fuel Vehicle Research Lab to promote the transition away from petroleum-based transportation.

In Albany this week, The New York Academy of Sciences and New Energy New York, a consortium of energy-related technology organizations including NYSERDA, will organize the 2nd Annual New Energy Symposium. Due to increased interest in green energy, this year the conference has added an extra day devoted to a hydrogen expo at which participants will have the chance to present and discuss the latest research and technology.

If the trip from NYC to Albany seems too long — or you’d just like to lessen your carbon footprint by minimizing travel — you can enjoy two free lectures on energy and the environment close to home: New York City’s Renewable Energy Future by Tria Case of Bronx Community College and the Secret Science Club event called “It’s Hot, Hot, Hot” at which William Schlesinger, Professor Emeritus of Biogeochemistry at Duke, and co-principal investigator for the Free Air Carbon Dioxide Enrichment (FACE) Experiment, will explain how CO2 emissions affect a forest’s ecosystem and what we can do to reduce our impact on climate.

Like the progressive and ever-changing nature of scientific research, artistic expression is an eclectic and technologically expanding field. Last April, The New York Academy of Sciences embraced the many connections between science and art with an event entitled Biology and Art Symposium: Two Worlds or One? at which nine scientists and artists presented their interpretations of life science through visual representation. If you missed the event, you can read about it here or take advantage of the many opportunities to explore the link between science and art at the city’s galleries and museums this summer.

On display until November 30, at The New York Hall of Science, is an exhibit entitled BioScapes, which shows the winners of last year’s Olympus International Digital Imaging Competition, a contest to find the best images of life science specimens captured through light microscopes.

The Hall of Science is also currently exhibiting deep water photography of microscopic marine ecology by Michael S. Maurer and is preparing for their September 29 opening of Digital ’07, the 9th Annual International digital print exhibition that “utilizes the structures and patterns of the universe to create art.”

If photography is not your interest, you might prefer learning about the intersection of art and technology in the many design exhibits at the Cooper-Hewitt National Design Museum. The museum houses an exhibit showcasing the progress of technology and design through an artifact timeline and currently hosts Design Life Now, 2006, an exhibit which curators say “brings together the experimental designs and emerging ideas—including animation, new media, and fashion, robotics, architecture, product, medical, and graphic design—at the center of American culture from 2003 to 2006.”

Or, learn how design can be not just beautiful but extremely useful at Design for the other 90%, an exhibit featuring technologies used for natural disaster recovery and poverty alleviation throughout the world.

Just as art can be found in science, so can science be found in art. The Metropolitan Museum of Art employs advances in science to protect its ancient collection of visual work. Dr. Eleonora Del Federico, a professor at the Pratt Institute who is on sabbatical working as part of the Met’s Art Department of Scientific Research, is studying how Mobile Nuclear Magnetic Resonance (Spectroscopy) can help assess the degradation of mural paintings and manuscripts. Del Federico, along with her colleague and fellow chemist Alexej Jerschow of New York University, were the first to publish an account of why ultramarine — a color of royalty and wealth that was used in the frescoes paintings such as the walls and ceiling of the Sistine Chapel — fades over time.

Jerschow said in a Science Daily interview:

Apart from the scientific interest in this work, these activities have created an exciting opportunity for both science and arts students to transcend discipline boundaries. These unique investigations promise to have tremendous impact on our understanding and prevention of the chemical processes that underlie the slow–often irreversible–decay of our cultural heirlooms.

For more science and nature art exhibits in the New York Tristate Area, search Art Exhibits in the Science & the City Calendar of Events.

After almost two years and $109 million of renovations, the Liberty Science Center in Jersey City will reopen Thursday, debuting new exhibits, refurbished old favorites, and the unprecedented Jennifer A. Chalsty Center for Science Learning and Teaching.

The new exhibit Skyscrapers! allows guests to explore a model skyline revealing the careful planning of these giant buildings, while kids and adults alike can join the action in a video game battle between invading germs and the immune system in Infection Connection. Just next door, Eat and Be Eaten houses some of the latest additions to the center’s family—leaf-tailed geckos, snapping turtles, mantids and many more exotic reptiles and insects.

The Communications exhibit features “The Eye Gaze,” a motion tracking device that allows visitors to use a computer without their hands. Instead of a keyboard and mouse, the users direct their eyes at an onscreen control to play music or turn on a light. The exhibit also looks at the history of writing. Guests can engrave clay, explore calligraphy, and even take the journey of a text message through fiber optic cable and radio waves.

Visitors should prepare to spend at least four hours if they want to catch most exhibits but should still save time for an IMAX show. The museum’s Dome Theater hasn’t changed and is still the largest in the world. Opening week will feature daily showings of Hurricane on the Bayou, Roving Mars, and Mummies: Secrets of the Pharaohs, which features the first scientists to extract DNA from ancient Egyptian pharaohs.

The Chalsty Center invites students and teachers from around the area to take part in hands-on labs. The popular Live From… lab will continue in the new center so that 7-12 grade students can once again watch live cardiac, neuro, or robotic surgeries while participating in on-site discussions with the surgeons and nurses as they work! As part of the museum’s refurbishment, handheld keypads were integrated into the exhibit so that students can respond to questions from the instructors and see how their answers compare to those of other students.

Also new to the center is the sophisticated Global Microscope, which shows digital images of global warming indicators, atmospheric changes, and other occurrences on earth’s surface as well as other planets in our solar system.

Best of all, the Liberty Science experience doesn’t end when you walk out the door. The Center has developed the Science Now, Science Everywhere program which allows guests to use their cell phones to download exhibit information not only while they’re in the Center but also long after they leave. To check out more information on exhibits, IMAX show times, and Learning Center activities, visit www.lsc.org and the Science & the City events calendar.

A scientific illustrator and entomologist, Maria Sibylla Merian (1647-1717) created portraits of insects and butterflies that are not just beautiful, but are also empirically accurate. Merian was an avid naturalist and raised butterflies to study the stages of their development. Many of her paintings feature insects in their various stages of metamorphosis alongside the plants upon which they feed.

Metamorphosis was a theme of Merian’s life as well as her work. After stints as an art teacher, business owner, and insect collector, in 1699, Merian transformed herself into a field biologist, and left her husband behind to travel with her youngest teenage daughter from the Netherlands to Surinam, where she spent two years sketching and observing tropical flora and fauna. Her paintings from this period became the book, The Metamorphosis of the Insects of Surinam, published in 1705.

Images from that book are shown in the newest Science & the City online art gallery, published with the permission of the National Museum of Women in the Arts.

The gallery is accompanied by an excerpt from the new biography of the naturalist, Chrysalis: Maria Sibylla Merian and the Secrets of Metamorphosis, called “spellbinding” by the New Yorker. The book is authored by science writer Kim Todd, who spoke recently at the Explorer’s Club in New York.

In the foreword to her masterwork, Merian explained how friends’ insect collections provoked her curiosity and inspired her to travel to the tropics, writing:

In these collections I had found innumerable other insects, but finally if here their origin and their reproduction is unknown, it begs the question as to how they transform, starting from caterpillars and chrysalises and so on. All this has, at the same time, led me to undertake a long dreamed of journey to Suriname.

Click here to see some of her paintings from Surinam.

Maria Sibylla Merian died in 1717. Six plants, nine butterflies, and two beetles are named for her.

For more about the contributions of female scientists, you might enjoy this podcast of a roundtable discussion at the American Museum of Natural History, held in honor of the 100th anniversary of the birth of Rachel Carson, entitled Remembering Silent Spring.

— Graphic contributed by John Pazmino, author of the SpaceWalk column for the New York Space Society.

Look to the western sky this Saturday or Sunday evening just after dusk and you will see Venus and Saturn getting cozy. For the last month, the two planets have been approaching one another in the night sky; each night getting closer to this weekend’s convergence.

On Saturday evening, Venus — the planet that is switching next month from its role as Evening Star to that of Morning star — will appear directly underneath Saturn. By Sunday evening, skywatchers will see Venus on Saturn’s lower left.

After this weekend, Venus and Saturn will pull apart and appear closer to the horizon at sunset each night.

According to Space.com, if you compare Venus and Saturn with a telescope, it is easy to see a difference in brilliance between the two planets. Venus appears much brighter than the mellower yellower Saturn.

An author on the eponymous Science Blog explains the reason for Venus’ shining appearance and offers a word of caution for people dreaming of visiting the planet named for the goddess of love, writing:

Venus is so bright because the planet’s clouds are wonderful reflectors of sunlight. Unlike clouds on Earth, which are made of water, clouds on Venus are made of sulfuric acid. They float atop an atmosphere where the pressure reaches 90 times the air pressure on Earth. If you went to Venus, you’d be crushed, smothered, dissolved and melted–not necessarily in that order. Don’t go.

Skywatching material provided to S&C by NYSkies Astronomy Inc. Click here for information about the next NYSkies event.

For 200 years Governors Island, a 172 acre piece of land in New York Harbor, at the mouth of the East River, was a military outpost. In 2003 the island was sold to New York State for the token sum of $1 — with the stipulation that there be no residential development on the property.

The planning and redevelopment of Governors Island is the responsibility of The Governors Island Preservation and Education Corporation which recently shared with the public the five proposals they commissioned for the 40-acre park area at the southern half of the island.

You can see the five visions for Governors Island online here and in person at an exhibition on Governors Island entitled The Park at the Center of the World. The organizers of the exhibit write:

The title “pays homage to Russell Shorto’s book, The Island at the Center of the World, a history of the Dutch in Manhattan, and references not only Governors Island’s location at the center of New York Harbor but its potential role in future waterfront access and recreation in the region.”

In an analysis of the designs, the New York Times voiced the city’s high hopes for the site, writing:

Its history and location give the island the potential to become one of the great civic undertakings in New York City, a rival in beauty, if not in scale, to Central Park and Prospect Park.

Yet realizing that potential is not without its challenges. According to a recent New York magazine article about the options for the island’s development, the island is a “remarkably difficult development conundrum, whose recent history is littered with failed plans.”

To maximize the site’s potential, designers have had to address the two major questions New Yorkers have been asking themselves when thinking about the island and its redevelopment: 1) How do I get out there? and 2) Why should I bother going?

Future development will offer new answers to those questions, but even now there are ways and reasons to go to Governors Island. Weekends in the summer a free ferry service departs from the Battery Maritime Building located adjacent to the Staten Island Ferry in Lower Manhattan and CUNY is hosting an exhibit and lecture series on the historic island. The theme of this year’s second annual series is Stabilizing the Climate in the 21st century and Energy Solutions for the 21st century.

This Saturday William Solecki of Hunter College will give a lecture entitled Environmental Change and Urban Sustainability — The Case of New York City.

More information on the event can be found here.

For more about urban development and design check out these podcasts from Science & the City:

• Urban Sustainability — Albert Appleton.
• Skyscraper Science — Carol Willis, founder, director, and curator of the Skyscraper Museum.
• Is Sustainable Development Feasible? — Jeffrey Sachs, Director of the Earth Institute

The arrival of summer couldn’t be more pleasant in the city this week, with sunny skies, sailboats on the Hudson, and breezes rustling the trees. But summer solstice also marks the beginning of the terrifying smog season for asthma sufferers, and, as a meeting on new research on air pollution’s role in asthma held earlier this year at the New York Academy of Sciences noted, there’s an inordinate number of them in the Bronx. A report on the meeting posted earlier this month, and available unabridged to NYAS members, explains:

In the Bronx, rates of asthma, while somewhat lower than they’ve been, are still so high that asthma constitutes a chronic epidemic. The City’s Asthma Initiative reports that rates tend to be highest in the lowest-income neighborhoods; hospitalization rates are highest for children. New York City ranks third on a list of the 50 U.S. cities with the largest numbers of children exposed to dirty air.

Experts blame the major highways that carry asthma-exacerbating diesel trucks through the Bronx and a large number of facilities that emit other known air pollutants there.

In one step in the right direction, the EPA yesterday announced plans to strengthen air quality standards for ground level ozone for the first time in 10 years.

But ironically, today’s news revealed that one of Mayor Bloomberg’s initiatives aimed at cleaning up the city air, Congestion Pricing, was killed in Albany yesterday.

If asthma is a concern to you or your family, the Asthma Initiative at the city’s Department of Health is a great resource. In New York, you can also request brochures and other materials by dialing 311. And you can keep a daily eye on air quality in New York at the EPA Region 2 Air Quality Index online.

— Graphic contributed by John Pazmino, author of the SpaceWalk column for the New York Space Society.

Venus, the second-closest planet to the Sun, appears brighter than the brightest stars in our night sky. Because she orbits the Sun every 224.7 days — faster than the Earth’s 365.2 day orbit — Venus overtakes the Earth every 584 days, at which time the planet changes from being the Evening Star, visible after sunset, to being the Morning Star, visible before sunrise.

The ancient Greeks identified a morning star and an evening star which they called Eosphoros and Hesperos. But after noticing the stars would appear and disappear at intervals and could never be seen in the sky at the same time of year, they concluded the stars were a single celestial body. The planet was later named Venus in honor of the Roman goddess of love.

After shining brilliantly in the evening sky all through the spring, this month Venus starts fading from the view of nocturnal skywatchers. By late July she’s lost in strong twilight and by mid August she will have shifted to the dawn sky. Venus will remain the morning star for the rest of 2007.

In her endgame as evening star, Venus puts on two final shows. On June 18th she convenes with Regulus, Saturn, Moon, and Beehive star cluster, lining up with them in a slanted row in the west. You may need binoculars to make out the Beehive cluster in strong twilight or misty summer air.

For the rest of June, watch Venus and Saturn converge, night by night, until on July 1st, they almost touch.

This skywatching material is provided by NYSkies Astronomy Inc.

As Natalie Angier’s New York Times tribute to the splendiferous sperm attests, Father’s Day is a true celebration of basic science. Then there’s anthropologist Sarah Blaffer Hrdy’s essay today in Time Magazine, The Psychology of Fatherhood, which points out that “Father’s Day salutes the world’s greatest dads, but it takes science to explain why some aren’t so great.” With no disrespect to all the fellas who’ve heroically taken on parenting of another’s offspring with little concern for what Angier calls “the central verity of paternity — that it’s a lot more fun to become a father than to be one,” we think Sunday seems the perfect holiday for a science outing.

Here are some fun ways to spend time with Dad, in New York or elsewhere this weekend:

• Check out Dad’s Day Out at the Bronx Zoo, 10:00-5:30, Saturday and Sunday. Enjoy games, storytelling, and music while zookeepers demonstrate the toys that help animals stay as physically fit and mentally stimulated as dear old Dad.

• Stay up superlate Saturday night and greet the dawn on Father’s Day watching the sky with Dad and the New York Amateur Astronomers Association at Bear Mountain or at Great Kills in Staten Island

• If you’re in the Boston area, take in Father’s Day brunch at the Boston Museum of Science.

• In Avon, Ohio, a weekend-long fair pays tribute to Dad’s favorite quick fix tool. The Duct Tape Festival promises lots of low tech educational entertainment.

• In Oakland, Calif., Dads can take a mission to Mars at the Chabot Space Center.

• If Dad has more fun tinkering around the garage, check out Make Magazine’s guide to DIY gifts for Dad. If you happen to be a Dad yourself, you’ll find plenty of projects here you can rope the kids into.

This week is the International Conference on the Biology, Ecology, and Conservation of Horseshoe Crabs at Dowling College on Long Island.

Horseshoe crabs, so named because they resemble the shape of a horse hoof, are not crabs at all. One of the oldest species still alive today, horseshoe crabs evolved about 300 million years ago — predating dinosaurs by some 100 million years.

If you’re on the water this summer, you can participate in a horseshoe crab monitoring study organized by the Long Island Horseshoe Crab Network and headed by Dr. John T. Tanacredi. The group says:

Anyone sighting a horseshoe crab, along the coast of Brooklyn, Queens and Long Island, is asked to make report through this form from May 1st. The information to be collected includes name, address, telephone number and e-mail of the reporter, date, time, location and condition of tide, number of Horseshoe Crabs, number living and dead, male, and female at sighting. Instructions are available for determining sex and measuring size by clicking this link.

This season will be the second year of data collection for this multi-year study. The data collected will be used to identify horseshoe crab population trends and to target sites for future research.

In honor of a creature who has evolved very little, check out Creatures of Accident, a Science & the City podcast with zoologist Wallace Arthur explaining how simple creatures evolved into complex ones via the accidental processes of duplication and divergence.