Now, look here!

The Boston Herald (via Crunchgear) has published a story about the creation of a bionic eye by researchers at The Boston Retinal Implant Project

Designed to be implanted behind the retina, it transmits signals along a fine wire directly into the optic nerve. While this bionic eye won’t provide a great deal of visual resolution and works only for people who were able to see at some time in the past, it holds great promise for helping to restore sight to those who have lost their sight to degenerative diseases of the eye.

Human trials will begin in the next couple of years.

Really, really old stuff

According to its growth rings, the zircon crystal below took 200 million years to grow.

Researchers at the University of Western Ontario discovered these crystals in northern Ontario. For something so small – less than the width of a human hair – they are having a massive impact: their existence has prompted a re-examination of the expected result of subjecting crystals like this to heat and pressure deep under the Earth.

Ideas about how minerals and crystals respond to these conditions may now have to be re-visited. Amazing to think, though, that crystals can be dated in the same way as trees.

Age of the universe

Careful observations, by the Wilkinson Microwave Anisotropy Probe over 3 years, of microwave radiation left over from the Big Bang have produced the most accurate information yet about the age of the Universe: 13.73 billion years, with an error margin of just 120 million years.

The diagram below, courtesy of NASA, gives an idea of the sequence of events during that time.

We really can’t hope to comprehend these sorts of time scales, but the evidence makes for interesting conjecture and a great narrative!

The Bad Astronomy Blog has a great overview of the universe’s story thus far.