Researchers at MIT have developed a new paper-like material that can sop up oil and other environmental spills and leave the water behind!

The scientists say they have created a membrane that can absorb up to 20 times its weight in oil, and can be recycled many times for future use. The oil itself can also be recovered. Some 200,000 tons of oil have already been spilled at sea since the start of the decade.

"What we found is that we can make 'paper' from an interwoven mesh of nanowires that is able to selectively absorb hydrophobic liquids--oil-like liquids--from water," said Francesco Stellacci, an associate professor in the Department of Materials Science and Engineering and leader of the work.

The combination of a nanowire mesh and a water-repellant coating makes this material effective for the purpose. Other applications include water purification and filtering. Link (with video) -via Digg

(image credit: Francesco Stellacci, MIT, and Nature Nanotechnology)

How do you win the title of World's Greatest Fisherman? How about being the first person ever to reach the “Holy Grail”, as defined by the International Game Fish Association!

Zyg Gregorek, 65, is the first recreational fisherman anywhere to catch all 27 species in the three so-called "royal slams" set by the International Game Fish Association (IGFA) – hooking nine species of shark, including the great white, ten of billfish and eight of tuna.

Gregorek has traveled the world and fished for many years to achieve the title.

Rob Kramer, president of Florida-based IGFA, described Mr Gregorek's achievement as "totally unique". He said: "To achieve one royal slam is impressive but to get all three is unheard of. He is the first and maybe the last. These awards are considered the big one – the Holy Grail. They are spectacular – travelling to exotic places and chasing a specific species of fish."

Mr Kramer stressed: "It is not about luck – you have to research, to know exactly where to go and when. Zyg is, by definition, the world's greatest fisherman."

Gregorek, from Halwill in Devon, England, tells a few fish tales to The Scotsman. Link -via Fark

(image credit: Marlin World Cup)

Etsy seller OctopusMe has metal jewelry made from real octopi octopusses. I’m not sure I want to know how it’s done. Tentacles hanging from your earlobes would be an instant conversation starter. Link -via Dump Trumpet

Ice is a great insulator, as attested to by anyone who has visited an igloo. English Russia has a video report of a hot sauna built from ice! If that isn’t weird enough, you’ll see a builder chinking the cracks with slush using his bare hands. And after a nice hot sauna, the participants take a dip in the water outside! The audio is in Russian. Link -via Unique Daily

Wired has a gallery of some of the stranger gadgets the CIA developed since the 1940s.

"Many of the devices first seen in movies and on TV actually came about," says Robert Wallace, former head of the CIA's covert skunk works, the Office of Technical Services. "Remember the Cone of Silence? We built shielded enclosures that did the same thing. And the pen communicator in The Man From U.N.C.L.E.? That evolved, 10 years later, into short-range agent communication."

Unfortunately, those particular devices are not illustrated in this post. In his new book Spycraft, Wallace writes about the CIA’s technical advances and some ideas that didn’t quite work out. The cigarette pistol pictured was a success! Link

(image credit: Steve Sanford)

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You might think that videogames began with Pong, but here’s one that dates back fifty years!

Way back in 1958, William Higinbotham invented Tennis For Two to liven up visitor day at Brookhaven National Laboratory, his workplace. The game uses an oscilloscope with two control pads. It remained largely unknown until 1981 when a lawyer trying to break Magnavox's patent for video games came across writings talking about the game.

Blueprints of it were found to predate Magnavox's game, the case was settled out of court, and the game found fame as the second ever invented, since it was later predated by A.S. Douglas' 'OXO' game from 1952.

The music is “To Find Our Freedom” from The Peacekeepers Peacespeakers. -via Grow-A-Brain

Leanne makes itty-bitty needle felted birds and nests that look like the real thing (only smaller). In this picture, you see cardinals, a goldfinch, a chickadee, and some robins, among others. The entire nest is only four inches long! Link -via Everlasting Blort

Sex and the City was an HBO series for six seasons and now a theatrical feature film. Today’s lunchtime quiz at mental_floss asks how well you know the world of Sex and the City. I didn’t take the quiz because I’ve never had HBO. http://www.mentalfloss.com/blogs/archives/15337

OK, should I put sliced onions on the soles of my feet, or is it Vicks VapoRub? If I get hiccups, will someone drop keys down my back for me? These are just a few of 15 of the Weirdest Home Remedies and Folk Treatments Ever. Some are gross, and some are just plain dangerous. http://remedicated.com/2008/05/29/15-of-the-weirdest-home-remedies-and-folk-treatments-ever/ -via Digg

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Comedic actor Harvey Korman died yesterday at the UCLA Medical Center after a long and distinguished career in movies and television. He was 81. In this scene from the 1974 movie Blazing Saddles, Hedley Lamarr elicits a pledge of allegiance from a group of doofuses. -via Viral Video Chart

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/n/a/2008/05/29/state/n155845D90.DTL to obituary.

See more funny clips of Korman's work at YesButNoButYes.

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This is obviously a case of life or death, from the kitten’s point of view. -via Cynical-C

A monkey at the University of Pittsburgh is able to use a robotic arm to feed himself using only the power of brain signals.

"It's the first time a monkey--or a human--is directly, with their brain, controlling a real prosthetic arm," says Krishna Shenoy, a neuroscientist at Stanford University who was not involved in the research.

People who suffer from strokes or spinal cord injury, or from some neurodegenerative diseases, such as amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS), are often left paralyzed. But their cerebral cortices--the parts of the brain that control movement, planning, and other functions--may remain largely intact. Scientists hope to capitalize on that with the development of brain machine interfaces--devices that convert brain activity into action, such as movement of a cursor on a computer screen.

Two monkeys in the experiment had previously learned to move the robotic arm using a joystick. In the brain wave experiment, their arms were temporarily restrained. Link (with video) -Thanks, Bill!

A fossil fish, estimated at 380 million years old, has been discovered in the act of giving birth. The fish and her offspring died while still connected by an umbilical cord.

Dubbed "mother fish" by the scientists who discovered her in northwestern Australia, Materpiscis attenboroughi is not only an entirely new genus and species, but pushes back the first known case of live birth in the animal kingdom by some 200 million years.

The discovery is also the earliest evidence so far of internal fertilization, or sex with penetration. Other fish species from the Middle Palaeozoic Era laid eggs. Link -via J-Walk Blog

(image credit: Museum Victoria)

Analogy is the name of a clock by designer Jesson Yip.

Analogy is a typographic clock which fuses the immediacy of digital with the visual-spatial quality of analogue into a new hybrid format. Presenting an everyday object with a fresh twist.

See it in action. Link -Thanks, Bill!

Cracked has a rundown of 5 scientists who performed experiments on themselves and and one facility that will make you cringe. Usually I recommend an article based on the subject matter (which is fascinating here), but this one is also fun to read for the inspired hyperbole of the writing.

Here we look at seven self-endangering scientists who only wear lab coats because you can't get explosive-bear-proof tuxedos outside of MI6. Each one of these researchers has been voted "Most likely to inject themselves with the Omega Serum while shouting, 'Dammit, there's no time for testing!'"

It’s from Cracked, so heed a warning for language. Pictured is Albert Hoffman, the only featured scientist most people are familiar with. Link