Long Before "GODZILLA"

Remarkable Skull of Predatory
Dinosaur Unearthed on Madagascar
Several specimens of a large predatory dinosaur -- including a nearly complete, exquisitely preserved skull -- were recently recovered on the island of Madagascar. The discovery is announced in a recent issue of the journal Science by a team of researchers funded by the National Science Foundation (NSF) and led by paleontologist/anatomist Scott Sampson of the New York College of Osteopathic Medicine of the New York Institute of Technology. The 65- to 70-million-year-old fossils, attributed to an animal called Majungatholus atopus (a theropod dinosaur), were unearthed on an international expedition conducted by Science paper co-author David Krause of the State University of New York at Stony Brook. With a total body length of almost 30 feet, Majungatholus was the top predator of the time on Madagascar.    More...

Artwork by Bill Parsons. Images courtesy of Science.

National Institute for Science
Education Graduate Forum, June 29-30
An NSF-sponsored National Institute for Science Education (NISE) Graduate Forum will be held June 29-30 at the Key Bridge Marriott Hotel in Arlington VA. The forum will feature promising practices in graduate education in the United States and alternative strategies for successfully implementing such practices. Organized by the University of Wisconsin-Madison Graduate School and NISE, the forum is one of a number of NSF-supported initiatives intended to improve data and information about science and engineering graduate education in the United States.    More...

NSB Hearing Highlights Importance of
Informal Education in Improving Science Literacy
A better connection between informal and formal education would help to prepare K-12 science and mathematics students for the 21st century, according to several participants at an unusual hearing in Los Angeles on May 29. The one-day hearing, titled "Enriching Lives Through Informal Education," was hosted by the Committee on Education and Human Resources (EHR) of the National Science Board (NSB). Held at the Natural History Museum of Los Angeles County and the California Science Center, the hearing is the first of three planned by the Board's education committee to increase the Board's geographic outreach.    More...

Automatic Observatories Watch
Upper Atmosphere from Antarctica
A network of six unmanned Antarctic Geophysical Observatories (AGOs) housing instruments to collect data about the earth's ionosphere and magnetosphere at high latitudes is now up and running in the remote reaches of Antarctica. The AGOs operate all year long, including over the long polar winter. "Data from the AGOs, added to observations from the inhabited Antarctic stations and from AGOs of the British Antarctic Survey, are beginning to give us a wealth of information about the ionosphere at high geomagnetic latitudes -- the region around the earth's geomagnetic pole," said John Lynch, National Science Foundation (NSF) program director for polar aeronomy and astrophysics.    More...