A real-life snapshot of Jurassic Park has been unearthed in the Argentinean province of Chubut. The treasure trove of fossils gives the first complete view of life 165 million years ago. Initial searches have already uncovered the bones of one plant-eating sauropod and a couple of predatory theropod dinosaurs. But what surprised the researchers from Argentina was the richness in small vertebrate fossils. Frog, fish, turtle, small mammal and plant remains have all been discovered.

Researchers in New Zealand have found that hidden cameras both reduced the number of crashes and speed of drivers in camera zones and cut the average speed of drivers on all roads. Officials at the Land Transport Safety Authority in Wellington found that hidden cameras led to an 11 per cent drop in open road accidents and a 19 per cent drop in casualty rate. Compared with the localised effect of visible cameras on speeds and crashes in speed-camera areas, the hidden cameras had a more general effect on all roads, they say. Although motorists could not see the cameras, publicity and warning signs alerted them that they were entering a speed-camera zone. The researchers think that the uncertainty of not knowing exactly where the cameras were made drivers more cautious.

American researchers have found that the offspring of drivers with a bad accident record are also likely to have a disproportionate number of accidents when they start to drive themselves. Researchers have found that the children of parents who had been in at least three crashes in the previous five years were 22 per cent more likely to have crashed their car than the children of parents who had not had an accident. They found a similar link for traffic violations such as exceeding the speed limit and running a red light. If the parents had three or more violations, their children were 38 per cent more likely to have broken traffic laws. Sons were twice as likely to have broken traffic laws as daughters. However, children from single-parent households had a slightly better accident record - possibly because these familis are likely to drive less, the researchers say.

The new portable soccer ball-sized chemical sensor system being developed by researchers in the USA is claimed to be capable of detecting even the smallest traces of explosives underwater - whether in a paddy field or deep in the ocean.

The sensor system, still in the proto-type stage, takes a sample of liquid drawn from water-surrounding submerged objects containing explosives and identifies the explosive based on the chemical signatures of the material. Developed by researchers of Sandia National Laboratories, its looks for actual explosive materials which eliminated the possibilities of false alarms.

After drawing a sample of the liquid, the sensor extracts the molecules of interest in a fibre and desorbs the molecules from the fibre into an ion mobility spectrometer (IMS) which analyses the material’s actual molecular make-up to identify the explosive, according to a Sandia release. The system relies on a concentration technology that gathers samples on a fibre and concentrates it thousands of times, facilitating levels large enough to analyse.

Several factors affect the system. The first is the phenomenon that all ammunitions or unexploded ordnance items that contain explosives emit molecules of explosive chemicals in trace amount which can be found in the surroundings.

Again, a type of polymer fibre (prolydimethysiloxane/divinylbenzene copolymer) attracts specific types of explosives chemicals in cool temperatures. The molecules loose their attraction for the fibre on mild heating causing them to rapidly desorb, which is the third factor contributing to the sensor system.

The researchers insert a polymer fibre into a syringe used to collect water samples near under-water explosive devices. The near-dry fibre containing the molecules is then removed from the collecting device and placed in the IMS where it is heated slightly.

When the molecules jump off the fibre, measurement of the rate at which the molecules transit the IMS, identifies the explosive.

The sensor system currently works only outside water but a new waterproof packaging is being developed to make it function underwater, the release says.

To reduce the size of the system, the researchers reduced the IMS from a commercially made 30 pound shoe-box sized device to a five-pound unit that fits in a person’s hand. The entire system weighs about nine kilograms. Tests conducted at several US naval facilities, have shown concentrations of the explosives can be detected at distances of more than 40 feet from the source.