Execution Could Kill Americans’ Access to Key Anesthetic: ‘Next month the state of Missouri is scheduled to execute convicted murderer Allen Nicklasson by overdosing him with propofol, a German anesthetic. Late last week, the European Union announced that the Missouri execution could trigger export controls on the drug. European Union law prohibits export of products that can be used for capital punishment. If export controls kick in, they could block American hospitals’ ability to purchase propofol, which is used in as many as 80 percent of American medical procedures requiring general anethesia.

The drug’s producer, the pharmaceutical company Fresenius Kabi, announced that it has unilaterally blocked distribution of the drug to American correctional systems. However, the E.U. regulations would go further than the private company’s decision.’ (Pacific Standard)

‘A very strange object called WISE J085510.83-071442.5 lies just 7.2 light-years from the earth. Discovered by the Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer (WISE), it is nominally one of those not-quite-planets-not-quite-stars known as a brown dwarf. Because they are so much smaller and cooler than stars, brown dwarfs appear red and faint. But astronomer Kevin Luhman noticed that WISE J085510.83-071442.5 was very red and very faint…partly because it is small—perhaps only 2 to 10 times the mass of Jupiter—and partly because it is so cold. It’s temperature, Luhman found, is only about 9° F (-13° C). That’s well below the freezing point of water. In other words, the brown dwarf is literally ice cold. The fact that it is so cold is a clue to its age. If it started out at a few thousand degrees it would have taken somewhere between 1 and 10 billion years to have cooled to its present temperature.

It may well be that instead of being a brown dwarf, this object may in reality be one of the half dozen or so mysterious rogue planets, the first of which was first observed in 2010. These are worlds that, as the result of some catastrophe, were ejected from their home systems and now orbit the galaxy directly, as our sun does…’ (io9).

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