Overnight News Digest: Science Saturday (Summer Solstice 2011 edition)

Welcome to Science Saturday, where the Overnight News Digest crew informs and entertains you with this week's news about science, space, and the environment.  In keeping with the theme of the past four months, Overnight News Digest: Science Saturday is featuring science and other news from the major public research universities in the midwestern states where Republican governors and legislatures are threatening the collective bargaining rights of public employees.

This week's featured stories come from the University of Michigan with the assistance of the White House on YouTube and National Geographic.

President Obama kicks off the Advanced Manufacturing Partnership (AMP), a national collaboration between the government, industries, and universities to invest in cutting-edge technologies, create new jobs and bring about a renaissance in American manufacturing. June 24, 2011

Responding to President Obama's call to action, University of Michigan President Mary Sue Coleman joins leaders from five other universities as part of the Advanced Manufacturing Partnership, a national effort bringing together industry, universities and the federal government.

The goal of the new AMP is to invest in the emerging technologies that will create high quality manufacturing jobs and enhance the United States' global competitiveness.
...
s part of the Advanced Manufacturing Partnership, Obama's plan, which leverages existing programs and proposals, is to invest more than $500 million to jumpstart this effort. Investments will be made in the following key areas: building domestic manufacturing capabilities in critical national security industries; reducing the time needed to make advanced materials used in manufacturing products; establishing U.S. leadership in next-generation robotics; increasing the energy efficiency of manufacturing processes; and developing new technologies that will dramatically reduce the time required to design, build, and test manufactured goods.

"This initiative matters more to Michigan than any other state," Coleman said. "We are at ground zero for losses in manufacturing jobs. But we also are better positioned to be the epicenter of manufacturing innovation. We know how to retool."

National Geographic: Summer Solstice 2011: Why It's the First Day of Summer
Why summer starts today, and why it's the longest day—but not the hottest.
Ker Than
for National Geographic News
Updated June 21, 2011

The first day of summer—heralded today by a manic bunny and bear in a Google doodle by artist Takashi Murakami—officially kicks off today at 1:16 p.m. ET, the beginning of the summer solstice and of the longest day of the year, at least in the Northern Hemisphere.

The summer solstice is a result of the Earth's north-south axis being tilted 23.4 degrees relative to the sun. The tilt causes different amounts of sunlight to reach different regions of the planet.

Today the North Pole is tipped more toward the sun than on any other day of 2011. The opposite holds true for the Southern Hemisphere, where today is the winter solstice, the shortest day of the year.

As a result, at high noon on the first day of summer, the sun appears at its highest point in the sky—its most directly overhead position—in the Northern Hemisphere.

More stories after the jump.