“This innovation sounds like it could be really useful to help people learn what they are looking at. It will be interesting to see how much the camera on the phones will be able to pick up.”

Carolin Crawford, of Cambridge University’s institute of astronomy, comments on Google’s latest toy, which will identify stars and planets via users’ mobile phone cameras (Times).

“It was stunning. I don’t know if I was surprised or simply blown away by what we came across.”

Kirk Olson, of the University of Massachusetts, has seen a mega-herd of Mongolian gazelles gathering (BBC).

“The blue whale, the biggest animal that has ever inhabited the planet, seems to be on the move in the Pacific Ocean in ways that could reflect the revival of old migratory patterns disrupted by decades of intensive whaling in the 20th century.”

Andrew Revkin, of the New York Times, reports on a new study published in Marine Mammal Research.

“[Carbofuran] can over-stimulate the nervous system, causing nausea, dizziness, confusion and, at very high exposures, respiratory paralysis and death.”

The EPA comments on the pesticide carbofuran, which it has just banned (AP).