Show Notes:

The Right Personality for Spicy Foods?

• The low down
• The science of spicy food liking and intake shows there’s more to it than just increased tolerance with repeated exposure
• Personality, researchers say, is also a factor in whether a person enjoys spicy meals and how often he or she eats them
• Desensitization to capsaicin, the plant chemical that gives peppers their burn, is well documented, there’s also evidence that the effect is surprisingly small
• Researchers have also previously linked chili liking to thrill seeking, specifically an affinity for amusement park rides and gambling
• Significance
• Investigators found a relationship between chili liking and sensation seeking when using a more formal measure of personality called Zuckerman’s Sensation Seeking Scale
• In both cases, however, the associations were fairly weak, and neither study looked at intake – how often a person eats spicy foods, versus how much a person likes spice.
• A new study used an updated measure of sensation seeking that avoided gender- and age-biased questions
• Ninety-seven male and female participants ranging in age from 18 to 45 filled out a food-liking questionnaire and rated the intensity of sensations after sampling six stimuli, including capsaicin mixed in water
• Sensation seeking emerged as a much stronger predictor of spicy food liking than in the previous studies it also predicted how often a person ate chili-laden meals
• Personality traits, however, were not associated with high liking of non-spicy foods, which reduced the possibility that thrill seekers are just crazy about food in general
• Of Note
• The study group may not have been large enough to show a desensitizing effect as there is a lack of evidence for desensitization in the study boosts the argument for personality as an important factor
• For instance frequent chili eaters didn’t feel the burn from the capsaicin sample any less than people who ate peppers less often
• A combination of factors likely influences who goes for the mild wings on Super Bowl Sunday and who reaches for hot
• Childhood exposure and learning all play a critical role in liking for spicy foods also individuals who acquired an entirely [new] set of food preferences as adults once they moved away from home as may have been a disconnect between reported frequency of intake and actual dose
• Further Reading / In the News
• Love Of Spicy Food Is Built Into Your Personality | Popular Science

— NEWS BYTE —

Public Funded KickSat

• The low down
• KickSat is set to launch more than 200 of these tiny satellites, nicknamed “sprites,” into low-Earth orbit
• KickSat will hitch a ride in September 2013 (subject to change) from Cape Canaveral on CRS–3, the third SpaceX Falcon 9 flight destined for the International Space Station
• The roughly 250 sprites will be sent into space the NASA’s Educational Launch of Nanosatellites (ELaNA) program, will provides a free launch (normally $300,000) for university space research
• Significance
• The team raised nearly $75,000 as more than 300 people sponsored a sprite that will transmit an identifying signal, such as the initials of the donor
• One person, who donated $10,000, Manchester added, will get to “push the big red button” on the day of the launch.
• Of Note
• The “Sprites” are the size of a cracker but are outfitted with solar cells, a radio transceiver and a microcontroller
• A large part of the project is helping people track their own satellites with a simple software radio interface
• From a research standpoint, the plan is to interested in the dynamics and behavior of the satellites, and plans to test how to track their positions and determine their orbits
• It’ll look like hundreds of postage stamps fluttering toward Earth-each an independent satellite transmitting a signal unique to the person who helped send it to space
• Multimedia
• YouTube KickSat | KickSatInSpace
• Further Reading / In the News
• KickSat website
• Kicksat: Crowd-funded, DIY spacecraft to float into low-Earth orbit | phys.org

— TWO-BYTE NEWS —

Smoking and Bone Density

• The low down
• Yet another reason not to smoke, especially as a teenager
• Note that these tests were specifically aimed at women because there is a much higher incidence rate, but similar results might be a near direct correlation to men
• Osteoporosis is a loss of bone density that predisposes people to fractures and leaves many elderly people – particularly women – hunched over
• Significance
• The teen years are crucial to developing a strong, dense skeleton, it is this age group is when you should gain about 50 percent of your bone accrual
• A study recruited 262 healthy girls ages 11 to 17. The girls answered confidential questions about their nutritional habits and lifestyles and returned for three yearly visits to undergo bone density tests
• Girls who reported smoking regularly showed nearly flat rates of bone density growth in the lower vertebrae and a decline in bone density at the hips
• Nonsmokers showed normal, steadily rising bone density in both regions
• By the time they reached age 19, daily smokers in the study had fallen a full year behind nonsmokers in bone mineral accrual
• Of Note
• The effects of smoking tend to be cumulative as the results also seem to concur with studies done in adults
• It is estimated that smoking increases the risk of a vertebral fracture by 13 percent and hip fracture by 31 percent in women
• It is still unclear, however exactly how smoking contributes to the reduced bone mineralization
• Further Reading / In the News
• Smoking hurts teen girls’ bones | ScienceNews.org

Snapshot Serengeti

• The low down
• Researchers at the University of Minnesota have been trying to count and locate the animals of the Serengeti, and began placing automatic cameras across the park a couple of years ago.
• They now have more than 200 cameras around the region – all triggered by motion – capturing animals day and night.
• They have amassed millions of images so far, and more come in all the time. So they’ve team up with us here at the Zooniverse!
• They need the help of online volunteers to spot and classify animals in these snapshot of life in Serengeti National Park. Doing this will provide the data needed to track and study these animals, whilst giving everyone the chance to see them in the wild.
• Snapshot Serengeti

– SPACECRAFT UPDATE –

Opportunity and the Search for a Habitable Environment

• The low down
• Opportunity rover is currently studying clay deposits on the rim of the Red Planet’s Endeavour Crater
• The clays imply that the area was exposed to relatively neutral water long ago, as opposed to harshly acidic or basic
• This clearly show that the chemistry that would’ve been suitable for life at the Opportunity site
• Significance
• The Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter spacecraft spotted them from orbit, leading the rover team to point the golf-cart-size robot toward its current location, which is known as Matijevic Hill.
• From orbit, scientists saw the unambiguous infrared spectral signature of clays along the rim of Endeavour Crater
• At this point Opportunity has already circumnavigated Matijevic Hill and is likely stay at Matijevic Hill for a while, trying to understand how the clays were laid down billions of years ago
• Of Note
• While Opportunity is still going strong, it has some age-related issues, such as an arthritic arm, but the rover remains in good health
• Part of the continuing work will involve investigating mysterious tiny spherules Opportunity has discovered embedded in the clay matrix
• Scientist initially thought the BB-size gray spheres were similar to the iron-rich “blueberries;” however, initial analyses has shown that that’s not the case, leading the team to dub them “newberries.”
• Currently the team isn’t sure exactly what the newberries are, or how they formed
• Social Media
• Spirit and Oppy @MarsRovers
• Further Reading / In the News
• NASA Opportunity Rover Does Walkabout of Crater Rim | NASA
• Mars Rover Opportunity Exploring Possibly Habitable Ancient Environment | Space.com

GRAIL’s Lunar Gravitational Map

• Last time on SciByte
• SciByte 49 | Spinal Cord Injuries & Venus Transit – GRAIL Moon mission extension | June 5, 2012
• SciByte 39 | Amazon & Martian Weather – First MoonKAM Image comes in from the Lunar Orbiters Ebb & Flow | March 27, 2012
• SciByte 37 | Solar Storms & Higgs Boson – SPACECRAFT UPDATE – GRAIL Moon Probes Ebb and Flow | March 13, 2012
• SciByte 27 | Revisiting the Moon – Moon meets GRAIL (Gravity Recovery And Interior Laboratory)
• The low down
• The first science results from NASA’s twin GRAIL lunar orbiters provide incredible detail of the Moon’s interior and the highest resolution gravity field map of any celestial body, including Earth
• Ebb and Flow, send radio signals to each other and any changes in distance between the two as they circle the Moon are measured, down to changes as small as 1/ 20,000th the velocity that a snail moves
• The new gravity maps reveals an abundance of features such as tectonic structures, volcanic landforms, basin rings, crater central peaks and numerous simple, bowl-shaped craters
• Using GRAIL gravity data, scientists found the average thickness of the crust is 32–34 kilometers which is about 10 km less than previous studies
• Gravitational Fields
• The moon’s gravity field is unlike that of any terrestrial planet in our solar system.
• Ninety-eight percent of local gravity is associated with surface topography, while 2 percent are other gravitational features
• In one masin, which forms one of the ‘man on moon’s’ eyes, the gravity maps shows a linear feature crossing the basin while topography maps show no such correlating feature
• The gravity anomaly formed before the impacts, additional data reveal that the Moon’s inner crust in almost completely pulverized
• Results from new data will be released soon
• Lunar Formation Theory
• Data shows that the bulk abundance of aluminum on Moon is nearly the same as that of the Earth which consistent with a recent hypothesis that the Moon is derived of materials from the Earth when it was formed during a giant impact event
• Mission and Mission Extension Review
• During its prime mission, the two GRAIL spacecraft orbited just 55 km above the Moon’s surface
• GRAIL finishes the primary science mission in May and during the mission extension the spacecraft altitude was lowered to just 23 km above the surface
• As the end of the mission nears the team is looking to lower the GRAIL spacecraft down to just 11 km above the lunar surface.
• They will be intentionally crashed into the surface of the moon on Dec. 17 at approximately 2:28 p.m. PST (5:28 p.m. EST).
• Multimedia
• YouTube GRAIL’s Gravity Tour of the Moon | NASASolarSystem
• Further Reading / In the News
• NASA’s GRAIL Creates Most Accurate Moon Gravity Map | jpl.NASA.gov
• GRAIL First Results Provide Most Precise Lunar Gravity Map Yet | UniverseToday.com

The Future Mars Rover?

• The low down
• NASA has announced plans to launch another mega-rover to the red planet in 2020 that will be modeled after Curiosity
• To keep costs down, engineers will borrow Curiosity’s blueprints, recycle spare parts where possible and use proven technology including the novel landing gear
• Significance
• This announcement comes as NASA reboots its Mars exploration program during tough fiscal times
• Many other details still need to be worked out, including where the rover will land and the types of tools it will carry to the surface
• The science goals of the possible rover remains fuzzy, it will probably kick start a campaign to return Martian soil and rocks to Earth
• A team of experts will debate whether the new rover should have the ability to drill into rocks and store pieces for a future pick up
• Of Note
• Curiosity ran over schedule and over budget, but with the engineering hurdles fixed the new rover is expected to cost less than Curiosity
• One independent estimate put the mission at $1.5 billion, though NASA is working on its own figure
• The Future
• Next year, NASA plans to launch an orbiter to study the atmosphere
• After NASA pulled out of a partnership with the Europeans in 2016 and 2018, it announced plans to fly a relatively low-cost robotic lander in 2016 to probe the interior but that it will contribute to the European missions, but in a minor role
• Multimedia
• New Rover to Mars on This Week @NASA | NASATelevision
• NASA ANNOUNCES ROBUST MULTI-YEAR MARS PROGRAM; NEW ROVER TO COME | NASATelevsion
• Further Reading / In the News
• NASA Announces Robust Multi-Year Mars Program; New Rover To Close Out Decade Of New Missions | mars.jpl.nasa.gov
• NASA aims to send another rover to Mars in 2020 | phys.org

Martian Mission Extensions

• NASA plans to keep its Mars assets going as long as possible, the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO), the Opportunity rover and the Mars Odyssey orbiter
• The Mars Odyssey orbiter is not expected to still be viable in 2021, launched in 2001 the orbiter has been showing some signs of age
• Of particularly important for the 2020 rover mission will be functioning orbiters at Mars to help relay communications back and forth to Earth
• Further Reading / In the News
• Mars Rover Curiosity Gets Mission Extension | Space.com

– CURIOSITY UPDATE –

• Mission Extension
• Curiosity’s mission was originally planned to last two years. It has now been extended indefinitely.
• The radioisotope thermoelectric generator (RTG), should be able to continue converting the heat of plutonium–238’s radioactive decay into electricity for an estimated 55 years of positive power margin
• First Round of Tests Complete
• Curiosity has wrapped up scientific study of Rocknest, which also means the team has completed the checkout and first scientific use of all the instruments on the rover
• The ChemCam laser and APXS chemical sensor were used to do initial technical analysis of the soil
• MAHLI, a hand lens imager is used to take close up views of the soil to look at different particle sizes, shapes and colors and how they change with depth
• The team analyzed the X-ray diffraction instrument data to see they can identify minerals in the soil based on their unique crystal structure
• A good amount of the material in the soil was not crystalline but that’s not a problem for the other laboratory, SAM.
• First Round of Tests Complete
• Curiosity has also found that the Martian surface is five times richer than Earth’s in deuterium, a heavy version of hydrogen that contains an extra neutron
• Radiation probably blasted water containing the lighter version of hydrogen into space early in the planet’s history
• The discovery will help scientists better understand Mars’ early atmosphere and climate.
• Of Note
• The overall results show a composition that is typical of Mars soils studied at other sites with perhaps some very simple carbon containing molecules and perchlorate salts.
• Curiosity has not yet seen any complex organic molecules but sand isn’t the best place to look and there won’t be any single image or measurement that’ll answer everything.
• Multimedia
• YouTube Curiosity Rover Report (Dec. 7, 2012): Rover Results at Rocknest | JPLNews
• Image Galleries at JPL and Curiosity Mulimedia
• Social Media
• Curiosity Rover @MarsCuriosity
• Further Reading / In the News
• Mars Rover Curiosity Gets Mission Extension | Space.com
• Transcript | Curiosity Rover Report (Dec. 7, 2012): Rover Results at Rocknest | JPLNews
• Mars rover deploys final instrument | sciencenews.com
• Orbiter Spies Where Rover’s Cruise Stage Hit Mars | mars.jpl.nasa.gov

SCIENCE CALENDAR

Sir Patrick Moore

Looking back

• Sir Patrick Moore (4 March 1923 – 9 December 2012)
• An English amateur astronomer who attained prominent status in that field as a writer, researcher, radio commentator and television presenter
• He presented the BBC programme The Sky At Night for more than 50 years, making him the longest-running host of the same television show
• The author of more than 60 books on astronomy geared toward the general public
• His research was used by the US and the Russians in their space programmes.
• Was a former president of the British Astronomical Association, co-founder and former president of the Society for Popular Astronomy (SPA)
• In 1959, the Russians used his charts to correlate the first Lunik 3 pictures of the far side of the Moon and he was involved in the lunar mapping before the NASA Apollo missions.
• Moore intended to be the first person ever to show a live broadcast of a direct telescopic view of a planet; the result was another unintended ‘comedy episode’, as cloud obscured all view of the heavens
• He participated or presented for Apollo 8–17
• Elected a member of the International Astronomical Union in 1966 and remains the only amateur astronomer to be a member of the IAU
• Further Reading
• BIOGRAPHY OF SIR PATRICK MOORE | bbc.co.uk

Looking up this week

• Keep an eye out for …

• Wed, Dec 12 | Late Twilight | Cassiopeia is on one end hight in the NE, within a few hours it turn into a horizontal M higher in the N

• Thurs, Dec 13 | Later in the night | The Geminid meteor shower, often the best in the annual meteor calendar, should be at its maximum

• Mercury, Venus, and Saturn | SE at Dawn | Form a diagonal as dawn brightens. Venus is the brightest with Saturn to the upper right, (with Spica farther out) and Mercury is to the lower left

• Mars | twilight | Remains low in the SW

• Jupiter | All night | Just after twilight it will be low in the East, moving higher in the sky to the E then SE through the evening, with it’s highest point just before midnight. Aldebaran will be to it’s lower right

• Further Reading and Resources

• Sky&Telescope

• SpaceWeather.com

• StarDate.org

• For the Southern hemisphere: SpaceInfo.com.au

• Constellations of the Southern Hemisphere : astronomyonline.org

• Royal Astronomical Society of New Zealand : rasnz.org.nz

• AstronomyNow

• HeavensAbove