We take a look at a solar sibling, mapping neurons with crowdsourcing, comets, an exoskeleton to help a paralyzed teen walk, Curiosity news, and as always take a peek back into history and up in the sky this week.

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Show Notes:

The Suns Long-Lost brother

• A team of researchers has identified the first \”sibling\” of the Sun — a star that was almost certainly born from the same cloud of gas and dust as our star
• The Suns \”Sibling\” | HD 162826
• The solar sibling the team identified is a star called HD 162826, a star 15 percent more massive than the Sun, located 110 light-years away in the constellation Hercules
• The star is not visible to the unaided eye, but easily can be seen with low-power binoculars, not far from the bright star Vega.
• Data in the Data
• By coincidence this star has been studied by the McDonald Observatory Planet Search team for more than 15 years
• Combining the data from those studies, together with new calculations has ruled out any \”hot Jupiters\” — massive planets orbiting close to the star
• The studies indicate that it\’s unlikely that a Jupiter analog orbits the star, either, but they do not rule out the presence of smaller terrestrial planets.
• **Identifying***
• The team identified HD 162826 as the Sun\’s sibling by following up on 30 possible candidates found by several groups around the world looking for solar siblings.
• All of these observations used high-resolution spectroscopy to get a deep understanding of the stars\’ chemical make-up.
• Several factors are needed to really pin down a solar sibling, in addition to chemical analysis, his team also included information about the stars\’ orbits, where they had been and where they are going in their paths around the center of the Milky Way galaxy
• Combining information on both chemical make-up and dynamics of the candidates narrowed the field down to one: HD 162826.
• Narrowing Down the Suspects
• Even with information on more stars to work with, it\’s not straightforwards to identify potential stellar siblings
• What the researchers are looking at is spectrographic analysis, certain key chemical elements that are going to be very useful
• Elements are ones that vary greatly among stars which otherwise have very similar chemical compositions, but the team has identified the elements barium and yttrium as particularly useful for differentiating star of interest
• Project Goals
• The project has a larger purpose: to create a road map for how to identify solar siblings
• \”The idea is that the Sun was born in a cluster with a thousand or a hundred thousand stars. This cluster, which formed more than 4.5 billion years ago, has since broken up,\” | Ivan Ramirez, McDonald Observatory
• The member stars have broken off into their own orbits around the galactic center, taking them to different parts of the Milky Way today. A few, like HD 162826, are still nearby. Others are much farther
• Learning More About the Sun
• The newly developed methods for locating the Sun\’s \’siblings\’ will help other astronomers find other \”solar siblings,\” work that could lead to an understanding of how and where our Sun formed, and how our solar system became hospitable for life
• To reach that goal, the dynamics specialists will make models that run the orbits of all known solar siblings backward in time, to find where they intersect: their birthplace.
• Further Reading / In the News
• Astronomers find sun\’s \’long-lost brother,\’ pave way for family reunion | ScienceDaily

— NEWS BYTE —

Gaming for Science | Eyewire

• A team of researchers working at MIT has used data supplied by gamers on EyeWire to help explain how it is that the retina is able to process motion detection
• The team describes how they worked with gamers at EyeWire and then used the resulting mapped neural networks to propose a new theory to describe how it is the eye is able to understand what happens when something moves in front of it.
• What We Know
• Scientists have known for quite some time that light enters the eye and strikes the back of the eyeball where photoreceptors respond
• Those photoreceptors send information they receive to another type of neural cell known as bipolar cells
• They in turn convert received signals to another signal format which is then sent to what are known as starburst amacrine cells (SACs)
• Signals from the SAC are sent via the optic nerve to the brain
• Scientists believe they have a pretty good idea about how the whole process works for static images, they have not been able to get a handle on what happens when images sent to the eyeball have information about things that are moving
• New Research
• The problem with figuring out how nerve cells work in the eye, of either mice or humans, is the inability to watch what happens in action-everything is too tiny and intricate
  +To get around that problem, researchers have been building three dimensional models on computers, but even that gets untenable when considering the complexity and numbers of nerves involved
• In this new effort, the researchers sought to do just that-via assistance from thousands of gamers on the EyeWire game playing site
• That\’s where the EyeWire gamers came in, a game was created that involved gamers creating mouse neural networks-the better they were at it the more points they got
• EyeWire
• In EyeWire you are given a cube to analyze, they have a basic idea of the shape of the Neuron they are looking for
• That shape comes from sequential slices where the computer tries to fill in layer by layer how the neuron moves from slide to slide creating a basic shape
• From that shape the user can scroll up and down the cube going slice by slice to visually correct anything that is not filled in or is filled in too much by the program
• By using ‘crowdsourcing’ the speed in which it moves forward is increased based on the number of people playing
• In addition to helping the scientists directly, they are also using the results to teach the program so that it’s processing ability also increases as the projects goes forward
• The result was the creation of a model that the researchers believe is an accurate representation of the cells involved in processing vision, and the networks that are made up of them
• Results So Far
• They noted that in the model, there were different types of bipolar cells connecting to SACs-some connected to dendrites close to the cells center, and others connected to dendrites that were farther away
• Prior research had shown that some bipolar cells take longer to process information than others
• The researchers believe that the bipolar cells that connect closer to the center are of the type that take longer to process signals
• This, they contend, could set up a scenario where the center of the SAC receives information from both types of bipolar cells at the same time-and that, they suggest, could be how the SAC comes to understand that motion-in one direction-is occurring
• The researchers suggest their theory can be real-world tested in the lab, and expect other teams will likely do so
• If they are right, the mystery of how our eyes detect motion will finally be solved.
• Multimedia
• YouTube | How To Play EyeWire | EyeWire
• YouTube | Gamers Help Solve Neuroscience Mystery | EyeWire
• Further Reading / In the News
• About EyeWire, A Game to Map the Brain
• EyeWire gamers help researchers understand retina\’s motion detection wiring | MedicalXPress.com

Old ‘Asteroid’ Now Comet

• On October 23, 2013, astronomers with the Catalina Sky Survey picked up a very faint asteroid with an unusual orbit more like a that of a comet than an asteroid
• At the time 2013 UQ4 was little more than a stellar point with no evidence of a hazy coma or tail that would tag it as a comet
• The Comet C/2013 UQ4, Formally Known As The Asteroid 2013 UQ4
• On May 7 a remote telescope located in Siding Spring, Australia to take photos of 2013 UQ4 shortly before dawn in the constellation Cetus and they noticed that the asteroid had grown a little fuzz, making the move to comethood
• Assuming the now renamed C/2013 UQ4 continues to spout dust and water vapor, it should brighten to magnitude +11 by month’s end as it moves northward across Pisces and into a dark morning sky
• It currently displays a substantial coma or atmosphere, but no tail is visible yet
• Studies of the comet/asteroid’s light indicate that it is a very dark but rather large object some 4-9 miles (7-15 km) across.
• It’s estimated that it takes at least 500 years to make one spin around the sun
• C/2013 UQ4, belongs to a special category of asteroids called damocloids
• Damocloids
• Damocloids are thought to be comets that have lost \”all their fizz\”
• Their volatile ices spent from previous trips around the sun, they stop growing comas and tails and appear identical to asteroids
• They have orbits resembling the Halley-family comets with long periods, fairly steep inclinations and highly eccentric orbits (elongated shapes)
• Occasionally, one comes back to life. It’s happened in at least four other cases and appears to be happening with C/2013 UQ4 as well.
• Observing
• Perihelion occurs on June 5 with the comet reaching magnitude +8-9 by month’s end
• Peak brightness of 7th magnitude is expected during its close approach of Earth on July 10 at 29 million miles (46.7 million km).
• It’s still bright enough to see in a 12-inch telescope under dark skies
• This should be a great summer comet, plainly visible in binoculars from a dark sky
• It is moving at a very quick pace, at the rate of some 7 degrees per night!
• That’s 1/3 of a degree per hour or fast enough to see movement through a telescope in a matter of minutes when the comet is nearest Earth
• Multimedia
• YouTube | An Unusual Asteroid | NormalLifeIsNotReal
• Further Reading / In the News
• Asteroid 2013 UQ4 Suddenly Becomes a Dark Comet with a Bright Future | UniverseToday.com

— TWO-BYTE NEWS —

Mind-Controlled Exoskeleton

• The World Cup opening ceremony on June 12 a mind-controlled exoskeleton designed to enable a paralyzed person to walk is to make its debut.
• Opening Ceremony
• A BBC report provided the latest developments in the robotic suit. \”If all goes as planned,\” wrote Alejandra Martins, \”the robotic suit will spring to life in front of almost 70,000 spectators and a global audience of billions of people.\”
• The (DiVE) website talks about the day when \”the first ceremonial kick in the World Cup game may be made \”by a paralyzed teenager, who, flanked by the two contending soccer teams, will saunter onto the pitch clad in a robotic body suit.\”
• According to the BBC, since November, Nicolelis has been training eight patients at a lab in Sao Paulo, amidst \”media speculation that one of them will stand up from his or her wheelchair and deliver the first kick of this year\’s World Cup.\”
• The Exoskeleton
• The exoskeleton was developed by an international team of scientists, part of the Walk Again Project, and described by the BBC report as a \”culmination\” of over 10 years of work
• The exoskeleton is being controlled by brain activity and it is relaying feedback signals to the patient.
• The patient wears a cap which picks up brain signals and relays them to a computer in the backpack, decoding the signals and sending them to the legs.
• A battery in the backpack allows for around two hours\’ use. The robotic suit is powered by hydraulics.
• Many different companies helped to build the skeleton\’s components
• They used a lot of 3-D printing technology for purposes of both speed and achieving strong but light materials, along with using standard aluminum parts
• \”When the foot of the exoskeleton touches the ground there is pressure, so the sensor senses the pressure and before the foot touches the ground we are also doing pre-contact sensing. It\’s a new way of doing skin sensing for robots\” | Dr Gordon Cheng, at the Technical University of Munich
• Multimedia
• YouTube | Paralysed teen in exoskeleton to kick off World Cup | Truthloader
• Further Reading / In the News
• Demo of mind-controlled exoskeleton planned for World Cup | Phys.org

— Updates —

Comet Siding Spring

• This October, a comet will brush by Mars giving scientists a chance to study how it possibly interacts with a planetary atmosphere
• An impact of the comet on the surface of the Red Planet has long been ruled out; however, there is now an interesting possibility of possible interactions of the coma of A1 Siding Spring and the tenuous atmosphere of Mars
• Last Time on SciByte …
• SciByte 117 | Asteroid Belt Water | January 29, 2014
• SciByte 90 | Alzheimer’s & Mars Missions | April 16, 2013
  • The Discovery
• The comet C/2013 A1 was discovered in the beginning of 2013 by comet-hunter Robert McNaught at the Siding Spring Observatory in New South Wales, Australia
• When the discovery was initially made, astronomers looked back over their observations to find “pre recovery” images of the comet dating back to Dec. 8, 2012.
• These observations placed the orbital trajectory of comet C/2013 A1 right through Mars orbit on Oct. 19, 2014
• Spacecraft Safety
• Orbiters are designed with the risk of space-dust collisions in mind
• Over a five-year span for a Mars orbiter, NASA figures on a few percent chance of significant damage to a spacecraft from the background level of impacts from such particles, called meteoroids
• If managers choose to position orbiters behind Mars during the peak risk, the further in advance any orbit-adjustment maneuvers can be made, the less fuel will be consumed
• Mars “Fly-By”
• With a nominal passage of 138,000 km [85,750 mi] from Mars, that is about one third the distance from Earth to the Moon, and 17 times closer than the nearest recorded passage of a comet to the Earth, Comet D/1770 L1 Lexell in 1780.
• Although the nucleus will safely pass Mars, the brush with its extended atmosphere might just be detectable by the fleet of spacecraft and rovers in service around Mars
• Spacecraft Involved
• NEOWISE (The Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer) and Hubble are already monitoring the comet for enhanced activity
• Currently on Mars, Curiosity rover is continuing science, the Opportunity rover is also still functioning, and Mars Odyssey and ESA’s Mars Express are still in orbit around the Red Planet and sending back data
• India’s Mars Orbiter Mission and NASA’s MAVEN orbiter arrive just before the comet.
• MAVEN was designed to study the upper atmosphere of Mars, and carries an ion-neutral mass spectrometer (NGIMS) which could yield information on the interaction of the coma with the Martian upper atmosphere and ionosphere.
• Other, Earth Based Observations
• Proposals for using Earth-based assets for further observations of the comet prior to the event in October are still pending
• Amateur observers will be able to follow the approach telescopically
• It’s also interesting to consider the potential for interactions of the coma with the surfaces of the moons of Mars as well, though the net amount of water vapor expected to be deposited will not be large
• Multimedia
• YouTube | Comet C/2013 A1 (Siding Spring) near Mars | SpaceObs
• Further Reading / In the News
• Interesting Prospects for Comet A1 Siding Spring Versus the Martian Atmosphere | UniverseToday.com

— VIEWER FEEDBACK —

Methane Life

• + Twitter | Kenny MacLeod ‏@siabost9deas
• \”Probing the Depths of the Methane World\” Implications for life on worlds like Titan?
• The Low Down
• In 2011, Jennifer Glass joined a scientific cruise to study a methane seep off of Oregon\’s coast
• In these cold, dark depths, microbes buried in the sediment feast on methane that seeps through the seafloor
• The Eco-System
• A product of their metabolism, bicarbonate, reacts with calcium in seawater to form tall rocky deposits
• The chemical energy these organisms extract from methane supports a vibrant underworld
• The group found evidence of a new microbial enzyme that seems to use the trace metal tungsten instead of molybdenum, the metal more commonly found in cold seep environments
• Previously, tungsten had only been found in microbes living at high temperatures, such as the boiling waters of hydrothermal vents
• \”It\’s a very unique chemical environment, with a lot of sulfur,\” \”We think that tungsten might just be more bioavailable in these highly sulfidic conditions.\” | Jennifer Glass
• These systems don\’t depend on oxygen, so the microbe-methane relationship likely developed early in Earth\’s history before the rise of oxygen
• What This Means for Exobiology
• They could also serve as analogues for worlds beyond our Earth.
• Methane has been detected in the atmosphere of other planets. Methane lakes have also been spotted on Titan, Saturn\’s largest moon, making it an intriguing candidate for life elsewhere.
• Further Reading / In the News
• Probing the Depths of the Methane World | AstroBio.net

— CURIOSITY UPDATE —

• Third Drilling Event
• The full-depth hole for sample collection is close to a shallower test hole drilled last week in the same rock, which gave researchers a preview of the interior material as tailings around the hole
• \”The drill tailings from this rock are darker-toned and less red than we saw at the two previous drill sites,\” said Jim Bell
  , deputy principal investigator for Curiosity\’s Mast Camera (Mastcam)
• \”This suggests that the detailed chemical and mineral analysis that will be coming from Curiosity\’s other instruments could reveal different materials than we\’ve seen before.
• Sample material from Windjana will be sieved, then delivered to onboard laboratories for determining the mineral and chemical composition
• One motive for the team\’s selection of Windjana for drilling is to analyze the cementing material that holds together sand-size grains in this sandstone.
• Multimedia
• YouTube Curiosity Rover Report JPLnews
• Image Galleries at JPL and Curiosity Mulimedia
• Social Media
• Curiosity Rover @MarsCuriosity
• Further Reading / In the News

SCIENCE CALENDAR

Looking back

• May 17, 1954 : 60 years ago : CERN Groundbreaking : The official ground-breaking took place at the Meyrin site of the new CERN Laboratory in Geneva. A recommendation had been adopted 12 Dec 1949 at the European Cultural Conference for a European Institute of Nuclear Physics. By 1952, the third session of its provisional Council decided to locate in Switzerland. In Jun 1953, the host community, the canton of Geneva, gave strong approval in a referendum passing with 16539 votes to 7332. On 29 Sep 1954, twelve founding Member States ratified CERN (Centre Européenne de Recherche Nucléaire): Federal Republic of Germany, Belgium, Denmark, France, Greece, Italy, Norway, Netherlands, United Kingdom, Sweden, Switzerland and Yugoslavia.
• The acronym CERN originally stood in French for Conseil Européen pour la Recherche Nucléaire (European Council for Nuclear Research), which was a provisional council for setting up the laboratory, established by 12 European governments in 1952
• The acronym was retained for the new laboratory after the provisional council was dissolved, even though the name changed
• Soon after the laboratory\’s establishment, its work went beyond the study of the atomic nucleus into higher-energy physics
• The NeXT Computer used by British scientist Sir Tim Berners-Lee at CERN became the first Web server, and a Cisco Systems router at CERN was probably one of the first IP routers deployed in Europe

Looking up this week

• Keep an eye out for …
• Wed, May 14 | Full Moon (exact at 3:16 p.m. Eastern Daylight Time.) Look for Saturn to its upper right
• Fri, May 16 | Twilight | Look for Mercury low in the west-northwest, far to the lower right of Jupiter
• Planets
• Mercury | Twilight | Is starting to become visible in evening twilight low in the W-NW to the far lower right of Jupiter about 40-60 min after sunset
• Venus | \”Morning Star\” | Is low in the E during dawn
• Mars | Just after dark | Highest in the S with Spica to the far lower left
• Jupiter | Twilight | High in the W at twilight sinking towards the horizon and setting around midnight

• Saturn | Opposition was on May 10 | At rises at sunset in the SE, is highest in the S around 12-1 am and setting at morning in the W

• 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

The post Solar Sibling & Comets | SciByte 130 first appeared on Jupiter Broadcasting.

We take a look at treating migraines, remembering John Dobson, sending your name to space, story and spacecraft updates, and as always take a peek back into history and up in the sky this week.

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— FauxShow Sticker Awards: —

• FauxShow Sticker Awards

A Blood Pressure Drug That Might Help Migraines

• Researchers have found that the drug Candesartan, used to help lower blood pressure, is as effective in combating migraines as the commonly prescribed drug
• The Study
• This finding is a follow up of a ten-year study from NTNU
• The results were confirmed based on triple a blind test where the doctors, patients and even the researchers were unaware whether the patient was given a placebo or the real drug.
• The study had 72 participants, who suffered migraine attacks at least twice every month
• The patients were given placebo, 16 mg of candesartan or 160 mg of propranolol for 12 weeks each and were given a break of 4 weeks without the medicines before the start of the drug and in between too.
• Study Results
• More than 20 percent of those suffering with migraine attacks felt better even when they were given a placebo.
• The blind test revealed that the candesartan works preventively for more 20-30 percent migraine patients
• The study confirmed that 16 mg of candesartan was as effective as 160 mg of propranolol in treating migraine attacks
• Researchers say that the drug Candesartan may be prescribed for those who get no relief from propranolol, the most commonly used medication to help prevent migraines
• Further Reading / In the News
• Migraine Attacks Can be Prevented with High Blood Pressure Drug Candesartan | ScienceWorldReport.com
• New Hope for Migraine Sufferers | ScienceDaily.com

— NEWS BYTE —

In Memory Of – John Dobson [Sep 14, 1915 – Jan 15, 2014]

• John Dobson is most notable for being the promoter of a design for a large, portable, low-cost Newtonian reflector telescope that bears his name, the Dobsonian telescope
• Dobsonian Telescopes
• Dobsonian Telescope | Wikipedia
• The design is considered revolutionary since it allowed amateur astronomers to build fairly large telescopes
• The design is a very simple, low cost [alt-azimuth mounted Newtonian] telescope that employs common materials such as plywood, formica, PVC closet flanges, cardboard construction tubes, recycled porthole glass, and indoor-outdoor carpet
• He was reluctant to take credit, however, pointing out that he built it that way because it was all he needed
• Sidewalk Astronomers
• Sidewalk Astronomers
• John Dobson was also the co-founder of the amateur astronomical group, the San Francisco Sidewalk Astronomers
• Has members throughout the world, and continues to promote public service astronomy by putting telescopes on street corners in urban areas
• Members of the organization also visit national parks giving slide show presentations, providing telescope viewing
• Misc
• Earned a masters degree in chemistry at the University of California, Berkeley in 1943, working in E. O. Lawrence\’s lab
• Dobson’s interest in telescope building was in part to better understand the universe, and in part to inspire in others a curiosity about the cosmos
• In 2005, the Smithsonian magazine listed John Dobson as among 35 individuals who have made a major difference during the lifetime of that periodical
• Multimedia
• YouTube | Have Telescopes, Will Travel | theimageweaver
• Further Reading / In the News
• John Dobson (amateur astronomer) | Wikipedia

— TWO-BYTE NEWS —

Send Your Name to an Asteroid on OSIRIS-REx

• NASA has invited the public to submit their names that will be engraved on a microchip aboard a spacecraft that will head to the 1,760-foot-wide asteroid 101955 Bennu
• OSIRIS-Rex
• The aim of the OSIRIS-Rex mission is to address the basic questions on the composition of the early solar system.
• The spacecraft will be sent to the asteroid where it will collect about two ounces of surface material and return with it to Earth in a sample-return capsule in 2023
• Once the samples return to the Earth, the spacecraft will be placed into a long term solar orbit around the sun, along with the microchip on which the names are engraved.
• Your Name in Space
• If you want to do this you must submit your name online before September 30 at \’Message to Bennu.\’
• OSIRIS-REx | The Planetary Society | Messages to Bennu
• Your name won\’t just stays up there for the 500 day mission but will remain in space even after the spacecraft returns the capsule to Earth.
• Meanwhile Here On Earth
• Those who have submitted their names can download and print a certificate documenting their participation in the OSIRIS-REx mission
• Participants who have registered their names and who \’follow\’ or \’like\’ the asteroid mission on Facebook and Twitter will get notifications on the status of their name in space from the time it is launched and until the samples are returned to Earth in 2013.
• Multimedia
• YouTube | NASA | OSIRIS-REx Investigates Asteroid Bennu | NASA Goddard
• Further Reading / In the News
• OSIRIS-REx | The Planetary Society | Messages to Bennu
• Send Your Names to an Asteroid, NASA Says | ScienceWorldReport
• Hitch a Ride on the Next Mission to an Asteroid | UniverseToday.com
• OSIRIS-REx | Asteroid Sample Return Mission | osiris-rex.lpl.arizona.edu

— Updates —

\”Cosmos: A Spacetime Odyssey\”

• Last Time on SciByte
• SciByte 53 | Higgs Boson | July 10, 2012
• Cosmos: A Personal Voyage [1981]
• Cosmos: A Personal Voyage | Wikipedia
• Was a thirteen-part television series written by Carl Sagan, Ann Druyan, and Steven Soter, with Sagan as presenter in 1981
• The series was first broadcast by the Public Broadcasting Service in 1980 and was the most widely watched series in the history of American public television until 1990
• It won an Emmy and a Peabody Award and has since been broadcast in more than 60 countries and seen by over 500 million people.
• \”Cosmos: A Spacetime Odyssey\” [2014]
• Cosmos: A Space-Time Odyssey | Wikipedia
• \”Cosmos: A Spacetime Odyssey,\” a 13-part series that will debut March 9 on Fox, that will also air on the National Geographic Channel.
• MacFarlane has been working to bring Sagan’s Cosmos series back to television, with Neil deGrasse Tyson reprising Sagan’s role for a while now,
• Carl Sagan’s Personal Archive
• Last year, SciByte 53, MacFarlane provided an “undisclosed sum of money” to the Library of Congress to purchase Carl Sagan’s personal archive from Sagan’s widow Ann Druyan, who had kept the papers preserved in storage
• When McFarlane got a peek at the collection he said it “ranges from childhood report cards to college term papers to eloquent letters written just before his untimely death in 1996 at age 62.”
• Multimedia
• YouTube | COSMOS: A SPACETIME ODYSSEY – Coming in 2014 | National Geographic Channel AU
• Further Reading / In the News
• NewsDaily: Seth MacFarlane brings his love of science to TV | NewsDaily.com
• Cosmos: A Space-Time Odyssey | Wikipedia
• Cosmos: A Personal Voyage | Wikipedia

— SPACECRAFT UPDATE—

Mystery Rock for Opportunity

• An intriguing recent mystery is a strange rock that suddenly appeared in photos from the Opportunity rover in a spot where photos taken just 12 sols earlier showed no rock
• The team is currently busy taking measurements on the rock, and discussing its origins
• Mars Exploration Rovers, mission principal investigator Steve Squyres
• Described the rock as “white around the outside, in the middle there’s low spot that is dark red that \”looks like a jelly donut\”
• “We had driven a meter or two away from here and somehow maybe one of the wheels managed spit it out of the ground. That’s the more likely theory.”
• “One theory is that we somehow flicked it with a wheel\” … \”the other theory is that there might be a smoking hole in the ground nearby and this may be crater ejecta. But that one is less likely,”
• Another idea suggested by others is that it may have tumbled down from a nearby rock outcrop
• \”We’ve taken pictures of both the donut part and the jelly part,”
• “The jelly part is like nothing we’ve seen before on Mars. It’s very high in sulfur and magnesium and it has twice as much manganese as anything we’ve seen before\”
• \”I don’t know what any of this means. We’re completely confused, everybody on the team is arguing and fighting. We’re having a wonderful time!”
• Further Reading / In the News
• Mars Exploration Rover Mission: Home | marsrovers.jpl.nasa.gov
• The Rock that Appeared Out of Nowhere on Mars | UniverseToday
• Mystery Rock \’Appears\’ in Front of Mars Rover | Space.com

New Horizons Journey to Pluto

• Last Time on SciByte
• SciByte 30 | Solar Storms & Private Space Flight | Jan 24, 2012
• Closest approach
• Closest approach is scheduled for July 2015 when New Horizons flies only 10,000 km [6,200 mi] from Pluto
• If New Horizons flew over Earth at the same altitude, it could see individual buildings and their shapes
• Other than a few indistinct markings seen from afar by Hubble, Pluto\’s landscape is totally unexplored
• Approaching Pluto
• The first step, in January 2015, is an intensive campaign of photography by the Long Range Reconnaissance Imager or \”LORRI.\”
• This will help mission controllers pinpoint Pluto\’s location, which is uncertain by a few thousand kilometers, 1000-3000 km [ 621 – 1864 mi ]
• The scientists will then use the images to refine Pluto\’s distance from the spacecraft, and then fire the engines to make any necessary corrections
• By late April 2015, the approaching spacecraft will be taking pictures of Pluto that surpass the best images from Hubble
• Multimedia
• YouTube | New Horizons Spacecraft Halfway to Pluto | NASAgovVideo
• Further Reading / In the News
• New Horizons | NASA
• Countdown to Pluto | Phys.org

SCIENCE CALENDAR

Looking back

• January 26, 1700 : 314 years ago : Canadian Earthquake : In 1700, an earthquake, the most intense Canada has ever seen, hit the sea floor off the British Columbia coast. Long before Europeans first landed on Vancouver Island, native legend tells of a great disaster. The sea rose in a heaving wave, and landslides buried a sleeping village. Myth was resolved with science in 2003 by government research. Earthquakes of that intensity cause tidal waves, and Japanese written history tells of a massive tsunami striking fishing villages the next day along the coast of Honshu, killing hundreds. Coupled with geological evidence of the level 9 quake, the connection was clear. Mythology and seismology came together to validate history. 1700 Cascadia earthquake | Wikipedia

Looking up this week

• Keep an eye out for …
• Wed, Jan 22 | ~midnight | The moon rises very close Spica, variable blue giant star, with Mars to the upper left. By dawn they are to the SW with Mars to the upper right
• Thurs, Jan 23 | 1am local | Mars-Spica are now to the upper right, about an hour after they rise Saturn can be seen to the lower left. By dawn they are lined up horizontally
• Planets
• Venus | Early Dawn | Rises in the E-SE, moving higher each day
• Mars | 11-12 pm | Rises in the E-NE with the variable blue giant star is about 6* below it, rising the highest point in the S at early dawn [5* three middle fingers together at arms length]

• Jupiter | Evening | Rises in the E sky, moving overhead around 11pm

• 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

The post Migraines & John Dobson | SciByte 116 first appeared on Jupiter Broadcasting.

We take a look at the Russian Meteorite ‘strike,’ a dark matter announcement, headaches, asteroid flyby, viewer feedback, an update on CERN, Curiosity news, and as always take a peek back into history and up in the sky this week.

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MP3 Audio | OGG Audio | Video | Torrent | YouTube

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MP3 Feed | OGG Feed | Video Feed | Torrent Feed | iTunes

Picks of the Week:

[asa]B00B7VZN76[/asa]
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Show Notes:

2013 Russian Meteorite Strike

• Why didn\’t we \”See it coming?\”
• NASA’s Near Earth Object Program and other skywatchers track thousands of larger asteroids, with smaller asteroids nearly impossible to track
• There are probably about 100 million asteroids about it\’s size with about 100,000 being Near Earth Objects
• Only one space rock that impacted the planet has ever been observed before it hit the Earth, a day before it exploded over Sudan.
• Most meteorites that do hit the Earth tend to be smaller, and reflect only a couple percent of the light that hits them, and ones of this size have to be very close to be able to spot them with telescopic surveys
• What Was Seen
• On February 15, 2013 at 9:20 am (0320 GMT), an object was observed above Chelyabinsk which flew by at great speed and left a trail behind. Within two minutes there were two bangs,\” regional emergencies official said
• It traveled through the atmosphere for about 30 seconds before breaking apart and producing violent airburst ‘explosion’ about 20-14 km (12-15 miles) above Earth’s surface
• Measurements Coming In
• On February 16 NASA revised it\’s measurements to about 55 feet (17 m) wide — with the power of the blast estimate of about 500 kilotons, 30 kilotons higher than before
• Updated mass measurements estimated about 10,000 tons and was travelling 40,000 mph (64,373 km/h) when it exploded
• New estimates were generated using new data that had been collected by five additional infrasound stations located around the world
• The first recording of the event being in Alaska, over 6,500 kilometers away, infrasound stations detect low-frequency sound waves that accompany exploding meteors, known as bolides
• The Power
• The explosion had the equivalent of up to 500,000 tons of TNT
• About 30 times the energy output of the Hiroshima atomic bomb
• Only 5 percent of the energy of the famous 1908 Tunguska meteor that downed trees over a 2,000-square-kilometer area in Siberia
• Damage on the Ground
• At least 300 buildings were damaged including schools, hospitals, a zinc factory and even an ice hockey stadium
• In the area of damage there are huge facilities that include a nuclear power plant and the massive Mayak atomic waste storage and treatment centre
• Radiation levels in the region also did not change and that 20,000 rescue workers had been dispatched to help the injured and locate those requiring help
• Multimedia
• YouTube Meteorite crash in Russia: Video of meteorite explosion that stirred panic in Urals region
• YouTube Russian meteor explosion: Spectacular dash cam video of meteorite fireball falling in Urals| RussiaToday
• YouTube Clip Meteorite blast wave blows out doors, window, and loading bay door| RussiaToday
• YouTube Clip Footage; Parking Lot, Traffic Cam | Russia Today
• YouTube Russia meteorite explosion: Zinc factory wall damaged, windows blown out | RussiaToday
• Infographic Huge Russian Meteor Blast is Biggest Since 1908 | Space.com
• Image / Video Gallery | Large meteor, possible meteorite near Chelyabinsk, Russia
• Further Reading / In the News
• Meteor explodes over Russia | Atom & Cosmos | Science News
• Russia meteor virtually impossible to see coming | Atom & Cosmos | Science News
• Airburst Explained: NASA Addresses the Russian Meteor Explosion | UniverseToday.com
• Russian Meteor Blast Bigger Than Thought, NASA Says | Space.com
• Meteor strike in Russia hurts almost 1,000 (w/ Video) | Phys.org
• Russian Meteor Not Related to Asteroid Flyby, NASA Confirms | UniverseToday.com
• Russian Fireball Is Biggest Meteor Blast in 100 Years | Near-Earth Asteroids | Space.com
• Meteor Blast Rocks Russia | UniverseToday.com
• Shouldn\’t We Have Been Able To See This Huge Meteor Coming? | popsci.com

— NEWS BYTE —

Dark Matter Announcement Coming

• Dark Matter
• The dark matter theory was born 80 years ago when Swiss astrophysicist Fritz Zwicky discovered that there was not enough mass in observable stars or galaxies to allow the force of gravity to hold them together
• The Standard Model only accounts for only around four or five percent of the stuff in the Universe that we see
• It could be useful for identifying the stable of particles and forces that regulate our daily life, the Standard Model only tells part of the cosmic story
• Dark matter, could make up 23 percent, and dark energy, an enigmatic force that appears to drive the expansion of the Universe, could accounts for around 72 or 73 percent
• Some physics theories suggest that dark matter is made of WIMPS (weakly interacting massive particles), a class of particles that are their own antimatter partner particles
• When matter and antimatter partners meet, they annihilate each other, so if two WIMPs collided, they would be destroyed, releasing a pair of daughter particles – an electron and its antimatter counterpart, the positron, in the process
• Although we can not explain gravity, although we know how to measure gravity and exploit it for our needs
• Announcement Coming Up
• In about two weeks the first paper of results of the Alpha Magnetic Spectrometer, a particle collector mounted on the outside of the International Space Station, will be published
• Researchers have said that the results bear on the mystery of dark matter, that \”It will not be a minor paper\” and that they rewrote the paper 30 times before they were satisfied with it
• Even with this tease for a \’major announcement\’ scientists still say it represents a \”small step\” in figuring out what dark matter is, and perhaps not the final answer
• Tracking Cosmic Particles
• To track these phantom particles, physicists rely on several methods and tools
• The Large Hadron Collider (LHC) near Geneva, the biggest particle smasher in the world
• The South Pole Neutrino Observatory, tracks subatomic particles known as neutrinos, which, according to physicists, are created when dark matter passes through the Sun and interacts with protons
• The Alpha Magnetic Spectrometer (AMS) aboard the International Space Station (ISS), captures gamma rays coming from collisions of dark matter particles.
• Alpha Magnetic Spectrometer
• Has the potential to detect the positrons and electrons produced by dark matter annihilations in the Milky Way
• It was installed on the International Space Station in May 2011, and so far, it has detected 25 billion particle events, including about 8 billion electrons and positrons
• This will first science paper from this instrument that will report how many of each were found, and what their energies are
• If the experiment detected an abundance of positrons peaking at a certain energy, that could indicate a detection of dark matter,
• What it Might Mean for What We Might Find
• There is a lot of stuff that can mimic dark matter,\”
• If the experiment detected an abundance of positrons peaking at a certain energy, that could indicate a detection of dark matter,
• While electrons are abundant in the universe around us, there are fewer known processes that could give rise to positrons
• The smoking gun signature is a rise and then a dramatic fall\” in the number of positrons with respect to energy
• The positrons produced by dark matter annihilation would have a very specific energy, depending on the mass of the WIMPs making up dark matter
• Another telling sign will be the question of whether positrons appear to be coming from one direction in space, or from all around
• If they\’re from dark matter, scientists expect them to be spread evenly through space, but if they\’re created by some normal astrophysical process, such as a star explosion, then they would originate in a single direction
• Regardless of whether AMS has found dark matter yet, the scientists said they expected the question of dark matter\’s origin to become clearer soon
• Further Reading / In the News
• Has Dark Matter Finally Been Found? Big News Soon | Space.com

— TWO-BYTE NEWS —

Lightning and Headaches

• The New Study
• A new study has found a 31 percent increase of the risk of headache and a 28 percent increased risk of migraine for chronic headache sufferers on days that lightning struck within 25 miles (40 kilometers) of their homes
• In addition new-onset headaches and migraines increased by 24 percent and 23 percent, respectively
• The Correlation
• This is the first study to show a correlation between lightning and associated weather phenomena and the squalls in our heads
• How exactly lightning might trigger headaches is still unknown but there are a number of possible explanations
• Electromagnetic waves emitted from lightning could trigger headaches
• Another explanation might be that lightning produces increases in air pollutants like ozone, and can cause release of fungal spores that might lead to migraine
• Still Unknown
• This study does show an apparent link between lightning and headaches; however, the exact mechanisms through which lightning and/or its associated meteorologic factors trigger headache is still unknown
• Multimedia
• YouTube Lightning = Headaches? | TheWeatherChannel
• Further Reading / In the News
• Newsflash: Lightning May Cause Headaches – News Watch | newswatch.nationalgeographic.com

The February 15th Asteroid Fly-By

• The low down
• On Friday, Feb. 15, the asteroid 2012 DA 14 roughly half a football field came well inside the orbit of even communication and weather satellites in geosynchronous orbit
• It is the closest known approach to Earth for an object its size
• It came within an altitude of 27,700 kilometers (17,200 miles). That is some 8000 km (5000 miles) inside the ring of geosynchronous satellites
• The asteroid posed no danger to the Space Station crew and they had no chance to observe it
• Although no NASA space-based assets were making measurements because it was moving so fast
• Radar astronomers did plan to take images around eight hours after the flyby using the Goldstone antenna in California’s Mojave Desert
• Multimedia
• YouTube Early Radar Observations of Asteroid 2012 DA14 | JPLnews
• YouTube (NEW!) Telescope View – Asteroid 2012 DA14 as it Passes Earth (short) | Credit : Daniel Lopez | joeyzola
• vimeo Asteroid 2012 DA14 Passes the Earth | Credit : Daniel Lopez | Astronomy Picture of the Day
• YouTube Asteroid 2012 DA14 to Safely Pass Earth NASA ANIMATION VIDEO | JrStudi0s
• Further Reading / In the News
• NASA – Asteroid 2012 DA14 – Earth Flyby Reality Check | NASA.gov
• Russian Meteor Not Related to Asteroid Flyby, NASA Confirms | UniverseToday.com
• NASA Unveils 1st Radar Video of Asteroid Flyby | Space.com
• 45 meter Asteroid to Skirt Very Near Earth on Feb 15 | UniverseToday.com

— VIEWER FEEDBACK —

Earth/Moon Relationship Simulations/Animations

• Jason Null
• What kind of program or software has a virtual model of the Earth and Moon
• Free JAVA Simulators
• Moon Phase and the Horizon diagram [free-java]
• Lunar Phase Simulator [free-java]
• Jonathan H
• Why do I seem to see the moon in the sky during the day so often?
• Different components to this
• Lunar Phase Simulator [free-java]
• The moon follow the same ‘orbital path’ as the sun, just as different speeds
• Click [Start Animation] to the bottom left to get a feel for this
• Higher latitudes have longer days and nights, which also gives the moon longer or fewer hours to be in the sky.
• If you think about it each time the Moon sets or rises at night it is doing the opposite for someone on the daytime side of the Earth

— Updates —

CERN, the Higgs-Boson, and Upgrades

• Upgrades
• Over the past three years, CERN has slammed protons together more than six million billion times
• Now seven months after the discovery announcement for a Boson, which they are now 99.9 percent certain is the Higgs-Boson, CERN scientists have brought CERN offline for an 18-month upgrade
• The upgrade will boost the LHC\’s energy capacity, essential for CERN to confirm definitively that its boson is the Higgs, and allow it to probe new dimensions such as supersymmetry and dark matter
• The Data
• Scientists still have vasts amount of data to comb through during this downtime,
• Even with the shutdown, CERN\’s researchers won\’t be taking a breather, as they must trawl through a vast mound of data
• They expect that they will have much more information about the data from the last three years, and once they are able to go back through the data they will probably have more questions, some of which will lead to more tests under the new upgrades
• What’s to Come
• In 2011 the LHC has able to achieve collisions with an energy level of seven teraelectron volts
• During 2012 CERN was able to increase to eight teraelectron volts
• When it comes back online in 2015 after the upgrades are completed they will be able to achieve 13-14
• It is expected that CERN will then run at those conditions for three to four years before more upgrades are installed
• Social Media
• CERN @CERN
• Further Reading / In the News
• CERN Website
• After Higgs Boson, scientists prepare for next quantum leap

— SPACECRAFT UPDATE—

Space Station Communication

• NASA\’s Mission Control center in Houston lost communication with the International Space Station at 9:45 a.m. ET (1445 GMT). [19 Feb 2013]
• They restored contact with the space station at 12:34 p.m. ET (17:34 GMT),
• A NASA official said \”Flight controllers were in the process of updating the station’s command and control software and were transitioning from the primary computer to the backup computer to complete the software load when the loss of communication occurred,\”
• A main data relay system malfunctioned, and the computer that controls the station\’s critical functions switched to a backup
• \”Mission Control Houston was able to communicate with the crew as the space station flew over Russian ground stations before 11:00 a.m. EST and instructed the crew to connect a backup computer to begin the process of restoring communications,\”
• This is not the first time Mission Control has lost direct communication with the orbiting science laboratory
• In 2010, the space station briefly lost communication with the ground when a primary computer failed and the backup had to take over. Communications were out for about one hour before NASA restored the connection
• Further Reading / In the News
• NASA Restores Contact with Space Station | Space.com
• Temporary Comm Loss Interrupts Crew’s Day | NASA.gov

— CURIOSITY UPDATE —

• Drilling
• Scientists were able to place the arm safely and drill vertically down into the rock to collect as much sample as possible
• The gray tailing tells us that there\’s something different about the inside of this rock than the surface of the rock
• A day after NASA\’s Mars rover Curiosity drilled the first sample-collection hole into a rock on Mars, the rover\’s Chemistry and Camera (ChemCam) instrument shot laser pulses into the fresh rock powder that the drilling generated
• In the coming weeks, one of the things they are trying to do with this first hole is to use this gray powder that we collect to clean the internal surfaces of the drill.
• Multimedia
• YouTube Curiosity Rover Report (February 15, 2013): Curiosity Drills on Mars | JPLnews
• Image Galleries at JPL and Curiosity Mulimedia
• Social Media
• Curiosity Rover @MarsCuriosity
• Further Reading / In the News
• Curiosity Drills on Mars | nasa.gov
• Laser Hits on Martian Drill Tailings | https://mars.jpl.nasa.gov

SCIENCE CALENDAR

Looking back

• February, 20 1962 : 51 years ago : Glenn in orbit : John Glenn piloted the Mercury-Atlas 6 Friendship 7 spacecraft on the first U.S. manned orbital mission. [The first manned orbital flight was Yu. Gagarin on the the Vostok 1 on 12 April 1961]
  Launched from Kennedy Space Center, Florida, he completed three-orbits around the earth, at a maximum altitude of approx. 162 miles and an orbital velocity of approx. 17,500 mph. He spotted Perth, Australia, when that city\’s residents greeted him by switching on their house lights in unison. A four-cent U.S. stamp was put on sale the same day, making it the first U.S. stamp issued on the day of the event it commemorated. Glenn returned to space 36 years later, making 134 more orbits as a crew member of the space shuttle Discovery (29 Oct – 7 Nov 1998) for investigations on space flight and the aging process.

Looking up this week

• Keep an eye out for …
• Mercury | Evening Twilight | Low in the W-SW it will be the brightest object in that part of the sky
• Mars | Sunset | Getting harder to see and moving farther to Mercury\’s lower right
• Jupiter | Starts in the S at dusk, moving to the SW and setting around 1-2am

• Saturn | ~11-12 pm local | moving to the high southern skies by dawn

• 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

The post Meteorites & Asteroids | SciByte 82 first appeared on Jupiter Broadcasting.

We take a look at Stradivarius violins, tiger time-sharing, asteroids, hydrogel, running robots, disintegrating planets, spacecraft updates and as always take a peek back into history and up in the sky this week.

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Show Notes

Tiger Timeshare’s

_{Credit: Center for Systems Integration and Sustainability, Michigan State University | Credit:Sue Nichols, Michigan State University}

• While tigers typically move around at all times of the day and night it has been discovered that the tigers around Chitwan National Park in Nepal, have become creatures of the night
• The low down
• Tigers need to use the same space as people if they are to have a viable long-term future and in Chitwan they seem to be adapting to make it work
• Analyses show that tigers were more likely to be found at sites away from human settlement
• The local human population collects firewood, soldiers patrol forest roads to deter poachers and other criminals, and a growing number of eco-tourists visit the area each year
• People in Nepal generally avoid the forests at night
• Significance
• Research from January through May—during the dry season before the monsoon rains began—in both 2010 and 2011, deployed at least 75 camera traps spaced no more than 1 kilometer apart.
• It was found that the tigers in and around Chitwan park were much more likely to be active at night than tigers living elsewhere
• Analysis of the thousands of images show that people and tigers are walking the same paths, albeit at different times
• In addition the overall tiger numbers in the park didn’t drop when more humans were around
• In 2010, the team estimates, the area hosted about 4.4 tigers per 100 square kilometers.
• The next year, that number jumped by about 40%—even though the number of humans measured by the “camera traps” rose by 55%.
• Of Note
• From this discovery there appears to be a middle ground where you might actually be able to protect the species at high densities and give people access to forest goods they need to live
• Timesharing the environment might not work well with many threatened species or in many areas
• However the notion of humans and endangered animals sharing the same terrain by shifting their behavior—and particularly by shifting when each species uses the habitat—should be incorporated into conservation plans when it makes sense
• Further Reading / In the News
• Humans and Tigers Can Timeshare Territory | news.ScienceMag.org
• Study: Tigers take the night shift to coexist with people | Phys.org

— NEWS BYTE —

New Stradivarius?

• A Swiss wood researcher has succeeded in modifying the wood for a violin through treatment with special fungi making it sound indistinguishably similar to a Stradivarius
• On September 7, 2012 he reported on his research and gave a preview of what his wood treatment method could mean, particularly for young violinists
• The low down
• A good violin depends not only on the expertise of the violin maker, but also on the quality of the wood that is used.
• Low density, high speed of sound and a high modulus of elasticity – these qualities are essential for ideal violin tone wood.
• Significance
• Research has shown that the chemicals used in the varnish at that time contributed to the sound quality of the instruments
• Recent research indicates that the wood itself may indeed be a part of the equation as well
• In the late 17th and early 18th century the famous violin maker Antonio Stradivari used a special wood that had grown in the cold period between 1645 and 1715
• Long winters and the cool summers, the wood grew especially slowly and evenly, creating low density and a high modulus of elasticity
• While normally fungi reduce the density of the wood, unfortunately at the same time they reduce the speed with which the sound waves travel through the wood
• Swiss wood researcher Professor Francis W. M. R. Schwarze discovered two species of fungi which decay Norway spruce and sycamore – the two important kinds of wood used for violin making – to such an extent that their tonal quality is improved
• The unique feature of these fungi is that they gradually degrade the cell walls, thus inducing a thinning of the walls
• A stiff scaffold structure remains via which the sound waves can still travel directly the wood remains just as resistant to strain as before the fungal treatment
• Before the, mycowood or treated with wood decay fungi, wood is further processed to a violin, it is treated with ethylene oxide gas so that no fungus survive
• Of Note
• In 2009 the violins were played in a blind, behind-the-curtain test versus a genuine Stradivarius from 1711
• Both the jury of experts and the majority of the audience thought that the mycowood violin that Schwarze had treated with fungi for nine months was the actual Strad
• Currently Professor Schwarze is working on an interdisciplinary project to develop a quality-controlled treatment for violin wood, with successful, reliable and reproducible results
• Further Reading / In the News
• Treatment with fungi makes a modern violin sound like a Stradiavarius | Phys.org
• ‘Biotech violin’ outdoes Stradivarius | Phys.org

— TWO-BYTE NEWS —

Name that Asteroid

_{YouTube Channel: NASAexplorer | Credit: planetary.org}

• NASA and the Planetary Society are giving students worldwide the opportunity to name an asteroid that an upcoming NASA mission will return samples of this asteroid to Earth
• The low down
• The asteroid was discovered in 1999 and received its designation of (101955) 1999 RQ36 from the Minor Planet Center, operated by the Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory
• An upcoming sample-return mission [Origins-Spectral Interpretation-Resource Identification-Security-Regolith Explorer (OSIRIS-REx)] will be heading to an asteroid, currently named (101955) 1999 RQ36
• The sample return mission is scheduled to launch in 2016, NASA also is planning a crewed mission to an asteroid by 2025
• Significance
• The competition is open to students under age 18 from anywhere in the world
• Each contestant can submit one name, up to 16 characters long and must include a short explanation and rationale for the name
• Submissions must be made by an adult on behalf of the student. The contest deadline is Sunday, Dec. 2, 2012
• Of Note
• The contest is sponsored by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology’s (MIT) Lincoln Laboratory in Lexington; and the University of Arizona in Tucson
• A panel will review proposed asteroid names. First prize will be awarded to the student who recommends a name that is approved by the International Astronomical Union Committee for Small-Body Nomenclature
• Multimedia
• YouTube NASA | Name That Asteroid!| NASAexplorer
• Simulated asteroid image – topography overlaid on radar imagery of 1999 RQ36 | Credit: NASA/GSFC/UA
• Social Media
• NASA Goddard @NASAGoddard
• Further Reading / In the News
• Planetary Society Contest Page
• Students: Asteroid 1999 RQ36 Needs a New Name! | UniverseToday.com

Tough Hydrogel

• The low down
• A hydrogel is a network of polymers that soaks up lots of water to form a jelly-like material.
• Researchers have already tried to make them autonomous self-healers, ready to repair themselves when they break but what if they just didn’t break at all under strain
• Toughness is a major plus for hydrogels, some of the toughest hydrogels are used to make soft contact lenses
• Significance
• This particular hydrogel comes from Harvard University materials engineer team who created the gel from two polymers: alginate and polyacrylamide
• The ionic bonds of the alginate molecules break and reform under pressure, spreading the energy of an impact over a wider area
• The alginate molecules protect the covalent bonds in the polyacrylamide molecules, which hold the gel together
• Of Note
• This process protects the covalent bonds in the polyacrylamide molecules, which hold the gel together
• Which makes this hydrogel as tough as rubber that can stretch 20 times its normal length / thickness
• Multimedia
• YouTube Ball bouncing off stretchy jelly | Nature Newsteam
• Further Reading / In the News
• A Ball of Metal Bounces Off a Thin Sheet of Super-Tough Hydrogel | PopSci.com
• Super-stretchy jelly can take a hit | Nature.com

— Updates —

Boston-Dynamics Robot’s

• Last time on SciByte
• Neutrinos & Leap Year | SciByte 35 – Legged Squad Support System (LS3) [February 28, 2012]
• Alpha Dog
• AlphaDog is the mechanical pack mule and descendant of the original Big Dog built for DARPA
• It is now able to follow a soldier without assistance
• The current version is bulkier and likely heavier than a horse, able to carry up to 400 pounds of gear and now able to walk for twenty miles before needing a recharge.
• Soldiers however typically move at seven to ten miles per hour, however, currently AlphaDog can walk at a pace of just a few miles an hour or trot at up to five
• The next goal for the engineers is to increase up that speed without sacrificing distance between recharges
• Cheetah
• Boston Dynamics’ Cheetah is the fastest a robot had ever run, 18 mph [29 kph] previously, up to a 28.3 mph [45.5 mph]
• In comparison Usain Bolt’s peak speed during the 100-meter dash was 27.78 mph [44.71 kph]
• For now, it remains tethered to an external power supply, and runs on an indoor treadmill.
• However next year Boston Dynamics plans to finish the “Wildcat,” a Cheetah that’s designed to run untethered.
• Multimedia
• YouTube Cheetah Robot runs 28.3 mph; a bit faster than Usain Bolt | BostonDynamics
• YouTube LS3 – Legged Squad Support System | BostonDynamics
• YouTube DARPA Legged Squad Support System (LS3) | BostonDynamics
• YouTube BigDog Evolution | BostonDynamics
• YouTube BigDog Overview (Updated March 2010) |BostonDynamics
• YouTube BigDog Beach’n | BostonDynamics
• YouTube BigDog robot | BostonDynamics
• Social Media
• Boston Dynamics @BostonDynamics
• Further Reading / In the News
• BostonDynamics.com
• Boston Dynamics shows off latest abilities of AlphaDog | Phys.org
• Cheetah Robot Sets a New Land Speed Record | PopSci.com

Disintegrating planet

• In May, researchers announced the detection of a possibly disintegrating exoplanet, a roughly Mercury-size world being boiled away by the intense heat of its parent star now a different team has found strong evidence in support of the find
• The low down
• Astronomers have found a dusty tail streaming off a faraway alien planet, suggesting that the tiny, scorching-hot world is indeed falling apart.
• Both studies used observations from NASA’s Kepler space telescope
• Surface temperatures estimated to be around 3,600 F (1,982 C) and it completes an orbit every 15 hours
• It is predicted that the planet is likely surrounded by a huge veil of dust and gas
• In the new study, a different team found clear signals that light is being scattered and absorbed by large amounts of dust.
• By observing the dust clouds in different colors, something Kepler cannot do, researchers could determine the amount and the composition of the dust and estimate its lifetime
• Further Reading / In the News
• Disintegrating Alien Planet Has Comet-Like Tail | Space.com

– SPACECRAFT UPDATE –

Shuttle Shuffle comes to an end

_{YouTube Channel: NASATelevision | YouTube Channel: spacearium}

• Endeavour (OV–105) was the last shuttle orbiter to be constructed for NASA. Endeavour completed 25 missions, spent 299 days in orbit, and orbited Earth 4,671 times while traveling 122,883,151 miles.
• Endeavour, mounted atop NASA’s modified 747 Shuttle Carrier Aircraft (SCA), will become the last Space Shuttle orbiter to soar aloft when it departs Monday, Sept. 17, from Kennedy Space Center in Florida on a three-day flight to Los Angeles International Airport.
• Last time on SciByte
• Mining Asteroids & Shuttle Discovery | SciByte 44 – The Shuttle Shuffle Continues [May 1, 2012]
• Martian Dust Devils & The Shuttles | SciByte 43 – The Shuttle Shuffle [April 24, 2012]
• The low down
• The SCA is scheduled to conduct low-level flyovers at about 1,500 ft (457 m)above many locations along the planned flight path
• Flyover include : Cape Canaveral, NASA’s Stennis Space Center in Mississippi, Michoud Assembly Facility in New Orleans, White Sands Test Facility near Las Cruces, N.M., and Dryden Flight Research Center at Edwards Air Force Base in California, Sacramento, San Francisco,
• Low passes are also planned over areas around Houston, Clear Lake and Galveston in Texas before making a landing at Ellington Field near NASA’s Johnson Space Center.
• The planned landing at LAX on the 20th
• The Trip Itinerary
• The trip is set to begin on Sept. 17, weather permitting, at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Cape Canaveral, Fla., and culminate at Los Angeles International Airport (LAX) on Sept. 20
• The carrier aircraft will arrive at Kennedy Space Center on Sept. 11
• Three days later, the orbiter will be rolled out to meet the SCA at the Shuttle Landing Facility (SLF), where Endeavour returned to Earth for its 25th and final time in the early morning hours of June 1, 2011
• Endeavour will be hoisted off the ground by crane, then be lowered onto the SCA’s back and secured for flight
• Weather permitting, the SCA and Endeavour will remain at Ellington for the remainder of the day and all day on Sept. 18, providing Johnson employees and the Houston public an ample opportunity to see the shuttle.
• It will then take to the air again at sunrise on Sept. 19, and after a brief refueling stop at Biggs Army Airfield in El Paso, Texas
• Finally on the morning of Sept. 20, Endeavour, still on top of the SCA, will take off one last time, departing Dryden to fly over Northern California, passing above NASA’s Ames Research Center at Moffett Field and various landmarks in multiple cities, including San Francisco and Sacramento, the state’s capitol
• The orbiter then will travel through Inglewood and Los Angeles city streets on a 12-mile journey from the airport to the California Science Center, arriving on the evening of Oct. 13
• Beginning Oct. 30, the shuttle will be on permanent display in the science center’s Samuel Oschin Space Shuttle Endeavour Display Pavilion
• Of Note
• According to NASA, some of the flyovers or layovers that are planned could be delayed or cancelled as a result
• Multimedia
• Mission 26: The Big Endeavour – Google Maps
• YouTube Part 1 – NASA Shuttle Carrier Aircraft 905 Arrival At Kennedy Space Center For Endeavour Departure | spacearium
• YouTube Endeavour Lifts Off on its Last Mission | NASATelevision
• Social Media
• Twitter [#spottheshuttle](https://twitter.com/#!/search/%23spottheshuttle)
• Twitter [#OV105](https://twitter.com/#!/search/%23OV105)
• Further Reading / In the News
• Endeavour to Take to the Skies One Last Time | UniverseToday.com
• NASA’s Space Shuttle Endeavour to Depart on Cross-Country Flight for Display | Space.com

– CURIOSITY UPDATE –

_{Credit: | Credit: NASA/GSFC/UA}

• Curiosity Rover Report
• YouTube Curiosity Rover Report (Sept. 6, 2012) | JPLnews
• EVENT
• Curiosity has started testing the arm capabilities and instruments including, vibration testing,
• The Alpha Particle X-Ray Spectrometer (APXS) did preliminary calibration readings
• The Dynamic Albedo of Neutrons (DAN) instrument, used to check whether the ground under the rover holds hydrated minerals, was sent commands for a six-hour reading
• Mars Hand Lens Imager (MAHLI) images the wheels and undercarriage of the rover to test maneuverability
• Image Panorama of Curiosity’s Belly Check | mars.jpl.nasa.gov
• The Curiosity’s tracks are visible from the MRO A Rover’s Journey Begins | mars.jpl.nasa.gov
• Multimedia
• Image Gallery Mars Rover Curiosity’s 1st Month in Pictures | Space.com
• Social Media
• Curiosity Rover @MarsCuriosity
• Further Reading / In the News
• Mars Rover Curiosity Snaps Amazing Hi-Res Self Portraits

SCIENCE CALENDAR

Looking back

• Sep 17, 1822 : 190 years ago : Rosetta Stone Decyphered : French Academie Royale des Inscriptions, Jean-François Champollion read a paper, Lettre a M. Dacier, describing his solution to the mystery of the triple inscriptions on the Rosetta Stone which had been unearthed July of 1799, by Napoleon’s army near the Rosetta branch of the Nile. (Baron Joseph Dacier, to whom he addressed the letter, was Secretary of the Academie.) Champollion’s work to decipher the hieroglyphics had began in 1808. Thomas Young did some preliminary fragmentary work, but otherwise it was Champollion’s major accomplishment. In 1823 he gave more details in a series of memoirs read at the Institute, published the following year as Precis du systeme hieroglyphique des anciens Egyptiens
• The Rosetta Stone is an ancient Egyptian granodiorite stele inscribed with a decree issued at Memphis in 196 BC on behalf of King Ptolemy V. The decree appears in three scripts: the upper text is Ancient Egyptian hieroglyphs, the middle portion Demotic script, and the lowest Ancient Greek.

–Viewer Submitted–

• Wesley Magyar | Linked some images he took of Jupiter September 8th around 2am Pacific
• Through a Celestron C8 Telescope using a 25MM lens
• Taken with a Samsung Galaxy S2 Camera
• Google Plus Image Gallery
• @JB_Mars_Base Identification
• Jupiter Impact?
• The amateur who observed the flash was Dan Petersen, from Oregon, who made the observation at approximately 11:35 UTC on September 10
• An amateur astronomer in Dallas Texas, George Hall captured the impact flash in his webcam at about 6:30 am on Sept. 10, 2012.
• Viewing Alert: Jupiter May Have Been Impacted by a Fireball |UniverseToday.com

Looking up this week

• Keep an eye out for …

• Venus | 2–3 hours before sunrise | Rise in the E-NE and by dawn it will be high high in the ern sky

• Mars and Saturn | Right after twilight | Low in the W and W-SW, widening to be roughly the distance between your pointer and pinky finger extended at arms length [ 13–17 ]

• Jupiter | ~ midnight | Rising in the E-NE, when it’s above the horizon you can see the faint orange star Aldebaran about 4 fingers width to it’s right [ 7* ]

• Further Reading and Resources

• Weekly SkyWatcher’s Forecast: September 10–16, 2012 | UniverseToday.com

• 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

The post Stradivarius & Tigers | SciByte 62 first appeared on Jupiter Broadcasting.

]]> https://original.jupiterbroadcasting.net/19186/mining-asteroids-shuttle-discovery-scibyte-44/ Tue, 01 May 2012 22:59:56 +0000 https://original.jupiterbroadcasting.net/?p=19186 We take a look at mining asteroids, recovery from strokes, lefties, talking to yourself, solar cells, a review of some recent major media stories, and much more.

The post Mining Asteroids & Shuttle Discovery | SciByte 44 first appeared on Jupiter Broadcasting.

]]>

We take a look at mining asteroids, recovery from strokes, lefties, talking to yourself, solar cells, a review of some recent major media stories, viewer feedback, spacecraft updates, and as always take a peek back into history and up in the sky this week.

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Show Notes:

New Mining Resources

_Credit: PlanetaryResources

• Asteroid Mining
  • The idea of exploiting the natural resources of asteroids dates back over 100 years.
  • California Institute of Technology in Pasadena completed an in-depth study of the feasibility of asteroid mining
  • The study showed that, for the first time in history, this was now feasible using technology available in this decade
  • It is reasonable to assume we could identify, and bring an entire asteroid that is roughly 23 feet [7 meters] wide [~500 tons] into a high lunar orbit
• Asteroid composition classifications
  • D class asteroids: They are also known as Trojan asteroids of Jupiter and are dark and carbonaceous in composition.
  • C class asteroids: They are found in the Earth’s outer belt and are darker and more carbonaceous than the ones found in the S class.
  • S class asteroids: They are found in the Earth’s inner belt, closer to Mars and are composed of mostly stone and iron.
  • V class asteroids: They are a far-out group of asteroids that follow a path between the orbits of Jupiter and Uranus, and are made of igneous, eruptive materials.
• Why is mining asteroids feasible now?
  • The ability to discover and characterize enough sufficiently small near-Earth asteroids for mining.
  • An evolving ability to equip powerful enough solar electric propulsion systems to enable transportation of the captured asteroid.
  • A proposed human presence around the moon in the 2020s both enables exploration and exploitation of the returned near-Earth asteroid.
• * Enter Planetary Resources, Inc.*
  • A new company Planetary Resources, Inc. is now making plans to be able to mine asteroids
  • The company, has been in existence for about three years, announced itself to the general public now because they are starting to aggressively search for the world’s best engineers, to help design and build a fleet of asteroid-mining robots [not Bruce Willis]
  • This company’s investors include Google execs Larry Page and Eric Schmidt, who are worth $16.7 billion and $6.2 billion
  • Their advisors include, filmmaker and adventurer James Cameron, former NASA astronaut Tom Jones and MIT planetary scientist Sara Seager
  • While it may be possible for this to happen, Planetary Resources is still years away from actually seizing an asteroid and staking a cosmic claim
  • Materials from such asteroids could be used for both the Earth and for planetary exploration, providing shielding galactic cosmic rays and propellant to transport a shielded
  • The initial focus will be developing Earth orbiting telescopes to scan for the best asteroids, and later, create extremely low-cost robotic spacecraft for surveying missions.
  • What we learn from such missions and a possible industry could someday help us deflect a much larger near-Earth object
• The Legal angle
• The legality of asteroid mining is in itself interesting
• The 1967 Outer Space Treaty says that “Outer space, including the moon and other celestial bodies, is not subject to national appropriation by claim of sovereignty, by means of use or occupation, or by any other means.”
• Whether or not that applies to individuals or companies is one question
• Anything launched into space remains the private property of its owner
• However NASA and other entities ‘own’ and sell rocks and dirt from the moon
• Even the sea-floor could be mined
  • Canada-based mining firm Nautilus Minerals said Tuesday it had signed China’s Tongling Nonferrous Metals Group as the first customer of its pioneering Papua New Guinean seafloor mine.
  • Currently it is slated to begin production in the fourth quarter of 2013 Nautilus claims the project to be the world’s first commercial seafloor mine
  • This area has deposits of rocks containing high grades of copper, gold, zinc and silver, what is known as “seafloor massive sulphides” from hydrothermal vents
  • Robots would be controlled remotely to drill for those sulphide deposits 5,250ft [1,600 m] below sea level
  • Then another machine would pump the material to a support vessel at the surface, which would then be dewatered for transport
  • These robots are currently under construction and are based on those used in deepwater oil and gas, terrestrial mining and marine dredging industries
• Multimedia
  • YouTube VIDEO : Asteroid Mining Mission Revealed by Planetary Resources, Inc.
    | PlanetaryResources
  • YouTube Playlist : Planetary Resources, Inc. Press Conference, April 24, 2012 Press Event
  • IMAGE GALLERY: Asteroid Mining Gallery: Planetary Resources to Mine Space Rocks | Space.com
  • Planetary Resources Technology
• Further Reading / In the News
  • Space Law: Is Asteroid Mining Legal?
  • Planetary Resources Website
  • Planetary Resources: The Video | UniverseToday.com
  • Asteroid Miners Wanted to Tap Space Rock Riches | space.com
  • Planetary Resources Group Wants to Mine Asteroids | UniverseToday.com
  • Is Asteroid Mining Possible? Study Says Yes, for $2.6 Billion | space.com
  • Interesting Facts About Asteroids | UniverseToday.com
  • World’s first sea-floor mine signs first customer | phys.org

— NEWS BYTE —

Recovery from Strokes

• The low down
  • Currently the drugs administered for a stroke are to break up clots that caused the stroke, and need to be given within 4.5 hours after a stroke
  • Neuroscientists at the Stanford University School of Medicine were looking for alternatives
• Significance
  • Brain-derived neurotrophic factor, BNNF, are powerful and long-studied nerve growth factor
  • BDNF is critical during the development of the nervous system and known to be involved in important brain functions including memory and learning.
  • A compound called LM22A–4, mimics this factor, is a small molecule that weighs less than one-seventieth that of BDNF
  • In a study the speed of recovery was improved rapidly, in fact those mice who had received the drug showed half as many stroked affected nerve cells as their counterparts without the drug
  • In fact the drug wasn’t even administered until a full three days after the strokes, showing that it does not limit a strokes damage but enhances recovery
  • These molecules stimulate the brain’s own stem cells to form new neurons
  • Stem-cell therapy is a somewhat invasive and expensive treatment for lost or damaged tissues, making a drug that could achieve the same results on the brain very promising and a welcome development
• Further Reading / In the News
  • Study points to potential treatment for stroke | medicalxpress.com
  • Stanford University Medical Center

The competitive nature of lefties

• The low down
  • Handedness, is partially genetic and partially environmental.
  • In the general population about 10% of people are left handed
  • A new mathematical model calculates that handedness might come from a need to balance cooperation and competition
  • The model also seems to work in the animal kingdom social species with limited combative interaction
  • There are other ideas about how the natural left handed brain processes things
  • The number of people who process language with both sides of the brain is 5% of right handed, and 14% of left handed people
  • Some link this increased amount of space dedicated to language to enhanced communication skills
• Percentages
  • Top hitter in the US major league – 58%
  • Baseball – 30%
  • American Presidents (* last 5, since 1981) – 2 Left; 2 Ambidextrous
  • American Presidents (* since 1929) – Left 35%; Ambidextrous 14%
  • American football quarterbacks – 6%
  • Top 120 male *golfers – 4%
  • Top 100 women *golfers – 0%
• Further Reading / In the News
  • Shedding light on southpaws: Sports data help confirm theory explaining left-handed minority in general population | phys.org
  • Lefties have element of surprise in sports arena: study | phys.org
  • A model balancing cooperation and competition can explain our right-handed world and the dominance of left-handed athletes | rsif.royalsocietypublishing.org

— TWO-BYTE NEWS —

Talking to yourself isn’t crazy

• The low down
  • When trying to find something a new study shows that saying the name of the object out loud actually helps you find the object quicker
• Adding the auditory component can temporarily increase your visual system, helping to find something quicker
• Further Reading / In the News
  • Self-directed speech affects visual search performance | The Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology

Liquid Solar cells

• Last time on SciByte
  • Solar Storms & Higgs Boson | SciByte 37 – Transparent Electrodes (March 13, 2012)
  • Habitable Planets & Plant Power | SciByte 32 – Solar panels you water? (February 7, 2012)
• The low down
  • Scientists at USC have developed a potential pathway to cheap, stable solar cells made from nanocrystals so small they can exist as a liquid ink and be painted or printed onto clear surfaces.
  • They are about four nanometers in size, you could fit more than 250,000,000,000 on the head of a pin
  • They can also float in a solution, meaning you could print them like you print a newspaper
• Further Reading / In the News
  • Researchers develop a path to liquid solar cells that can be printed onto surfaces | Phys.org

— THE NEWS IS CATCHING UP—

Nine Planet System

• Last time on SciByte
  • World Climate & Light Pollution | SciByte 42 – A busy planetary system (April 17, 2012)
• Nine Planet System
  • HD 10180 was first noted in 2010 and is about 130 light years away
  • Going back and studying old observations and using different statistical analysis techniques one astronomer found evidence that brought the number of planets in the system up to nine
• Further Reading / In the News
  • New look at HD 10180 shows it might have nine planets
  • World Climate & Light Pollution | SciByte 42 – A busy planetary system (April 17, 2012)

Planet in habitable zone

• Last time on SciByte
  • Habitable Planets & Plant Power | SciByte 32 (February 7, 2012) – Habitable planet?)
• The lowdown
  • Gliese 667Cc, found orbiting around a red dwarf star in the habitable zone
  • Planet found in the habitable zone of a star only 22 light years away combining data from three ground-based telescopes going back 10 years
  • Orbit a red dwarf every 28.15 day with a mass about 4.5 times that of Earth;
  • Receives 90% of light that Earth does, but mostly in the infrared making the overall energy absorbed from the sun about the same that is seen on Earth
• Further Reading / In the News
• New look at HD 10180 shows it might have nine planets + World Climate & Light Pollution | SciByte 42 – A busy planetary system (April 17, 2012)
• Social Media
  • Twitter Exoplanet App @ExoplanetApp
• Further Reading / In the News
  • New Study Shows How Trace Elements Affect Stars’ Habitable Zones
  • Newfound Alien Planet is Best Candidate Yet to Support Life, Scientists Say
  • New super-earth detected within the habitable zone of a nearby star
  • New super-Earth detected within the habitable zone of a nearby cool star
  • Potential ‘Goldilocks’ Planet Found
  • Super-Earth spotted in life-friendly zone
  • ScienceShot: Double-Star System Hosts Ancient World
  • New Planet Found: Could a Super-Earth plus Triple Stars Equal Life?
  • Cool sun could host habitable planet

— VIEWER FEEDBACK —

_{Credit: [Arizona State University]}

Spirals on Mars

• For making sure that we saw this, thanks to
• Jacob Roecker & other JupiterBroadcasting staff members
• The low down
• What started as research into nighttime infrared temperatures of the plates, came in interest in the terrain between the plates, leading to a Arizona State University graduate student noticing spiral patterns in the lava
• Here on Earth lava coils can be found on the Hawaiian islands(*seen in space.com article below) and near the Galapagos Rift on the Pacific Ocean floor
• When lava flows move past each other at different speeds, or directions, rubbery lava crust can peel away or coil up to create wrinkles in the crust that can then be twisted around
• In order to really make them out the images need to be zoomed and have their contrast tweaked a bit
• The largest Martian coil is however bigger than any seen on Earth; at 98 ft [30 m] when the ones on Earth are about a third of that
• Further Reading / In the News
• Researchers find new form of Mars lava flow | phys.org
• Ancient Mars Lava Spirals Reveal Volcanic Secrets of Red Planet | space.com

SPACECRAFT UPDATE

The Shuttle Shuffle Continues

_{YouTube channel : daujla2}

• Friday April 27, the space shuttle Enterprise was brought to New York City on top of the 747 Shuttle Carrier Aircraft, after the Discovery was delivered to the Smithsonian
• Multimedia / Further Reading
• YouTube : Enterprise Space Shuttle Last Landing from Tarmac @ JFK
  
• YouTube : Discovery’s Journey Playlist | NASA
• Final Voyage of Space Shuttle Enterprise (Photos) | Space.com
• Enterprise Arrives at the Big Apple | universetoday.com
• Millions Mesmerized by Shuttle Enterprise over Freedom’s Beacon in New York | universetoday.com

SpaceX Falcon 9 Rocket

• SpaceX is preparing for a scheduled launch of May 7th headed to the International Space Station!
• Further Reading
• SpaceX

You may have seen

California Meteorite

_{CREDIT: Lisa Warren | Credit : P. Jenniskens (SETI Institute) and Eric James (NASA Ames)}

• Last time on SciByte
  • Meteorites & Lasers | SciByte 38(March 20, 2012) – The sky, well a meteorite, fell in Norway right into a cabin
• The low down
  • Sunday April 22 over California a large fireball was seen along with a sonic boom characteristic of large meteors entering the Earth atmosphere
  • Scientists have confirmed that this meteor was between 4 to 5 billion years old and probably about the size of a minivan, about 154,300 pounds [69,989 kg]
  • Meteorites don’t actually ‘burn-up’ the friction against the air during re-entry actually causes it to vaporize
  • The sonic boom heard from this meteor was because it entered the atmosphere faster than the speed of sound, between 22,000 mph and 44,000 mph [35,000kph – 70,000kph]
• Significance
  • The meteors reentry was seen from Sacramento, Calif., to Las Vegas and parts of northern Nevada.
  • The first pieces, discovered by Robert Ward, were neat where gold was first discovered in California in 1848
  • Ward has been hunting and collecting meteorites for more than 20 years and has found meteorites in every continent but Antarctica
  • Those two pieces were probably part of the same meteorite that broke apart on impact, each weighs about 10 grams, about the same as two nickels
  • Most nighttime meteors that you see are around the size of grain of sand or a tiny stone, and only last a few seconds
  • An meteor event of this size typically happens around the world once a year, and then most occur over ocean or uninhabited places
  • Although this event occurred just after the peak of the annual mid-April Lyrid meteor shower it is unlikely that it was a Lyrid meteor, although without more information about its trajectory it won’t be known for sure
• Of Note
  • “NASA and the SETI Institute are asking the public to submit any amateur photos or video footage of the meteor that illuminated the sky over the Sierra Nevada mountains and created sonic booms that were heard over a wide area at 7:51 a.m. PDT Sunday, April 22, 2012.”
  • Also any security footage should be checked to see if the fireball was visible, which could also be used in pinpointing the area for fragments
• Further Reading / In the News
  • Meteorites found in Calif. along path of fireball | phys.org
  • Rare Daytime Fireball Created by Minivan-Size Space Rock | space.com
  • Meteorite Hunters Find Fragments from the Recent ‘Daytime Fireball’ in California | universetoday.com

SCIENCE CALENDER

Looking back

• May 08 1790 : 222 years ago : Metric System : Acting on a motion by a bishop, Charles Maurice de Talleyrand (1754–1838), the French National Assembly decided to create a simple, stable, decimal system of measurement units. The earliest metre unit chosen was the length of a pendulum with a half-period of a second. On 30 Mar 1791, after a proposal by the Académie des sciences (Borda, Lagrange, Laplace, Monge and Condorcet), the Assembly revised the definition of the metre to be 1/10 000 000 of the distance between the north pole and the equator. On 7 Apr 1795, the Convention decreed that the new “Republican Measures” were to be henceforth legal measures in France. The metric system adopted prefixes: greek for multiples and latin for decimal fractions.
• May 06 1937 : 75 years ago : Hindenburg : At 7:25 pm, the dirigible The Hindenburg burned while landing at the naval air station at Lakehurst, N.J. On board were 6l crew and 36 passengers. The landing approach seemed normal, when suddenly a tongue of flame appeared near the stern. Fire spread rapidly through the 7 million cubic feet of hydrogen that filled the balloon. Within a few seconds the Zeppelin exploded in a huge ball of fire. The ship fell tail first with flames shooting out the nose. It crashed into the ground 32 seconds after the flame was first spotted; 36 people died. Captain Ernst Lehmann survived the crash but died the next day. He muttered “I can’t understand it,” The cause remains the subject of debate even today.

Looking up this week

• Solar Activity

• Another CME will pass by the Curiosity rover around May 4th, Curiosity is actually equipped with instruments to sense and study solar storms

• Keep an eye out for …
  
  

• Thursday, May 3rd : Saturn and Spica are to the lower of the moon, Saturn being the farther from the Moon and to the left

• Friday, May 4th : The Moon will now sit below both Saturn and Spica

• Saturday, May 5th : The moon will be near the horizon below and to the left

• Saturday, May 5th is Full Moon, called a ‘super moon’ because it is the one full moon of the year when the Moon is in its closest part of its orbit, appearing 14% larger and 30% brigher

• Later this month there will be an Annular (ring) eclipse for the Western Americas, and a Partial eclipse for the rest.

• The southern hemisphere should, Keep an eye out for …

• Just remember to vertically flip all the things for the Northern hemisphere

• Saturn and Spica will sitting above the Moon

• Further Reading and Resources

• More on what’s in the sky this week

• 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

The post Mining Asteroids & Shuttle Discovery | SciByte 44 first appeared on Jupiter Broadcasting.

]]> https://original.jupiterbroadcasting.net/14486/spacecraft-updates-scibyte-23/ Tue, 29 Nov 2011 23:28:59 +0000 https://original.jupiterbroadcasting.net/?p=14486 Find out the latest on Russia’s failed attempt to reach Mars, NASA’s new mission, and we’ll update you on the biggest stories of the month!

The post Spacecraft Updates | SciByte 23 first appeared on Jupiter Broadcasting.

]]>

Find out the latest on Russia’s failed attempt to reach Mars, NASA’s new mission, and we’ll update you on the biggest stories of the month, including a few updates that could have huge impacts for physics!

Too much out there is just plain distraction, why can’t we have our cake and eat it too? There are a lot of interesting things going on out there in science, but getting to the interesting bits without all the hype you get from major media outlets is a trick we at Jupiter Broadcasting are hoping to pull off.

SciByte will provide you with a treasure trove of small talk for your next cocktail party, the knowledge to show off to friends and family, and provide you the means, with the help of our trusty show notes, to further investigate the things that interest you the most.

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Phobos-Grunt : Update

• Last time on SciByte
• SciByte 20 (Nov 8)
• The low down
• Launch Date : November 9, 2011 at 00:26 a.m. Moscow time [Nov. 8 3:36 p.m. EST]
• It successfully launched by a Zenit–2 booster rocket just after midnight Moscow time Wednesday , separated from the booster about 11 minutes later and was to fire its engines twice to set out on its path to the Red Planet, but never did
• Scientists had hoped that studies of Phobos’ surface could help solve the mystery of its origin and shed more light on the genesis of the solar system.
• About seven tons of nitrogen teroxide and hydrazine are on board
• Also a small amount of cobalt–57 onboard the spacecraft, which is intended as a gamma ray source for the probe’s soil spectrometers. Cobalt–57 has a half life of about 270 days / ~ 9 months
• What should have happened is that two and a half hours after launch, the first burn should have put the spacecraft into an higher orbit around Earth, and a second burn should have occurred 126 minutes later, which would have sent it the spacecraft to Mars. Neither occurred
• encountered problems with either computer software or the propulsion system
• The spacecraft surprised everyone by maneuvering on its own, raising its orbit a few times
• Significance
• Nov 22 : a ground station in Australia heard an acquisition of a radio signal [Perth station heard a signal from Phobos-Grunt at about 2025 GMT (3:25 p.m. EST)]
• Nov 23 : ESA’s tracking station in Australia again established two-way communication with Russia’s Phobos–Grunt spacecraft, data received from the spacecraft have been sent to the Russian mission control centre for analysis
• Nov 24 : signal was received at a Russian station at the Baikonur cosmodrome in Kazakhstan on Thursday afternoon
• Nov 25 : Russian specialists have deciphered telemetry data received
• Nov 25 : contact was lost again, as the ESA ground station near Perth Australia was unable to establish contact during several passes over the ground station
• * Of Note*
• Phobos-Grunt could be sent to orbit the Moon or may be even an asteroid
• Theoretically, Grunt’s lander could set down on any celestial body with a gravitational force similar to that of Phobos (should such asteroid candidate exists) the return capsule back to Earth might be utilized to deliver a sample of the asteroid
• Even if they can’t save the mission telemetric data from the spacecraft could help identify the causes of the failure and make adjustments for future interplanetary missions
• Multimedia
• VIDEO : Launch of Phobos-Grunt @ YouTube
• VIDEO : Phobos-Grunt rocket moving into place @ YouTube
• VIDEO : in orbit as seen from ground @ YouTube
• VIDEO : Mission Animation @ YouTube
• VIDEO : Will Phobos-Grunt fall to Earth @ Space.com
• The Phobos-Grunt mission profile @UniverseToday.com
• Social Media
• Twitter Results for [#PhobosGrunt](https://twitter.com/#!/search?q=%23PhobosGrunt)
• Further Reading / In the News
• Russian President Vows To Punish Space Officials [RIA Novosti] @ SpaceNews
• Phobos-Grunt goes silent again @SpaceToday
• Distant-sensing news from Phobos-Grunt received
• [Phobos-Grunt could be rerouted to visit an asteroid @NewsScientist](
  https://www.newscientist.com/blogs/shortsharpscience/2011/11/phobos-mission-phones-home-as.html)
• Data beamed from Russia Mars probe deciphered @MarsDaily
• Russia ‘makes first contact’ with stranded Mars probe (Update) @ PhysOrg
• ESA station keeps contact with Russian Mars mission Phobos-Grunt @ ESA.int
• Contact Established with Phobos-Grunt Spacecraft — Can the Mission Go On? @ UniverseToday
• It’s Alive! Russia’s Phobos-Grunt Probe Phones Home @Space.com
• It’s alive! Russia’s Phobos-Grunt probe phones home @ SpaceFlightNow
• Consolation Prize for Phobos-Grunt? Experts Consider Possibilities for Sending Spacecraft to Moon or Asteroid @ UniverseToday
• Russia Races to Save Mars Moon Probe from Space Junk Fate @Space.com @ Space.com
• Trouble for the Phobos-Grunt Mission @UniverseToday
• Russian probe fails to set course to Mars – Roscosmos @ Rian.ru
• Russians desperately try to save Mars moon probe (Update) @PhysOrg.com
• Outlook Grim for Stranded Russian Mars Moon Probe @Space.com
• Chance of Russia Mars probe rescue ‘very small’ @PhysOrg.com
• Russia’s attempts to save Mars probe unsuccessful (Update) @Physorg.com
• Phobos-Grunt: a legal analysis of potential liability and options for mitigation @ The Space Review

NASA’s Mars Science Laboratory “Curiosity” Rover : Updates and more

• Last time on SciByte
• SciByte 18 (Oct 25)
• Rover low down
• Target Landing Date: August 5, 2012
• Length : 9 feet / 2.8 meters
• Total Weight : 1,984 pounds / 900kg [Scientific Instruments = 176 pounds / 80kg]
• Mission duration 668 Martian sols (686 Earth days)
• Not going to use the ‘airbag’ landing that the other rovers have used; a parachute will slow the rover’s descent toward Mars [Diameter of 51 feet /16 meters]
• Rocket-powered backpack will lower the rover on a tether during the final moments before landing YouTube Video – @
• It will perform the first-ever precision landing on Mars
• Launch vehicle low down
• Launch vehicle Atlas V 541
• The Atlas 5 blasted off with nearly 2 million pounds of thrust it equipped with four solid-fuel strap-on boosters for additional power, the 1.2-million-pound
• The mission got underway on time at 10:02 a.m. EST (GMT–5) from launch complex 41 at the Cape Canaveral Air Force Station
• Four-and-a-half minutes after takeoff, the first stage dropped away
• Earth-escape velocity of 22,500 mph
• Telemetry from the rocket was spotty during a 20-minute coast to the Mars departure point
• During the eight-and-a-half-month cruise to Mars NASA will test the rover’s instruments, adjust the craft’s trajectory, and tweak the control software
• * Signatures Story*
• On the rover’s deck is a plaque inscribed with the signatures of President Barack Obama and Vice President Joe Biden, in addition to other administration and NASA leaders
• The Autograph plaque will be visible and that at some point will be photographed on Mars by Curiosity’s camera-topped mast
• The signatures plaque continues a more than 40-year tradition of sending presidential plaques on planetary missions
• Elsewhere on the rover is the autograph of the 14-year-old girl from Kansas who gave Curiosity its name
• More than 1.24 million names from members of the public who signed up through NASA have digital signatures on chips about the size of a dime
• The names from the public were etched into silicon using an electron-beam machine used for fabricating micro-devices at JPL
• More than 20,000 visitors to locations of work on the rover at JPL and Kennedy Space Center wrote their names on pages, which were scanned and reproduced at microscopic scale on another chip
• Of Note
• As Curiosity drives over the martian terrain, the groves in each wheel will form a string of ‘dash’ and ‘dot’ imprints – morse code that will spell out “J-P-L.” Picture of Rover Morse Code
• Multimedia
• VIDEO @ YouTube.com : Mars Science Laboratory Launch
• VIDEO @ YouTube.com : MSL Launch Day Sep Video in Space
• VIDEO @ YouTube.com : Mars Science Laboratory (Curiosity Rover) Mission Animation
  
• VIDEO @ YouTube.com : Mars in a Minute: Is Mars Really Red?
• VIDEO @ YouTube.com : Building Curiosity: Landing System Drop Test
• VIDEO @ YouTube.com : Mars Curiosity Rover – First Test Drive
• VIDEO @ YouTube.com : Mars Science Laboratory Curiosity Rover Animation
• VIDEO @ YouTube.com : Curiosity Update: Curiosity’s Stunt Double Takes a Spin
• ‘Curiosity Cam’ @ Ustream provided live video from the construction
• VIDEO : Curiosity Rover’s Perculiar Mars Landing Described @ Space.com
• VIDEO : New Mars Rover Powered by Plutonium @ Space.com
• VIDEO : New Mars Science Rover Landing Site – Birds Eye View @ Space.com
• VIDEO : Tumbleweed Rovers Could Explore Mars @Discovery News Videos
• Photo Gallery: Last Look at Mars Rover Curiosity Before Launch @Space.com
• Photos: Curiosity Rover, NASA’s Mars Science Laboratory @ Space.com
• Photos: Gale Crater on Mars, Curiosity Rover’s Landing Site @ Space.com
• Photos of Mars: The Amazing Red Planet @ Space.com
• Slide Show : When Discovery News Met Mars Rover ‘Curiosity’ @ Discovery.com
• Infographic : Inside Huge Mars Rover’s Sky Crane Landing @ Space.com
• Photo : Mock up’s size comparison @ NASA.gov
• Rendition Size comparison – landers @ NASA.gov
• Photo of parachute to be used @ NASA.gov
• Social Media
• Curiosity Rover @MarsCuriosity
• NASA JPL @NASAJPL
• Further Reading / In the News
• Phobos-Grunt goes silent again
• NASA’s Curiosity Rover Flying to Mars with Obama & Others’ Autographs Aboard
• Next Stop Mars! Huge NASA Rover Launches Toward Red Planet
• NASA’s Curiosity rover flying to Mars with Obama’s, others’ autographs on board
• Mars Science Laboratory begins cruise to red planet
• 11 Amazing Things NASA’s Huge Mars Rover Can Do @ Space.com
• Complete Coverage: NASA’s Huge New Rover Launching to Mars @ Space.com
• Mars Science Laboratory @ marsprogram.jpl.NASA.gov
• MSL launch delayed to Saturday, Nov. 26 @ NASA.gov
• A Mars Rover Named “Curiosity” @NASA.gov
• NASA’s Curiosity Set to Search for Signs of Martian Life @ universetoday.com
• 7 Biggest Mysteries of Mars @ Space.com
• New NASA missions to investigate how Mars turned hostile @ PhysOrg.com
• Journey to the Red Planet: A Mars Missions Timeline @ Space.com
• Mars rover carries device for underground scouting @ PhysOrg.com
• Mars Rover Curiosity Gets Sealed Up @ Discovery.com
• Could New Rover’s Wheels Deliver Germs to Mars? @ Discovery.com
  
• Curiosity Rover Testing in Harsh Mars-like Environment @ UniverseToday.com
• Encapsulating Curiosity for Martian Flight Test @ UniverseToday.com
• Assembling Curiosity’s Rocket to Mars @ UniverseToday.com
• Closing the Clamshell on a Martian Curiosity @ UniverseToday.com
• Curiosity Rover Bolted to Atlas Rocket – In Search of Martian Microbial Habitats @ UniverseToday.com
• NASA’s Next Mars Rover Hoisted Atop Rocket @ Space.com
• Curiosity Mars Rover Almost Complete @ UniverseToday.com
• Mars Science Laboratory @ Wikipedia.org

YU55, the molten asteroid : Update

• Last time on SciByte
• SciByte 19 (Nov 1)
• The low down
• In July 2010, the European Space Agency’s Rosetta spacecraft flew within 3,200 kilometers of Lutetia, peered at the asteroid and attempted to read its stony story.
• Images from the OSIRIS camera reveal that parts of Lutetia’s surface are around 3.6 billion years old. Other parts are young by astronomical standards, at 50–80 million years old.
• Scientists think it is a leftover planetary seed, booted into the main belt
• Lutetia turns out to have one of the highest densities of any known asteroid: 3400 kg per cubic metre.
• The density implies that Lutetia contains significant quantities of iron, but not necessarily in a fully formed core.
• Earlier studies of its colour and surface properties showed that Lutetia was rare and represented less than 1% of the asteroid population of the main belt
• Significance
• OSIRIS camera on ESA’s Rosetta spacecraft, ESO’s New Technology Telescope (NTT) at the La Silla Observatory in Chile, and NASA’s Infrared Telescope Facility in Hawaii and Spitzer Space Telescope were combined
• This combined data provided the most complete spectrum of an asteroid ever assembled
• Lutetia’s spectrum matched that of one particular class of meteorite called enstatite chondrites, which are known to date from the early solar system
• Enstatite chondrites are thought to have formed close to the sun and to have served as building blocks for the rocky planets
• Making Lutetia a rocky remnant of the material that formed Earth, Venus and Mercury about 4.5 billion years ago
• It was most likely booted out to its current location after a run-in with a young planet
• Of Note
• Astronomers have estimated that just 2 percent of the bodies that formed where it likely did ended up in the main asteroid belt
• Multimedia
• Astronomy Picture of the Day : YU55
• VIDEO @ YouTube.com : First Video of YU55, 860,000 miles (1.38 million kilometers) away
• VIDEO : NASA | Swift Captures Flyby of Asteroid 2005 YU55 @YouTube.com
• Asteroid 2005 YU55 Passes the Earth @ Astronomy Picture of the Day
• Animation showing Asteroid 2005 YU55 moving across the sky
• Social Media
• Twitter Results for [#YU55](https://twitter.com/#!/search?q=%23YU55)
• Further Reading / In the News
• Swift Satellite Captures Asteroid 2005 YU55′s Tumbling Flyby @UniverseToday.com
• Swift Satellite Captures Asteroid 2005 YU55′s Tumbling Flyby @UniverseToday.com

Faster than light Neutrinos : Update

• Last time on SciByte
• SciByte 17 (Oct 18)
• The low down
• Neutrinos are among the weirdest denizens of the weird quantum subatomic world. Once thought to be massless and to travel at the speed of light, they can sail through walls and planets like wind through a screen door.
• 1300-metric-ton particle detector named Oscillation Project with Emulsion-tRacking Apparatus (OPERA)
• Since neutrinos hardly interact at all with other matter, they stream right through the ground, with only a very few striking the material in the detector and making a noticeable shower of particles.
• Significance
• New high-precision tests in Italy broadly confirm its claim to have detected neutrinos travelling at faster than the speed of light
• Some members continue to insist that further checks are needed before the result can be considered sound
• The new tests, did away with the statistical analysis by splitting each pulse into bunches just 1- to 2-nanoseconds long
• Confirmed that the neutrinos arrived 60 nanoseconds early, with an uncertainty of about 10 nanoseconds, comparable to that of the initial result
• A major concern among the dissenters is the fact that the “time window” within which neutrinos were detected by OPERA in the most recent run had a width of 50 nanoseconds, when it was initially assumed that this window was just 10 nanoseconds wide
• Leaves open the possibility, they say, that not all possible errors have been accounted for
• Food for thought
• Are there yet skill some unforeseen forces acting on the equipment or experiment?
• Do photons actually travel at the maximum speed of light?
• This process will take a while, and many repeated experiments at various locations.
• Multimedia
• IMAGE – Cern test ‘breaks speed of light’ @ bbc.co.uk
• IMAGE: Universal Speed Limit?
• IMAGE – The Neutrino’s Path ‘Side Vies’
• IMAGE – The Neutrino’s Path ‘Top View’
• IMAGE – Global Gravity model
• VIDEO – Global Gravity model
• VIDEO – New results from OPERA on neutrino properties @ CERN
• CERNtv @ youtube.com
• Social Media
• Twitter account for CERN @CERN
• Twitter account for OPERA @
• Further Reading / In the News
• Faster-Than-Light Neutrinos: OPERA Confirms and Submits Results, But Unease Remains
• Neutrinos Travel Faster Than Light, According to One Experiment @ news.sciencemag.org
• Tiny Neutrinos May Have Broken Cosmic Speed Limit @ NYtimes.com
• Speed-of-light results under scrutiny at Cern @ bbc.co.uk
• Faster-than-light neutrinos face time trial @ Nature.com
• Special Relativity May Answer Faster-than-Light Neutrino Mystery
• Measurement of the neutrino velocity with the OPERA detector in the CNGS beam @ Cornell University Library
• The OPERA neutrino velocity result and the synchronisation of clocks @ Cornell University Library
• A simple explanation of OPERA results without strange physics @ Cornell University Library
• Findings that showed faster-than-light travel were released to the public too soon @ PhysOrg.com
• OPREA – Oscillation Project with Emulsion-tRacking Apparatus
• Critics take aim at fast neutrinos

*— NEWS BYTE — *

Super Saturnian storm

• The low down
• a giant storm has wrapped itself around Saturn
• it has around for more than 200 days making it the longest-lasting observed storm
• There is a giant hole torn into the deeper layers of Saturn’s atmosphere
• Multimedia
• Picture : Saturn Storm in July 2011
• Picture : Saturn Storm in Nov 2011
• Picture : Saturn Storm over time (large image)
• Further Reading / In the News
• Super Saturnian storm

Gumby-Bot

• The low down
• The Harvard team, borrowed from squids, starfish and other animals without hard skeletons to fashion a small, four-legged rubber robot
• The new robot, is 5 inches long. Its four legs can be separately controlled by pumping air into the limbs, either manually or via computer
• A drawback is that the robot is tethered to an external power source
• Significance
• robots designed to squeeze through hard-to-reach cracks after a disaster like an earthquake or navigate rough terrain in the battlefield
• * Of Note*
• Tufts University earlier this year showed off a 4-inch caterpillar-shaped robot made of silicone rubber that can curl into a ball and propel itself forward
• Multimedia
• VIDEO @ YouTube.com : Harvard’s Flexible Robot
• VIDEO @ YouTube.com : Harvard’s Flexible Robot
• IMAGE : Gripping an Orange
• VIDEO @ BBC News
• VIDEO @ Phys.org
• Social Media
• Harvard University @Harvard
• Harvard University
• Further Reading / In the News
• Harvard researchers build flexible robot that can crawl, slither under a pane of glass @ WashingPost
• Bendy robot can squeeze under obstacles @ BBC News

SCIENCE CALENDER

Looking back

• Dec 04, 1819 : 192 years ago : Watermarking – A triple paper was patented in Britain by Sir William Congreve that could incorporate a colored watermark visible when the paper was held up to the light, to make currency harder to counterfeit
• Dec 6, 1830 : 181 years ago : US Navel Observatory – One of the oldest scientific agencies in the U.S., was established as the Depot of Charts and Instruments in Washington, D.C. Its primary mission was to care for the U.S. Navy’s chronometers, charts and other navigational equipment.
• Dec 6, 1850 : 161 years ago : Ophthalmoscope – Hermann von Helmholtz announced his invention, the ophthalmoscope, to the Berlin Physical Society. It revolutionized ophthalmology, enabling a view inside a person’s eye to see the details of the living retina, diagnose eye diseases and prevent blindness. Ophthalmoscope Retina from Ophthalmoscope
• Dec 06, 1945 : 66 years ago : Microwave Oven – The microwave oven was patented.
• Nov 30, 1954 : 57 years ago : The Sky WAS Falling – In Alabama, USA, Ann Hodges, was bruised on the arm and hip by a meteorite that fell through the roof of her house, smashed the case of her wooden radio and struck her as she lay resting on her sofa. The meteor made a fireball visible from three states, even though it fell early in the afternoon Image Image Image of Meteorite
• Dec 01, 1997 : 14 years ago : Planets align – Eight planets from our Solar System lined up from West to East beginning with Pluto, followed by Mercury, Mars, Venus, Neptune, Uranus, Jupiter, and Saturn, with a crescent moon alongside that lasted until Dec 8. The planets also aligned in May 2000, but too close to the sun to be visible from Earth. It will be at least another 100 years before so many planets will be so close and so visible.IMAGE

Looking up this week

• You might have seen …
• Nov 9 Filament Eruption CME VIDEO @ YouTube
• Nov 11 Coronal Mass Ejection VIDEO @ YouTube
• Nov 21 Aurora Spectacular VIDEO @ YouTube: Around the world in 90 minutes
  VIDEO : Around the world in 90minutes @ Vimeo
• Black Friday’s Secret Solar Eclipse @ UniverseToday

• Keep an eye out for …

• All this week during dawn hours, Saturn and Spica remain 5 degrees apart all this week, or about half the width of your fist held at arm’s length. IMAGE

• Friday, Dec 2nd : Moon hits first quarter IMAGE

• Monday, Dec 5th : Jupiter will be to the lower left of the Moon at nightfall. Only the Moon and Venus outshine it.

• More on whats in the sky this week

• Sky&Telescope

• AstronomyNow

• SpaceWeather.com

• HeavensAbove

• StarDate.org

The post Spacecraft Updates | SciByte 23 first appeared on Jupiter Broadcasting.

]]> https://original.jupiterbroadcasting.net/13622/asteroids-and-black-holes-scibyte-20/ Tue, 08 Nov 2011 22:29:06 +0000 https://original.jupiterbroadcasting.net/?p=13622 We take a look at asteroid flyby's, black hole data, new elements, Mars water, the brain, headaches, Mars500, and take peek at what’s up in the sky this week.

The post Asteroids and Black Holes | SciByte 20 first appeared on Jupiter Broadcasting.

]]>

We take a look at asteroid flyby’s, black hole data, new elements, Mars water, the brain, headaches, Mars500, health sensors in our cars and game systems, and take another peek at what’s up in the sky this week.

SciByte will provide you with a treasure trove of small talk for your next cocktail party, the knowledge to show off to friends and family, and provide you the means, with the help of our trusty show notes, to further investigate the things that interest you the most.

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Show Notes:

Feedback

• Satellite re-entry response from Duncan

Nov. 8 Asteroid Flyby

• The low down
• 2005 YU55 : 1,300-foot-wide (quarter-mile / 400-meter) asteroid
• At the point of closest approach, it will be no closer than 201,700 miles (324,600 kilometers) or 0.85 the distance from the moon to Earth. (above the Guatemalan coast)
• Data collected during Arecibo’s observation of 2005 YU55 allowed scientists to refine the space rock’s orbit, allowing the Near-Earth Object Program Office at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory to rule out any possibility of an Earth impact for the next 100 years.
• Amateur astronomers would need a 6-inch-or-bigger telescope and know exactly where to look to spot it.
• Significance
• The gravitational influence of the asteroid will have no detectable effect on anything here on Earth, including our planet’s tides or tectonic plates.
• NASA scientists hope to obtain images of the asteroid from Goldstone as fine as about 7 feet (2 meters) per pixel.
• The last time a space rock as big came as close to Earth was in 1976, although astronomers did not know about the flyby at the time. The next known approach of an asteroid this large will be in 2028.
• With more observations in the coming years, scientists may be able to accurately plot 2005 YU55’s orbit even further out.
• * Of Note*
• If it’s so close why can’t we spot it naked eye? One, it’s a dark object, composed of carbonaceous material and is thus effectively darker than coal. Two, the moon is close to full.
• As for an actual strike by an asteroid this size, that’s estimated to occur once every 100,000 years or so.
• If 2005 YU55 were to plow into the home planet, it would blast out a crater four miles across and 1,700 feet deep, according to Melosh’s calculations. Think a magnitude–7 earthquake and 70-foot-high tsunami waves
• Multimedia
• Huge Space Rock 2005 YU55 Sneaks Within Moon’s Distance (Infographic) @ Space.com
• VIDEO : Asteroid 2005 YU55 @ YouTube.com
• Close Shave Asteroid 2005 YU55 Bombarded by Radio Waves
• VIDEO : Radar image of 2005 YU55, acquired in April 2010
• VIDEO : First Movie of Asteroid 2005 YU55
• 2005YU555 Fly-by in Spacemap
• Animation of the trajectory for asteroid 2005 YU55 – November 8–9, 2011. Image credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech
• Social Media
• On Twitter, Asteroid YU55 @AsteroidYU55
• @NASAJPL :: Asteroid 2005 #YU55 comes closest to Earth at 3:28pm PT, ~200,000 miles above the Guatemalan coast. Map
• On Twitter, Asteroid Watch @AsteroidWatch
• Further Reading / In the News
• NASA in Final Preparations for Nov. 8 Asteroid Flyby @ NASA.gov
• Asteroid 2005 YU55: An Expert’s Explanation @ UniverseToday.com
• Radar Love: Asteroid Detection and Science @JPL.NASA.gov
• Radar Clicks Asteroid’s Pic @ JPL.NASA.gov
• Quarter-mile-wide asteroid coming close to Earth @ Physorg.com
• New Model Predicts Fallout from Big Meteorite Strike @ LiveScience.com
• How to Spot the Huge Asteroid 2005 YU55’s Close Encounter With Earth @ Space.com
• Asteroid 2005 YU55: See It For Yourself! @ UniverseToday
• Huge Asteroid 2005 YU55 Approaches Earth @ Discovery.com
• 2005 YU55 asteroid will sweep near Earth November 8, 2011 @ EarthSky.org
• Asteroids: Formation, Discovery and Exploration @ Space.com
• Huge Asteroid 2005 YU55 Zips by Earth in Rare Close Flyby @Space.com
• Slooh SpaceCamera
• More information about asteroids and near-Earth objects
• More information about asteroid radar research is at
• More information about the Deep Space Network is at

Direct Observations of disk around black hole

• The low down
• Quasars — short for quasi-stellar objects — are glowing discs of matter that orbit supermassive black holes, heating up and emitting extremely bright radiation as they do so.
• Until now, the minute apparent size of quasars has meant that most of our knowledge of their inner structure has been based on theoretical extrapolations, rather than direct observations.
• The new study makes use of a novel technique that uses gravitational lensing to give an immense boost to the power of the telescope.
• The team measured the disc’s size and studied the colours (and hence the temperatures) of different parts of the disc.
• The team used an innovative method to study the quasar: using the stars in an intervening galaxy as a scanning microscope to probe features in the quasar’s disc that would otherwise be far too small to see.
• Significance
• this type of observation is akin to spotting individual grains of sand on the Moon
• The precision of the method has allowed astronomers to directly measure the disc’s size and temperature across different parts of the disc.
• They found that the disc is between four and eleven light-days across (approximately 100 to 300 billion kilometres).
• Multimedia
• VIDEO : Observing a quasar accretion disc using gravitational lensing with Hubble @ YouTube.com
• This picture shows a quasar that has been gravitationally lensed by a galaxy in the foreground, which can be seen as a faint shape around the two bright images of the quasar.
• Social Media
• On Twitter, Hubble @NASA_Hubble
• Further Reading / In the News
• Hubble directly observes the disc around a black hole @ SpaceTelescope.org
• Hubble Telescope Directly Observes Quasar Accretion Disc Surrounding Black Hole @ UniverseToday.com
• Hubble Directly Observes the Disk Around a Black Hole @ ScienceDaily.com
• Hubble directly observes the disc around a black hole [heic 1116] @ Sci.ESA.int
• Hubble directly observes the disk around a black hole @ Astronomy.com

*— NEWS BYTE — *

Three New Elements Added To The Periodic Table

• The low down
• November 4, 2011, the General Assembly of the International Union of Pure and Applied Physics (IUPAP) met to approve the names of three new elements… one of which will honor the great Copernicus
• Copernicus was a Renaissance astronomer and the first person to formulate a comprehensive heliocentric cosmology which displaced the Earth from the center of the universe.
• Their names are: Element 110, darmstadtium (Ds), Element111, roentgenium (Rg) and Element 112. copernicium (Cn).
• Copernicium was created on February 9, 1996 by the Gesellschaft für Schwerionenforschung, but its original name – ununbium – didn’t get changed until almost two years ago when a German team of scientists provided enough information to prove its existence.
• When it was time to give it a moniker, the rules were that it had to end in “ium” and it couldn’t be named for a living person.
• Multimedia
• Electron shell diagram for Copernicium
• Periodic Table of Elements
• Further Reading / In the News
• Honoring Copernicus – Three New Elements Added To The Periodic Table @UniverseToday.com
• Three new elements named, including one for Copernicus @ PhysOrg.com
• International Union of Pure and Applied Physics (IUPAP)

Mars’ history is a fluid situation

• The low down
• The picture painted by a review paper in the November 3 issue of Nature.
• An international team of researchers crafted a tale of Mars’ parched, frigid history
• Four billion years ago, the Martian surface may have been cold and dry — not warm, watery and more Earthlike than it is today, as many scientists have suggested.
• Instead of saturating the dusty surface, fluids appeared only occasionally, quickly shaping channels and other landforms that bear watery footprints.
• Beneath the planet’s reddish, rocky sands lurked a warm and wet subterranean environment, a potential incubator powered by hydrothermal activity and revealed when meteorite impacts blasted telltale minerals from the planet’s crust.
• Water-carved landscapes, like snaking channels and river deltas, played a large role in producing the current view of a warm and watery Martian past.
• Significance
• If the authors are right, scientists hunting for evidence of past Martian life might be better off using a shovel
• While the evidence for subterranean hydrothermal activity is strong, Bishop says it’s unlikely that transient or small amounts of surface water quickly crafted some of the river features, valley networks, or layered beds seen across Mars.
• In September, NASA announced that Opportunity had found a rock at the edge of Endeavour Crater that looked as though it had been formed in a subterranean hydrothermal system.
• Whether life might have evolved in the Martian subsurface is an open question. But on Earth, even multicellular organisms can live in the deep.
• Multimedia
• Mars WHERE’S WATER?
• Further Reading / In the News
• Mars’ history is a fluid situation @ ScienceNews.com
• ‘Tisdale 2’ Rock, Next Stop for Opportunity @ NASA.gov

Researchers identify brain cells responsible for keeping us awake

• The low down
• Bright light makes it easier to stay awake.
  Very bright light not only arouses us but is known to have antidepressant effects
• dark rooms can make us sleepy
• researchers at UCLA have identified the group of neurons that mediates whether light arouses us – or not
• the cells necessary for a light-induced arousal response are located in the hypothalamus, an area at the base of the brain responsible for, among other things, control of the autonomic nervous system, body temperature, hunger, thirst, fatigue – and sleep.
• These cells release a neurotransmitter called hypocretin
• Significance
• This same UCLA research group earlier determined that the loss of hypocretin was responsible for narcolepsy and the sleepiness associated with Parkinson’s disease
• This current finding explains prior work in humans that found that narcoleptics lack the arousing response to light, unlike other equally sleepy individuals
• findings suggest that administering hypocretin and boosting the function of hypocretin cells will increase the light-induced arousal response
• onversely, blocking their function by administering hypocretin receptor blockers will reduce this response and thereby induce sleep
• implications for treating sleep disorders as well as depression
• Further Reading / In the News
• UCLA researchers identify brain cells responsible for keeping us awake @ UCLA Newsroom
• Researchers identify brain cells responsible for keeping us awake @ MedicalxPress.com
• Researchers Identify Brain Cells Responsible for Keeping Us Awake @ BioScienceTechnology.com
• Brain Cells Responsible for Keeping Us Awake Identified @ TimesofScience.com

Headache tree is a pain in the brain

• The low down
• One whiff of bay laurel tree can spur intense, excruciating pain — and now scientists know why.
• An ingredient in the tree sets off a chain of events that eventually amps up blood flow to the brain’s outer membrane.
• The protein tickles the same cellular detector that responds to painfully cold stimuli and the sinus-clearing scent of wasabi and mustard oil
• This protein prompts blood vessels to swell, and scientists think this swelling puts pressure on the skull and nerves, causing pain.
• Significance
• Other headache triggers interact with some of the same cellular machinery, suggesting they all work via the same pain-inducing mechanism.
• Stimulating this chemical detector ultimately triggers the release of a particular protein implicated in migraine headaches
• Further Reading / In the News
• Headache tree is a pain in the brain @ ScienceNews.org

Mars500 experiment ends

• The low down
• All-male crew of three Russians, a Frenchman, an Italian-Colombian and a Chinese have stayed at the facility at a Moscow space research center since June 2010 to simulate confinement, stress and fatigue of interplanetary travel minus the weightlessness.
• the crew achieved the longest-ever imitation of space flight
• During the experiment, the crew communicated with the organizers and their families via the Internet, which was delayed and occasionally disrupted to imitate the effects of space travel.
• They ate canned food similar to that offered on the International Space Station.
• the crew even conducted a mock Mars landing, venturing from their cramped quarters in heavy space suits to trudge into a sand-covered room and plant flags of Russia, China and the European Space Agency on a simulated Red Planet.
• The organizers said each crew member will be paid about $100,000, except the Chinese researcher whose reward hasn’t been revealed by Chinese officials.
• The organizers said they had considered some female candidates for the experiment, but left them out for various reasons.
• They denied that they deliberately had formed an all-man crew because of the failure of a similar simulation in the past.
• To kill time, China’s Wang Yue practiced calligraphy, France’s Romain Charles strummed his guitar and together the crew, aged from 28–38, played karaoke, chess and Nintendo Wii.
• Significance
• Space veteran Sergei Krikalyov, who has spent a record 803 days in orbit, told Reuters: “It’s useful but, sitting here on Earth, it won’t solve real problems of long human exposure in space.”
• “The most difficult thing for them was being starved of information.”
• A previous 420-day experiment ended in drunken disaster in 2000, when two participants got into a fistfight and a third tried to forcibly kiss a female crew member.
• Multimedia
• Mars500 video diary 1 – Diego’s guided tour()
• Mars500 – 520 days in 15 minutes
• Replay of the Mars500 hatch opening
• Mars500: Photos From Russia’s Mock Mars Mission @ Space.com
• Replay of the Mars500 hatch opening @ YouTube.com
• Social Media
• Twitter account, Mars500 experiment @Mars_500
• Further Reading / In the News
• ESA Mars 500
• Hatch Opens as Simulated Mars Mission Ends @ UniverseToday.com
• Researchers complete 520-day mock mission to Mars @ PhysOrg.com
• Mars500 Crew Finally Freed @ PBS.org
• Fake Mars mission to open hatch after 520 days in isolation @ MotherNatureNetwork
• “Mars crew” played Counter-Strike to cool tempers @ Reuters

Health check on the road

• The low down
• A research team at the Technische Universitaet Muenchen (TUM), in collaboration with researchers at the BMW Group develop a sensor system integrated into the steering wheel that can monitor the driver’s state of health while driving
• monitors vital signs such as heart rate, skin conductance and oxygen saturation in the blood via simple sensors in the steering wheel
• A driver’s skin conductance, for instance, reveals whether he or she is under severe stress, or whether his or her blood pressure exceeds a critical value
• Two commercially available sensors are key elements of the integrated vital signs measurement system
• One of them shines infrared light into the fingers and measures the heart rate and oxygen saturation via reflected light
• One of them shines infrared light into the fingers and measures the heart rate and oxygen saturation via reflected light
• Significance
• the device might be used recognize the onset fainting spells or heart attacks
• When a stress situation is detected by means of skin conductance values, phone calls can be blocked, for instance, or the volume of the radio turned down automatically.
• With more serious problems the system could turn on the hazard warning lights, reduce the speed or even induce automated emergency braking
• Further Reading / In the News
• Health check on the road @ PhysOrg.com
• Health Check on the Road: Safe Stop When the Driver Can’t Go On @ ScienceNEwslineTechnology

Sony Patent Reveals Biometric Controllers

• The low down
• Measuring skin moisture, heart rhythm and muscle movement
• The last time biometric feedback was introduced to mainstream games was Nintendo’s vitality sensor, which was announced at E3 2009 but never released.
• Mentioned in the application
• Character changes based on biometric feedback, such as a character sweating when you’re nervous.
• Tensing up your muscles to absorb an attack or power up shields
• Weapons that become more accurate or less steady depending on your level of stress
• A boost to run faster, jump higher and punch harder while stressed
• Rapid decreases in health if your stress increases
• Different attacks based on stress levels.
• Background music that matches your stress level, or becomes more relaxing if you’re stressed
• Scaling difficulty based on stress level.
• Further Reading / In the News
• Sony Patent Reveals Biometric Controllers

Largest Sunspot in Years Observed on the Sun

• The low down
• The massive sunspot, called AR1339, is about 50,000 miles (80,000 km) long, and 25,000 miles (40,000 km) wide
• Earth itself is only 8,000 miles (12,800 km) wide.
• Was first observed Nov 3 by NASA’s Solar Dynamics Observatory (SDO) satellite and was not yet facing Earth
• Sunspots appear when intense magnetic activity ramps up on the sun, blocking the flow of heat through the process of convection, which causes areas of the sun’s surface to cool down.
• Sunspots appear when intense magnetic activity ramps up on the sun, blocking the flow of heat through the process of convection, which causes areas of the sun’s surface to cool down.
• The intense magnetic activity around sunspots can often cause solar flares, which are large releases of energy that can actually brighten up the sun.
• Significance
• Flares are also accompanied by flows of charged particles out into space, called coronal mass ejections, which can wreak havoc on satellites and power grids on Earth if they head our way.
• AR1339 erupted with an X-Class solar flare and a coronal mass ejection forecast to impact Mercury on November 4 and Venus on November 5
• The MESSENGER spacecraft currently orbiting Mercury is in prime condition to observe the CME scour material off the planet’s surface and form a temporary comet-like tail.
• Multimedia
• VIDEO : Solar Flare From Group AR1339 (2011.11.03) @YouTube
• Analysts at the Goddard Space Weather Lab
• The Sun as of 20:00 UT on Nov. 3, 2011. AR 1339 is on the top left of the Sun. Credit SDO/GSFC
• Social Media
• Twitter account for Space Weather @spaceweather
• Twitter account for NASA Goddard’s Space Weather Lab @NASA_SDO
• Twitter account for iNtegrated Space Weather Analysis System @NASAiSWA
• Further Reading / In the News
• Largest Sunspot in Years Observed on the Sun @Space.com
• Huge Sunspot (Named AR1339) @ AccuWeather.com
  +Giant Sunspot Unleashes Massive Solar Flare @ Space.com
• Largest Sunspot in Years Now on the Sun @ UniverseToday
  +NOAA projects 20% chance of X-class solar flares today

LAUNCHING THIS WEEK

Phobos-Grunt and Yinghuo–1

• Launch Date
• November 9, 2011 at 00:26 a.m. Moscow time [Nov. 8 3:36 p.m. EST]
• Mission Duration
• 3 years
• Mission Run Down
• The Phobos-Grunt (A Russian spacecraft) mission will try to grab some Phobos (the larger of Mars’s two tiny moons) soil and bring it back to Earth
• Phobos-Grunt translates as Phobos-Soil.
• Phobos–Grunt is bringing a couple of tagalongs on the trip
• One is China’s first Mars craft, a small satellite called Yinghuo 1 that will orbit Mars
• The other is a project of the nonprofit Planetary Society: a biological experiment called Phobos LIFE
• Further Reading
• Phobos-Grunt and Yinghuo–1 Encapsulated for Voyage to Mars and Phobos
• Planetary Scientists Hope to Bring Back Mars Moondust @ ScientificAmerican
• China’s Yinghuo–1 Mars Orbiter
• LIFE Experiment: Shuttle & Phobos
• Multimedia
• Animated look at the Phobos-Grunt mission @ Space.com

SCIENCE CALENDER

Looking back this week

• Nov 11, 1572 – 439 years ago : Tycho’s Supernova – Danish astronomer Tycho Brahe began his meticulous observations of the supernova. Brahe was at the beginning of his career in 1572, and it was this supernova that inspired him to devote his lifetime to making accurate measurements of the positions of the stars and planets. Thus 16th-century astronomers learned that the heavens were not immutable, as had been believed. Brahe’s book on his observations, De Nova Stella, originated the word “nova.”
• Nov 14, 1666 – 345 years ago : First blood transfusion – the English physician, Samuel Pepys, made an record in his diary describing Richard Lower making the first documented blood transfusion.
• Nov 10, 1885 – 126 years ago : Motorcycle – the world’s first motorcycle, designed by Gottlieb Daimler, made its debut. The frame and wheels were made of wood. A leather belt transfered power from the engine to large brass gears mounted to the rear wheel. The single cylinder engine had a bore of 58mm and stroke of 100mm giving a displacement of 264cc’s. The engine gave 0.5hp at 700 rpm. The top speed for the motorcycle was 7mph [12 km/h]
• Nov 12, 1901 – 110 years ago : First Nobel Prize in Physics – The first Nobel Prize for Physics was awarded to Wilhelm Roentgen for his discovery of X-rays.
• Nov 11, 1925 – 86 years ago : Cosmic rays – the discovery of cosmic rays was announced in Madison, Wisconsin by Robert A. Millikan who coined their name.
• Nov 12–13, 1927 – 84 years ago : Holland Tunnel – the Holland Tunnel connecting N.Y. and N.J., the world’s first underwater vehicular tunnel, officially opened.
• Nov 13, 1946 – 65 years ago : Artificial snow – artificial snow from a natural cloud was produced over Mount Greylock, Mass., for the first time in the U.S. An airplane spread small pellets of dry-ice (frozen carbon dioxide) for three miles at a height of 14,000 ft. Although the snow fell an estimated 3,000 feet, it evaporated as it fell through dry air, and never reached the ground.
• Nov 09, 1957 – 54 years ago : Laser invented – Gordon Gould began to write down the principles of what he called a laser in his notebook during a sleepless Saturday night. By Wednesday morning he had a notary witness and date his notebook. Unfortunately, he misunderstood the patent process, and did not file promptly. But, other scientists, did file for a patent on their similar but independent discovery of how to make a laser. When Gould belatedly tried to get a patent, it took decades to eventually establish priority and gain what had then grown to be profitable royalties from the established laser industry.
• Nov 13, 1971 – 40 years ago : Mars satellite – Mariner–9, the first man-made object to orbit another planet, entered Martian orbit. The mission of the unmanned craft was to return photographs mapping 70% of the surface, and to study the planet’s thin atmosphere, clouds, and hazes, together with its surface chemistry and seasonal changes.
• Nov 10, 1983 – 28 years ago : First computer virus – U.S. student Fred Cohen presented to a security seminar the results of his test – the first documented virus, created as an experiment in computer security.In the paper, he defined a virus as “a program that can ‘infect’ other programs by modifying them to include a … version of itself”.
• Nov 09, 1991 – 20 years ago : Nuclear fusion power – In Culham, England, nuclear fusion was first harnessed to produce a significant amount of power. Though lasting for only two seconds, about 1.7 megawatts of electric power was produced.

Post Show Correction

• One letter can make a world of difference …
• Today’s power plants use fission to generate heat and do useful work. The creation of the first man-made fission reactor, known as Chicago Pile–1, achieved criticality on December 2, 1942. Fusion differs from the fission reactions used in current nuclear power plants for it occurs when light nuclei travelling at high speed combine, without radioactive waste as a byproduct.

Looking up this week

• You might have seen …

• Tuesday, Nov. 8 : The bright “star” near the Moon is Jupiter. Although they look close together, Jupiter is 1,400 times farther away.

• Tuesday, Nov. 8 : 2005 YU55 passed closer to us than the Moon; closest approach was at 6:28 p.m. EST. ’s visible across North America in the ensuing hours, dim at 11th or 12th magnitude and moving fast Chart

• Keep an eye out for …

• Wednesday, Nov. 9 : In bright twilight just 20 or 30 minutes after sunset, bring binoculars to a location with a clear view practically down to the southwest horizon. There will be Venus

• Thursday, Nov. 10 : Full Moon

• Thursday-Sunday Nov. 10–13 : Mars moves past Regulus, the brightest star of Leo, the lion. They rise shortly after midnight and are high in the southeast at first light. Mars looks like a bright orange star with Regulus quite close to the right or lower right.

• Friday, Nov. 11 : Venus and Mercury are quite lo

The post Asteroids and Black Holes | SciByte 20 first appeared on Jupiter Broadcasting.

]]> https://original.jupiterbroadcasting.net/13418/space-station-and-lizards-scibyte-19/ Tue, 01 Nov 2011 21:35:47 +0000 https://original.jupiterbroadcasting.net/?p=13418 We take a look at the Space Station resupply mission, dinosaurs, Mars, Snake Oil, Asteroids, cryptography, and take another peek at what’s up in the sky.

The post Space Station and Lizards | SciByte 19 first appeared on Jupiter Broadcasting.

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Hello everyone and welcome back to SciByte!

We take a look at the Space Station resupply mission, dinosaurs, Mars, Snake Oil, Asteroids, cryptography, and take another peek at what’s up in the sky this week.

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Show Notes:

Audible.com:

The Master Swtich: The Rise and Fall of Information Empires

Space Station Re-Supply Mission

• The low down

• Progress 45 cargo ship successfully launched from Kazakhstan on Oct. 30, 2011, bound for the ISS.

• Progress 45 will automatically link up with the ISS at the Pirs Docking Compartment on Nov. 2

• Progress 45 is carrying nearly 3 tons of supplies to the ISS, including food, water, clothing, spare parts, fuel, oxygen and science experiments for use by the resident crews.

• Deliver 1,653 pounds of propellant, 110 pounds of oxygen and air, 926 pounds of water and 3,108 pounds of spare parts, experiment hardware and other supplies

• Significance

• Soyuz rocket booster is used for both the Progress cargo resupply missions and the Soyuz manned capsules

• If this Progress flight had failed, the ISS would have had to be left in an uncrewed state for the first time since continuous manned occupation began more than 10 years ago and would have significantly increased the risk for survival of the ISS in the event of a major malfunction and no human presence on board to take swift corrective action.

• Multimedia

• Successful Launch for Soyuz Flight @ NASA TV

• Further Reading / In the News

• Success ! Launch Video of Crucial Russian Rocket to ISS puts Human Flights back on Track

• First Progress Launch Since Accident Looms Large for Space Station Program

• Russian Space Agency Sets Dates for Resuming Progress, Soyuz Launches

• Progress Crash Investigation Update

• ISS Crew Provides Light-Hearted Look at Current Space Flight Plight

• Cause of Progress Crash May Have Been Determined

• International Space Station Could be De-Crewed by November

• Managers Still Assessing How Progress Crash Will Affect ISS Operations

• Breaking: “Emergency Situation” as Russian Progress Re-Supply Ship Fails

— NEWS BYTE —

Migrating Dinosaurs

• The low down
• studying chemical variations in the teeth of the chewing-challenged sauropod
• When animals drink water, the oxygen in that water gets incorporated into the blood stream and eventually into tooth enamel
• water from a mountain tarn and water from a lowland swamp will have different amounts of a particular form, or isotope, of oxygen that has two extra neutrons in its nucleus
• Significance
• oxygen isotopes extracted from the tooth enamel of eight fossils remains from the western United States, and then compared the enamel isotope levels to those of minerals found in nearby sediments
• isotopic variation suggests, that they were moving around
• Multimedia
• By comparing the levels of a chemical tracer found in the enamel of sauropod teeth
• Social Media
• Twitter account for Colorado College @ColoradoCollege
• Further Reading / In the News
• Giant dinosaurs may have migrated

Mars feels the Suns Wrath

• The low down
• A bright CME blasted off the sun Oct. 22nd, heading for Mars. Analysts at the Goddard Space Weather Lab expected the cloud to reach the Red Planet on Oct. 26th
• Significance
• Mars is constantly losing part of its atmosphere to space and pressure from solar wind pulses is a significant cause.
• unlike Earth, Mars has no planet-wide magnetic field to redirect the atmosphere-eroding solar wind around and away from the planet
• How does it manage to have any atmosphere at all? Mars depends on comet impacts, polar dry ice and perhaps underground water that de-gasses over time to keep the red planet from being entirely airless
• It is believed Mars suffered a cataclysmic impact event in its early history that damaged the planet’s internal “dynamo.” Therefore, its magnetosphere was shut down and any residual magnetic field acts as mini-magnetic “umbrellas.”
• Multimedia
• predicted solar system path of the Mars-directed CME in the Space Weather Laboratory simulation
• CME launched toward Mars orbit on Oct. 22, as seen here by the LASCO instrument on the Solar and Heliospheric Observatory (NASA/ESA)
• NASA Spacecraft Photographs Avalanches on Mars
• Avalanches on North Polar Scarps @NASA.gov
• Dust Devils on Mars from the rovers @ NASA.gov
• Social Media
• Twitter account for Space Weather @spaceweather
• Twitter account for iNtegrated Space Weather Analysis System NASAiSWA
• Further Reading / In the News
• Martian Air Blown Away by Solar Super Wave @ Discovery.com
• Mars Feels Sun’s Wrath @ FoxNews.com
• Martian Air Blown Away by Solar Super Wave @ Discovery.com

Snake Oil

• The low down
• snakes naturally enlarge their own hearts by some 40 percent in two to three days after eating one of their huge but rare meals
• A mix of compounds called fatty acids identified in pythons can spur an exercise-like boost in the size of mouse hearts
• three fatty acids identified in the blood of Burmese pythons boosted the mass of a heart chamber in lab mice by 10 percent in just a week
• Significance
• Enlarging heart tissue can be a danger sign for humans
• the growth seen in the mice looks more like an athlete’s healthful heart growth than a heart disease patient’s worrisome one
• These ubiquitous compounds perform a variety of functions in reptiles and humans alike. Just the right mix of three of them — myristic, palmitic and palmitoleic acid — turns out to trigger a quick upsizing in heart muscle cells
• many questions remain about how the snakes’ fatty acids actually work to trigger heart muscle cells to bulge
• Further Reading / In the News
• Python’s heart-restoring elixir works in mice

Story of a Molten Asteroid

• The low down
• Lutetia and its asteroid cousins are thought to be relics from the early solar system
• rocky fossils that have recorded a history of the solar system’s early days in their pits and fractures
• In July 2010, the European Space Agency’s Rosetta spacecraft flew within 3,200 kilometers of Lutetia, peered at the asteroid and attempted to read its stony story.
• Images from the OSIRIS camera reveal that parts of Lutetia’s surface are around 3.6 billion years old. Other parts are young by astronomical standards, at 50–80 million years old.
• Astronomers estimate the age of airless planets, moons, and asteroids by counting craters.
• Lutetia’s weak gravity tugged on Rosetta. The slight change in Rosetta’s path was reflected in radio signals received back at Earth
• Significance
• Scientists now think it is a leftover planetary seed, booted into the main belt
• Lutetia turns out to have one of the highest densities of any known asteroid: 3400 kg per cubic metre.
• The density implies that Lutetia contains significant quantities of iron, but not necessarily in a fully formed core.
• The only explanation appears to be that Lutetia was subjected to some internal heating early in its history but did not melt completely and so did not end up with a well-defined iron core.
• Multimedia
• ESA Rosetta Images of Lutetia
• ESA Rosetta Images of Lutetia
• Social Media
• Twitter account for ESA Science Team @esascience
• Twitter Results for [#Lutetia](https://twitter.com/#%21/search?q=%23Lutetia)
• Further Reading / In the News
• Chronicles of Lutetia
• Asteroid Lutetia: postcard from the past @ ESA

Cracking a 250 year old puzzle

• The low down
• Code breaking still relies on good guesses and flashes of insight more than brute force
• more than three centuries after it was devised, the 75,000-character Copiale Cipher finally has been broken.
• To break the cipher the team tracked down the original manuscript, and transcribed a machine-readable version of the text, using a computer program created by Knight to help quantify the co-occurrences of certain symbols and other patterns.
• reveals the rituals and political leanings of an 18th-century secret society in Germany
• handwritten message in abstract symbols and Roman letters meticulously covering 105 yellowing pages hidden in the depths of an academic archive.
• rituals detailed in the document indicate the society had a fascination with eye surgery and ophthalmology
• Knight now is targeting other coded messages, including ciphers sent by the Zodiac Killer and other famous unsolved codes
• Significance
• There are quite a number of antique documents that remain mysterious, despite cryptologists’ best efforts
• opens up a window for people who study the history of ideas and the history of secret societies
• Historians believe that secret societies have had a role in revolutions
• * Of Note*
• Translation remains a tough challenge for artificial intelligence
• Copiale cipher. Translation from German (August 2011)
• Multimedia
• • USC Scientist Cracks Mysterious “Copiale Cipher” @ YouTube
• Social Media
• Twitter account for University of Southern California USC
• Further Reading / In the News
• Computer Scientists Crack “Unbreakable” Code, Find Minutes of 250-Year-Old Secret Society
• Computer Scientist Cracks Mysterious ‘Copiale Cipher’ @ ScienceDaily.com
• For more information about the method of decipherment
• Modern Algorithms Crack 18th Century Secret Code @ Wired.com

SCIENCE CALENDER

Looking back this week

• Nov 06, 1572 – 439 years ago : Tycho’s Supernova – A supernova was first noted in the W-shaped constellation of Cassiopeia but was seen by many observers throughout Europe and in the Far East. For two weeks it was brighter than any other star in the sky and visible in daytime. By month’s end, it began to fade and change colour, from bright white to yellow and orange to faint reddish light. It was visible to the naked eye for about 16 months
• Nov 08, 1895 – 116 years ago : X-rays – Wilhelm Röntgen discovered X-rays during an experiment at Würzburg University
• Nov 07, 1908 – 103 years ago : Single atom – Prof. Ernest Rutherford announced in London that he had isolated a single atom of matter
• Nov 07, 1918 – 93 years ago : Goddard rocket – Goddard demonstrated a tube-launched solid propellant rocket, using a music stand as his launching platform,. Goddard began work for the Army in 1917 to design rockets to aid in the war effort.
• Nov 04–05, 1922 – 89 years ago : Tutankhamen’s tomb – The entrance to King Tutankhamen’s tomb was discovered in Egypt in the Valley of the Kings where the English archaeologist Howard Carter had been making extended excavations. One of Carter’s labourers stumbled upon a stone step, the first step in a sunken stairway that ran down into the rock. Howard Carter excavated a further 11 steps and exposed a large part of a plastered and sealed doorway to Tutankhamun’s tomb in the Valley of the Kings near Luxor, Egypt. The tomb was the most complete ancient Egyptian royal tomb ever found.
• Nov 07, 1940 – 71 years ago : Tacoma Narrows Bridge collapse – at approximately 11:00 am, the first Tacoma Narrows suspension bridge collapsed due to wind-induced vibrations. Situated on the Tacoma Narrows in Puget Sound, near the city of Tacoma, Washington, the bridge had only been open for traffic a few months. Video of Tacoma Narrows Bridge Collapse “Gallopin’ Gertie”
• Nov 02, 1947 – 64 years ago : Spruce Goose – Howard Hughes piloted his huge wooden airplane, known as the Spruce Goose on its only flight, which lasted about a minute over Long Beach Harbor in California. It was the first test of a U.S. plane with eight engines. Wing span was 319 feet, 11 inches. Originally conceived by Henry J. Kaiser, a steelmaker and builder of Liberty ships, the aircraft was designed and constructed by Hughes and his staff. The original proposal for the enormous, 400,000-pound wooden flying boat, with its spectacular 320-foot wingspan, came from the U.S. government in 1942. The entire airframe and surface structures are composed of laminated wood (primarily birch, not spruce).
• Nov 03, 1957 – 54 years ago : Laika – Sputnik 2 was launched, with the first live animal sent into space – a Siberian husky dog, Laika (“barker” in Russian). By design, the craft which was built in only 4 weeks. Biological data, the first data of its kind, was transmitted back to Earth while she lived. The data showed scientists how Laika was adapting to space – information important to the imminent planned manned missions. The 508-kg satellite remained in orbit 162 days. The true cause and time of Laika’s death was not made public until 2002, Laika likely died within hours after launch from overheating.
• Nov 05, 1963 – 48 years ago : Vikings in America – Archaeologists found Viking ruins in Newfoundland predating Columbus by 500 years. Leif Ericson, Icelandic explorer, second son of Eric the Red, is believed by most historians to have been the first European to reach the North American mainland.

Looking up this week

• You might have seen …

• A small comet dove into the sun during the late hours of Oct. 30th. Watch the movie to see what SOHO saw

• Keep an eye out for …

• Wednesday, Nov. 2 : 1st Quarter Moon

• Thursday, Nov. 3 : Look lower left of the Moon this evening, by two or three fist-widths at arm’s length, for Fomalhaut, the Autumn Star.

• Friday, Nov. 4 : Jupiter’s Great Red Spot should be crossing the planet’s central meridian.

• Sat November 5, 2011 : The planet Saturn is quite low in the east at first light. It looks like a golden star, with the true star Spica to its lower right. Saturn’s largest moon, Titan, is visible through modest telescopes as a tiny “star” quite near Saturn.

• Mars, the red planet, is a morning object among the stars of Leo during November

• In the Southern Hemisphere : Mercury and Venus get together in the evening sky

• Early November : The Taurids meteor shower is active in early November and although rates are not high with no well-defined peak, around five meteors per hour can be expected with hopefully some unusually bright and slow moving events. Although Eastern Europe and the Middle East are most favoured, it is essential that observers head out as soon as the Sun is a few degrees below the horizon also be aware you will

• Saturday, Nov. 5 : Daylight-saving time ends (for most of North America) at 2 a.m. Sunday morning. Clocks “fall back” an hour.

• More on whats in the sky this week

• Sky&Telescope

• AstronomyNow

• SpaceWeather.com

• HeavensAbove

• StarDate.org

The post Space Station and Lizards | SciByte 19 first appeared on Jupiter Broadcasting.

]]> https://original.jupiterbroadcasting.net/11271/near-earth-objects-scibyte-12/ Wed, 17 Aug 2011 19:35:03 +0000 https://original.jupiterbroadcasting.net/?p=11271 We take a look at Near Earth Object, what qualifies as a NEO, what dangers they actually pose and some of the impacts that had already occurred on the Earth.

The post Near Earth Objects | SciByte 12 first appeared on Jupiter Broadcasting.

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This week on SciByte we take a look at Near Earth Object, what qualifies as a NEO, what dangers they actually pose and some of the impacts that had already occurred on the Earth. Plus we take a quick look at at the DAWN spacecraft that is currently orbiting the asteroid Vesta and has plans to visit the asteroid Ceres as well.

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Show Notes:

What is a Near Earth Object? NEO

• A Solar System object, like comets or asteroids, whose orbit brings them into close proximity, less than 1.3 AU, with the Earth.
• That’s 15,245.6 times the diameter of the Earth, or 508.2 times the distance from the center of the Earth to the center of the Moon.
  • 1.3 AU = 120,842,549.5 mi / 194,477,231.9 km
  • Astronomical unit (AU) : 92,955,807.3 mi / 149,597,870.7 km
  • Earth’s Diameter :7,926.4 mi / 12,756.3 km
  • Moon Orbit ~= 238,858.2 mi / 384,405 km
  • Moon Orbit ~= 30 Earth Diameters

Asteroids and Meteoroids and Meteorites … oh my!

• Asteroid : A relatively small, inactive, rocky body orbiting the Sun.
• Comet : A relatively small, at times active, object whose ices can vaporize in sunlight forming an atmosphere (coma) of dust and gas and, sometimes, a tail of dust and/or gas.
• Meteoroid : A small particle, conventionally below 32ft / 10m, from a comet or asteroid orbiting the Sun.
• Meteor : The light phenomena which results when a meteoroid enters the Earth’s atmosphere and vaporizes; a shooting star.
• Meteorite : A meteoroid that survives its passage through the Earth’s atmosphere and lands upon the Earth’s surface.

What was that thing I saw in the sky?

• It depends on when and what you saw …
• Meteors, often called shooting stars or fireballs, streak across the sky in a matter of seconds, can leave a faint ionization trail visible for minutes, and can be as bright as the Moon sometimes.
• Satellites in orbit around the Earth, are much slower moving and relatively constant in brightness. Just after sunset and before sunrise, are likely times to see them as this is the time when they are reflecting sunlight but it is still dark on the surface of the Earth. (Some satellites can flare up for a few seconds and become very bright when their solar panels reflect the sunlight.)

Asteroids / NEO’s Facts

• The mass of all the objects of the Main asteroid belt, lying between the orbits of Mars and Jupiter, is about 4 percent of the mass of the Moon.
• Objects spend on average a few million years as NEOs before hitting the Sun, being ejected from the Solar System, or (for a small number of them) hitting a planet.

How Many Near-Earth Objects Have Been Discovered So Far?

• August 8, 2011 : 8,168 Near-Earth objects have been discovered.
  • 828 have a diameter of approximately 0.6mi / 1 km or larger
  • 1,243 have been classified as Potentially Hazardous Asteroids (PHAs).
  • NASA – How many NEO’s have been discovered?
    *Generally the hype from an object is more due to the ‘late discovery’ of an object. With some being discovered mere days before an encounter.

Potentially hazardous object

• An asteroid or comet with an orbit such that it has the potential to make close approaches, within 0.05 AU, to the Earth and a size large enough to cause significant regional damage in the event of impact.
• That’s 586.4 times the diameter of the Earth, or 19.5 times the distance from the center of the Earth to the center of the Moon.
  • Astronomical unit (AU) : 92,955,807.3 mi / 149,597,870.7 km
  • Earth’s Diameter : 7,926.4 mi / 12,756.3 km
  • Moon Orbit ~= 238,858.2 mi / 384,405 km</li>
<li>Moon Orbit ~= 30 Earth Diameters
• Diameter is at least 492ft / 150 m.
  • Would cause regional devastation to human settlements. No impact of this size has occurred during human history.
  • Such impacts would occur on average around once per 10,000 years.

How often does the Earth get a close encounter?

• Objects with diameters of 16-30 ft / 5-10 m impact the Earth’s atmosphere approximately once per year. These ordinarily explode in the upper atmosphere, and most or all of the solids are vaporized
  • These can produce as much energy as the atomic bomb dropped on Hiroshima
  • ~15,000 tonnes of TNT
  • Every 2000–3000 years NEAs produce explosions comparable to the one observed at Tunguska in 1908
• Objects with a diameter of one kilometer hit the Earth an average of twice every million year interval
• Large collisions with five kilometer objects happen approximately once every ten million years.

Impact Craters on Earth

• It was around the turn of the century that the idea that craters were due to impacts rather than volcanism.
• Grove Karl Gilbert : In 1892 Gilbert would be among the first to propose that the moon’s craters were caused by impact rather than volcanism
• Daniel Barringer : In 1903, mining engineer and businessman Daniel M. Barringer suggested that the crater had been produced by the impact of a large iron-metallic meteorite.
• It wasn’t until 1960 that we had definitive proof that there were actual impact craters on Earth.
• This was proved by Eugene Shoemaker, the same guy who co-discovered the comet Shoemaker-Levy 9 that hit Jupiter in 1994, studying Meteor Crater in Arizona.
• The key discovery was the presence in the crater of the mineral stishovite, a rare form of silica found only where quartz-bearing rocks have been severely shocked by an instantaneous overpressure.
• Where are all the Earth impact we know about?

How do we categorize the danger level?

• Palermo Technical Impact Hazard Scale : a logarithmic scale used by astronomers to rate the potential hazard of impact of a near-earth object (NEO) and combines two types of data; probability of impact, and estimated kinetic yield, into a single “hazard” value.
  • A rating of 0 indicates a low hazard level
  • A rating of +2 would indicate the hazard is 100 times more likely
• Torino Scale : a method for categorizing the impact hazard associated with near-Earth objects (NEOs) such as asteroids and comets. It is intended as a tool for astronomers and the public to assess the seriousness of collision predictions, by combining probability statistics and known kinetic damage potentials into a single threat value.

NEO Asteroid 99942 : Apophis

• Diameter : 886 ft / 270 m
• 2.9 x height Statue of Liberty [ 306 ft / 93.47 m ]
• 2 x height of Pyramids of Giza [ 449.5 ft / 137 m ]
• Rotation : 30.4 h
• Mass [ 59,524,810,800 lb / 27,000,000,000 kg ]
• 4.5 x Great Pyramids of Giza : 13,227,735,700 lb / 6,000,000,000 kg
• 519 x RMS Titantic : 114,640,376 lb / 52,000,000 kg
• Caused a brief period of concern in December 2004 because initial observations indicated a small probability (up to 2.7%) that it would strike the Earth in 2029.
• Additional observations provided improved predictions that eliminated the possibility of an impact on Earth or the Moon in 2029
• However, a possibility remained that during the 2029 close encounter with Earth, Apophis would pass through a gravitational keyhole, a precise region in space no more than about a half-mile wide, that would set up a future impact on April 13, 2036.
• This possibility kept the asteroid at Level 1 on the Torino impact hazard scale until August 2006, when the probability that Apophis will pass through the keyhole was determined to be very small.
• Apophis broke the record for the highest level on the Torino Scale, being, for only a short time, a level 4, before it was lowered

NEO Asteroid 99942 : Apophis what DID NOT happen

• Apophis Path of Risk
• Energy Estimates were originally equivalent of 1480 megatons of TNT, but were later refined to estimate was 880 megatons, then revised to 510 megatons
  • Barringer Crater or the Tunguska event are estimated to be in the 3–10 megaton range
• Biggest hydrogen bomb ever exploded, the Tsar Bomba, was around 50 megatons
• Krakatoa was the equivalent of roughly 200 megatons
• Chicxulub impact has been estimated to have released about as much energy as 100,000,000 megatons
• It was estimated that the hypothetical impact of Apophis in countries such as Colombia and Venezuela, which are in the path of risk, could have more than 10 million casualties

DAWN Spacecraft (https://dawn.jpl.nasa.gov/)

• Science Payload that includes : Camera’s, Visible and Infrared Spectrometer, Gamma Ray and Neutron Spectrometer (GraND), and Gravity Science
• Images of Vesta and Ceres in three colors and black and white
• Full surface with mapping spectrometer
• In three bands, 0.35 to 0.9 micron, 0.8 to 2.5 micron and 2.4 to 5.0 micron
• Neutron and gamma ray spectra to produce maps of the surface elemental composition of each asteroid
• Including the abundance of major rock-forming elements (O, Mg, Al, Si, Ca, Ti, and Fe), trace elements (Gd and Sm), long-lived radioactive elements (K, Th, and U), and light elements such as H, C, and N, which are the major constituents of ices.
• Radio tracking to determine mass, gravity field, principal axes, rotational axis and moments of inertia.

Other Spacecraft Missions to Comets & Asteroids

Near-Earth Asteroid Rendezvous (NEAR)
Deep Impact
Deep Space 1 (DS1)
STARDUST
Hayabusa (MUSES-C)
Rosetta
EPOXI
Stardust-NExT

Additional Research Material

Interactive : Impact Earth!
NASA : Near Earth Object Program
Meteor Crater / Barringer Crater
WIKI : East Antarctica Crater
WIKI : Near Earth Object
WIKI : List of impact craters on Earth
WIKI : Tunguska event
WIKI : Chicxulub crater
WIKI : Meteor Crater

Tracking Study’s or Groups

Asiago-DLR Asteroid Survey
Japan Spaceguard Association
Campo Imperatore Near-Earth Object Survey
Catalina Sky Survey
Lowell Observatory Near-Earth-Object Search
Space Watch
Near Earth Asteroid Tracking
The Lincoln Near-Earth Asteroid Research

Social Media

Facebook : Asiago-DLR Asteroid Survey
Facebook : Campo Imperatore Near-Earth Object Survey
Facebook : Catalina Sky Survey
Facebook : Near Earth Asteroid Tracking
Facebook : The Lincoln Near-Earth Asteroid Research
Twitter : Catalina Sky Survey

Related News Stories

NASA : Near Earth Object News
NASA : Asteroid 2005 YU55 to Approach Earth on November 8, 2011
NASA : 2010 TK7: The First Earth Trojan Asteroid
ScienceNews.com : Five days after being discovered, an interplanetary visitor whizzes past
National Geographic : Huge Impact Crater Found in Remote Congo (March 2011)
National Geographic : “Fresh” Crater Found in Egypt; Changes Impact Risk? (July 2010)
National Geographic : India Asteroid Killed Dinosaurs, Made Largest Crater? (Oct 2009)
Wired : Asteroid Impact Craters on Earth as Seen From Space (Aug 2009)
National Geographic : Huge Impact Crater Uncovered in Canadian Forest (Nov 2008)
National Geographic : Giant Meteor Fireball Explodes Over Northwest U.S. (Feb 2008)
National Geographic : Crater From 1908 Russian Space Impact Found, Team Says (Nov 2007)
National Geographic : Photo in the News: Mysterious Space Object Crashes Into House (Jan 2007)
National Geographic : Meteorite Impact Reformulated Earth’s Crust, Study Shows (Jan 2006)

The post Near Earth Objects | SciByte 12 first appeared on Jupiter Broadcasting.

]]> https://original.jupiterbroadcasting.net/3546/the-sky-is-falling-jn-111710/ Wed, 17 Nov 2010 22:10:32 +0000 https://original.jupiterbroadcasting.net/?p=3546 Tonight’s show ROCKS! Wait, wh- oh we’re TALKING about rocks. Space rocks, to be exact.

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Tonight’s show ROCKS! Wait, wh- oh we’re TALKING about rocks. Space rocks, to be exact. This week marks the high-point of this year’s Leonid Meteor Shower, and we’re gonna tell you all about our space rock stories, and include some tips on getting the best view.

We’ll also share some exciting space news about near-miss asteroids, Japanese space probes and anti-matter! Get SPACEY with us!

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Leonid Meteor Shower is peaking this week (11/16)
https://www.space.com/spacewatch/leonid-meteor-shower-peaking-now-101116.html
* Caused by debris from the Tempel-Tuttle Comet entering Earth’s atmosphere at extremely high speeds. (comet revisits every ~33 years)
* Each fragment is no larger than a marble and most grains of sand.
* Light show caused by speeds of more than 160,000 mph (compared to rifle = 2,240 mph)

Top 10 Leonid Meteor Shower Facts: https://www.space.com/scienceastronomy/top10_leonidsfacts-10.html
* Neatest fact – you can LISTEN to the shower via radio waves.
* Also, the re-entry occasionally causes electromagnetic distortions that make it seem as though the meteors’ sound reaches earth BEFORE it is visible.

Japanese Space Probe accidentally brings home Asteroid dust
https://www.jaxa.jp/press/2010/11/20101116_hayabusa_e.html
NewScientist article on subject: https://www.newscientist.com/article/dn19730-spacecraft-is-first-to-bring-asteroid-dust-to-earth.html?DCMP=OTC-rss&nsref=online-news
* The dust contains a mineral not found on Earth’s surface.

CERN scientists successfully contain Anti-hydrogen for the FIRST TIME
https://www.latimes.com/news/science/la-sci-trapped-antihydrogen-20101118,0,2787137.story
Antimatter infographic: https://press.web.cern.ch/livefromcern/antimatter/

Courtesy of Rikai: https://news.discovery.com/space/comet-hartley-2-pumps-out-the-cyanide.html

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The post The Sky Is Falling | J@N | 11.17.10 first appeared on Jupiter Broadcasting.

]]> https://original.jupiterbroadcasting.net/2781/a-firefly-future-jupiternite-9810/ Wed, 08 Sep 2010 21:50:16 +0000 https://original.jupiterbroadcasting.net/?p=2781 Tonight we take a practical look at space travel, and what our local space neighborhood might look like in roughly 100 years!

The post A Firefly Future? | Jupiter@Nite | 9.8.10 first appeared on Jupiter Broadcasting.

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A keen observer of the news will have noticed a constant and steady march towards exploring and learning more about our own solar system. Many believe it’s unlikely man could travel beyond our solar system, and the very task of man visiting a neighboring planet such as Mars may be the absolute limits of our technology for the next 100 years.

We’ve talked in the past about deep space travel, faster than light travel, and even worm holes and black holes. Tonight we take a practical look at space travel, and what our local space neighborhood might look like in roughly 100 years!

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In the News:

Our favorite crazy-smart physicist Steven Hawking urges humans to colonize off-planet

• His proposed alternative:  Extinction.  Thanks for the sunny outlook!
• Reasoning — we have already faced possible global extinction at our own hands (Cuban Missle Crisis could have sparked global nuclear war).  If such an event were ever to occur, our entire species could be annihilated.  At least if we colonize off-world, we have the potential for survival in these situations.

NASA Launching a Probe into the Sun

• Plans Call for Launch in 2018
• 8 Weeks Travel to the Sun
• Will remain four million miles away from the Sun
• Eight times closer to the sun then any other spacecraft
• They want to learn what “accelerates the plasma”.
• Maybe the key to future travel?

Colorful mix of near earth asteroids discovered, may aid future space travel

• They are cataloging 700 near-Earth objects
• There are roughly 7,000 known near-Earth objects
• Some might come from the main belt between Mars and Jupiter, and others could come from farther out in the solar system.
• Since asteroid surfaces become darker with time due to exposure to solar radiation, the presence of lighter, shinier surfaces for some asteroids may indicate that they are relatively young. This is evidence for the continuing evolution of the near-Earth object population.
• Obama recently urged Congress to pass a bill for NASA that would have a goal of asteroid visits/landings by 2025. (So far, Congress has been uncooperative.)
  • Also mentioned in this report, is the imminent retirement of our shuttle program.  After which, the US will rely upon foreign launches to send astronauts into space. Work is under way at NASA to build the Orion Spacecraft. The project is in the early stages.

Yesterday: NASA Tweets about the “near earth objects”:

“Asteriods passing Earth near moon tomorrow morning..no worries. Visit https://neat.jpl.nasa.gov/”

Long-term Travel Concepts?
Between Ion Drives and Solar Sails, we already have viable means of long-term propulsion for sub-light speeds.

• Problem:  Sublight speeds mean extremely long periods of time spent in space.
  • Travel to Mars can vary between 6 months and 2.5 years, depending on orbit.
• Solutions:
  • Colony Ships?
    • NASA has published mock-ups and concept art of a massive ringed ship that would be capable of producing its own food, and using the rotation of rings to generate artificial gravity within portions of the ship.  Neat!
  • Cryonics? (aka Cryogenics)
    • As of 2010, only around 200 people have undergone the procedure since it was first proposed in 1962. In the United States, cryonics can only be legally performed on humans after they have been pronounced legally dead.
    • Scientists currently have no viable method for resuscitating humans frozen in this manner, and all such concepts are completely theoretical.  Based on the concept that the brain’s physical structure is what creates memories (at a cellular/chemical level).

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