Very brief descriptions, with appropriate links, of current or recent news items.
The Air Force has agreed to share the meteorite data its surveillance satellites detect.
Though the article above makes it sound like this data includes a lot of Earth-destroying asteriods, almost all of these detections are of smaller rocks burning up in the atmosphere, information researchers need to produce a more complete census of the solar system.
A software glitch prevented Kepler from making science observations for 13 hours this week.
At least the Russians can still do this: At 2:09 pm (Eastern) today a Russian Soyuz rocket lifted off, carrying the next crew to the International Space Station.
A cyclone on Saturn has now lasted more than five years, since scientists started tracking it closely in 2004 with the arrival of Cassini in orbit around Saturn.
Opt out! Doctors say that, for health reasons, you should avoid the TSA’s full body scanners.
Maybe this might stop the spending: Republican Senator Jim DeMint wants the Senate to read the entire 1900-plus omnibus budget bill before anyone votes on it. Key quote
The reading could take 40 hours, some news outlets estimate. Last year, Sen. Tom Coburn, R-Okla., forced the reading of an 800-page amendment on the Senate floor. The reading ended when Sanders, who had proposed the amendment, came to the floor to withdraw it.
The Japanese Venus probe Akatsuka might have failed, but its partner, the solar sail Ikaros, continues to function, and remains in contact with its ground controlers, even at a distance of 45 million miles. (The google translation of the daily blog is sometimes spotty (” I will go home ε ₯Rita bath. It will fit your feet smell.”) but still worth reading,)
The largest commercial antenna reflector ever flown in space has successfully deployed in orbit.
The first inspection of Hayabusa’s inner chamber revealed no visible asteroid particles. A microscopic search will follow however, as was done for the outer chamber, where 1500 asteroid particles were found.
This is how tyrants respond to democracy: Violence erupts in Rome after the head of Italy’s center-right government survived a no-confidence vote. Though the article does not tell us much about the political views of the protesters, this quote gives a strong hint that they might be leftwing:
The protesters were mostly students but also included workers and immigrants.
Scientists have used data from Cassini to identify what they think are ice volcanoes on Titan. The two volcanoes, each about 3000 feet high, are located near the equator and appear to resemble the volcanoes on Earth, with a central crater on top of cone-like peak and finger-like flows coming down the sides from the crater. The lava here, however, is not molten rock, but water.
Science discovers the obvious! Researchers at the University of Colorado have found that the post-9/11 security efforts — such as the TSA — do little to increase security and much to turn society into a police state.
