Curiosity has obtained its first drill sample.
Curiosity has obtained its first drill sample.
Tag: science
The founder of the green movement sees the light.
The founder of the green movement sees the light.
I am an environmentalist and founder member of the Greens but I bow my head in shame at the thought that our original good intentions should have been so misunderstood. We never intended a fundamentalist Green movement that rejected all energy sources other than renewable, nor did we expect the Greens to cast aside our priceless ecological heritage because of their failure to understand that the needs of the Earth are not separable from human needs. … Although well-intentioned it is an erosion of our freedom and draws near to what I see as fascism.
The weak solar maximum continues
On February 4, NOAA released its monthly update of the Sun’s sunspot cycle, covering the period of January 2013. As I do every month, I have posted the latest graph, with annotation, below the fold.
Not surprisingly, the sunspot numbers in January showed a recovery and rise from the steep plunge in December. What is surprising, however, is that the rise is not very much, barely bringing the sunspot number for the month back to the weak numbers we’ve seen for most of 2012.
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An American team who grabbed a sample from buried Lake Whillans in Antarctica last month now claim their work obtained the first evidence of microbial life in subglacial Antarctic waters.
An American team who grabbed a sample from buried Lake Whillans in Antarctica last month now claim their work obtained the first evidence of microbial life from below the icecap.
Curiosity has drilled its first hole.
Curiosity has drilled its first hole.
Kepler is back in operation after a ten day rest to safe the mission.
Kepler is back in operation after a ten day rest to save the mission.
When Kepler launched in March 2009, it had four reaction wheels — three for immediate use, and one spare. But one wheel (known as number two) failed in July 2012, so a major problem with the currently glitchy wheel (called number four) could spell the end of the $600 million Kepler mission. It’s unknown at the moment if the 10-day rest period will bring wheel number four back into line. “Over the next month, the engineering team will review the performance of reaction wheel #4 before, during and after the safe mode to determine the efficacy of the rest operation,” Hunter wrote.
A NASA experiment should produce a light show for those on the east coast tonight.
A NASA experiment should produce a light show for those on the east coast tonight.
Iran today claimed it has successfully flown a monkey on a suborbital rocket flight.
Iran today claimed it has successfully flown a monkey on a suborbital rocket flight.
The only sources for this story come from Iranian sources, so I remain unsure whether it actually happened.
Norwegian scientists admit that the climate has shown no warming since 2000.
Norwegian scientists admit that the climate has shown no warming since 2000.
They then spend a lot of time trying to explain this — and failing — in the context of the theory of global warming. The bottom line remains, however. All the predictions and models of the global warming advocates have been shown to be wrong. Carbon dioxide in the atmosphere has continued to rise, without causing any increase in global climate temperature.
Or to put it plainly: We don’t know what’s going on.
An American team has successfully obtained samples from Lake Whillans, buried half a mile under the Antarctic icecap.
More Antarctica news: An American team has successfully obtained samples from Lake Whillans, buried half a mile under the Antarctic icecap.
No survivors in Antarctica airplane crash
No survivors from last week’s Antarctica airplane crash.
The first nighttime photos from Mars.
The first nighttime photos from Mars.
The seasons change on Mars.
The seasons change on Mars.
With three years of data in hand the researchers report on the sequence and variety of changes that take place over the spring, including outbursts of gas carrying sand, polygonal cracking of the ice on the dunes, sandfalls down the slipface of the dunes, and dark fans of sand propelled out onto the ice. Gas escaping from under the seasonal layer of dry ice erodes channels in the dunes, reminiscent of the erosion that carves more permanent “spider” channels in the southern hemisphere polar region.
Polio virus from Pakistan has been found in Egypt.
Bad news: Polio virus from Pakistan has been found in Egypt.
The importation of the virus into Egypt is another setback for the global program, which has finally been making significant progress in the past 2 years, with polio cornered in just three endemic countries: Pakistan, Afghanistan, and Nigeria. (India has now gone 2 years without a single case of polio.) Of the three, Pakistan was doing especially well in knocking out the virus, but the program there has recently been disrupted by the targeted assassination of nine polio workers in December and early January. Those killings, widely condemned, have stoked fears the virus will regain strength in Pakistan and then reinfect polio-free countries. “This is proof positive of long-distance importation from Pakistan, and there may be more,” Aylward says.
But don’t worry: the Muslim Brotherhood have us covered! “Experts are worried, Bari says, because Egypt has scaled back its national polio vaccinations campaigns from twice to once a year during the turmoil of the revolution.” [emphasis mine]
A research plane has crashed in a remote area of Antarctica, stranding three.
A research plane has crashed in a remote area of Antarctica, stranding three.
Once the beacon had sounded, a U.S. LC-130 aircraft was sent to the crash site, but it was unable to establish radio contact with the Twin Otter, while a thick layer of low-lying clouds prevented those onboard from seeing the plane. Later, a DC-3 aircraft spent hours circling above the crash site, but it also came away empty-handed.
Happy 10th anniversary to the Opportunity rover on Mars!
Happy 9th anniversary to the Opportunity rover on Mars!
Talk about getting your money’s worth: The rover was planned as a 90 day mission.
NASA has now agreed to contribute equipment and researchers to a European dark energy mission.
The check is in the mail: NASA has now agreed to contribute equipment and researchers to a European dark energy mission.
And why should Europe have any expectation that NASA will follow through? Europe’s ExoMars project was screwed badly when NASA pulled out last year. Nor was that the first time the U.S. government reneged on a deal with Europe.
Considering the fragile nature of the U.S. federal budget, I wouldn’t depend on anything from NASA or any U.S. government agency for the foreseeable future. And this includes the various private space companies such as SpaceX and Orbital Sciences that are using NASA subsidies to build their spaceships. Get those things built, and quickly! The government money could disappear very soon.
A balloon sent above Antarctica to study cosmic rays has set a new record for the longest flight.
A balloon sent above Antarctica to study cosmic rays has set a new record for the longest flight.
Archeologists have now found the earliest evidence of chocolate in Utah, suggesting that trade with the tropics was going on as early as 800 AD.
Archeologists have now found the earliest evidence of chocolate in Utah, suggesting that trade with the tropics was going on as early as 800 AD.
Since there still are some uncertainties about the evidence, there are still doubts about the trade.
A new infrared image of Betelgeuse suggests the star and its winds will smash into the interstellar medium in only a few thousand years.
Crash! Boom! A new infrared image of Betelgeuse suggests the star and its winds will smash into the interstellar medium in only a few thousand years.
If the bar [of gas] is a completely separate object, then taking into account the motion of Betelgeuse and its arcs and the separation between them and the bar, the [star’s] outermost arc will collide with the bar in just 5000 years, with the red supergiant star itself hitting the bar roughly 12 500 years later.