blua:
This is what happens when a thunderstorm meets a volcano. Photos were taken February 2013 at the Sakurajima Volcano by photographer Martin Rietze.
The continental U.S. overlaid on the Moon, for your daily dose of perspective. Whoa. Compare the size of the craters to our biggest cities!
The Closest Star System Found in a Century
A pair of newly discovered stars is the third-closest star system to the Sun, according to a paper that will be published in Astrophysical Journal Letters. The duo is the closest star system discovered since 1916. The discovery was made by Kevin Luhman, an associate professor of astronomy and astrophysics at Penn State University and a researcher in Penn State’s Center for Exoplanets and Habitable Worlds.
Both stars in the new binary system are “brown dwarfs,” which are stars that are too small in mass to ever become hot enough to ignite hydrogen fusion. As a result, they are very cool and dim, resembling a giant planet like Jupiter more than a bright star like the Sun.
Grasshopper Successfully Completes 80M Hover SlamOn Thursday, March 7, 2013, SpaceX’s Grasshopper doubled its highest leap to date to rise 24 stories or 80.1 meters (262.8 feet), hovering for approximately 34 seconds and landing safely using closed loop thrust vector and throttle control. Grasshopper touched down with its most accurate precision thus far on the centermost part of the launch pad. At touchdown, the thrust to weight ratio of the vehicle was greater than one, proving a key landing algorithm for Falcon 9. The test was completed at SpaceX’s rocket development facility in McGregor, Texas.
Grasshopper, SpaceX’s vertical and takeoff and landing (VTVL) vehicle, continues SpaceX’s work toward one of its key goals – developing fully and rapidly reusable rockets, a feat that will transform space exploration by radically reducing its cost. With Grasshopper, SpaceX engineers are testing the technology that would enable a launched rocket to land intact, rather than burning up upon reentry to the Earth’s atmosphere.
This is Grasshopper’s fourth in a series of test flights, with each test demonstrating exponential increases in altitude. Last September, Grasshopper flew to 2.5 meters (8.2 feet), in November, it flew to 5.4 meters (17.7 feet) and in December, it flew to 40 meters (131 feet).
Grasshopper stands 10 stories tall and consists of a Falcon 9 rocket first stage tank, Merlin 1D engine, four steel and aluminum landing legs with hydraulic dampers, and a steel support structure.
bravo!
X-ray snapshots: from big black holes to tiny viruses
Cameras designed for capturing black holes are now exploring a new frontier: they are helping us to get up close to viruses on Earth, opening the door to solving medical problems.
These space cameras are opening new frontiers in life sciences by probing ultrafast physical, chemical and biochemical processes at the atomic level, gaining clearer images of structures such as viruses and proteins.
A descendant of the X-ray space camera took the first images of the Mimi virus, the largest and most complex virus currently known. Analysis of this intriguing virus may shed light on basic questions of viral evolution and, perhaps, the origins of life.Researchers at the University of Leicester in the UK developed special X-ray cameras for ESA’s XMM-Newton satellite in the early 1990s.
“ESA funded a lot of that early work to create the X-ray sensors,” said Karen Holland, CEO of XCAM, the company founded in 1995 as a spin-off from the university to develop and market these advanced techniques.
Complex technology is required to take snapshots of the Universe’s X-rays, which are generated by extremely hot objects or from strong magnetic or gravitational fields.“Things like black holes are what you’re looking for, really, with this technique,” notes Karen.
“In order to capture an image in space, you often need many detectors, so the mechanical camera head on a satellite’s X-ray telescope is a very complicated item. It needs to hold and handle the detectors in an array, but must also be lightweight.
“All must be built so the area around the detector stays extremely clean, and all must function in space vacuum.“ Special electronics are also required to drive and operate the detectors.Once these technologies were developed for XMM-Newton’s X-ray camera, the developers realised that the knowhow could be used in a variety of applications on Earth.
In addition to efficient mechanical cameras, XCAM also developed a new type of X-ray camera that produced better images for terrestrial applications, with smaller pixels at higher resolution.
As a result, XCAM was able to supply cameras for the X-ray Free Electron Laser at the DESY German Electron Synchrotron centre in Hamburg, Germany, to take very precise pictures of viruses. Understanding the virus structure could lead to better medicines and healthier people.IMAGE….At DESY in Germany, electromagnetic fields accelerate the electrons in the superconducting resonators.SOURCE DESY 1999
- Quadriplegic uses her mind to control her robotic arm.
- DARPA robot can traverse an obstacle course.
- Genetically modified silk is stronger than steel.
- DNA was photographed for the first time.
- Invisibility cloak technology took a huge leap forward.
- Spray-on skin.
- James Cameron reached the deepest known point in the ocean.
- Stem cells could extend human life by over 100 years.
- 3-D printer creates full-size house in one session.
- Self-driving cars are legal in Nevada, Florida, and California.
- Voyager I leaves the solar system.
- Custom Jaw transplant created with 3-D printer.
- Rogue planet[s] floating through space.
- Chimera monkey’s created from multiple embryos.
- Artificial leaves generate electricity.
- Google goggles bring the internet everywhere.
- Higgs-Boson Particle discovery.
- Flexible, inexpensive solar panels challenge fossil fuel.
- Diamond planet discovered.
- Eye implants give sight to the blind.
- Wales barcodes DNA of every flowering plant species in the country.
- First unmanned commercial space flight docks with the ISS.
- Ultra-flexible “willow” glass will allow for curved electronic devices.
- NASA begins using robotic exoskeletons.
- Human brain is hacked.
- First planet with four suns discovered.
- Microsoft patented the “Holodeck”.
Learn more about each of these scientific break-throughs and discoveries here.
