Why Is Human Mars Exploration So Surprisingly Hard?

Mars as seen near opposition late August 2003, by the Hubble Space Telescope
Credit: NASA/STSci/Hubble; Captioning credit MSSS/ ASU Themis/ NASA/ JPL

From The Space Review:

As space policy experts mull over alternative strategies for astronaut exploration of the solar system, possibly including human flight to Mars, the recently-concluded fortieth anniversary celebrations of the Apollo 11 moon landing inspire one specific question: what’s taken so long?

In the heady days of the Apollo triumphs, even the “pessimistic” forecasts imagined it might take as long as twenty years to get astronauts to Mars. Optimistic schedules put the first footsteps on the Red Planet—another “giant leap for mankind”—as early as 1982.

Read more ....

Echoes Of The Birth Of The Universe: New Limits On Big Bang's Gravitational Waves

Aerial view of LIGO facility in Livingston, Louisiana.
(Credit: LIGO, California Institute of Technology.)

From Science Daily:

ScienceDaily (Aug. 20, 2009) — An investigation by the LIGO (Laser Interferometer Gravitational-Wave Observatory) Scientific Collaboration and the Virgo Collaboration has significantly advanced our understanding the early evolution of the universe.

Analysis of data taken over a two-year period, from 2005 to 2007, has set the most stringent limits yet on the amount of gravitational waves that could have come from the Big Bang in the gravitational wave frequency band where LIGO can observe. In doing so, the gravitational-wave scientists have put new constraints on the details of how the universe looked in its earliest moments.

Read more ....

Astronauts Eye Hurricane Bill

The spiral bands of Hurricane Bill in the Atlantic Ocean fill the view as Expedition 20 crew members on the International Space Station look east-southeastward along the horizon. This view was taken on Aug. 18, 2009 at 16:08:54 GMT with a Nikkor 28-70mm zoom lens at the 40mm lens setting. At the time this photograph was taken, Hurricane Bill was centered at 15.9 degrees north latitude and 51.2 degrees west longitude, the winds were 90 knots (103.7 miles per hour) gusting to 110 knots (126.7 mph) and it was moving west-northwest (285 degrees) at 14 knots (16.1 mph). Credit: NASA

From Live Science:

From space, fury is beauty.

The spiral bands of Hurricane Bill in the Atlantic Ocean fill the view of a new image by Expedition 20 crew members on the International Space Station.

The picture looks east-southeastward along the horizon.

It was taken on Aug. 18, 2009 when the storm was centered at 15.9 degrees north latitude and 51.2 degrees west longitude.

Bill is expected to stay offshore as it curves north and then eastward along the eastern coast of North America, according to the latest update from the National Hurricane Center. The route is a typical one for hurricanes.

Read more ....

Giant Robotic Cages to Roam Seas as Future Fish Farms?

A worker cleans an Aquapod fish cage off Peurto Rico in an undated photo. Another Aquapod has been outfitted with remote-control propellers. Someday such automated cages could herald an entirely new form of fish farming, with robotic cages roaming the seas, mimicking the movements of wild schools. Photograph courtesy Ocean Farm Technologies

From National Geographic:

In the future, giant, autonomous fish farms may whir through the open ocean, mimicking the movements of wild schools or even allowing fish to forage "free range" before capturing them once again. Already scientists have constructed working remote control cages.

Such motorized cages could help produce greener, healthier, and more numerous fish, just when we need them most.

The world's growing population is devouring seafood as quickly as it can be caught and has seriously depleted the world's wild fish stocks, experts warn.

Read more ....

Worldwide Battle Rages For Control Of The Internet

From New Scientist:

WHEN thousands of protestors took to the streets in Iran following this year's disputed presidential election, Twitter messages sent by activists let the world know about the brutal policing that followed. A few months earlier, campaigners in Moldova used Facebook to organise protests against the country's communist government, and elsewhere too the internet is playing an increasing role in political dissent.

Now governments are trying to regain control. By reinforcing their efforts to monitor activity online, they hope to deprive dissenters of information and the ability to communicate.

Read more ....

Entertainment Weekly To Embed Video Ad In Print Magazine

From Popular Science:

Last year Esquire rolled out an e-ink cover to celebrate the mag's 75 anniversary and introduced moving pictures (well, scrolling text and flashing images, at least) to the world of print. Next up: talkies. Yesterday, CBS and Time Inc. announced a video ad set to appear in the September 18 issue of Entertainment Weekly.

Read more ....

Average Video Gamer Is 35, Fat And Depressed

The average video gamer: Players are typically 35, overweight and suffering from depression, and rely more on the internet for social support (file pic)

From The Daily Mail:

Playing video games is often regarded as a pastime for children and teenagers.

But the average age of players is now 35 - and it seems they have similar problems to their younger counterparts, according to researchers.

Adults who spend hours in front of a games console every day are more likely to be fat and depressed than those who don't, a U.S. study found.

Read more ....

Google Book Project Gains Three Major Tech Opponents

From L.A. Times:

Microsoft, Yahoo and Amazon have signed on to a coalition that opposes the search giant's proposed settlement with the Authors Guild and the Assn. of American Publishers.

Three powerful technology companies have banded together to oppose Google Inc.'s proposed settlement with the Authors Guild and the Assn. of American Publishers over the Internet search giant's book scanning project.

Read more ....

Who Said Anything About Landing? The Unmanned Surveillance Plane That Can fly For Five Years Non-Stop

Shape-shifter: The Z-wing configuration allows the
aircraft to absorb solar power when in sunlight

From The Daily Mail:

It might look like alien technology but this aircraft is no UFO. It's an Odysseus solar-powered aircraft that aims to be able to stay in the air for over five years continuously.

It has a Z-wing configuration that spans almost 500ft (150 metres) so that the aircraft's shape can be adjusted when in sunlight to absorb as much solar power as possible.

Then when it is in darkness, it flies flat in a straight line for aerodynamic efficiency with the energy collected stored in onboard batteries used to drive the aircraft's electric motors.

Read more ....

NASA Panel Faces The Facts, And Asteroids

From Wired Science:

The 60s are over and no amount of artists’ renderings are going to bring back the Apollo days if NASA’s budget doesn’t get a big boost.

That’s the key message from the independent panel chartered to rethink NASA’s future. The Review of Human Space Flight Plans group also is looking at a variety of imaginative approaches to space exploration that could make NASA’s future seem less like reheated Apollo leftovers.

Read more ....

Why We Lie So Much

Photodisc / Getty

From Time Magazine:

A professor of psychology at the University of Massachusetts, Robert Feldman has spent most of his career studying the role deception plays in human relationships. His most recent book, The Liar in Your Life: How Lies Work and What They Tell Us About Ourselves, lays out in stark terms just how prevalent lying has become. He talked to TIME about why we all need a dose of honesty.

Read more ....

Dark Energy – How Would You Explain It?

The concept of dark energy was created by cosmologists to fit Albert Einstein's General Theory of Relativity into reality Photo: AP

From The Telegraph:

I firmly believe that it should be possible to explain every scientific theory, experiment or concept in simple language that can be understood by a layperson.

However some subjects are so complicated they appear to defy simplification.

Dark energy, which made the news this week, is one such subject. Even the Oxford Dictionary of Science admitted that its nature is not known.

Has anyone come across a simple explanation?

Read more ....

The Origin Of Dogs

From Scientific American:

Fido's cousins may be Eurasian wolves, but new findings complicate the details of domestication.

From precious pomeranians to mangy mutts, all domestic dogs (Canis familiaris) seem to be descended from the Eurasian gray wolf (Canis lupis). But what we still don't know is exactly when and where our best friends transformed from predators into partners. And such knowledge might help solve the long-disputed question of exactly why dogs were the first animal to be domesticated.

Read more ....

A Step Closer To 'Synthetic Life'

From The BBC:

In what has been described as a step towards the creation of a synthetic cell, scientists have created a new "engineered" strain of bacteria.

A team successfully transferred the genome of one type of bacteria into a yeast cell, modified it, and then transplanted into another bacterium.

This paves the way to the creation of a synthetic organism - inserting a human-made genome into a bacterial cell.

Read more ....

In Hot Water: World Sets Ocean Temperature Record

From Yahoo News/AP:

WASHINGTON – Steve Kramer spent an hour and a half swimming in the ocean Sunday — in Maine. The water temperature was 72 degrees — more like Ocean City, Md., this time of year. And Ocean City's water temp hit 88 degrees this week, toasty even by Miami Beach standards.

Kramer, 26, who lives in the seaside town of Scarborough, said it was the first time he's ever swam so long in Maine's coastal waters. "Usually, you're in five minutes and you're out," he said.

Read more ....

Drop In World Temperatures Fuels Global Warming Debate

From McClatchy News:

WASHINGTON — Has Earth's fever broken?

Official government measurements show that the world's temperature has cooled a bit since reaching its most recent peak in 1998.

That's given global warming skeptics new ammunition to attack the prevailing theory of climate change. The skeptics argue that the current stretch of slightly cooler temperatures means that costly measures to limit carbon dioxide emissions are ill-founded and unnecessary.

Read more ....

If An Autonomous Machine Kills Someone, Who Is Responsible?

The supercomputer Hal in Stanley Kubrick's 2001: A Space Odyssey embodies our worst fears about autonomous machines. Photograph: RGA

From The Guardian:

The Royal Academy of Engineering has published a report exploring the social, legal and ethical implications of ceding control to autonomous systems.

Within a decade, we could be routinely interacting with machines that are truly autonomous – systems that can adapt, learn from their experience and make decisions for themselves. Free from fatigue and emotion, they would perform better than humans in tasks that are dull, dangerous or stressful.

Read more ....

Satellites Unlock Secret To Northern India's Vanishing Water

The map shows groundwater changes in India during 2002-08, with losses in red and gains in blue, based on GRACE satellite observations. The estimated rate of depletion of groundwater in northwestern India is 4.0 centimeters of water per year, equivalent to a water table decline of 33 centimeters per year. Increases in groundwater in southern India are due to recent above-average rainfall, whereas rain in northwestern India was close to normal during the study period. (Credit: I. Velicogna/UC Irvine)

From Science Daily:

ScienceDaily (Aug. 19, 2009) — Using satellite data, UC Irvine and NASA hydrologists have found that groundwater beneath northern India has been receding by as much as 1 foot per year over the past decade – and they believe human consumption is almost entirely to blame.

More than 109 cubic kilometers (26 cubic miles) of groundwater disappeared from the region's aquifers between 2002 and 2008 – double the capacity of India's largest surface-water reservoir, the Upper Wainganga, and triple that of Lake Mead, the largest manmade reservoir in the U.S.

Read more ....

The Truth About Record-Setting U.S. Life Expectancy

From Live Science:

Life expectancy in the United States rose to an all-time high, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said today. But that's only half the story.

The country is behind about 30 others on this measure.

Though the United States has by far the highest level of health care spending per capita in the world, we have one of the lowest life expectancies among developed nations — lower than Italy, Spain and Cuba and just a smidgeon ahead of Chile, Costa Rica and Slovenia, according to the United Nations. China does almost as well as we do. Japan tops the list at 83 years.

Read more ....

OurTube

Credit: Technology Review

From Technology Review:

"Open video" could beget the next great wave in Web innovation--if it gets off the ground.

In 2005, Michael Dale and Abram Stern, a pair of grad students in digital media arts at the University of California, Santa Cruz, decided it would be fun to make video remixes of speeches in the U.S. Congress. Their goals were artistic; Stern had notions, for example, of editing a Senate floor speech to remove everything but the pronouns. They would be following, loosely, in a tradition of video commentary that includes remixing speeches from the 2004 Republican National Convention to feature only the many utterances of terrorism or September the 11th by George and Laura Bush, Dick Cheney, Rudy Giuliani, and others. Aware that congressional proceedings are public--and that C-SPAN airs them freely--the pair went online to hunt for the raw material. But "the footage wasn't there," Dale recalls. While C-SPAN did offer archival material for a fee, he says, "if we wanted to pull together a few different clips of senators saying different things--there was no online repository for download."

Read more ....