Life is just a theory

spaceplasma: A Burning Candle In Zero-Gravity The results of a...

Mon, 20 May 2013 10:00:36 -0400

A Burning Candle In Zero-Gravity

The results of a Burning and Suppression of Solids (BASS) experiment demonstrates that in zero-gravity—where heat doesn’t rise—a flame burns in a uniform oval.

Credit: Col. Chris Hadfield

freshphotons: “Modeling the physics of foams and foamlike...

Fri, 17 May 2013 10:00:35 -0400

freshphotons:

“Modeling the physics of foams and foamlike materials, such as soapy froths, fire retardants, and lightweight crash-absorbent structures, presents challenges, because of the vastly different time and space scales involved. By separating and coupling these disparate scales, we have designed a multiscale framework to model dry foam dynamics. This leads to a predictive and flexible computational methodology linking, with a few simplifying assumptions, foam drainage, rupture, and topological rearrangement, to coupled interface-fluid motion under surface tension, gravity, and incompressible fluid dynamics.” Via.

kqedscience: Kepler scientist: “A beautiful instrument has...

Thu, 16 May 2013 16:32:33 -0400

kqedscience:

Kepler scientist: “A beautiful instrument has died”

“One of NASA’s most popular and successful missions has hit a disabling technical snag, the agency announced Wednesday. A reaction wheel on the Kepler spacecraft has become stuck, say NASA engineers. Without it, scientists can’t aim the telescope as precisely as they need to.”

Read more from KQED Science reporter Amy Standen.

homo-medicus: Ancient DNA Found Hidden Below Sea Floor In the...

Wed, 15 May 2013 10:00:23 -0400

homo-medicus:

Ancient DNA Found Hidden Below Sea Floor

In the middle of the South Atlantic, there’s a patch of sea almost devoid of life. There are no birds, few fish, not even much plankton. But researchers report that they’ve found buried treasure under the empty waters: ancient DNA hidden in the muck of the sea floor, which lies 5000 meters below the waves.

The DNA, from tiny, one-celled sea creatures that lived up to 32,500 years ago, is the first to be recovered from the abyssal plains, the deep-sea bottoms that cover huge stretches of Earth. In a separate finding published this week, another research team reports teasing out plankton DNA that’s up to 11,400 years old from the floor of the much shallower Black Sea. The researchers say that the ability to retrieve such old DNA from such large stretches of the planet’s surface could help reveal everything from ancient climate to the evolutionary ecology of the seas.

thescienceofreality: ISS Astronauts Returned Safely to...

Tue, 14 May 2013 09:00:26 -0400

Back on Earth: Expedition 35 CrewCredit: NASA TV

Soyuz Leaves Space Station: Expedition 35Credit: NASA TV

Landing Site via Gizmodo.com

Canada's Chris Hadfield: Thumb's Up on EarthCredit: NASA TV

thescienceofreality:

ISS Astronauts Returned Safely to Earth.

“After inspiring all of us on Earth, Commander Chris Hadfield and crew have finally re-joined us here. The Soyuz space capsule landed safely at 10:31 PM EDT in Kazakhstan. Hadfield had spent 144 days on the ISS, 2,336 orbits around the planet and totaled up around 62 million miles. That’s a lot of miles!

The Soyuz capsule landed vertically, which is the preferred position. The crew, which includes Canadian Astronaut Chris Hadfield, NASA astronaut Tom Marshburn and Russian cosmonaut Roman Romanenko, are back on Earth and reportedly all feeling good as they re-adjust to the gravity. Marshburn was one of the astronauts who performed the awe-inspiring emergency spacewalk to fix the leak of ammonia coolant two days ago.

The landing of the capsule comes a little over three hours since the capsule undocked from the ISS. It marks the end of the ISS’ Expedition 35 Crew in space. The crew will head over to the medical tent to get all properly tested and fixed for normal Earth life. Or as normal life can be in the eyes of men who were in space.” via Gizmodo

“On Sunday, Hadfield handed over command of the space station to Russian cosmonaut Pavel Vinogradov.

As part of his personal farewell to the space station, Hadfield released a video of his version of David Bowie’s Space Oddity, which NASA said is the first music video made in space.” via CBC

thatscienceguy: The Alkaline Metals simply added to water....

Mon, 13 May 2013 10:00:11 -0400

thatscienceguy:

The Alkaline Metals simply added to water. (last gif features Cesium, and unfortunately i could not find any with Francium which is the most explosive)

wnycradiolab: atlasobscura: Delivering a dinosaur to the...

Fri, 10 May 2013 10:00:37 -0400

wnycradiolab:

atlasobscura:

Delivering a dinosaur to the Boston Museum of Science - Arthur Pollock - 1984

It kills me that I didn’t get to witness this.

propaedeuticist: microscopic trichomes of the stinging nettle

Thu, 09 May 2013 10:00:25 -0400

propaedeuticist:

microscopic trichomes of the stinging nettle

This is what happens when you frustrate a laser! In physics, the...

Wed, 08 May 2013 10:00:27 -0400

This is what happens when you frustrate a laser! In physics, the term “geometric frustration” refers to a situation where some ordered system can’t settle in to one single ground state. Scientists want to find out more about frustration because they think it may contribute to several unexplained phenomena, including high-temperature superconductivity.

To create a model for this type of system, physicists set up 1500 different lasers in set patterns. As an APS Physics Synopsis explains,

By changing the position of the laser cavity output mirror, the authors could couple the lasers together by allowing light to leak from one laser to its neighbors. As the lasers go in and out of phase, patterns of optical interference change in the laser output.

This creates the lovely images seen above. If you have a subscription, you can read more about the study in Physical Review Letters. Or just check out the full Physics Synopsis.

Ferrofluids are cool—period. I will never get tired of...

Tue, 07 May 2013 10:00:17 -0400

Ferrofluids are cool—period. I will never get tired of posting about them. In this video, Mark Miodownik puts this magnetic material through its paces, explaining how a liquid can respond to a magnetic field. Bonus points for the jazzy background music.

Via [Geeks are Sexy]

biologicalmarginalia: Historical depictions of the Walrus...

Mon, 06 May 2013 10:00:26 -0400

biologicalmarginalia:

Historical depictions of the Walrus (Odobenus rosmarus) are supposedly some of the strangest and most varied of any animal. The Swedish writer Olaus Magnus is largely to blame for this, having produced the first five. Of course, context is everything; it was the 16th Century and there were no previous models to work from, no formal science, few remains and lots of garbled anecdotes. There was really no reason to think there wasn’t an armada of tusked monsters lurking in the mysterious Arctic. The third of these depictions — which can only be described as some sort of sabre-toothed otter-pig — was labeled the “Rosmarus seu Morsus Norvegicus”, and appears to have provided the walrus with the specific part of its scientific name.

In 1598, De Veer had a close encounter with some “Sea Horses”, although somehow produced a drawing that looked like a legless otter with barely-protruding fangs. In 1613, things took a huge leap forward with Hessel Gerard’s “Walruss”, who drew the young animal from life and its mother from a mount. Apparently, this was the last time the hindlimbs of a walrus would be correctly depicted for 250 years.

In 1765, things took a bit of a step back with Buffon’s illustration, evidently made from a mount posed like a true seal, and a huge step back with Marten’s neckless “Wall-Ross”.

All of this information is from:
Allen, J. (1880) History of North American Pinnipeds. Available.

These are all supposed to be walruses?! Oh, biological illustration…why?

Now THAT is a tiny robot! Inspired by the agility of flies,...

Fri, 03 May 2013 14:19:36 -0400

Now THAT is a tiny robot! Inspired by the agility of flies, researchers have built light, maneuverable flying robots—or flybots, if you will.

The mechanical bugs flap their wings to hover, but all that whirring takes energy. To stay afloat, they need a slim tether connected to an external power source.

You can read more about the flybots in the journal Science.

A Boy and His Atom This is the world’s smallest movie, a...

Wed, 01 May 2013 10:47:00 -0400

A Boy and His Atom

This is the world’s smallest movie, a stop-motion film that IBM made by manipulating individual atoms.

Let’s just sit here and digest that for a while. We humans can move individual atoms around with incredible precision…and we use this fantastic ability to make adorable and dorky videos. Living in the future is so fricking awesome!

You can read more how the movie was made and filmed at Scientific American’s Observations blog.

circleoftyrants: jtotheizzoe: crookedindifference: NASA Probe...

Tue, 30 Apr 2013 10:00:28 -0400

circleoftyrants:

jtotheizzoe:

crookedindifference:

NASA Probe Gets Close Views of Large Saturn Hurricane

Holy hell … that’s gorgeous (and false-colored, sadly).

Regardless of the colour’s falsification, this is still a breath-taking photo. The detail of the 2nd picture is just too perfect to pass up.

Can Your Lawn Stop a Flood? The short answer is...

Fri, 26 Apr 2013 10:00:30 -0400

Can Your Lawn Stop a Flood?

The short answer is “no.” But certain grasses DO absorb more water, which reduces the effect of runoff and could help floods dissipate more quickly. And researchers have just bred a very thirsty new grass species.

The Festulolium cultivar is a hybrid, the offspring of perennial ryegrass and meadow fescue. Ryegrass grows quickly and is popular with farmers, while meadow fescue has a wide-ranging root system that helps it soak up water. Although its parents absorb water well, Festulolium outperforms them both.

Over two years of field experiments, the new hybrid reduced runoff 51% more than perennial ryegrass and 43% more than meadow fescue. Plus, it stood up very well to extremes in weather. You can read the full paper in Scientific Reports.

Remind me again why I should care about some water-guzzling grass? Well, Festulolium adds to the toolkit we’ll need to cope with a warming world. In this world, we can expect more potential flooding from rising sea levels and from extreme weather events like superstorm Sandy. So a grass that can reduce flooding will definitely come in handy!

Image via i_gallagher / Flickr

thescienceofreality: NASA Probe Observes Meteors Colliding with...

Thu, 25 Apr 2013 16:50:19 -0400

thescienceofreality:

NASA Probe Observes Meteors Colliding with Saturn’s Rings.

“NASA’s Cassini spacecraft has provided the first direct evidence of small meteoroids breaking into streams of rubble and crashing into Saturn’s rings.

These observations make Saturn’s rings the only location besides Earth, the moon and Jupiter where scientists and amateur astronomers have been able to observe impacts as they occur. Studying the impact rate of meteoroids from outside the Saturnian system helps scientists understand how different planet systems in our solar system formed.

The solar system is full of small, speeding objects. These objects frequently pummel planetary bodies. The meteoroids at Saturn are estimated to range from about one-half inch to several yards (1 centimeter to several meters) in size. It took scientists years to distinguish tracks left by nine meteoroids in 2005, 2009 and 2012.

Results from Cassini have already shown Saturn’s rings act as very effective detectors of many kinds of surrounding phenomena, including the interior structure of the planet and the orbits of its moons. For example, a subtle but extensive corrugation that ripples 12,000 miles (19,000 kilometers) across the innermost rings tells of a very large meteoroid impact in 1983.”

Read more…

So cool…I wish OUR planet had rings…

ianbrooks: Lava Mountains photos by Lusika33 Do you ever see...

Thu, 25 Apr 2013 10:00:40 -0400

Lava Mountains photos by Lusika33 / posted by ianbrooks.me

Lava Mountains photos by Lusika33 / posted by ianbrooks.me

Lava Mountains photos by Lusika33 / posted by ianbrooks.me

Lava Mountains photos by Lusika33 / posted by ianbrooks.me

Lava Mountains photos by Lusika33 / posted by ianbrooks.me

Lava Mountains photos by Lusika33 / posted by ianbrooks.me

Lava Mountains photos by Lusika33 / posted by ianbrooks.me

Lava Mountains photos by Lusika33 / posted by ianbrooks.me

Lava Mountains photos by Lusika33 / posted by ianbrooks.me

Lava Mountains photos by Lusika33 / posted by ianbrooks.me

ianbrooks:

Lava Mountains photos by Lusika33

Do you ever see pictures of lava and think: “that doesn’t look so hot, what’s the big deal”? A group of intrepid Russian photographers must have had the same idea when they ventured to the volcanic complex of Tolbachnik on the Kamchatka Peninsula. Consisting of two active volcanoes Plosky and Ostry, the pair put on some impressive fireworks when it recently erupted in November, 2012, with the lava flow overtaking buildings 4 kilometers away. While some of the pictures are mesmerizing in their display of the raw plasma that burns inside the furnace of the earth, I was more amazed (and quite frankly, a little concerned) with the nonchalant photographers setting up cameras mere meters away from the molten swarm. The flickering lights of the cooling magma resembles a city at night and almost seems romantic in an imminent fiery destruction-type way.

Photog: Livejournal (via: English Russia)

scinerds: The ‘FlipperBot’ Is Almost as Cute as the Baby Sea...

Wed, 24 Apr 2013 23:13:55 -0400

scinerds:

The ‘FlipperBot’ Is Almost as Cute as the Baby Sea Turtles It Mimics

This adorable little Flipper Bot was designed to mimics the motion of baby turtles as they crawl across a beach toward the ocean. The speed with which it crawls has a lot to do with an individual turtle’s survival, and along the way, some baby turtles may get stuck in a rut created by the turtles that went before it.

Scientists at Georgia Tech and Northwestern University built the Flipper Bot to understand the motion the turtles use as they cross the sand. This is valuable not only with respect to sea turtle conservation, but also with respect to beach restoration:

Umbanhowar said understanding beach surfaces and how turtles move is important because many beaches in the United States are often subject to beach nourishment programs, where sand is dredged and dumped to prevent erosion.

“If you are restoring a beach, it might be the wrong kind of sand or deposited in a way that is unnatural,” Umbanhoward said. “In order for this turtle to advance, it has to generate these kind of thrust forces and it may be unable to get their flippers into it. We could say something about that given our models.”

Read more

currrentbiology: Self Defense The image depicts a live clam...

Tue, 23 Apr 2013 20:46:13 -0400

currrentbiology:

Self Defense

The image depicts a live clam (left) and whelk (right) tucked into their shells. Unlike the clam, which can quickly slam its shell shut in response to danger, the whelk can only squirm back into the spiral recesses of its calcified fortress. But the whelk ultimately has the upper hand: it can drill into the clam’s shell and suck it dry. This image was produced by a team in Hong Kong that CT-scanned live organisms.

Credit: Kai-hung Fung, Pamela Youde Nethersole Eastern Hospital (Hong Kong)

the-star-stuff: Magnetic Putty is Completely...

Mon, 22 Apr 2013 13:00:40 -0400

the-star-stuff:

Magnetic Putty is Completely Amazing/Terrifying

Magnetic putty is just like any other putty in that you can handle it, sculpt it, and squeeze it in a fist as you visualize your enemies. But place it anywhere near a strong magnetic field and it will SPONTANEOUSLY ANIMATE and move to consume anything magnetic in its path like a voracious mutated slug. In fact the putty won’t stop moving until the object has been equally engulfed on all sides.