archer Posted March 30, 2019 Report Share Posted March 30, 2019 11 hours ago, Christopher said: Pretty sure Curiosity has recovered. It was working on 28th of March:https://mars.nasa.gov/msl/mission/mars-rover-curiosity-mission-updates/ The Opportunity rover was the one that died. To be fair, the Opportunity lasted 14 years longer than it was supposed to. But finally dying because of a thin layer of dust was a rough way to go. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Scott Ruggels Posted March 31, 2019 Report Share Posted March 31, 2019 "The Day the Dinosaurs Died." an article in the New Yorker about a young Paleontologist who may have discovered the day the Cretaceous Ended.https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2019/04/08/the-day-the-dinosaurs-died Summary from the New York Times:https://www.nytimes.com/2019/03/29/science/dinosaurs-extinction-asteroid.html Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tkdguy Posted April 1, 2019 Author Report Share Posted April 1, 2019 Dust rings found around the orbits of Mercury and Venus Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
archer Posted April 1, 2019 Report Share Posted April 1, 2019 Those dirty rings. You try scrubbing them out. And soaking them out. But you still have "ring around the planet". tkdguy 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tkdguy Posted April 1, 2019 Author Report Share Posted April 1, 2019 Let's face it: Space is full of dust and gas. Cleaning up is all but impossible. L. Marcus 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
L. Marcus Posted April 1, 2019 Report Share Posted April 1, 2019 Needs a good vacuuming. Christopher and tkdguy 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
archer Posted April 1, 2019 Report Share Posted April 1, 2019 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Old Man Posted April 3, 2019 Report Share Posted April 3, 2019 Apparently we are to be treated to some black hole news next week or thereabouts. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
L. Marcus Posted April 3, 2019 Report Share Posted April 3, 2019 ... Have you been time travelling again? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tkdguy Posted April 3, 2019 Author Report Share Posted April 3, 2019 I have heard something about an announcement, but I'll wait until it has been made before posting anything. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Old Man Posted April 3, 2019 Report Share Posted April 3, 2019 9 minutes ago, L. Marcus said: ... Have you been time travelling again? Forward only, at a fixed rate of 3600 seconds per hour. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
L. Marcus Posted April 3, 2019 Report Share Posted April 3, 2019 Good mileage? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DShomshak Posted April 3, 2019 Report Share Posted April 3, 2019 Heard on the radio a few days ago that the upgraded LIGO is returning to service. I wonder what it'll discover next? Dean Shomshak Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dmjalund Posted April 4, 2019 Report Share Posted April 4, 2019 20 hours ago, DShomshak said: Heard on the radio a few days ago that the upgraded LIGO is returning to service. I wonder what it'll discover next? brown holes? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DShomshak Posted April 4, 2019 Report Share Posted April 4, 2019 The March 30, 2019 issue of The Economist has an article about camera systems for photographing and tracking meteors. A system based in the Czech Republic has been operating for decades: It's now good enough to project the impact point of a likely meteorite within 100 meters. There are other meteor observatories in the US and elsewhere. So, why keep cameras running all night to spot meteors? Detailed observation can reveal clues about their composition, velocity, likely impact site and -- perhaps most important -- their orbits before they run into Earth. Knowing the directions space junk is most likely to come from matters for positioning satellites and launching rockets. Oh, and a radar system tracks meteors day and night by bouncing radio waves off the ionized trails they leave behind. Because I'm me, I immediately thought of a high-tech version of ancient divination by meteors, clouds, etc. Portents from paths in various configurations, etc. When five trails form a pentagram, the way is open for Hell to invade Heaven. Dean Shomshak Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DShomshak Posted April 4, 2019 Report Share Posted April 4, 2019 The April, 2019 issue of Scientific American has an article about experiments to detect quantum gravitational effects. The great difficulty here is that quantum gravity is expected to operate on the Planck scale, which is so small that a particle accelerator would need to be the size of the Milky Way to access the necessary energies. But some physicists think there might be clever ways to detect quantum gravity effects propagating up to larger scales. (The analogy given is how Brownian motion of tiny particles in water reveals the jiggling of the much smaller atoms.) So these physicists are working on experiments to measure very, very small gravitational effects -- like, the gravity between millimeter-sized spheres of gold or diamond. (Why these substances? The way they conduct heat prevents theremal variations from swamping the gravitational effects.) With sufficient precision, it might be possible to measure gravitational versions of quantum superposition and entanglement between the teeny-weeny test objects. Instead of an apparatus the size of a galaxy, the whole experiment might fit on a table top. It's a long shot, but nobody has anything better. The article notes that there are actually several theories of quantum gravity. Playing with math is relatively easy. The greater challenge is coming up with experiments to test the theories. Dean Shomshak tkdguy 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DShomshak Posted April 4, 2019 Report Share Posted April 4, 2019 4 hours ago, dmjalund said: brown holes? Wow, that's a straight line for some really crude jokes. But I shall resist the temptation. Dean Shomshak Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lord Liaden Posted April 5, 2019 Report Share Posted April 5, 2019 On 4/1/2019 at 4:52 AM, tkdguy said: Let's face it: Space is full of dust and gas. Cleaning up is all but impossible. Succinct description of my apartment. tkdguy 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Zeropoint Posted April 5, 2019 Report Share Posted April 5, 2019 On 4/3/2019 at 3:46 PM, DShomshak said: Heard on the radio a few days ago that the upgraded LIGO is returning to service. I wonder what it'll discover next? Probably a bunch of nerd stuff. Which is cool, because I'm a nerd. tkdguy and DShomshak 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Scott Ruggels Posted April 8, 2019 Report Share Posted April 8, 2019 This week in Science. Links:1. https://www.sciencealert.com/we-now-have-independent-confirmation-of-methane-on-mars 2. https://www.sciencealert.com/record-sized-genetics-study-rules-out-chances-of-a-depression-gene 3. https://www.sciencealert.com/stars-don-t-just-produce-light-they-reflect-it-too 4. https://www.sciencealert.com/building-blocks-of-rna-and-dna-might-have-appeared-together-before-life-began-on-earth 5. https://www.sciencealert.com/four-legged-whale-ancestors-discovered-their-evolutionary-link-between-land-and-sea 6. https://www.sciencealert.com/review-of-31-studies-shows-we-ve-been-wrong-about-sugar-s-effect-on-our-mood tkdguy 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tkdguy Posted April 9, 2019 Author Report Share Posted April 9, 2019 Evidence of a gigantic exoplanet found This planet makes Jupiter look small! Three Neptune-sized planets found Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
archer Posted April 9, 2019 Report Share Posted April 9, 2019 Grapes on Mars? Georgia winemakers aiming high https://phys.org/news/2019-04-grapes-mars-georgia-winemakers-aiming.html Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Old Man Posted April 9, 2019 Report Share Posted April 9, 2019 Falcon Heavy launch set for tomorrow (4/10/2019) at 635pm EDT. First real mission for FH and first daylight SpaceX launch in a while. tkdguy 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RDU Neil Posted April 10, 2019 Report Share Posted April 10, 2019 https://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-47873592 tkdguy and DShomshak 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
archer Posted April 10, 2019 Report Share Posted April 10, 2019 1 hour ago, RDU Neil said: https://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-47873592 Are we sure that's not just a textbook example of why you shouldn't eat too much hot sauce? tkdguy 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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