The Final Colony - Author Lacerant Plainer 
Science Fiction writer, Lacerant Plainer
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Latest postings
2013-06-19 07:05:13 (6 comments, 8 reshares, 30 +1s)
My only grouse is the shortage of Helium : The dirigible airship, the oddball aircraft of another era, is making a comeback. California-based Aeros Corporation has created a prototype of its new breed of variable buoyancy aircraft and expects the vehicle to be finished before the end of 2012. With its new cargo handling technology, minimum fuel consumption, vertical take-off and landing features and point to point delivery, the Aeroscraft platform promises to revolutionize airship technology.
The Aeroscraft ship uses a suite of new mechanical and aerospace technologies. It operates off a buoyancy management system which controls and adjusts the buoyancy of the vehicle, making it light or heavy for any stages of ground and flight operation. Automatic flight control systems give it equilibrium in all flight modes and allow it to adjust helium pressurized envelopes depending on the buoyancy... more »
2013-06-19 06:35:32 (0 comments, 1 reshares, 7 +1s)
The science of Tattoos: It’s all about the particles in the tattoo ink’s pigment says Dr. Anne Laumann, MBChB, a professor of dermatology at Northwestern University. Tattoo application uses a mechanized needle to puncture the skin and inject ink into the dermis or second layer of skin just below the epidermis. Since the process involves damaging the skin, the body responds with white blood cells which attempt to absorb the foreign particles and dispose of them in the blood stream.
“The reason pigment stays there is because the pigment particles are too big to be eaten by the white cells, so they just sit there,” Laumann says. Tattoos also tend to become problematic with age. Ink can become blurred if injected too deeply into the skin, causing the pigment to migrate beyond the intended area. Fading and distortion due to changes in body shape are also common problems with tattoos.
more »
2013-06-18 10:40:21 (0 comments, 0 reshares, 5 +1s)
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2013-06-18 07:06:59 (0 comments, 7 reshares, 29 +1s)
You are more bacteria than you are you : We are practically walking petri dishes, rife with bacterial colonies from our skin to the deepest recesses of our guts. All the bacteria living inside you would fill a half-gallon jug; there are 10 times more bacterial cells in your body than human cells, according to Carolyn Bohach, a microbiologist at the University of Idaho (U.I.)
Starting in the mouth, nose or other orifices, these microbes travel through the esophagus, stomach and / or intestines—locations where most of them set up camp.
This is an extract from an article in NYT, as part of a Univ of Colorado research: As part of a new citizen-science initiative called the American Gut project, the lab sequenced my microbiome — that is, the genes not of “me,” exactly, but of the several hundred microbial species with whom I share this body. These bacteria, which number around ... more »
2013-06-17 15:51:50 (0 comments, 1 reshares, 13 +1s)
Dry ice moves on Mars
(This is a mix of the caption to the video and the article at the bottom)
Is frozen carbon dioxide a key to features in some Martian gullies? To find out, scientists grabbed a bag of dry ice and took a road trip.
NASA research indicates hunks of frozen carbon dioxide -- dry ice -- may glide down some Martian sand dunes on cushions of gas similar to miniature hovercraft, plowing furrows as they go.
"I have always dreamed of going to Mars," said Serina Diniega, a planetary scientist at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif., and lead author of a report published online by the journal Icarus. "Now I dream of snowboarding down a Martian sand dune on a block of dry ice."
Researchers deduced this process could explain one enigmatic class of gullies seen on Martian sand dunes by examining images from NASA's... more »
2013-06-17 15:45:55 (5 comments, 4 reshares, 25 +1s)
Bait ball - The Science of swarms Thanks to new observation technologies, powerful software, and statistical methods, the mechanics of collectives are being revealed. Indeed, enough physicists, biologists, and engineers have gotten involved that the science itself seems to be hitting a density-dependent shift. Without obvious leaders or an overarching plan, this collective of the collective-obsessed is finding that the rules that produce majestic cohesion out of local jostling turn up in everything from neurons to human beings. Behavior that seems impossibly complex can have disarmingly simple foundations. And the rules may explain everything from how cancer spreads to how the brain works and how armadas of robot-driven cars might someday navigate highways. The way individuals work together may actually be more important than the way they work alone.
_British Wildlife photographer... more »
2013-06-17 07:52:54 (2 comments, 7 reshares, 13 +1s)
Amazing recent posts on Science on G+ http://goo.gl/OKZO2 community
Post on Art in Science ( +Khalil A. Cassimally ) : http://goo.gl/I8he1
Post on Caffiene ( +Health Psychology of San Diego ) : http://goo.gl/uXJTJ
Post on self healing material ( +William Carter and ) : http://goo.gl/0uwZT
First fluorescent protein identified in a vertebrate ( +Biosciencia) : http://goo.gl/WGwUv
From Superman to science ( +Chris Worth) : http://goo.gl/n8C21
Meet Snowflake, the albino gorilla! ( +BioMed Central ) : http://goo.gl/Kczm7
#science #scienceeveryday #scienceongplus #posts
2013-06-16 10:29:41 (10 comments, 8 reshares, 54 +1s)
The hoverbike : Its not new, its just looking much better.
The hovering drones would not fly as efficiently as helicopters because of their shorter rotor blades, but their enclosed rotors have the advantage of a much smaller size and safety near humans. "They are less efficient than a helicopter, which has the benefit of larger diameter rotors," De Roche explained. "They do have unique performance advantages, though, as they have demonstrated flight within trees, close to walls and under bridges." Aerofex has currently limited human flight testing to a height of 15 feet and speeds of about 30 mph, but more out of caution rather than because of any technological limits. Older versions of the hover vehicles could fly about as fast as helicopters, De Roche said.
Article Link: http://www.nbcnews.com/technology/hover-bike-lets-you-drive-jedi-956125
more »
2013-06-16 05:45:26 (16 comments, 0 reshares, 30 +1s)
The rising threats to our cities : Sea-level rise due to climate change has already raised the risk of extreme floods in major coastal cities around the world, and many are slowly sinking into the oceans..
Half of us now live in cities - the concrete, steel and glass landscapes that make up the world’s great urban sprawls. Our cities have spread and replaced wild lands, and they roar and blaze with the energy from fossil fuels. They’re colossal – sometimes magnificent – and they are growing ever bigger and more numerous in the Anthropocene, as humans carry out the greatest ever urban migration. But on a geological timescale, cities, like all human constructs, are likely to be temporary. Many won’t survive the changes, let alone natural upheavals.
Article link : http://www.bbc.com/future/story/20130613-the-rising-threat-to-our-cities
Pic details clockwise... more »
2013-06-15 11:57:21 (3 comments, 11 reshares, 40 +1s)
Secret life of the cat: The science of tracking our pets They share our homes, sleep on our beds and occasionally bring unwanted gifts. Yet, despite our domestic cats playing a big role in our lives, we know surprisingly little about what they get up to. A research project by BBC2's Horizon and the Royal Veterinary College set out to find out more. Alan Wilson, a professor specialising in animal movement, describes what was involved.
The biggest challenge for the team was to make the tracking equipment - the GPS and activity sensor tags - small and light enough for domestic cats to wear around their necks on safety-release collars. The project was fascinating as the researchers able to learn so much about cats and their human interactions. Often the findings would contradict what owners believed their cats were getting up to.
It was also interesting to see how much variation... more »
2013-06-14 10:13:18 (5 comments, 5 reshares, 20 +1s)
Speed Kings - Peregrine Falcons : Thanks to +Yonatan Zunger posting about the 10g accelerations which Cheetahs are able to achieve, it reminded me that raptors can actually exceed Terminal Velocity
Airspacemag published an article 'Falling with the Falcon' starring "Frightful' except reproduced here : It’s an improbable and wonderful sight to witness Franklin release Frightful into the slipstream of a Cessna 172 at 17,000 feet above sea level. She stabilizes immediately into level flight and matches the speed of the airplane. She flies just off the wingtip, keeping her sharp eye on Franklin, inside the airplane, as he prepares to dive out the door. Then he leaps, and they fall together for more than two miles, along with a lure that Franklin drops during the descent to simulate prey.
Franklin began releasing lures that could fall faster, at about 195 mph. F... more »
2013-06-14 07:05:57 (6 comments, 2 reshares, 23 +1s)
So long and thanks for all the fish! : BBC Future recently published an article on 'Decoding the secrets of dolphins’ language'. Here is an except; The marine mammals are regarded as one of the world’s most intelligent species, travelling in pods which display complex hierarchies and group cultures. Behavioural biologist Dr Denise Herzing has spent the last 25 years trying to find out what makes dolphins tick – studying their social structure and behaviour in the wild, and attempting to decode the body language and intricate sounds dolphins use to communicate with each other. (If we ever understand the language of another species, it would be wonderful!).
Facts about dolphins:
1) New research suggests that the bottlenose dolphin's genetic makeup is actually much more human-like than scientists once thought. The findings are part of a growing canon of evidence bolst... more »
2013-06-14 06:54:57 (3 comments, 6 reshares, 23 +1s)
So long and thanks for all the fish! : BBC Future recently published an article on 'Decoding the secrets of dolphins’ language'. Here is an except; The marine mammals are regarded as one of the world’s most intelligent species, travelling in pods which display complex hierarchies and group cultures. Behavioural biologist Dr Denise Herzing has spent the last 25 years trying to find out what makes dolphins tick – studying their social structure and behaviour in the wild, and attempting to decode the body language and intricate sounds dolphins use to communicate with each other. (If we ever understand the language of another species, it would be wonderful!).
Facts about dolphins:
1) New research suggests that the bottlenose dolphin's genetic makeup is actually much more human-like than scientists once thought. The findings are part of a growing canon of evidence bolst... more »
2013-06-13 16:01:11 (7 comments, 2 reshares, 25 +1s)
Logicomix is a wonderful graphic novel
An unexpected kind of comic book hero is set to emerge this autumn: Bertrand Russell, the philosopher, logician, mathematician and Nobel prize for literature winner who wrote the seminal work on mathematical logic, the Principia Mathematica.
Set between the late 19th century and present-day, the graphic novel Logicomix is based on the story of the so-called "foundational quest" in mathematics.
Logicomix intertwines the philosophical struggles with the characters' own personal turmoil. These are in turn played out just upstage of the momentous historical events of the era and the ideological battles which gave rise to them. The narrator of the story is Bertrand Russell, who stands as an icon of many of these themes: a deeply sensitive and introspective man, Russell was not just a philosopher and pacifist, he ... more »
2013-06-12 14:09:23 (0 comments, 4 reshares, 12 +1s)
Thinking, breathing buildings : Mankind is rethinking how we build the structures we live and work in – and that, in turn, is changing the way our cities look and feel. Using striking technical breakthroughs in complex computation and highly sensitive manufacturing, designers are moving closer to making lightweight buildings that can move, and perhaps even think and feel. Instead of hard, polished building faces, emerging prototypes from some of the world’s research centres suggest future cities might begin to resemble artificial floating forests.
Rather than a civic plaza made from polished stone, new public gathering spaces could be softly layered, their resilient woven fabrics arranged in multiple hovering skins. Instead of clear skies and open air, our atmosphere could be filled with lacy meshwork that filters air and renews the environment. Technical crafts made possible by new res... more »
2013-06-11 14:34:57 (2 comments, 0 reshares, 6 +1s)
525 given - 475 needed
Now more than half-way to having a purple beard, I am.
And just over one-quarter of the way to have a naked face... (my oh my...).
Woo hoo!
https://give.everydayhero.com/au/charlesstrebor
2013-06-11 02:58:56 (14 comments, 7 reshares, 23 +1s)
Using science & technology to help those without drinking water
Millions of people lack access to clean drinking water today (more facts here: http://bit.ly/11rz5dC).
We wanted to help, but didn’t want to harm the environment with a process like desalinization or reverse osmosis (more info here: http://bit.ly/14t5kyh). After looking at the options, we settled on atmospheric water generation (see how it works here: http://bit.ly/16Y4H3L). The only byproduct of the process is slightly warmer and cleaner air exiting the machine. And, environmentally friendly alternate energy sources are compatible with our custom-built water generators.
You can see our largest to date generator being built in Gilroy, California here - http://bit.ly/18pgJU6 and the completed generator here - http://bit.ly/11rzjSe and here - http://bit.ly/114Yrm7
Atmospheric water produc... more »
2013-06-10 09:49:48 (1 comments, 2 reshares, 11 +1s)
What Animal Sounds Look Like : Acoustic Art ; Those who have a neurological condition called chromesthesia associate certain colors with certain sounds. It’s these people that I think of when I see Mark Fischer’s Aguasonic Acoustics project. Fischer systematically transforms the songs of whales, dolphins and birds into brightly colored, psychedelic art.
The software developer from San Jose, California, gathers the sounds of marine mammals in nearby Monterey Bay using a hydrophone. Fischer scans the clips for calls that demonstrate a high degree of symmetry. Once he identifies a sound that interests him, he transforms it into a mathematical construct called a wavelet where the frequency of the sound is plotted over time. Fischer adds color to the wavelet—a graph with an x and y axis—using a hue saturation value map.
Article Link: http://blo... more »
2013-06-10 09:42:59 (5 comments, 11 reshares, 29 +1s)
Ambitious building plans: A Chinese construction company has built this building in the video in 15 days. What next? Broad Sustainable Building plans to build the world's tallest skyscraper in the city of Changsha , a 220-story, 2,750-foot skyscraper, the largest in the world. Even crazier, the Chinese firm is trying to build it in just three months.
The current record-holder, the Burj Khalifa in Dubai, was constructed in five years, and even that took some impressive engineering. BSB wants to make Sky City possible by spending four months prefabricating the materials off-site, then erecting it all over the course of three months, starting this month. (The original plan was to start construction in December, but the project has apparently tied up in red tape for months.)
When complete, the building will be almost a city: 30,000 people will be able to take 104 elevators or a... more »
2013-06-09 15:24:20 (0 comments, 0 reshares, 2 +1s)
Here's the latest update of my Engagers circle. This is a circle of people who have recently engaged with one of my posts in the form of +1s, comments and public reshares. I might have missed some people because of limitations of G+, and I excluded one person on grounds of craziness. The circle has grown a lot since the last share, because one of my recent posts attracted a large number of comments.
I'm also going to piggy-back my Sunday Seven on this circle share. I've included all the following people in the circle, and five of them would have been in it anyway.
+Frank Beaney is worth following just for his excellent pictures of food.
+Brian Buckley and +Scott Buehler post on a variety of topics of general interest, and they both have good taste in reshares.
+Kevin Clift posts well-written short articles about science in general, and other topic... more »
2013-06-09 15:11:40 (0 comments, 2 reshares, 20 +1s)
Quetzalcoatlus Northropi: was a winged Pterosaur from the late Cretaceous period (approx. 66 million years ago); and one of the largest flying animals of all time. Named after the Aztec winged serpent god, it had an impressive wingspan as large as 40 feet.
As large as a modern-day giraffe, the Quetzalcoatlus would spot its prey from the air, slam down into the ground next to it and hobble-wing-charge (now considered as fast as a Horse galloping), scooping the prey animal up into its huge, jagged beak. Studies have shown that Quetzalcoatlus could take off under its own power, but once aloft it may have spent much of its time soaring.
The Smithsonian project to build a working model of Q. northropi was the subject of the 1986 IMAX documentary On the Wing, shown at the National Air and space museum in Washington, D.C.
Incidentally DARPA and AeroVironment used... more »
2013-06-09 11:12:39 (3 comments, 2 reshares, 40 +1s)
Happy Birthday +Mz Maau!
Wish you a glitter-filled day and a wonderful year ahead. Best wishes for a hassle-free and peaceful happy time ahead!
Old post reminds me - https://plus.google.com/103586346709495625226/posts/Hcw1L12AFwu
Best wishes!!:))
#happybirthdaymaau #happybirthdaymzmaau
2013-06-09 11:07:20 (3 comments, 5 reshares, 29 +1s)
A very Happy Birthday Dear +Mz Maau!
It dawned on me that I have had the pleasure of knowing you for over a year at least! Though the birthday sneaked up on me, I remember the shenanigans last time as well. Have a wonderful birthday and wish you all the very best!!
Look... Ephelants!! (thanks to +Dirk Reul for posting first and prodding me into action) !!
#happybirthdaymaau #happybirthdaymzmaau
2013-06-08 16:27:24 (0 comments, 1 reshares, 4 +1s)
In the interest of promoting Science.... we please ask you to share this community with your circles! We are so close to the 100,000 mark!
Super easy short link: gplus.to/sciences
2013-06-08 12:12:02 (14 comments, 0 reshares, 4 +1s)
Verification status.... tried to get my business page verified. Got this response from Google "Dear User, After reviewing your request, we can't verify your page at this time, because: Your page does not have enough followers to be eligible for verification. Please resubmit your request after your page has more followers."
Considering I have around 26.000 people in my circles, this seems extraordinary. A followup email to Google got no response.
P.S. I did all the badge etc. as requested!
Also tagging +Jaana Nyström in case you have some insights on what I can do next.
2013-06-08 09:38:11 (0 comments, 1 reshares, 5 +1s)
Please donate to our robotics team so we can have a girls team s (please reshare also!)
2013-06-08 08:42:18 (0 comments, 1 reshares, 11 +1s)
Food wrapped in Wikicells : Every day, Americans throw away some 200,000 pounds of packaging—only about half of which is recycled. But Harvard bioengineer David Edwards believes he has found a way to reduce that waste: He wants us to eat it. Edwards has invented a two-layered, edible membrane that he calls the WikiCell. It can be fashioned into attractive packaging that is capable of keeping food such as yogurt, cheese and juice fresh for up to six months.
The layers function as a wrapper and box. A soft inner skin is made from tiny particles of food, mixed with either algae extract or chitosan (a biochemical polymer), and held together with calcium or magnesium ions. For extra protection, a firm outer skin made from a sugar derivative can be added, and then eaten or peeled off. (It’s biodegradable.)
WikiCell-wrapped foods are already being served at Le Laboratoire, an art and... more »
2013-06-08 07:50:23 (2 comments, 1 reshares, 14 +1s)
Renewable Energy : The way humans now live requires that energy continue to be ample and easy. Look back 50 or 60 years, the earth had given us abundant coal and oil, which we turned into electricity for our homes or used to power our cars and manufacturing plants, creating an entirely new world.
Energy isn’t like that anymore. Fossil fuels are still abundant, but they now often require new technologies to extract or are found in regions much more difficult to access, such as the deep sea and the Arctic. We’re far more aware of the environmental costs of energy production, which has led to the development of cleaner options, including solar and wind.
Meanwhile, in developing countries, where 1.3 billion people lack access to electricity and 2.6 billion don’t have clean cooking facilities, many are still struggling to advance beyond wood and charcoal. For the past couple hundr... more »
2013-06-07 10:26:03 (0 comments, 1 reshares, 11 +1s)
Why Navy Scientists Want to Mimic Cicadas : But really what fascinates U.S. Navy scientists about the brood of cicadas now infesting large pockets of the East Coast is their mind-boggling sound–a din that can climb over 90 decibels. That’s louder than a garbage disposal, food blender or a truck 50 feet away, and almost as loud as power mower or a 737 coming in for a landing.
The scientists are trying to figure out how it’s possible to make a sound that loud without using much power. And they think that devices that sound like cicadas could be used for remote sensing underwater, ship-to-ship communications, maybe even rescue operations. They’ve been able to use lasers to simultaneously measure the vibration of the insect’s “tymbals,” the ribbed membranes on both sides of a cicada’s torso. When a male seeks sex, it contorts its body and that buckling causes the membrane to click, then cli... more »
2013-06-06 15:39:02 (0 comments, 1 reshares, 20 +1s)
Lensless Camera : From the Pinhole to the reconstructive camera : Researchers from Bell Labs in New Jersey have created a camera that operates without any lens, making it lighter, cheaper and immune to blurry, out-of-focus images. The lensless camera relies on compressive sensing, a type of signal processing that uses algorithms to reconstruct images or signals based only a small sample of data. Instead of capturing a couple hundred pixels, you would take a few pixels here and there and reconstruct the full image with an algorithm--kind of like turning an Impressionist painting into a photograph.
The Bell Labs camera, described in a paper here, uses only two components: an aperture array made of an LCD panel and a single sensor. By adding another sensor, it could also be used to take multiple images at the same time. The lack of lens means the camera doesn't need to be focused,... more »
2013-06-06 04:30:01 (7 comments, 2 reshares, 16 +1s)
Can City Farms succeed? : There will be billions more hungry people in 2050. Growing our food on vertical farms or under radical new lighting systems may be key to ensuring they have enough to eat.
Serious issues loom in the near future as our population continues to expand, placing greater pressure on the world’s agricultural industries to meet demands. As a species, we need to know whether modern farming is sustainable and compatible with the rest of the natural world, or is it causing irreparable damage to the environment that will eventually turn today’s serious problem of today into a food crisis of epic proportions in the near future?
Today’s cities are at risk from a different set of issues. If trends in urbanisation continue at their current rates, cities could evolve into places where intolerable numbers of people may have to live, and who are forced to live well below... more »
2013-06-05 16:16:03 (0 comments, 0 reshares, 7 +1s)
Be part of a Google+ Conversation with +Al Gore on Combating Climate Change
Seven years ago +Al Gore kick-started a critical discussion on climate change with the release of An Inconvenient Truth. The issue is as pressing as ever and former Vice President Gore and Jeff Skoll, the film’s executive producer, want to hear your ideas.
This coming week they’re engaging with the awesome Science on G+ Community and will select the most insightful participants to join them live in a Hangout On Air on June 11th (RSVP - http://goo.gl/2lt9v).
Be a part of the Conversation in the Science on G+ Community to have your voice heard: http://goo.gl/t8MOj
#GoreConversation
2013-06-05 11:16:11 (1 comments, 3 reshares, 17 +1s)
Space tower : A Science Fiction concept. The new Center for Science and the Imagination at Arizona State University brings novelists and engineers together to push the boundaries of science. Neal Stephenson (A Sci-Fi novelist) has a big idea. He imagines a 20-kilometre-high steel tower that reaches into the stratosphere. From that height, weather patterns would be distant swirls. Planes could save fuel by docking at the tower rather than landing, and space missions could do the same by launching from it.
Stephenson is teaming up with a structural engineer, Keith Hjelmstad at Arizona State University (ASU) in Phoenix, to work out how to actually build the tower.
The project is not a one-off. This month will see the launch of the Center for Science and the Imagination, an ASU project that will bring together scientists, engineers, artists and writers and encourage them to think... more »
2013-06-05 06:09:25 (1 comments, 8 reshares, 30 +1s)
From Astronomy to Solar Power : An astronomer famous for designing some of the largest telescope mirrors on the planet now has another trick up his sleeve: he wants to build highly efficient solar collectors that produce electricity on the cheap. An Arizona company he founded, REhnu, claims the new design could drive the price of a solar power farm down to $1 per watt by 2020.
Two decades ago, Roger Angel cast a honeycomb-structure mirror 6.5 metres in diameter at the University of Arizona, using a unique spin-casting technique that rotated a furnace several times a minute, so the molten glass inside formed a parabola close to the mirror's final shape. Five years later, he scaled up to 8.4 metres, and the age of giant Earth-based telescopes was in full swing. Today, four 8.2-metre mirrors designed in this way are used in the Very Large Telescope in Chile.
Others have tried... more »
2013-06-04 09:59:19 (3 comments, 5 reshares, 33 +1s)
Inspired by Sci-Fi : Nourbakhsh, a roboticist at Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, was enchanted by the human-shaped C-3PO and friendly R2-D2 in Star Wars when he was a child. But he also came to understand the world of the interconnected Borg from Star Trek and Blade Runner's dangerous replicants. This is clear from his near-future scenarios, set in 2030, 2040 and 2045. These have robots collecting personal data for marketing, toys that threaten our public spaces, and reservations agents that are indistinguishable from humans.
More speculatively, suggests Nourbakhsh, by 2231 some robots could look like us. But only if we use a real human body as a shell and populate it with trillions of nanobots working together to make an artificial nervous system.
Article Link: http://www.newscientist.com/blogs/culturelab/2013/04/robot-futures-nourbakhsh.html... more »
2013-06-03 10:25:15 (5 comments, 5 reshares, 24 +1s)
Hovercrafts - an amazing invention of its time : The idea of the modern hovercraft is most often associated with Sir Christopher Cockerell. Cockerell came across the key concept in his design when studying the ring of airflow when high-pressure air was blown into the annular area between two concentric tin cans, one coffee and the other from cat food. To test his hypothesis, he put one a smaller can inside a larger can and used a hairdryer to blow air into them. The downward thrust produced was greater when one can was inside the other rather than air just being blown into one can.
This produced a ring of airflow, as expected, but he noticed an unexpected benefit as well; the sheet of fast moving air presented a sort of physical barrier to the air on either side of it. He called this effect the "momentum curtain".
Sir Christopher Cockerell developed the first practical... more »
2013-06-03 10:24:43 (0 comments, 0 reshares, 9 +1s)
Mars Express : _ It was built on a relative shoestring, was completed in just five years and was designed to survive for just 687 days. Ten years later, after more than 12,000 swings around the Red Planet, Europe's Mars Express is still going strong._
Along with NASA's massively successful fleet of probes and landers, the orbital scout has helped pull aside the veil of secrecy surrounding our sister planet. It has pointed to the presence of subterranean water and a wild volcanic past and shed light on the bizarrely-pocked martian moons.
The first European mission to explore another planet, Mars Express was launched by a Russian Soyuz rocket on June 2 2003, just when Earth and Mars were approaching their closest alignment in 17 years. The mission, designed to last for one martian year, has already been extended four times, and its latest closure date is for the end of... more »
2013-06-02 09:42:46 (3 comments, 3 reshares, 21 +1s)
Futurecity: _ Cities are growing at a frightening rate, and using more and more energy created from polluting fuels. While the surrounding countryside is being developed too, the cities have become minor countries into themselves._
Earth has a current population of 7.1 billion; and births outnumber deaths by three to one. The human population will rise to 10 billion by the year 2050, and 75% of us will live in cities. This means the population of our cities will double in a few decades. To accommodate this, cities must adapt and grow, or smaller towns will increase in size that demands a change in economic centres and infrastructure (or, more likely, a mix of the two).
This reminds me of Peter F. Hamilton's dystopian future in The Reality Dysfunction where cities are only connected to each other though superfast 'trains' (I would have assumed to be Evacuated Tube... more »
2013-06-02 06:07:54 (0 comments, 0 reshares, 1 +1s)
Want a better G+ experience? ..... Here is how.... add this circle!
My VIP circle of top engagers melded with the circle of people who are my friends, supporters and essentially those who make what G+ is for me.
Wonderfully supportive of my writing, posting and most of them are now close friends. When I started out, it was all about engagement, I did not expect so many friends! (I may have missed some people here due to oversight, please just comment and I will rectify it. No sleight is intended).
Thank you all for being who you are and for the wonderful time on Googleplus!! Share if you like the circle :)
#sharingcircle #vip #sharedcircles #sharedpubliccircles #sharingiscaring #awesomepeople #awesomesauce #topcircles #circle #circleshare #suggesteduserlist
2013-06-02 05:37:10 (0 comments, 1 reshares, 7 +1s)
Why everyone must understand science : Many people feel excluded by science, but philosopher AC Grayling says this makes us slaves to technology. The less we know the more likely we are to be manipulated by others.
Science is undoubtedly humanity’s greatest achievement, says AC Grayling, Master of the New College of the Humanities. People have to wake up to the fact that they have to be part of the story in thinking about science, and thinking about the meaning of science as it applies to our world.
People feel excluded by science and debates about science, they use laptops, they fly in planes, use appliances in the home and they don’t know what’s behind this technology. That is a problem, as it turns people into the slaves of our technology.
People are aware that there are lots of problems with the environment and the climate. If people knew more about the scien... more »
2013-06-01 06:59:47 (0 comments, 4 reshares, 22 +1s)
This Is How the Sun Will Die (in 3D) : The Ring Nebula is one of the most famous celestial objects because of its delicate beauty. That shimmering oval of rainbow colors has popped up everywhere from dorm-room posters to book jackets to album covers to just about every TV backdrop in the history of sci-fi. But it is more than mere eye candy. The Ring is also fascinating for what it tells us about our future.
Middleweight stars like the sun expand and cool in their old age, briefly turning into red giants. After the red giant stage, the outer layers puff off, leaving behind a white dwarf: a dense, super-hot stellar cinder. Those puffed-out layers glow brightly before they disperse. That is exactly what we are seeing in this brand-new Hubble image of the Ring Nebula, along with the video interpretation of that image–a snapshot of what will happen to the sun as it runs out of nuclear fuel i... more »
2013-06-01 05:24:02 (2 comments, 20 reshares, 62 +1s)
Greening deserts with Seawater : The most remarkable thing about this little island of glass and greenery (Called the Sahara Forest Project) is that there is no external supply of either water or electricity – the plants are kept cool and watered using only sunlight and seawater.
Some see this pilot project as the first step towards turning hundreds of square kilometres of parched coastal desert into fertile farms. The head of the project, Norwegian biologist Joakim Hauge, has an even bigger dream. He wants to do nothing less than revegetate the desert. And the claim isn't as crazy as it might sound.
This greenhouse is different. For starters, whereas greenhouses in temperate lands are mostly for keeping crops warm, here in Qatar the main task is keeping them cool. This is done by evaporative cooling. The clever part is that no precious fresh water is wasted on this task; i... more »
2013-05-31 14:48:38 (0 comments, 18 reshares, 36 +1s)
A Terrifying, Fascinating Time Lapse of 30 Years of Human Impact on Earth
Since the 1970s, NASA and the U.S. Geological Survey have been amassing satellite images of every inch of our planet as part of the Landsat program. Over time, the images reveal a record of change: of cities expanding, lakes and forests disappearing, new islands emerging from the sea off the coast of rising Middle East metropolises like Dubai.
If you could thumb through these historic pictures as if in a flip book, they would show stunning change across the earth's surface, in both our natural environments and our man-made ones. Now, the digital equivalent of that experience is possible – three decades of global change as GIF – in a project unveiled today between NASA, the USGS, TIME, Google, and the CREATE Lab at Carnegie Mellon University.
Landsat images taken between 1984 and 2012 have... more »
2013-05-31 09:37:22 (1 comments, 8 reshares, 26 +1s)
Smile, hydrogen atom, you're on quantum camera : H/t to +Jyoti Dahiya and +Stephen Boyd who led me on this path of trying to figure out if this was a hoax. It's true, this is an image of the Hydrogen atom!
AN ATOM'S electrons are an ever-shifting quantum melee, but it turns out you can still take their photograph as if they were standing still. A quantum-style microscope has imaged the hydrogen atom's wave function, the equation that determines its electrons' positions – and in turn the atom's properties.
The electrons that dance around an atomic nucleus help determine how the atom bonds with others, but they are notoriously difficult to pin down. Thanks to quantum theory, which says that tiny particles are in multiple places simultaneously, you can never say where a given electron actually is. The best you can do is say how likely it is to be in a... more »
2013-05-31 09:19:23 (1 comments, 1 reshares, 11 +1s)
Masdar's Beam Down Optical Tower : I wrote about Masdar city some time back. They now have an Optical Tower which works quietly efficiently and without any carbon emissions - The Beam Down Tower at Masdar is a step forward in concentrated solar power (CSP). Unlike other plants, the system reflects sunlight twice, once from the heliostats to the central tower and once from the tower down to a collection platform at the system’s base. Because scientists can focus the sunlight at a very small area, they can achieve great heat. They recently concentrated solar energy to 1,100 degrees. The plant is currently only 100 kW, but designers say it could scale up easily.
Thirty-three heliostats—mirrors arranged in the shape of a parabola—circle the 66-foot tower in three concentric rings. Motors adjust the elevation and angle of the heliostats throughout the day to track the sun.
An ... more »
2013-05-30 15:11:38 (4 comments, 6 reshares, 25 +1s)
Alternative Energy : Kicking off the most optimal idea on Alternate energy is not easy. A lot of technologies are in the works and still some ways off from fruition. Personally I post about the technologies which look promising and sustainable. These are a few of them. What are your favorite alternate energies? I really would love to know!
Artificial Photosynthesis: http://goo.gl/w2eRy
Economical Hydrogen Fuel cells: http://goo.gl/s0eto
Space based solar power: http://goo.gl/jJAtv
Growing batteries: http://goo.gl/xgbBG
Photosynthesis car : http://goo.gl/rTiht
Wind / Current hybrid turbine: http://goo.gl/t8kz8
Plasma device: http://goo.gl/kGz2c
Solar Paint: http://goo.gl/fuSyg
Google's Robotic kite: http://goo.gl/ruceV
The great Energy challenge: http://goo.gl/lwE4G
... more »
2013-05-30 12:00:36 (6 comments, 1 reshares, 10 +1s)
Climate change... is it real? : Various surveys have been conducted to evaluate scientific opinion on global warming. They have concluded that the majority of scientists support the idea of anthropogenic climate change.
Since 1991, roughly 97 percent of all published scientific papers that take a position on the question agree that humans are warming the planet.
One thing is clear. The past decade is by far the warmest on record. Human induced global warming really kicked in during the 1970s, and warming has been pretty steady since then. Global warming is manifested in a number of ways, and there is a continuing radiative imbalance at the top of atmosphere. The current hiatus in surface warming is temporary, and global warming has not gone away.
+Andrij Harasewych's post on the new Carbon dioxide milestone being breached:... more »
2013-05-30 04:50:55 (0 comments, 3 reshares, 16 +1s)
If everything fades into the background, you may have a high IQ : (that's my excuse at least for being absent-minded) .. The absent-minded professor is a classic image: someone who's lost in deep thoughts all the time but pays very little attention to what's going on right in front of them. There may be a little something to that cliché (if only just a little) if a study published this week in Current Biology is to be believed. The study showed that IQ scores, an imperfect measure of general mental faculties, correlated with their tendency to ignore an image that may be mistaken for background visual noise.
Although we think of this in terms of ignoring background distractions and focusing on a task, the authors suggest that what we're really seeing is two things competing for the same mental resources in a brain's visual processing system. One of them is trying to ... more »
2013-05-29 14:19:52 (0 comments, 0 reshares, 4 +1s)
In the interest of promoting Science.... we please ask you to share this community with your circles! We are so close to the 100,000 mark!
2013-05-28 09:23:56 (11 comments, 0 reshares, 16 +1s)
What I learned using only Google products.
As a former Windows and current Apple user, I wanted to understand the full Google platform experience firsthand. So I went all-in.
Sure, I've used Android devices and even a Chromebook casually before. But I never tried to rely on them full time.
Boy, did I learn a lot about Google (and Apple). And my opinions on many things have changed. I'm going to tell you the 10 shocking things I learned and how my mobile computing buying and usage have been transformed.
http://www.computerworld.com/s/article/9239533/What_I_learned_using_only_Google_products
#google #chromebookpixel #nexus4 #nexus #googlediet
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