photomonkey366:

The Aperture Science Enrichment Center promises to always provide a safe testing environment. In dangerous testing environments, we promise to always provide useful advice. For instance, the floor here will kill you. Try to avoid it. [day 33 of 366] on Flickr.

One of the stickers on my work laptop is from where I actually work. The other is where I like to pretend I work… designing combustible lemons.

February 2, 2012

spacingouttv:

Star Maps From Mobile App Maker Brings Astronomy to the Masses

doctorwhogifs:

Bernard Cribbins – Tom Campbell (Daleks – Invasion Earth: 2150) / Wilfred Mott (Series 4/The End of Time)

(I know the Peter Cushing films are more like a tangent to Classic Who than Classic Who proper, but I refuse to let technicalities stop me from posting Bernard Cribbins )

mothernaturenetwork:

Why we chicken out (and how to avoid it)
People often overestimate how well they handle being scared, resulting in an ‘illusion of courage.’

jtotheizzoe:

OK Go … Is There Nothing You Can Not Do?

Sesame Street has teamed up with the band OK GO in this video introducing the basics of color theory. It’s all about the three primary colors.

This video might seem simplistic at first, but color theory is deeply rooted in physics and biology. The “colors” we see in light are nothing more than a certain window of wavelengths of electromagnetic radiation. Red, blue and green are primary colors in human vision (“trichromacy”). This is because you possess three different kinds of cone cells, each corresponding (more or less) to one of these wavelength ranges.

More “complicated” colors are a result of your nervous system integrating these different wavelength combinations via a very complicated network of interconnected cells that the cones connect to. The same goes for what we view as “complementary” and so on. It’s all dependent on certain cells that you have in your head and how they interpret the world around you.

For more:

• Go play the OK Go color game
• A previous post about color vision, with links to mind-bending color illusions

(via Brain Pickings)

jtotheizzoe:

Spiders dodge cannibalism through remote copulation

That’s a whole new meaning to “absentee father”. Put yourself in a scenario. You get to have sex one time, and if you stick around too long you’ll get eaten. You want to make that one time count, and you’d also like to make sure that no one else got the opportunity to reproduce with your chosen lady.

Solution? If you’re an orb-web spider, it appears that breaking off your penis inside of the female and running away is just what Dr. Evolution ordered. It saves his legs, it prevents other males from copulating, and it allows him to fight to protect her. Even if she does want to eat him in the first place. How romantic.

Violent mating behaviors are actually rather common. Hermaphroditic flatworms engage in “penis fencing” to decide who will be the mother and who will be the father of their offspring. Honeybees’ genitals explode and break off inside the queen in a manner similar to the spider. Bedbugs simply impale the female with their penises and deposit sperm through the opening. And banana slugs have such large penises that if they freak out the female with one too large, they risk getting their organ chewed off.

(via Nature News)

awesome-everyday:

weroccupyunited:

1 in 7 American houses are empty. 1 in 402 Americans are Homeless = 24 Empty houses for each homeless person #ows #oo #99

This exact statistic came up yesterday during a conversation about foreclosures, and how the law bends directly towards the banks, rather than the home owner.

There are things being done in Louisville, and all over the country to fight back. Women In Transition and Occupy Louisville are actively working to educate home owners on how to battle the banks. There are even some more radical ideas in the works, in regards to foreclosed and abandoned homes.

My councilwoman, Attica Scott has made housing one of her top priorities. The number of foreclosed homes IN MY ZIP CODE is higher than it is anywhere else in this city. 

With so many vacant homes, it is absolutely insane to me that there are any homeless people in this city. 

I think that an initiative either by local economic/social justice groups or by the city MUST be enacted to help rebuild our communities, and put people in safe, warm housing. The houses are there, waiting to be loved. All we need to do is occupy ‘em.

inspiringshipments:

Absolutely moving #documentary about Hans Rosling => known from #TED talks (via @presentationzen)

contemplatingmadness:

Slow graphene down, speed computers up

Astonishing conductivity helped the discoverers of graphene win the Nobel prize in physics in 2010. Now a way to switch off the easy flow of electrons in this wonder form of carbon is bringing superfast graphene computers closer.

A sheet-like molecule just one carbon atom thick, graphene offers much less resistance to the flow of electrons than silicon. It has been hailed for its potential as the basis for computer circuits that operate at unprecedented speed. “It’s an extremely promising material,” says Konstantin Novoselov, who shared the Nobel prize with his co-discoverer, Andre Geim, both at the University of Manchester, UK.

But the ease of electron flow also creates a problem. To perform calculations, computers need to turn the flow of electricity on and off in their circuits. The gates that open and close to regulate the flow are called transistors. Makinggraphene-based transistors has proven difficult because it is such a good conductor.

Previous attempts have involved electrons confined to a single layer of graphene, but these still suffer from a leakage of electrons when the transistor is in its “off” state.

Quantum tunnel

Now Novoselov and colleagues have found a way to overcome this leakage problem by sandwiching a layer of molybdenum disulfide between two layers of graphene. The molybdenum acts as an insulator, preventing electrons from flowing in the normal way from one graphene layer to the other. This constitutes an “off” state.

A quantum mechanical effect means a small number of electrons can “tunnel”through the molybdenum. This normally happens very rarely but applying a voltage across the barrier boosts the energy of the electrons, making tunnelling much more probable – a sizable current starts to flow. This is the “on” state. By varying the voltage, the researchers could turn the flow on and off, making the device a transistor.

The graphene sandwich reduces leakage by a factor of 10 compared with previous graphene-based transistors. The team suggests reducing leakage further by increasing the thickness of the insulating layer. “It really opens a new dimension in our research,” says Novoselov.

yearningforunity:

Martin Luther King Jr. at Hartley-Woods Gymnasium, Johnson C. Smith University, Charlotte, NC (1966)

January 15, 1929 – April 4, 1968

peterwknox:

(via UnMarketing » Blog Archive » How Budweiser Just Won The Superbowl and The Internet)

Like Improv Everywhere meets Big Brands and the result is enjoyable.

ianbrooks:

AirPort by Electroboutique

In 2009, Electroboutique installed an airport flight departure kiosk in the middle of a forest. Their reasoning, and best use of the word “ferroconcrete” you’ll read today: “We are facing a choice: whether we should further sink our ferroconcrete teeth of architecture and transport system into the nature’s body; or should we try to minimize our impact on it”.

(via: juxtapoz)

unknownskywalker:

La Silla Star Trails North and South

Fix your camera to a tripod and you can record graceful trails traced by the stars as planet Earth rotates on its axis. If the tripod is set up at ESO’s La Silla Observatory, high in the Atacama desert of Chile, your star trails would look something like this.

Spanning about 4 hours on the night of January 24, the image is actually a composite of 250 consecutive 1-minute exposures, looking toward the north. The North Celestial Pole, at the center of the star trail arcs, is just below the horizon in this southern hemisphere perspective.

In the foreground, the polished 15-meter diameter dish antenna of the Swedish-ESO Submillimeter Telescope (now decommissioned) shows star trails toward the south by reflection. Sweeping around the South Celestial Pole, the distorted arcs of those stars appear underneath the southern horizon in the focusing dish’s inverted view.

Right of the dish is the dome of the observatory’s 3.6 meter telescope, home to the planet hunting HARPS spectrograph.

huffpostcomedy:

comedycentral:

Jon Stewart’s Extended and Uncensored Interview with Brad Pitt

For the record: this is a pro-jetpack blog.

So say we all.

mrcheyl:

The original Jordan Jumpman photoshoot that resulted in the still iconic logo.

motherjones:

“But dear God, we should not be putting civil rights issues to a popular vote to be subject to the sentiments, the passions of the day. No minority should have their rights subject to the passions and sentiments of the majority. This is a fundamental bedrock of what our nation stands for.”

Chris Christie, check your gay-marriage milkshake. Cory Booker just drank it.

Five minutes well spent.

fastcompany:

They were doing just fine before, but the biggest of minority owners of Facebook are about to be catapulted into a far more elite bracket. As we ponder what they’ll do with with new millions (nearly half a billion dollars for Reid Hoffman?), here’s a look at what got them where they are today.

The Facebook IPO Players Club: Reid Hoffman 

New Alien Planet Ripe for Life?

A potentially habitable alien planet that orbits a triple-star system is perfectly positioned for liquid water on its surface to exist.

keep reading

thenewenlightenmentage:

Repulsive Gravity as an Alternative to Dark Energy (Part 2: In the quantum vacuum)

(PhysOrg.com) — During the past few years, CERN physicist Dragan Hajdukovic has been investigating what he thinks may be a widely overlooked part of the cosmos: the quantum vacuum. He suggests that the quantum vacuum has a gravitational charge stemming from the gravitational repulsion of virtual particles and antiparticles. Previously, he has theoretically shown that this repulsive gravity can explain several observations, including effects usually attributed to dark matter. Additionally, this additional gravity suggests that we live in a cyclic Universe (with no Big Bang) and may provide insight into the nature of black holes and an estimate of the neutrino mass. In his most recent paper, published in Astrophysics and Space Science, he shows that the quantum vacuum could explain one more observation: the Universe’s accelerating expansion, without the need for dark energy.

“The quantum vacuum was predicted theoretically more than 60 years ago,” Hajdukovic told PhysOrg.com. “Today, there is significant experimental evidence that the quantum vacuum exists. I have decided to combine one reality (the quantum vacuum) with one hypothesis (the negative gravitational charge of antiparticles) and to study the consequences. The hypothesis of the gravitational repulsion between matter and antimatter is older than half a century, but before me no one has used it in the combination with the quantum vacuum. … The results are surprising; there is potential to explain [the Universe’s accelerating expansion] in the framework of the quantum vacuum enriched with the gravitational repulsion between matter and antimatter.”

Read More

hippimodphotography:

Jogrul Bank Telescope

abluegirl:

NASA’s GRAIL mission has beamed back its first video of the far side of the moon. The imagery was taken on Jan. 19 by the MoonKAM aboard the mission’s ‘Ebb’ spacecraft.

mothernaturenetwork:

Alaska’s Cleveland Volcano raises alarms
The isolated volcano has formed a new lava dome, scientists report, possibly foreshadowing an eruption and ash cloud that could disrupt air travel.

discoverynews:

We’re Living in a Space Cloud

A NASA robotic probe sampling particles flowing into our solar system from the galactic neighborhood shows we’re living in a cloud — and likely to stay that way for hundreds or even thousands of years.

keep reading

rocketboom:

100 year old keeps sharp playing Nintendo DS http://mag.ma/andrew/3829201

thisistheverge:

Qualcomm drives augmented reality forward: an exclusive look at Vuforia

During his recent trip to Qualcomm, Joshua Topolsky got an up-close look at Vuforia, the company’s new augmented reality smartphone platform. CEO and chairman Dr. Paul E. Jacobs described it as the latest in a long line of technology platforms that Qualcomm has developed for others to build on top of. 

jtotheizzoe:

Computational Origami

Erik and Martin Demaine are a father-son team exploring the mathematical mysteries in folded paper. When circular sheets are crinkled along concentric circumferences, it results in exotic projections like the ones seen above. 

This is a form of paper art that has been explored since the 1920’s, but the Demaines are using modern computation to unravel the complex algorithms behind the shapes. Starting with different curvatures and rotations in flat paper, they don’t always know what will come out the other end.

More of their curved-crease sculpture here, and their book.

(via Brain Pickings)

mothernaturenetwork:

Design, not just threads, toughens spider webs
Scientists have unraveled the mystery of how spider webs can withstand multiple tears and even hurricane-force winds without collapsing.

inothernews:

STARS’ TREKS    In this long-exposure photograph, star trails above the Atacama Desert in Chile are also reflected in the now-decommissioned ESO Submillimeter Telescope on the grounds of the La Silla Observatory.  (Photo: Alexandre Santerne / Laboratoire d’Astrophysique de Marseille / Observatoire de Haute Provence via NASA APOD)

brokemogul:

More than half-a-million people were drawn to the Luminaire De Cagna LED=light display at the 2012 Light Festival in Ghent, Belgium.

Link

today:

Philly chocolate cream cheese — the American Nutella?

Only the most important question of our generation: Will America finally embrace a chocolate spread for breakfast?

fastcompany:

Twitter exec Adam Bain predicts at least half of Super Bowl XLVI ads will include a hashtag.

Twitter Launches Ad Scrimmage Competition For Super Bowl XLVI’s Hashtag Sunday

What if you woke…

huffingtonpost:

Play along. 

‘Lunch Scholars’ Video Reveals American Teens Can’t Answer Basic Trivia

mothernaturenetwork:

Eau Good: A striking addition to the reusable water bottle market
New York International Gift Fair favorite black + blum debuts Eau Good, a reusable water bottle with a cork topper that’s design proudly displays, instead of hides, an activated carbon filter.

edgina:

Milwaukee Art Museum by Santiago Calatrava

ikenbot:

This Is NASA’s Cancer-Sniffing Cellphone Sensor

What if you could use your phone to test the air for toxins? What if you could monitor your health simply by blowing on it? Sounds amazing, right? Nanosensor technology developed by NASA Ames is going to make that a reality.

Jing Li, a scientist at NASA Ames, has been working for years on what will be the greatest phone accessory of all time. It’s a small chip (about the size of a postage stamp) that houses 32 nanosensor bars. Each bar is composed of a different nano-structure material. Because each sensor bar is unique it can respond to different chemicals in different ways, enabling it to not only differentiate between them, but also to monitor their relative levels, in real time.

In its current state (which is looking mighty close to production-ready), it’s housed in a small case that attaches to a smartphone. For legal reasons they wouldn’t say which smartphone it’s built to attach to, but you can probably guess. Eventually, it will be built to attach to many other popular models. The idea is to develop a low-cost version so that consumers can afford to have them for health and safety applications. But let’s back up a second.

This nanosensor technology was originally developed by NASA Ames for space applications. This is NASA, after all. The first usage was monitoring for fuel leaks around launch vehicles. They’ve been on the International Space Station since 2008, monitoring air-quality and checking for formaldehyde in the air. Future applications could include taking samples on asteroids and Mars missions. So that’s where it started, but the Department of Homeland Security is now funding this project in order to bring it back down to earth—and to consumers.

The most exciting potential use, though, is how it could diagnose and monitor people with medical conditions. For example, for diabetes patients there is a direct correlation between the level of acetone in their breath and the level of sugar in their blood. The nanosensor could be used as a completely non-invasive diagnosis and measurement method. Just breathe on your phone. No more pricking your finger a million times a day. We have a pretty serious aversion to the word revolutionary here, but this thing fits the bill.

Full article

fuckyeahstartrek:

blogwell:

collegehumor:

Drawing Wesley’s sweater was the highlight of my week. Thanks to Pat for the idea, and Becca for her excellent suggestion!

 Click for the full comic!

apoplecticskeptic:

ohryankelley:

The graffiti artist who is about to become a Facebook millionaire

Graffiti artist David Choe took Facebook stock instead of cash for painting the walls of Facebook’s first headquarters and his shares are now expected to be worth about $200 million when Facebook stock trades publicly.

(via: NYTimes.com)

Wow. Smart move on his part.

Love this story! It’s not always about getting paid upfront. Look at the big  picture!

itsfullofstars:

Apollo Station

Sometimes simpler is better. Conceived during the Apollo era, the Large Orbiting Research Laboratory is based around three small compartments

Much in the same way that the later Space Shuttle would ferry astronauts and supplies between the ISS and the ground, this design uses the Saturn V rocket — which launched the Apollo missions — to bring a small crew to the station.

dkoerner:

(via Math Elevator WIN – Win!)

A few days ago,…

scinerds:

Drug-Resistant Bugs Found in Organic Meat

If you’re paying premium prices for pesticide- and antibiotic-free meat, you might expect that it’s also free of antibiotic-resistant bacteria. Not so, according to a new study. The prevalence of one of the world’s most dangerous drug-resistant microbe strains is similar in retail pork products labeled “raised without antibiotics” and in meat from conventionally raised pigs, researchers have found.

Methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA), a drug-resistant form of the normally harmless S. aureus bacterium, kills 18,000 people in the United States every year and sickens 76,000 more. The majority of cases are linked to a hospital stay, where the combination of other sick people and surgical procedures puts patients at risk. But transmission also can happen in schools, jails, and locker rooms (and an estimated 1.5% of Americans carry MRSA in their noses). All of this has led to a growing concern about antibiotic use in agriculture, which may be creating a reservoir of drug-resistant organisms in billions of food animals around the world.

Tara Smith, an epidemiologist at the University of Iowa College of Public Health in Iowa City who studies the movement of staph bacteria between animals and people, wondered whether meat products might be another mode of transmission. For the new study, published this month in PLoS ONE, she and colleagues bought a variety of pork products—395 packages in all—from 36 different stores in two big pig farming states, Iowa and Minnesota, and one of the most densely populated, New Jersey.

In the laboratory, the team mixed meat samples “vigorously” with a bacterial growth medium and allowed any microbes present to grow. MRSA, which appears as mauve-colored colonies on agar plates, was genetically typed and tested for antibiotic susceptibility.

The researchers found that 64.8% of the samples were positive for staph bacteria and 6.6% were positive for MRSA. Rates of contamination were similar for conventionally raised pigs (19 of 300 samples) and those labeled antibiotic-free (seven of 95 samples). Results of genetic typing identified several well-known strains, including the so-called livestock-associated MRSA (ST398) as well as common human strains; all were found in conventional and antibiotic-free meat.

socialsociety:

The Matrix & Philosophy

scipsy:

(via Human Connectome Project)

scipsy:

Soyuz VS01 on launch pad (by europeanspaceagency)

theartofgooglebooks:

Late 19th and early 20th century circulation stamps.

From the back matter of The Epochs of Painting by R. N. Wornum (1864).

theartofgooglebooks:

Late 19th and early 20th century circulation stamps.

From the back matter of The Epochs of Painting by R. N. Wornum (1864).

fuckyeahlucasfilm:

Jawa score.

STARGAZE ALL OF THE COSMOS!

doubtingmarcus:

More Shit Skeptics Say

If you consider yourself skeptical at all then take the time and laugh at yourself. This is the first of two sequels to Shit Skeptics Say which came out today.

Even More Shit Skeptics Say

Skeptically Pwnd

poptech:

High-powered plasma turns garbage into gas

Recycling is all well and good.But it hardly addresses the real problem we have with our household waste: We throw two-thirds of it in landfills while somehow managing to feel virtuous that we put last night’s empty wine bottle in the recycling bin. Surely we could do better, environmentally and economically.

There is, in fact, value in trash—if you can unlock it. That’s what this facility in northern Oregon is designed to do. Run by a startup called S4 Energy Solutions, it’s the first commercial plant in the US to use plasma gasification to convert municipal household garbage into gas products like hydrogen and carbon monoxide, which can in turn be burned as fuel or sold to industry for other applications.

Photo: Kevin Van Aelst

thenewenlightenmentage:

Repulsive Gravity as an Alternative to Dark Energy (Part 1)

The Local Sheet, which includes the Local Galactic Group and other nearby galaxies, has a peculiar velocity that can theoretically be explained by the repulsive gravity of antimatter in a large void, among other components. Image credit: Wikimedia Commons (CC BY-SA 3.0)

(PhysOrg.com) — When scientists discovered in 1998 that the Universe is expanding at an accelerating rate, the possibility that dark energy could explain the observation was intriguing. But because there has been little progress in figuring out exactly what dark energy is, the idea has since become more of a problem than a solution for some scientists. One physicist, Massimo Villata of the National Institute for Astrophysics (INAF) in Pino Torinese, Italy, describes dark energy as “embarrassing,” saying that the concept is an ad hoc element to standard cosmology and is devoid of any physical meaning. Villata is one of many scientists who are looking for new explanations of the Universe’s accelerating expansion that involve some form of repulsive gravity. In this case, the repulsive gravity could stem from antimatter hiding in voids.

Read More

unknownskywalker:

Spitzer Discovers Largest Ring Around Saturn

NASA’s Spitzer Space Telescope has discovered an enormous ring around Saturn –?? by far the largest of the giant planet’s many rings.

The new belt lies at the far reaches of the Saturnian system, with an orbit tilted 27 degrees from the main ring plane. The bulk of its material starts about six million kilometers away from the planet and extends outward roughly another 12 million kilometers. One of Saturn’s farthest moons, Phoebe, circles within the newfound ring, and is likely the source of its material.

Saturn’s newest halo is thick, too –?? its vertical height is about 20 times the diameter of the planet. It would take about one billion Earths stacked together to fill the ring. The ring itself is tenuous, made up of a thin array of ice and dust particles. Spitzer’s infrared eyes were able to spot the glow of the band’s cool dust.

The ring would be difficult to see with visible-light telescopes. Its particles are diffuse and may even extend beyond the bulk of the ring material all the way in to Saturn and all the way out to interplanetary space. The relatively small numbers of particles in the ring wouldn’t reflect much visible light, especially out at Saturn where sunlight is weak.

Spitzer was able to sense the glow of the cool dust, which is only about 80 Kelvin (minus 316 degrees Fahrenheit). Cool objects shine with infrared, or thermal radiation; for example, even a cup of ice cream is blazing with infrared light. By focusing on the glow of the ring’s cool dust, Spitzer made it easy to find.

Not sure if…

Beautiful Ijen (by tropicaLiving – Jessy Eykendorp)

Ijen Crater is a nature reserve Ijen Park is located between Banyuwangi and Bondowoso District, East Java, Indonesia. This crater exactly located at the top of Mount Ijen which is one of a series of volcanoes in East Java such as Bromo, Semeru and Merapi. Another uniqueness of this crater has a level of acidity is very high with almost close to zero and the temperature of the water is 20° Celsius. In addition to elevation 2,799 m (9,183 ft) Posis crater is located in the middle of the largest caldera on the island of Java. The caldera size about 20 miles. The crater size is about 960 meters x 600 meters with a depth of 200 meters. This crater is located at a depth of more than 300 meters below the caldera wall.

This crater is a large lake with a bluish-green mist and smoke of the sulfur that is stunning. In addition, cold air with temperatures 10° Celsius, the temperature might reach 2° Celsius will increase the sensation of its own experience. Various plants that exist only in the highlands can also be found here, such as Edelweis Flowers and Pine.

inspirement:

Jan. 31, 2012 — A couple of weeks ago I stumbled across some truly stunning photographs by German photographer Markus Reugels, part of his “Setup Liquid Art” series, depicting spherical representations of the Earth, Jupiter, and the moon, among other objects. The twist: they are “liquid planets,” comprised of a drop of water caught mid-fall.

And there’s no computer manipulation — these shots are real.

Reugels was kind enough to answer a few questions about his art via email. That’s how I learned that the father of two started doing photography seriously as a hobby around three years ago, initially just taking pictures as mementos for the family album. Soon he connected with the broader photography community, and became interested in taking pictures of “the beautiful things we are not able to see with our own eyes.”

Now, he lays parquet floors by day and works on his photography in his spare time. And his favorite medium is water. He dropped water onto various surfaces and figured out how to rig up a sensor-based trigger to his high-speed camera to capture its motion mid-splash, revealing all kinds of wonderful shapes that would otherwise not be visible to the human eye.

“Water can create beautiful shapes, but without high-speed photography we could never see them,” Reugels told the Daily Mail last year. (His shutter speed is a blistering one sixteen thousandth of a second.)

Reugels kept experimenting, first adding food coloring to the water and adding colored gels to his flashes to create an eerie glowing effect. Last year, in what he describes as a “personal milestone,” he figured out how to create “jumping spouts” so that the splashes were bigger, reaching between 3 cm to 15 cm in height. The secret? Adding sugar to the mix, along with a thickening agent (guar gum) to get even more bizarre shapes.

He got the inspiration for his “liquid planets” when he saw a photograph of Spiderman caught in a water drop. “I thought it would be great to place the Earth in a single drop,” he said. He used a satellite image of our pretty blue planet as a backdrop, and his high-speed camera setup captured the light refracting through the falling water drops. Voila! And then he extended the project to other planets, like Jupiter (above).

Of course, while the process seems simple, it’s far from easy. Everything has to come together at just the right moment, with just the right lighting, to create these photographs, and Reugel’s labor-intensive process requires a great deal of patience. While other photographers might boast fancier, more expensive equipment, he’s proud of what he’s been able to accomplish with his souped-up home apparatus and a boatload of creativity.

“The technical devices are only the key to bring your imagination into the pictures,” he says. We can’t wait to see what Reugels comes up with next.

—by Jennifer Ouellette

All true fans need one Trek product in their fridge. What.

crookedindifference:

Sam, the Rhesus monkey, after his ride in the Little Joe-2 (LJ-2) spacecraft

A U.S. Navy destroyer safely recovered Sam after he experienced three minutes of weightlessness during the flight. Animals were often used during test flights for Project Mercury to help determine the effects of spaceflight and weightlessness on humans. LJ-2 was one in a series of flights that led up to the human orbital flights of NASA’s Project Mercury program. The Little Joe rocket booster was developed as a cheaper, smaller, and more functional alternative to the Redstone rockets. Little Joe could be produced at one-fifth the cost of Redstone rockets and still have enough power to carry a capsule payload. Seven unmanned Little Joe rockets were launched from Wallops Island, Virginia from August 1959 to April 1961.

Sam does not look amused. In fact Sam looks mad ABOUT it.

wolframalpha:

Humanity has built enough roads to cover the distance from the earth to the moon over 80 times*.

* This value will change – Wolfram|Alpha calculates the moon’s current distance from the Earth, which varies as it moves through its monthly orbit. 

mothernaturenetwork:

Telepathy machine reads your mind then repeats it back to you
Your thoughts may not be private for long: New machine can turn your inner dialogue into speech just by monitoring brain waves.

digithoughts:

Give them some time

ARM’s CEO Warren East:

…when Android phones were introduced, there was a lot of hype. And then, actually, they didn’t take off in the sort of way that reflected that hype. Then a few years later – two years later – half a million units a day, 700,000 units a day. Android phones now are really… a very successful product. I think we should give Android tablets a little bit more time.

It’s easy to forget that Android phones also came off to a rough start. Personally, I don’t want to be the end-consumer taking chances on somewhat rough products, but I believe there are enough early adopters out there in order to get that Android snowball rolling a second time.

Source: Cnet

Sounds of Classic New York Radio.  WKTU 92.3 FM.

As we look back on the life of Don today, I couldn’t help but think about how influential radio was on so many of our careers. And how far it’s come (or fallen,  depending on where you sit.)  For me, one major story is that of WKTU. The right station in the right market for the right time.

In 1975,  WKTU started playing an adult contemporary format. At that point, WKTU was positioned as a “soft rock” station and called “Mellow 92”. Ratings were relatively low. The station held on to the format in spite of low ratings until 1978. That June, when a station executive visited New York’s Studio 54 on half a dozen occasions, he was very impressed with the crowds there. He then got the idea that a disco music-based station was needed, as several FM-based Top 40 stations were leaning disco in other markets. As a result, the station management purchased 200 disco records and brought them into the station. Keeping the same airstaff, adding Paco from their Spanish-language AM station WHOM, and with no notice, the station abruptly flipped to a disco-based rhythmic top 40 format with the tagline “Disco 92” at 6 p.m. July 24, 1978. That fall, the station rose from “Worst to First”, unseating WABC in the 18-30 age demographic. Air personalities of this era included Kenn Hayes, Randy Place, Paul Robinson, Trip Reeb, Mary Thomas, Dave Mallow and Joe Guarisco. During the height of the disco craze, WKTU was the station to follow in New York.

At first, WKTU played mostly dance/disco and a few rhythm-friendly pop and rock songs (such as “Miss You” by the Rolling Stones), but by 1979, the station began to add more R&B music as well as rhythm friendly new wave rock. By then, WKTU was still regarded as a disco station, but could be more accurately described as rhythmic contemporary hit radio. Since that term was not yet used, the station had been classified as urban contemporary. During this period, disc jockeys such as Paco, Rosko, J.D. Holiday (Paul Zarcone), Dale Reeves, Bob Bottone, Jim Harlan Carlos DeJesus, Joe Causi, Guy Broady, Jay Thomas (yes, THAT Jay Thomas), Freddie Colon, Don Geronimo, Al Bandiero and Dianne Pryor graced the airwaves, as the station continued to be at or near the top into the 1980s.

This was a serious soundtrack for me as I explored parts of New York beyond Brooklyn.

On July 13, 1985 WKTU aired the historic Live Aid concert, and taht  night,  at  midnight, the station switched to an album-oriented rock format, adopted the nickname of “K-Rock”, and changed their call letters to WXRK.

Now, K-Rock was great  for what it was. It  was the FM Stereo home of Howard Stern, for example. It introduced some great  progressive mixshows. But there will  never be another 92 KTU.

(The WKTU call letters, by the way, later reappeared on New York City’s 103.5 FM with a dance pop format in 1996, which would later become HOT 103, and then — HOT 97).

I listened to a lot of radio growing up in New York. The ORIGINAL KTU will always hold a special place in my  heart.

lecturehall:

Calculating Average Velocity or Speed

To calculate average velocity, take the displacement over time; for speed, take distance over time. 

And always remember units! My roommate’s a Physics major, and I’ve seen him tear his hair out over some wacky complicated problems with fucked up unit arithmetic. 

As much as I love physics from a distance, I’m soooooooo glad I’m not a Physics major.

Here’s an experiment whose…

anticharm:

SNR 1572

I have various “pick up” lines involving supernovae. Pretty much, these cosmic events have always fascinated me. That fascination is purely through the knowledge that a star had to die in order for me to be using tumblr (there goes the beginning of each supernova “pick up” line).

Anyway, turning my focus to the image above, white dwarfs can sometimes be brought back to stellar life for a short period. As if they were stellar vampires, when (or if) an adjacent star drifts too close, it can inadvertently contribute fresh fuel to its supposedly depleted predator. When this occurs, a fresh cycle of nuclear fusion reignites the star, producing a “super supernova” that leaves nothing in its wake except an echoing shell of gas.

You can think of SNR 1572 (pictured above) as one of the Draculas of the universe. Tycho Brahe observed its final explosion in 1572. No worries, this vampire is 7,500 light years from you.

Sources:
Bizony, Piers. “The Cosmic Tour”. Metro Books.
Image Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/Harvard-Smithsonian CIA.

mothernaturenetwork:

Did volcanoes spark the Little Ice Age?
On Baffin Island, scientists have discovered plants that died suddenly due an extreme cooling, possibly caused by volcanic eruptions.

(SN 2012a, marked with arrow, in…

(“Starbursting” galaxies…

sense-of-innocence:

1st photo:

The clouds at the peak of the Teide

2nd photo:

the shadow of the volcano was again visible over the sea towards Gran Canaria as the Sun moved below the side of the mountain.

3rd photo: 

Teide’s lenticular cloud was hanging over the moonlit landscape

credits to: Péter I. Pápics

• Blog

richardsison:

“Design Matters” with Debbie Millman, Malcolm Gladwell and Special Guests

Great watch. Goes for 10mins so grab a coffee or a snack.

A live version of Design Matters with Debbie Millman taped live at the School of Visual Arts Masters in Branding Studio by Hillman Curtis. Guests include NY Times bestselling author Malcolm Gladwell, artist Brian Rea, designer Paul Sahre, entrepreneur Josh Liberson and innovation expert DeeDee Gordon talking about the launch of Malcolm Gladwell’s new boxed set of three of his most well-known books: The Tipping Point, Blink and Outliers.

the-star-stuff:

City Lights at Night: Astronaut’s Amazing View from Space

A remarkable nighttime panorama taken from the International Space Station captured a dazzling cobweb of city lights as the orbiting complex flew roughly 240 miles (386 kilometers) overhead.

The captivating picture of Earth from space was taken on Jan. 22. The image shows the space station in the foreground, with the lights of Belgium and the Netherlands shining at the bottom center. The British Isles are slightly blocked by the station’s solar array panels on the left, according to NASA officials.

CREDIT: NASA 

good:

Fish Out of Water: Five Ocean Species We’re Eating to Death

The prickly little sea urchin isn’t the only one in danger—consumers have taken a serious jab at oceanic ecosystems with their collective knives, forks, spoons, and chopsticks. Thanks to human appetites, for some species of ocean dwellers, there just aren’t that many fish in the sea. 

Read more on GOOD? 

EYE OF THE STORM by Lovett

Directed by Christopher Alender
Produced by Kris Eber for Soapbox Films
Cinematography by Craig Kief
Visual Effects by Wes Ball
From the album HIGHWAY COLLECTION by Lovett

jaymug:

Lamborghini Ankonian

thedailyfeed:

Last week, we exclusively reported that Kinect motion-sensing technology is coming to your laptop. Now we’re back with more details on Microsoft’s plans, which we’ve heard will include “Mission: Impossible” -style tech. 

Our correspondent examines the…

laboratoryequipment:

Silk Acts as Scaffold for Cardiac Tissue

Damaged human heart muscle cannot be regenerated. Scar tissue grows in place of the damaged muscle cells. Scientists from the Max Planck Institute for Heart and Lung Research in Bad Nauheim are seeking to restore complete cardiac function with the help of artificial cardiac tissue. They have succeeded in loading cardiac muscle cells onto a three-dimensional scaffold, created using the silk produced by a tropical silkworm.

Read more: http://www.laboratoryequipment.com/news-Silk-Can-Act-as-Scaffold-for-Cardiac-Tissue-013112.aspx

smarterplanet:

The hot tech gig of 2022: Data scientist – Fortune Tech

By the end of the decade 50 billion devices will be emitting information nonstop. Data scientists will help manage it all.

A decade from now the smart techies who decided to become app developers may wish they had taken an applied-mathematics class or two. The coming deluge of data (more on that in a moment) will create demand for a new kind of computer scientist — a gig that’s one part mathematician, one part product-development guru, and one part detective.

D.J. Patil is a pioneer in the field of data science, a new discipline that aims to organize and make sense of all the data generated by machines. It’s a challenge that will grow exponentially over the next decade.

Tech in 2012: Face-offs, failures and fairly big changes at the office

Today there are some 400 million devices connected to the Internet, mostly phones and computers. By 2020 some 50 billion devices, from cars to appliances, will be talking to one another. And companies will need teams of data scientists like Patil to sort through everything from internal inventory metrics to customer tweets. The role is so important that Greylock Partners has hired Patil to serve as a “data scientist in residence” to help its portfolio companies mine their data for patterns or stats that will make them more efficient or smarter than their competitors.

albotas:

Collector’s Corner: Moritz Wanke’s collection of custom backlit Game Boy systems. It’s glorious!