also interesting (for the Earth Science girls): Nilton Renno of the University of Michigan, who studies how rocket plumes from Mars landers affect the Martian surface.
quite self-explanatory described though:
"The terrorists apparently would win if Google told you the exact number of times the Federal Bureau of Investigation invoked a secret process to extract data about the media giant's customers.
That's why it is unlawful for any record-keeper to disclose it has received a so-called National Security Letter. But under a deal brokered with the President Barack Obama administration, Google on Tuesday published a "range" of times it received National Security Letters demanding it divulge account information to the authorities without warrants.
It was the first time a company has ever released data chronicling the volume of National Security Letter requests.
National Security Letters allow the government to get detailed information on Americans' finances and communications without oversight from a judge. The FBI has issued hundreds of thousands of NSLs and has even been reprimanded for abusing them. The NSLs are written demands from the FBI that compel internet service providers, credit companies, financial institutions and businesses like Google to hand over confidential records about their customers, such as subscriber information, phone numbers and e-mail addresses, websites visited and more as long as the FBI says the information is "relevant" to an investigation."
and
""You'll notice that we're reporting numerical ranges rather than exact numbers. This is to address concerns raised by the FBI, Justice Department and other agencies that releasing exact numbers might reveal information about investigations. We plan to update these figures annually," Richard Salgado, a Google legal director, wrote in a blog post.
Salgado was not available for comment.
What makes the government's position questionable is that it is required by Congress to disclose the number of times the bureau issues National Security Letters. In 2011, the year with the latest available figures, the FBI issued 16,511 National Sec
The Robobee takes off without guide wires!
It is still powered via a wire, and the control is done with the help of a VICON system and on an external computer, but this still is an amazing feat!
The way they make this thing is just as impressive. The manufacturing technique is "pop-up book" folding, a method that has been developed by the same group and that allows a two dimensional monolithic MEMS structures to be easily assembled into a 3D structure. I actually put this as an item of the "Technology List 2020" on the wiki this morning.
Latest update: the European Space Agency says their experts "confirm there is no link between the meteor incidents in Russia and asteroid 2012DA14 flyby tonight". How did they find this?
As they did not see this one coming, how could they come to that conclusion that early!
As you can see from the videos of this meteorite it is coming in from an east to south-east direction (i.e. the direction of the sunrise, more or less). 2012DA14 is coming from due south as you can see here: http://www.wired.com/wiredscience/2013/02/how-to-watch-asteroid-2012-da14/
So the two objects seem to be coming from different directions - at least that would be my explanation.
My point is, that if you want to come to such a conclusion (that it is not rubble) you need to be able to construct back the orbits of both objects. 2012DA14 has been observed for one year only, but it is well enough. When the meteor has been observed for the first time, such that we knew its orbit? has it been observed before? if yes, why the impact has not been predicted?
I don't think so. If both objects were part of the same, they would be on different but intersecting orbits anyway, hence different directions. Anyway, I am not knowledgeable in atmospheric entry ...
But, with so few information about the object, I am surprised they are 100% certain it is not related to DA14. I think science requires more cautions ... With only the direction they are 100% sure, while the probability of such event is itself extremely small, I am amazed... They can't even predict with 100% certainty where a space debris will fall... plus, nobody consider the object being part of a bigger one that broke up during early entry (which has not been observed) ... so many uncertainties and possible hypothesis...
and i am not the only one :) http://www.infowars.com/russian-meteor-linked-to-da14-asteroid/
was not that evident to me also but apparently with the right understanding it was quite clear; was amazed also how quickly NASA has published the likely trajectory of the russian object - have a look at it: quite evident that these are not coming from the same body
A crack team of engineers at the University of Illinois has developed an electronic circuit that autonomously self-heals when its metal wires are broken.