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Mars Base

Chang'e 3 Lander Beams Back New Lunar Panorama Photos - 0 views

www.universetoday.com/...back-new-lunar-panorama-photos

scibyte117 ChineseSpaceProgram

shared by Mars Base on 19 Jan 14 - No Cached
  • the lander beamed back a series of new photos taken with its panoramic camera
  • Stitched together, they give us a more detailed and colorful look of the rover’s surroundings in northern Mare Imbrium
  • The final mosaic unfortunately doesn’t have the resolution yet of the other images. Perhaps one will be published soon
  • ...5 more annotations...
  • One thing that stands out
  • is the brown color of the lunar surface soil or regolith
  • Color images of the moon’s surface by the Apollo astronauts along with  their verbal descriptions indicate a uniform gray color punctuated in rare spots by patches of more colorful soils
  • Apollo visited six different moonscapes – all essentially gray
  • wonder if the color balance in the Chinese images might be off. Or did Chang’e 3 just happen to land on browner soils
Mars Base

Smart Foam In Football Helmets Measures Impact Of Each Hit | Popular Science - 0 views

www.popsci.com/...lmets-measures-impact-each-hit

scibyte117 Football

shared by Mars Base on 23 Jan 14 - No Cached
  • . The CDC estimates that between the 1.6 million and 3.8 million Americans suffer sports-related concussions every year
  • , these concussions occur after what seems like a pretty mild blow to the head
  • in football,
  • ...11 more annotations...
  • the risk of concussion has been a hot-button issue,
  • Sensors within helmets can catch what human eyes often miss, alerting people on the sidelines that a player may need to be taken out of play and screened for a concussion
  • Jake Merrell, a graduate student in mechanical engineering at Brigham Young University
  • created a smart foam that works within football helmets to measure how hard a player just got hit
  • Motion sensors transmit data wirelessly to a tablet or computer when the foam in the helmet is compressed by the player's head, measuring the force and acceleration of the impact.
  • The helmet manufacturer Riddell debuted a similar concussion-alert product this year, called the InSite Impact Response System
  • is being used by some high school teams in the 2013 season.
  • Sensors inside the player's helmet lining measure the severity of a head impact and send an alert to the sidelines if a player has sustained a potentially concussion-inducing hit
  • the system only works in Riddell's Revolution Speed helmet so far.
  • "A coach will know within seconds exactly how hard their player just got hit
  • l plans to submit his project to the Head Health Challenge sponsored by GE and the NFL.
Mars Base

Nighttime smartphone use zaps workers' energy - 0 views

www.sciencedaily.com/...140122170624.htm

scibyte117

shared by Mars Base on 23 Jan 14 - No Cached
  • In a pair of studies surveying a broad spectrum of U.S. workers
  • found that people who monitored their smart phones for business purposes after 9 p.m. were more tired and were less engaged the following day on the job.
  • More than half of U.S. adults own a smartphone
  • ...14 more annotations...
  • Many consider the devices to be among the most important tools ever invented when it comes to increasing productivity of knowledge-based work
  • the National Sleep Foundation says only 40 percent of Americans get enough sleep on most nights
  • a commonly cited reason is smartphone usage for work.
  • the first study, the researchers had 82 upper-level managers complete multiple surveys every day for two weeks.
  • The second study surveyed 161 employees daily in a variety of occupations -- from nursing to manufacturing and from accounting to dentistry
  • both studies
  • showed that nighttime smartphone usage for business purposes cut into sleep and sapped workers' energy the next day in the office
  • The second study also compared smartphone usage to other electronic devices and found that smartphones had a larger negative effect than watching television and using laptop and tablet computers
  • In addition to keeping people mentally engaged at night, smartphones emit "blue light"
  • the most disruptive of all colors of light. Blue light is known to hinder melatonin, a chemical in the body that promotes sleep
  • nighttime use of smartphones appears to have both psychological and physiological effects on people's ability to sleep and on sleep's essential recovery functions
  • "There may be times in which putting off work until the next day would have disastrous consequences and using your smartphone is well worth the negative effects on less important tasks the next day,"
  • "But on many other nights, more sleep may be your best bet."
  • Johnson, MSU assistant professor of management
Mars Base

Driverless Taxis in European Cities from 2014 - 0 views

www.scienceworldreport.com/...-european-cities-from-2014.htm

scibyte117

shared by Mars Base on 23 Jan 14 - No Cached
  • Driverless taxis will be carrying passengers during demonstration projects in five European cities as of February 2014.
  • cybercars, by the EU-funded CityMobil2 project, is one of a number of research initiatives that are testing out specially designed self-driving road vehicles as the technology required to navigate them becomes cheaper and more reliable.
  • Cybercars have traditionally sensed the world through expensive gyroscopes, microwaves and laser beams
  • ...20 more annotations...
  • cheap cameras and fast image-recognition algorithms has led to a new technique known as visual odometry
  • a computer analyses images to determine the position and orientation of the vehicle.
  • researchers have better access to the technology required for automated vehicles
  • e V-Charge project, a consortium of companies and universities which is working on fully automated low-speed driving in cities using only cameras and other low-cost sensors mounted on standard cars
  • . The consortium is working to produce detailed maps and a perception system that allows a vehicle to recognize its location and identify nearby pedestrians and vehicles, all using only stereoscopic or fisheye cameras.
  • team has taken this a step further, pioneering a guidance system that works economically by using a single camera.
  • car manufacturers are already making automated piloting features of their own – radar-based cruise control, anti-braking systems (ABS) and lane-control assistance
  • cables and hydraulic pressure valves which previously linked the controls of the vehicle to its working parts are gradually being replaced with electronic circuits
  • While companies such as Google see autonomous cars in a couple of decades
  • CityMobil2 project
  • thinks that they could be hitting the road sooner than that
  • The challenge lies in their environment
  • believes that, in addition to teaching cars to respond autonomously to traffic conditions, traffic should be adapted to automated cars
  • In their current state of development, cybercars could already drive safely in pedestrian areas and designated lanes
  • , investors are at present deterred by their high initial investment and perceived risks.
  • why they are being implemented in small stages
  • The first CityMobil project shuttled passengers across the car park of London Heathrow airport in a fleet of driverless pods
  • CityMobil2, now brings specially designed automated vehicles to designated roads inside the city centre
  • The project plans to procure two sets of automated vehicles which will tour five cities in a series of demonstration projects each lasting six to eight months
  • CityMobil2 is bringing together experts from ministries in each member state to agree on technical requirements by the time the project concludes in 2016 that could feed into a future European directive on the issue
Mars Base

Telescope spies water plumes on dwarf planet Ceres - 0 views

phys.org/...spies-plumes-dwarf-planet.html

scibyte117 Asteroid Ceres

shared by Mars Base on 23 Jan 14 - No Cached
  • Scientists
  • have made the first definitive detection of water vapor on the largest and roundest object in the asteroid belt, Ceres.
  • Plumes of water vapor are thought to shoot up periodically from Ceres when portions of its icy surface warm slightly
  • ...26 more annotations...
  • Ceres is classified as a dwarf planet, a solar system body bigger than an asteroid and smaller than a planet.
  • "This is the first time water vapor has been unequivocally detected on Ceres or any other object in the asteroid belt and provides proof that Ceres has an icy surface and an atmosphere,"
  • Michael Küppers of ESA in Spain
  • NASA's Dawn mission, which is on its way to Ceres now after spending more than a year orbiting the large asteroid Vesta
  • Dawn is scheduled to arrive at Ceres in the spring of 2015, where it will take the closest look ever at its surface.
  • will map the geology and chemistry of the surface in high resolution
  • International Astronomical Union, the governing organization responsible for naming planetary objects
  • Ceres was known as the largest asteroid in our solar system
  • reclassified Ceres as a dwarf planet because of its large size. It is roughly 590 miles (950 kilometers) in diameter
  • When it first was spotted in 1801, astronomers thought it was a planet orbiting between Mars and Jupiter
  • Scientists believe Ceres contains rock in its interior with a thick mantle of ice that, if melted, would amount to more fresh water than is present on all of Earth
  • The materials making up Ceres likely date from the first few million years of our solar system's existence and accumulated before the planets formed.
  • Until now, ice had been theorized to exist on Ceres but had not been detected conclusively
  • far-infrared vision to see, finally, a clear spectral signature of the water vapor. But
  • did not see water vapor every time it looked
  • spied water vapor four different times, on one occasion there was no signature.
  • what scientists think is happening
  • when Ceres swings through the part of its orbit that is closer to the sun, a portion of its icy surface becomes warm enough to cause water vapor to escape in plumes
  • a rate of about 6 kilograms (13 pounds) per second
  • When Ceres is in the colder part of its orbit, no water escapes
  • The strength of the signal also varied over hours, weeks and months
  • water vapor plumes rotating in and out of Herschel's views as the object spun on its axis
  • This enabled the scientists to localize the source of water to two darker spots on the surface of Ceres
  • previously seen by NASA's Hubble Space Telescope and ground-based telescopes. The dark spots might be more likely to outgas because dark material warms faster than light material.
  • "The lines are becoming more and more blurred between comets and asteroids," said Seungwon Lee of JPL
  • Paul von Allmen, also of JPL. "We knew before about main belt asteroids that show comet-like activity, but this is the first detection of water vapor in an asteroid-like object."
Mars Base

February 1 - Today in Science History - Scientists born on February 1st, died, and events - 0 views

todayinsci.com/2_01.htm

scibyte117 LookingBack

shared by Mars Base on 25 Jan 14 - No Cached
  • Bell Rock Lighthouse
  • the Bell Rock Lighthouse was lit for the first time. Using 24 lanterns, it began flashing its warning light, 11 miles out off the east coast of Scotland atop a white stone tower rising over 30m (100ft) high. It was built by Robert Stevenson on a treacherous sandstone reef, which, except at low tides, lies submerged just beneath the waves. Since then, no repair has been necessary to its stonework. It is the oldest sea-washed lighthouse in existence. It was Stevenson's finest achievement, regarded by many as the finest lighthouse ever built, the most outstanding engineering achievement of the 19th century. In the centuries before, the dangerous Bell Rock had claimed thousands of lives, as vessels were wrecked on its razor-sharp serrated rocks.
Mars Base

Yutu rover Suffers Significant Setback at Start of 2nd Lunar Night - 0 views

www.universetoday.com/...ck-at-start-of-2nd-lunar-night

scibyte117 ChineseSpaceProgram

shared by Mars Base on 29 Jan 14 - No Cached
  • The six wheeled Yutu rover, which means ‘Jade Rabbit’, has “experienced a mechanical control abnormality” in a new report by China’s official government newspaper, The People’s Daily. Remove this ad
  • ‘Jade Rabbit’ was traversing southwards from the landing site as the incident occurred just days ago – about six weeks into its planned 3 month moon roving expedition
  • very few details have emerged or been released by the Chinese government about Yutu’s condition or fate
  • ...7 more annotations...
  • The abnormality occurred due to the “complicated lunar surface environment,” said the State Administration of Science, Technology and Industry for National Defence
  • took place just prior to the beginning of the 2nd lunar night and
  • ‘dormancy’ for both ‘Jade Rabbit’ and the Chang’e-3
  • Based on unofficial accounts, it appears that one of the solar panels did not fold back properly over Yutu’s mast after it was lowered to the required horizontal position into a warmed box to shield and protect it from the extremely frigid lunar night time temperatures
  • could potentially spell doom for the mast mounted instruments and electronic systems, including the color and navigation cameras and the high gain antenna, if true
  • each Lunar night also lasts approximately 14 Earth days
  • there is no communication possible during sleep mode, no one will know until the resumption of daylight some two weeks from now – around Feb. 8 to 9.
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