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Bad Astronomy Blog
As the Earth Turns
Last week, I highlighted an amazing video of the Sun taken from space in super-hi-def resolution, put together from NASA imagery by James Tyrwhitt-Drake.
Today, how about we turn that around, look down, and do the same thing for our fair planet?
Here's the Earth, as seen by the Russian Roscosmos's Elektro-L satellite from May 15 – 19, 2011, and put together into a video again by Tyrwhitt-Drake. Set it to maximum resolution and make it full screen, and soak up the incredible beauty of home.
Fantastic, isn't it? But it also takes some explaining.
First, Elektro-L is an Earth-observing weather satellite. It's in a geosynchronous orbit, meaning it goes around the Earth once every 24 hours, the time it takes the Earth to spin once. From our point of view that means the satellite is fixed in the sky, neither rising nor setting. From the satellite's point of view the Earth always shows the same face; looking down it always sees the same part of Earth. That's why a geosynch orbit is so useful for weather. The video makes that obvious, too.
The satellite has cameras sensitive to visible light — the kind we see — and near-infrared. Plants reflect that kind of light very strongly, so places where there's vegetation show up strongly in the satellite images. Normally those are colored red in pictures, but for this video Tyrwhitt-Drake colored that channel a more natural-looking green. Plants aren't the only thing that reflect IR light, so some places look green that aren't; note Saudi Arabia, for example, and the Sahara, which have a yellow-green tint from sand.
If the motion looks odd to you, that's because Tyrwhitt-Drake had to interpolate between frames taken every 30 minutes by Elektro-L (I explain how this is done in a post about a video of the Curiosity Mars rover landing). It creates an odd flowing effect, but is far better than the jerky snap between images taken so long apart.
Also, the video only shows the northern hemisphere first, then the southern flipped over (note the shadow line between night and day, called the terminator, moves the other way), and then finally the whole Earth at lower but still spectacular resolution.
Incredibly, the images off the satellite are originally 11k x 11k (each 120 megapixels!), which Tyrwhitt-Drake resized down to 50 percent, presumably so it would take less than a century to render the video. He says his 5568 x 5568 pixel video is available upon request. That would be amazing… if I had a monitor with enough resolution to see it! Maybe I could stitch 25 TVs together…
Tip o' the chlorophyll to Fraser Cain.
"Happy 10th Anniversary in Space," He Said Swiftly
Ten years ago today — on Nov. 20, 2004, at 17:16 UTC — A Delta II rocket thundered into the sky. Sitting inside the payload cowling was NASA's Swift observatory, awaiting its chance to revolutionize astronomy.
Swift was sent into orbit to look for gamma-ray bursts, the most violent bangs in the Universe since The Big One. These explosions are the birth cries of black holes, and occur somewhere in the Universe every day.
They're so luminous they can be seen clear across the Universe, but so short in duration that in some cases, literally, if you blink you'll miss them. They made them incredibly hard to study; it was a lucky break when a burst in 1997 was caught by an X-ray satellite called BeppoSax, the first to have its distance accurately determined; it was a whopping six billion light years away! The history of GRBs involves the cold war, nuclear bomb testing, and many, many years of astronomers scratching their heads. It was one of the most enduring mysteries in astronomy*, and Swift helped us understand them better than any observatory before it.
Swift was designed and built to detect GRBs in gamma rays, X-rays, ultraviolet and optical light — a huge chunk of the electromagnetic spectrum — and rapidly slew over to point at them, sometimes in well under a minute. It was named after the acrobatic bird, which catches huge numbers of insects on the fly.
It turned out to be a good name.
Swift quickly became the go-to observatory for GRB detection. By the end of 2004 it found nine GRBs — averaging about one per week — even before its observational methods had been fine-tuned. As I write this, after ten years, it's detected 921 of these cosmic explosions! That's stunning.
As soon as it detects a burst, it sends the coordinates out via the Gamma-ray Coordinates Network. Telescopes hooked up to the network can automatically look for the burst within moments of its discovery that way, and hope to catch the rapidly fading afterglow, caused by the initial explosion sending out so much energy and high speed matter that in a few seconds it dwarfs the Sun's entire energy output over its entire 11 billion lifetime!
GRBs are awe-inspiring.
Along the way Swift's also seen a magnetar explosion (one of the very few astronomical events that actually freak me out due to their mind-crushing violence and scale), watched a neutron star get torn apart by a black hole (!!!), observed hundreds of galaxies, exploding stars, asteroids, comets, and more... including, get this, the single most luminous event ever witnessed by humans up to that time. And Swift is still up there, orbiting the Earth, scanning the skies diligently and patiently, waiting for the next burst. You can even see a map of the sky showing where the latest bursts have been seen.
Although I wasn't involved with the science of the mission except tangentially, I worked for many years on the education and public outreach part of the mission. I wrote countless articles about Swift, including much of the EPO website. Our team at Sonoma State University designed a lot of activities for kids using Swift science, including brochures, a paper model of the satellite, classroom activities, a planetarium show, and a lot more. I'm still pretty proud of the work we did for Swift.
And I'm proud of the satellite. It was relatively inexpensive (the total mission cost was about $250 million) and it's performed nearly flawlessly in the ravages of space for a decade. It's a paragon of international cooperation to study the Universe, and a true achievement for NASA.
Congratulations to the entire Swift team, and happy anniversary. You deserve it.
* I wrote about this for my book Death from the Skies!, and/or you can read more about it here.
What Exploded Over Russia This Time?
On Nov. 14, 2014, something exploded over the skies of the Sverdlovsk region of Russia, about 1500 kilometers east of Moscow. I'm not sure what it was, but the videos coming out are pretty dramatic:
As we learned from Chelyabinsk in 2013, Russian cars commonly have dashboard cameras, so I'm hoping more footage will surface soon. A couple of teenagers managed to catch it on a phone camera:
It's very cloudy, but the light can be seen through them. The first obvious guess is that this was a bolide, a fireball caused by a chunk of debris entering our atmosphere from space at high speed. These happen pretty often.
The color is odd; the reddish glow, if accurately portrayed in these videos, isn't something I generally see in bolide videos and photos (or from the few I have seen with my own eye). They tend to be green or blue, or just white. Not always, but just in general. of course, the clouds may be affecting the color, too.
Also, it's really hard to tell, but it doesn't look like the light is moving, as you might expect from a meteor. The videos are both shaky, so it's not easy to measure that. The movement looks minimal to me, though. That could be geometry: If the meteor is moving across your line of sight then there is a lot of motion, but if it's headed more or less toward or away from you as it moves through the air, sideways motion will be low. I'd expect that the two videos would show different geometries, but again they're so shaky it's hard to tell.
There are some preliminary flashes in the teenagers' video a few seconds before the big one, and that's consistent with a meteoroid breaking up as it comes in. As a big rock rams through the air at many times the speed of sound, the pressure breaks the rock up into smaller pieces, creating flashes as the energy of motion is converted into light and heat. There can then be a much larger flash as the smaller rocks all disintegrate rapidly.
If this wasn't a bolide, what was it? Beats me. It's a bit odd to think that a biggish rock from interplanetary space is the most mundane and prosaic explanation, but in this case it is! However, I won't make up my mind until more evidence is in.
Tip o' the Whipple Shield to NASANeoCAM on Twitter.
Distant Horizons
— with apologies to Robert Browning
We humans have lived on Earth a long time. Hundreds of thousands of years, give or take, depending on what you define as human. And all that time we have yearned to reach the stars, to explore, to find out what exists elsewhere.
We're just now starting to do just that. We've only been able to fly for a little over a century, and the elapsed time since we first left our atmosphere can be counted in decades, less than a human lifetime. We're taking our first tentative steps.
And yet we have accomplished so much! We've sent our spacecraft to every major body in the solar system, and quite a few minor ones besides. We've continuously occupied space for years, and we've launched observatories into orbit that examine the Universe in every wavelength regime of the electromagnetic spectrum.
And we've done even more: We've set down on other worlds. Certainly, most have been through our robotic proxies, but given the inhospitable nature of so many of these worlds, that's not surprising.
And now we can include an entirely new body to that list: a comet, thanks to the Philae lander sitting on the surface of 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko.
To celebrate that, Michiel Straathof has updated Mike Malaska's classic "Distant Horizons" mosaic to show all the worlds that humans have touched.
From left to right we see the comet; the asteroid Itokawa, seen by the Japanese Hayabusa probe; the Moon from Apollo; Venus from the Soviet Venera 14 lander; Mars from the Spirit rover; Titan from the European Space Agency's Huygens probe; and our own fair and watery world.
We see the horizon of each, a poetic and fitting tribute to our own nature of looking beyond. As each of these landings is a magnificent accomplishment worthy of our praise and awe, they are yet each still just a stepping stone, a footprint that leads beyond.
After all, as Konstantin Tsiolkovsky, father of rocketry, has often been quoted:
"The Earth is the cradle of humanity, but one cannot live in the cradle forever."
Last week, the European Space Agency landed a space probe on a comet. It was big news—historic, even.
But another event caused a stir at the same time, tangentially related to the event. Matt Taylor, the Rosetta mission's project scientist, went on the air to talk about the successful landing. However, his choice of attire was unfortunate.
He was wearing a bowling shirt covered in pinup-style drawings of scantily clad women.
This upset a lot of people. A lot. It was compounded by his extremely poorly thought-out description of the difficulty of the Rosetta mission: "She's sexy, but I never said she was easy."
Yikes. To be clear, I don't think Taylor is a raging misogynist or anything like that; I think he was just clueless about how his words might sound and his shirt might be interpreted. We all live in an atmosphere steeped in sexism, and we hardly notice it; a fish doesn't notice the water in which it swims. I've lived in that environment my whole life, and I was well into adulthood before I started becoming aware of it and figuring out how to counter it. I'm still learning.
Importantly, the next day, clearly upset he had caused such a fuss, Taylor apologized on air sincerely and graciously for his actions. For the most part, the people who were upset accepted his apology and moved on.
But it doesn't end there. As you might expect, when people complained about the casual sexism of the shirt and the mission description, a frothing torrent of backlash misogyny swept over social media, another in a long line of demonstrations of Lewis' law ("Comments on any article about feminism justify feminism.")
There is much I could say here, but Dr24Hours wrote an excellent summary that aligns fairly well with my thinking. Please go read that right now.
But I have something to add.
If you think this is just women complaining, you're wrong. Certainly many have, and rightly so. But the fact is, I'm writing about it. I can point you to many men, friends of mine, scientists and science communicators all, who have spoken up about it. It's important that men speak up, and it's important that we listen, too.
If you think this is just complaining from wannabes who can't hold a candle to someone who just landed a probe on a comet, you're wrong. Talk to my friend, the cosmologist Katie Mack. Or the planetary scientist Sarah Horst. Or geologist Mika McKinnon. Or planetary geologist Emily Lakdawalla. Or radio astronomer Nicole Gugliucci. Or professor and science communicator extraordinaire Pamela Gay. Or Carolyn Porco, who worked on the Voyager mission and is the leader of the Cassini imaging team, the space probe that's been orbiting Saturn for over a decade now.
If you think this is just a bunch of prudes, you're wrong. It's not about the prurience. It's about the atmosphere of denigration.
If you think it's OK to use a misogynistic gender-charged word to insult and demean a woman because she used a generic nongender-charged insult about a man, then you're really wrong (and that's one representative tweet from many I saw just like it).
If you think this isn't a big deal, well, by itself, it's not a huge one. But it's not by itself, is it? This event didn't happen in a vacuum. It comes when there is still a tremendously leaky pipeline for women from undergraduate science classes to professional scientist. It comes when having a female name on a paper makes it less likely to get published, and cited less. It comes when there is still not even close to parity in hiring and retaining women in the sciences.
So yeah, it's just a shirt.
And it's just an ad.
It's just a saying.
It's just a TV show.
It's just the Internet.
Yes, but you almost make as much as a man does.
It's just a catcall.
It's a compliment!
It's just that boys will be boys.
It's just that she's a slut.
It's just that your dress is too short.
It's just that we want to know what you were wearing at the time, ma'am.
It's just it's just it's just.
It's just a death by a thousand cuts. No one cut does the deed. In the end, they all do.
Philae Spotted Hopping Away in Photo of Comet
A few days ago, the world watched and cheered as the tiny spaceship Philae landed on the surface of a comet. However, it was quickly determined that the anchoring harpoons didn't fire, and the lander bounced off the comet. It soared a kilometer high before falling agonizingly slowly back down nearly two hours later, only to take a second, shorter hop, ending up in comet incognita.
It took a little while, but images taken by the orbiting Rosetta spacecraft mothership (and assembled into a short video) were released by the European Space Agency showing where Philae impacted the first time. The video shows before-and-after images of where Philae smacked down. At the time, my friend/planetary geologist/Planetary Society blogger Emily Lakdawalla speculated that you could actually see Philae and its shadow in the "after" image, but the data were so noisy I was pretty skeptical.
Turns out, she was right*.
Here is a lovely animated gif showing the two images, with the impact site marked in the first image, and the lander (with shadow) in the second.
[Photo by ESA/Rosetta/NAVCAM; pre-processed by Mikel Canania]
Amazing! Astrophysicist Eamonn Kerins did this even better: He made a "difference image", subtracting one from the other to show what's changed between the two. It really brings out Philae and its shadow:
You can see lots of bright pixels — most likely "hot pixels", overactive spots on the camera detector — with dark ones next to them, a product of how the images were processed. Note how the spot labeled as Philae is blurrier, and the shadow is several pixels below it. That's pretty convincing to me.
I was initially skeptical because the "plume" stretching below and to the right of the impact site looked the same in both images, and was also mimicked by a similar feature to the upper right; both look like ridge shadows.
In the difference image those go away, so most likely they really are shadows, the lower one coincidentally right on top of where the lander bounced. That's unfortunate, since it steered me away from what was really happening.
And as a reminder of what you're seeing: That's an action shot of a 100 kilogram machine the size of a lounge chair that weighs less than an ounce in the local gravity hitting the surface of a four kilometer wide dirty snowball almost precisely on target as seen by another spaceship that took ten years and three planet flybys to achieve its goal of matching the 40,000 kph velocity and entering orbit around a comet… all of which is a first for humanity, ever.
So yeah. Cool.
* At least she was gracious in victory.
Epic 4K Sun Video, with Bonus Sunspot Tantrums
Not long ago, the ridiculously huge sunspot called Active Region 2192 ruled the face of the Sun. Bigger than Jupiter, it was easily seen by the (adequately protected) naked eye, and it was a distracting though extremely cool blemish during October's solar eclipse.
A sunspot that big has a lot of storage space to stuff magnetic fields, and 2192 didn't disappoint. Sunspots are essentially magnetic phenomena, and as the huge looping magnetic field lines in the spot tangled up, they sometimes violently snapped and reconnected, releasing their energy as solar flares. Dwarfing every nuclear bomb on Earth combined, the flares kept popping off as 2192 marched across the Sun's disk, swept along with our star's rotation.
From space, the Solar Dynamics Observatory keeps a close eye on the Sun, and watched in multiple wavelengths (think of them as colors) as 2192 did its thing. James Tyrwhitt-Drake, who has created interested scientific animations before, took 17,000 SDO images of the Sun in the ultraviolet, spanning Oct. 14 – 30, 2014, and created an astonishing video that shows 2192 in all its glory. The video is available in 4k resolution, if your bandwidth can choke that down, but it's worth it to make this full screen:
The sound you hear is not real; it's made from visible light data by SDO's Helioseismic and Magnetic Imager, which maps motions on the Sun's surface, which was then converted into sound by solar astronomer Alexander Kosovichev.
In this view, south is up, so the Sun rotates right to left (I'm used to it the other way, but hey, in space there is no up, so fine). 2192 makes its appearance early on, announcing its presence with towering loops of magnetic energy over 200,000 km high — mind you, the Earth is a mere 13,000 km across — and dominates the view thereafter. It's incredible.
You can watch as enormous prominences erupt away from it, hot hydrogen gas flowing along otherwise invisible magnetic field lines like beads on a wire. The gravity of the Sun is strong, and pulls the gas with a force nearly 30 times stronger than Earth's gravity, but the magnetic field is strong, too, and the gas flows back to the Sun along curving, graceful paths. It's mesmerizing.
As the Sun rotates, AR 2192 has come around again, returning on or about Nov. 12. But it decayed substantially when it was on the far side of the Sun from the Earth. It's a shadow, so to speak, of its former self. It doesn't look like it'll last much longer. We may not get another spot like it for a long time; it was the biggest seen in decades. But the Sun is a complex beast, and predicting its behavior for things like this is a losing bet. We may not see another like 2192, or another might grow and swell into existence once again. We'll have to wait and see.
Hey, Galileo Was Right!
One of the funny things about being a human is that our intuition can steer us wrong, even on things that should be pretty obvious, things we see literally every day.
For example, if you ask someone what would fall faster, a bowling ball or a marble, I bet a lot of folks would say the heavier bowling ball falls faster. But in fact, if dropped from a meter or so off the ground, they'd fall at the same rate. Gravity accelerates them at the same rate, so they fall at the same rate.
Part of the reason our intuition is off here is due to air. As objects fall, the air pushes back on them. This depends pretty strongly on their surface area, how big they are, so a lightweight large object will in fact fall more slowly than a heavier, smaller one.
Dropping a bowling ball and a feather will yield results that will satisfy our intuition. But what if you removed all the air from the room and dropped them? What happens then?
My friend and physicist Brian Cox did just this for his new BBC TV series Human Universe. He traveled to NASA's Space Power Facility at the Glenn Research Center in Ohio to test gravity. What happens when he does is pretty wonderful.
Lovely! With the air removed, the feathers and ball fall at the same rate, just as Galileo predicted and Newton showed mathematically. I assume the bit at the end of the video about Einstein is referring to the Equivalence Principle, which has to due with acceleration due to gravity—if you're standing on the Earth's surface, you feel this as your weight, the force due to Earth's gravity on your mass—and is indistinguishable from acceleration due to some force (like being in a rocket under power). This idea has profound implications, and in part led to Einstein developing the theory of General Relativity. I'd love to see this show and find out how Brian follows that concept farther.
I've known Brian for quite some time, and I have to say it's nice to see him finally get some recognition for his work. The poor guy has been languishing in obscurity for years.
Rosetta Spots Site of Philae's First Bounce
Update (Nov. 14, 2014 at 23:00 UTC): Contact with Philae has been re-established! Data taken from the surface (including drill samples) have been sent back to Earth. Not only that, a command was sent to rotate the lander, and that worked as well! It rotated by 35°, enough to point a bigger solar panel up to the Sun. Reports indicate power is flowing, so the life of the mission has at the very least been extended somewhat. This is incredible work by the ESA team!
Update 2 (Nov. 15, 2014 at 00:00 UTC): While the move to rotate the lander was successful, the drain on the battery by the instruments on board was too much. At about half past midnight the voltage dropped below the critical point and the lander put itself into standby mode (no science being done; just communication with the Rosetta orbiter). HOWEVER, the point of the rotation was to get more power available. It's entirely possible that over the next few days, as the comet rotates around, enough sunlight will hit the solar panel to the battery enough charge to restart Philae. As usual, Emily Lakdawalla has more info on this. So Philae is not necessarily dead. It may just be sleeping, hibernating. We could very well hear from it again.
The European Space Agency just released a great short video showing Rosetta's view on the comet where the Philae lander took its first kilometer-high bounce!
If I've measured this correctly, the red circle is roughly 15 meters (50 feet) across. The "flight dynamics solution" is where the spot was predicted to be given Philae's trajectory, and as you can see they pretty much nailed it.
It's hard to interpret exactly what we're seeing in the before and after. The dark streak looks like a plume of material, but I'm not so sure. Just above and to the right you can see another similar dark feature, and I'm leaning toward them both being shadows cast by low ridges as the angle to the Sun changed between the first image and the second.
These images should prove useful in figuring out just where Philae is; its location is still unknown. As I write this we're still awaiting word that contact between the still-orbiting Rosetta and the lander has been re-established, and the data taken uploaded. Hopefully, samples of the comet have been analyzed by Philae, and we'll get a sense of what materials are on and just below its surface.
This is still very exciting! Certainly, it would've been far better had the lander stayed upright, and able to draw energy from the Sun, but even if that's not to be, it's still done an amazing job.
Quick Philae Update
There's more news this morning about Philae, the European Space Agency lander that is on the surface of the comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko. Recap: It set down on the comet yesterday, but the harpoons didn't deploy. It bounced, twice, and came to rest a kilometer or so from the desired landing site. It's not known precisely where it is, and it's too small for the Rosetta spacecraft, still orbiting the comet, to easily find it.
Update, Nov. 14, 2014 at 18:00 UTC: The ESA Rosetta blog has posted an update, which has information about what the instruments on Philae have been doing so far.
Philae came to a rest on its side, unfortunately in a hole or an area surrounded by tall outcroppings. Because of this it's not getting enough sunlight for its solar power cells to keep it charged. It has two batteries, but the instruments are using up that power rapidly. If nothing is done, it will run out of power soon.
If it does run out of power, all is not necessarily lost; as the comet nears the Sun the cells may receive enough charge to turn the lander back on. This is speculative, though.
The good news is the lander is working and taking data; dozens of high-res photos have been taken, for example, and are waiting to be transmitted up to Rosetta so they can be sent back to Earth. Contact between Rosetta and Philae is intermittent as the orbiter moves around the comet and the line of sight clears to the lander. The next good pass should be today around 21:00–23:00 UTC (16:00–18:00 Eastern).
I wondered yesterday if outgassing from the comet could dislodge Philae, but apparently it's too dense for that to happen. One idea engineers are looking into is turning on the lander's flywheel (a heavy, rapidly rotating disk that is used to rotate the lander)—Lander Manager Stephan Ulamec calls it "a very attractive idea"—which might provide enough torque to get Philae upright. There may not be enough power to spin it up though.*
I get the impression that, of course, people on the Philae team are disappointed at what happened, but are still really happy that it worked at all and got as far as it did. I keep hearing comments that anything they get now is "cream on top" of the amazing data they've already received. In other words, this mission was a success!
Let's hope that the success it's had so far is just the beginning, and not the end. And remember: Rosetta is still orbiting and going strong. That part of the mission has many months of discovery ahead of it.
*Correction, Nov. 14, 2014: This post originally misspelled the first name of Stephan Ulamec.
Cymatics: Science v. Music
I'm about to make you very happy. Stop what you're doing and watch this extremely cool video called "Cymatics: Science v. Music", by musician Nigel Stanford. Seriously. Make it high-def, full screen, and crank up the volume.
Science! Music!
There are a couple of things I want to point out in particular. I laughed out loud when I saw the drummer's spiraling water (starting around the 1:20 mark). His drumming makes the rubber tube vibrate in a circular motion, which sends the water flow out in a different direction over time, like a lawn sprinkler. You don't see the hose move because the vibration is synched with the video frame rate; every new frame of video is taken when the hose is back to the starting position. I explain this in great detail in an earlier post about this effect (you really do want to see that post; it's got very cool stuff in it).
I like the way the flames move starting around 3:30, too. There's a speaker at one end of the gas tube, and as sound waves come out of it the gas in the tube gets compressed and rarefacted (the opposite of compression, so decreasing the density of something) by the waves. Standing waves are created in the gas, like the waves you get if you snap a rope at just the right rate. That's why you see the flames going up and down in those graceful sine curves.
And I love the patterns of sand on the metal plates seen throughout the video. That's an interference effect. Waves of sound travel through the plate, making it vibrate. Where the crests of those waves meet each other you get amplification of the waves, again related to standing waves. The patterns are complex because of the shape of the plate; the waves propagate through it and get their direction and shape changed by the edges and corners of the plate. I remember working through the math of this in my grad school mechanics physics class; it took days and many, many sheets of paper to solve the equations even to show how a circular drumhead vibrates, which is a pretty simple shape.
But out of complexity can come great symmetry and beauty. The patterns are lovely.
And Tesla coils? C'mon. They may be the single coolest thing ever invented.
I really like Stanford's music, too. The video was sent to me by Tom Lowe, an astonishingly talented astrophotographer. Lowe created the time-lapse videos "Rapture", "TimeScapes", and "Death Is the Road to Awe", which are all stunning. Stanford did the music to "TimeScapes", which is how this is all connected.
I can't get enough of stuff like this. Astronomy, physics, science, math, music, video… they are all related, and the interconnectivity is, simply, art.
COMET UPDATE: Where is Philae?
Yesterday, the Philae lander separated from the Rosetta spacecraft, descended to the comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko, and then … what, exactly?
It was supposed to fire harpoons, reel itself down to the surface, then engage screws in the bottom of its landing legs to secure itself to the surface. However, the harpoons didn't fire. Yesterday we knew it bounced, and landed somewhere else, but now we've learned more.
First of all, it actually bounced twice! It probably hit, then rebounded nearly a kilometer off the surface in the tremendously low gravity—on the comet it weighs about as much as 10 grams would on Earth, the same as four ping-pong balls. The comet rotated underneath it, and then the lander slowly hit again some distance downrange, only to rebound again. This was a much lower bounce, perhaps 20 meters (60 or so feet) high, and didn't last nearly as long, only about seven minutes.
Where did it land? It's not clear. In the image above it hit in the red square, its original landing site, then bounced to somewhere in the blue diamond hundreds of meters away. There is a large, shallow crater on the top of the smaller of the two lobes of the comet (what looks like the rubber ducky's head in the original pictures of the comet showing its shape) and it's most likely in there somewhere. The high-resolution camera OSIRIS on Rosetta itself is busily taking images of the area to see if the lander can be spotted.
The bad news is it isn't upright. It's on its side, with one leg sticking up "in the air"—really into space, since there's no air on the comet. The good news is that the folks at the European Space Agency are still in contact with Philae, and it's sending back data, including pictures.
And the first one sent back (at the top of this post, and enlarged above) is dramatic, showing the weird, forbidding landscape. The lander appears to have come to against a flattish surface of some kind. The angle is confusing, since we know the lander is on its side. The picture was taken by the CIVA camera near the top of the barrel-shaped lander, and it looks down on the foot. Judging from the orientation here, this means we may be seeing the highly angular surface of the comet, though it could be a wall or side of a cliff. The material looks more solid, not powdery and soft, which might explain the lander bouncing.
The lighting is worrisome; if the lander is in shadow for long periods of time the frigid cold might affect it, and the solar panels may not be able to supply enough energy. Hopefully at the next ESA press conference they'll be able to fill us in on that situation.
So while this isn't ideal, let's keep in mind the real situation and what we're seeing here: The Philae lander is down, on the surface of a comet, it's working, sending back data, and will still be able to carry out much of its mission.
That counts. This mission was already a success yesterday, and now everything we get back from it just makes things better.
Shmutz in Jupiter's Pupik
I remember when I was in grad school, running a telescope observing lab. I was setting up the telescopes, and Jupiter was well placed in the sky, so I was using it to align the finderscopes and get things focused. By coincidence, one of its moons, Io, happened to be just on the edge of Jupiter's broad face when I looked. Over the course of the three hour lab, we all took turns going back to that 'scope to see how much Io had moved. By another sheer coincidence, Io takes about three hours to cross Jupiter's disk, so the transit ended just as the lab did.
It was mesmerizing. But it was nothing like this:
That's how Hubble sees Jupiter, which is way better than my old (otherwise very nice) 25 cm 'scopes did. You can see the broad bands and swirly festooned storms all over its cloud tops. But what really gets you is the ridiculously huge Great Red Spot, big enough to swallow the Earth.
And as if even that isn't cool enough, there's a big black spot on it: That's the shadow of the moon Ganymede, which happened to fall right across the Spot when the shot was taken.
Jupiter's moons orbit the planet above its equator, and Jupiter has almost no axial tilt (unlike the Earth, where our spin axis is tipped about 24° to the plane of our orbit). That means Jupiter's moons pass directly between the planet and the Sun every orbit, casting their shadows on the clouds (Jupiter doesn't have a solid surface; we only see the top of its dense atmosphere, which is tens of thousands of kilometers deep).
I've seen moon shadows on Jupiter many times through telescopes, but I've never seen one throw its shadow over the Spot! That's really cool. And what really strikes me is how big Ganymede's shadow is compared with the Spot. There are two reasons for that: One is that Ganymede is big, 5,270 km across—bigger than the planet Mercury! So it casts a huge shadow.
But also, the Great Red Spot over the years has become somewhat less Great. It's shrinking. In the past 40 years it's lost more than 30 percent of its width, and no one knows why.
Incidentally, another mystery is why the Spot is red. Is it from material upwelling from deep within Jupiter's atmosphere, or is it from something else? A new study indicates that it might be due to gases and other material in the upper atmosphere of the planet that get smacked by solar ultraviolet light, changing their chemistry. In the lab, such a process has created a red gas similar to what's seen in the Spot. I can't say if it's conclusive, but it's an interesting step in solving this long-standing enigma.
Anyway, the picture above, released the week of Halloween, was being sold as "Spooky Shadow Play Gives Jupiter a Giant Eye." I am a master observer of pareidolia, and I'm not buying this. It looks a little like an eye to me, but the placement and relative dimensions don't look right. If pressed, I'd say it looks more like a jovian belly button.
So maybe, instead of using Hubble, they should have taken this picture with the Naval Observatory.
When We Reached Out Into Space and Grasped a Comet
Today, Nov. 12, 2014, at 16:02 UTC, a tiny robot landed gently down onto the surface of a comet.
Five hundred million kilometers away, millions of humans on Earth rode along with it.
After 10 years of travel through the depths of space, and at least that long beforehand filled with meetings, designs, construction, and a launch in 2004, the Philae spacecraft was successfully released from its Rosetta mothership. Then, seven hours later, it made history.
We have flown by eight comets before, impacted one with a 370 kilogram block of copper, and, now, for the first time ever, have landed on another. The robotic proxy of humanity sits on the surface of the comet 67P/Churyumov–Gerasimenko.
But only barely. For reasons yet unknown, the harpoons failed to deploy, so the lander may not be firmly anchored in place. In fact, from the telemetry received, it appears to have slowly hit the surface, bounced, spun a bit as it was over the surface (possibly due to the rotation of an internal flywheel used to change the attitude of the spacecraft), then landed again.
But it is down, and very nearly in the center of the planned target area. And if only for this reason, the mission has been a success.
It's difficult to overstate this achievement. The comet is moving on an elliptical orbit that takes it just outside the orbit of Jupiter (850 million kilometers from the Sun) and as close as 186 million km sunward (just inside the orbit of Mars). The Rosetta spacecraft had to travel for a decade through space to catch up to its target, flying past two asteroids—Lutetia and Steins—as well as getting a gravitational boost by swinging past Mars and even Earth. It was a long, cold journey, which finally brought it alongside 67P in August 2014.
After that it slowly approached the comet, taking mapping images along the way, searching the bizarre terrain (cometain?) for a landing site. After much deliberation a suitable site was chosen. Rosetta moved in, dropped Philae, and the rest is history.
Except, again, we're still waiting for more information. Philae is definitely down, and definitely working. It returned a few images, and engineers are still receiving telemetry from it. But it's not clear what will happen next. The gravity on the comet is terribly weak—about 0.01 percent that of Earth—and the lander weighs half an ounce on the surface. That wouldn't be a problem in the vacuum of space, except the comet is outgassing: The ice on and below the surface is warming as the comet approaches the Sun, and turns directly from a solid into a gas. This is a gentle wind, to be sure, but when you weigh less than a sheet of paper does on Earth, it doesn't take much to set you flying again.
Philae has screws on the bottoms of its landing legs, and they did appear to deploy, but it's not known how well the lander is secured. Nothing is clear right now. The European Space Agency held a press conference to give an update, but it won't be until tomorrow that they know enough to take the next step. As soon as I know, I'll let you know.
But, despite this sobering news, there is still joy and wonder to be had. The technical prowess to achieve this landing is nothing short of awe-inspiring. Math, science, engineering, even management and teamwork—in this case, across many countries in Europe—produced a breathtaking result: We have sent our work and our minds and our hearts across space, and done something truly remarkable.
Congratulations to ESA, to everyone involved with Rosetta, and yes, to all of us who care about exploring the Universe. It's one of the noblest things we do.
Watch Humanity Touch a Comet
At approximately 16:03 UTC (11:03 Eastern) Wednesday, Nov. 12, for the first time in human history, a spacecraft is expected to physically land on a comet.
As I write these words, less than a day before the event, the lander Philae has not yet separated from the Rosetta probe. As you read these words—and assuming no roadblocks messed things up—that should have occurred on or about 09:03 UTC (04:03 Eastern time). Philae will then slowly approach the comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko, taking data and images along the way, and at the right moment will fire harpoons into the comet's surface and then reel itself down.
These events happen over night for most of the United States, making it difficult for me to cover everything live. So first, I suggest following my friends Emily Lakdawalla and Karl Battams on Twitter; they are at Rosetta HQ and tweeting everything as they hear it. Emily has posted a very useful timeline of events as well.
Second, I'm embedding a live feed from the European Space Agency. It's not clear when new images will be released, but if you're up you might get a chance to see them. I plan on getting up early so I can find out what's what, and when I do I'll update this post. Think of this as a placeholder until then. But stay tuned! I'll have images as soon as I can get them.
And remember, the times listed here are approximate, so you might want to tune in early so you don't miss anything!
The Dark Side of a Comet
Every now and again, I think it's OK to simply post an amazingly dramatic and moody photo of an astronomical object. So please take a moment to appreciate this portrait of a brooding comet:
This is 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko, the double-lobed 10 billion ton chunk of ice and rock that is currently the flame to the ESA Rosetta spacecraft's moth. The images we've seen so far have been well-lit by the Sun, but this one was taken when the comet was between the probe and the Sun. With only the illuminated limb of the comet visible, how is it we can still see some features in the dark landscape?
Comets are not static; they change. As they approach the Sun, the ice vaporizes, releasing dust. This dust scatters the sunlight, providing a soft glow that fills in a bit of the gloom.
Rosetta was only 19 kilometers from the comet when this picture was taken. That's a whisker's width; when I go bicycling in the summer, 19 km would be a fun jaunt.
The spacecraft is so close because it's gearing up for history: Tomorrow, Nov. 12 at 16:03 UTC (11:03 Eastern), the Philae lander will touch down on the surface of 67P, the first time such an attempt has ever been made. As usual when it comes to solar system encounters, Emily Lakdawalla has what you need to know about the landing.
I'm very excited about this. We've slammed a probe into a comet before, but we've never soft landed on one. The images will be stunning, I'm sure, and this is an entirely new type of world we've never seen in such detail. This will be quite an adventure.
When Worlds Collide, Rings Follow
A few days ago I posted a spectacular picture of a protoplanetary disk, a sprawling multi-ringed wheel of gas and dust swirling around a young, nearby star. I mentioned I had studied such objects before; it all started in the late 1990s when I was working on a Hubble Space Telescope camera called STIS. An astronomer named Carol Grady had observed several such disks around stars, and I helped calibrate and process the images.
And by coincidence, new Hubble images of several similar structures was just released… taken by STIS!
Quite the menagerie. Each image shows a ring around a different star, and the fierce light of the stars themselves has been blocked out so it doesn't blow out the much fainter light from the rings.
However, unlike the disk image I wrote about last week, these are not protoplanetary disks. They're dusty debris remnants, shaped more like rings than disks, probably caused by collisions of asteroids and/or comets (some of them quite large) orbiting these stars after planetary formation has already been well underway. In other words, these are somewhat older structures from 100 to 350 light years away.
What's striking are the weird shapes. You might expect they'd be circular, symmetric, and flat. But they are anything but! The ring seen edge-on around HD 32297 appears to flare, like wings, as does the one around HD 61005. My first thought was that they're moving through space, plowing through the thin material between the stars. That would blow the rings back a bit, warping them. The analysis done by the team that took the images agrees.
I was also struck by the asymmetry in the ring around HD 181327. Elliptical rings are usually actually circular, but we see them at an angle (like the rim of a drinking glass can look like an oval). But this ring is distorted, thicker and brighter on one side. If it's from the collision of two objects, they must have been pretty large, and what's left of the two bodies is probably in that larger thicker part, with the debris having spread out around the star. The ring is about 13 billion kilometers in radius (about three times the distance of Neptune to the Sun), which is pretty weird: You'd think space would be fairly empty that far from the star, and collisions rare. But there it is.
Interestingly, the inner edge of the ring is pretty sharp, when it would be expected to be fuzzy. That means there may be a planet too faint to see in these images, orbiting inside the ring, and gravitationally clearing out the debris closer to the star.
Clearly, other young solar systems have all sorts of behavior problems, and no two appear to be exactly alike. While that makes them somewhat harder to study (it's nice to be able to categorize objects using similar characteristics) it also makes this more exciting. Surprises are always fun.
And it pleases me greatly to know that not only were these observations made using my old camera, but they were also taken by my old friends Glenn Schneider and the aforementioned Carol Grady, along with a handful of other astronomers with whom I worked in my Hubble days. It's nice to see good scientists still doing good work.
Weightless Water Sports
Recently, space station astronaut Reid Wiseman fell back to Earth riding a trail of fire as his Soyuz capsule rammed through the air. But shortly before he returned to the ground, he and his crewmates took some time while in space to play with… water.
In the weightless conditions of orbit, water behaves differently than it does on Earth. With the space station and all inside falling freely around our planet, other forces dominate the water's actions, which provides for some eerie, cool, and very fun videos.
Weird, isn't it? The two drops of water are floating, and for a moment after they touch nothing happens, until they suddenly merge into one, bigger blob.
They resist merging due to surface tension. I describe this in detail in an earlier post about water in space, but in short, the water molecules on the surface of a drop feel a weak electromagnetic force inward, toward the center of the drop, because water molecules are slightly asymmetric. The outside of the drop has an overall (though faint) positive charge. When two drops touch, that positive charge on each initially resists the other drop, like the north poles of two magnets repelling each other. But if they're moving at the right speed, their own momentum overcomes that weak resistance. The water molecules in the drops rearrange themselves, and you get one bigger blob.
I love how the resulting blob moves! The water flows around inside due to the momentum of the collision, which settles down after a few seconds as surface tension and friction take over.
However, not every collision results in a merger. If you set up things just right, the repulsion between drops wins:
What I like most about that video — besides the droplets splattering around the bigger drop if their velocity is too low to overcome surface tension — is what looks like a second droplet inside the big drop. But that's not water. It's air.
I'll let Expedition 31 astronaut André Kuipers demonstrate:
Kuipers injected a bubble of air into that drop of water, and without gravity acting on it, the air is free to move around inside the drop. The water in the drop acts like a lens, flipping the image of his face over, and the air bubble does the same thing, so inside that we see him right-side up. Neither the bubble nor the drop is perfectly symmetric, so the images are distorted.
I find this kind of stuff fascinating. I mean, we know how the science works, but to see it in action is delightful (and it's not always obvious what will happen even when you know the science). The astronauts were clearly having a great time filming this; here's a video of them playing with the water (note: this was recorded using a 3D camera; you'll need red/green glasses to see it at its best, and I do recommend watching it that way!):
There isn't enough money in the world to get my butt in a rocket and blast me off into space. I get sick if I read in a car. But videos like this make me regret my weak stomach and stuffy sinuses. This really does look like a lot of fun.
Announcing Crash Course Astronomy!
I've been hinting for some time about a secret project I've been working on, and the time has finally come to announce it:
I'm writing and hosting an online astronomy video series!
The series will air on the PBS Digital Studios YouTube network starting in January, and — get this — is done as part of Hank and John Green's Crash Course video series.
Yes, that Hank and John Green, the Vlog Brothers. Hank approached me about it last summer, and we quickly worked out the details. I recently started writing the episodes, and the first few will be filmed extremely soon.
Regular readers may remember I visited Hank in his Montana fortress of solitude last August, and filmed a special episode of SciShow about how we know the distances to stars, as well as a SciShow episode about the smallest known star in the Universe. Of course, that's all we told the public. Behind the scenes we were plotting and hatching our nefarious scheme.
I'm really, really excited about this. I've been a fan of Hank and John for a while, and this is something I've been wanting to do for a long time. They have an excellent production system, and I know this is going to be a lot of fun.
Along with Crash Course Astronomy, there's going to be a new U.S. Government series hosted by Craig Benzine (aka WheezyWaiter). I know, you'd think he'd be doing a chemistry series, but Hank already had that covered.
In fact, Hank made a video describing how all this works (the good part starts at 2:43).
I'll keep y'all posted when the time nears for the premier. In the meantime, you can read more about all this at re/code. You can also support Crash Course at Subbable.
Thanks, and see you on YouTube!
Expedition 41 Set to Return to Earth Tonight
Tonight (Sunday night/Monday morning) at 00:31 UTC (21:31 Eastern), a Soyuz-13M space capsule will undock from the International Space Station. After moving away from the facility, it will begin a de-orbit burn, ram through Earth's air, and then land in Kazakhstan three hours later, scheduled for 03:58 UTC. On board are three astronauts: American Reid Wiseman, Russian Maxim Suraev, and German Alexander Gerst.
You can watch the procedure live on NASA TV, as well as NASA's Ustream channel (embedded above). The European Space Agency will also stream it. Actually, I love the line they use to describe the journey: "Their three-hour trip back to Earth will reduce their speed from 28 800 km/h to zero."
Hard to argue with that. It's succinct.
When the astronauts close the Soyuz-13M hatch behind them, Expedition 41 will officially end, and Expedition 42 on board the ISS begins (which is how the numbering generally works). 42 will then consist of three astronauts who have been on board since September, and they'll be joined later this month by three more astronauts when that trio launch aboard a Soyuz to ISS. SpaceFlight101 has a good overview of Expedition 41.


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"It's amazing because when I was growing up I was like the best soccer player in my area, so coming to America I thought I was going to play major league soccer," Wilson said. "When I got here and I signed up for football, I did it by mistake. Soccer in Africa is called football so that's what I signed up for, but they put me in American football.
"The football I'm playing now was by mistake," he added with a laugh. "There I was thinking I'm going to play soccer and now I may have a chance to play professional football one day. It's crazy man."
Wilson may have started playing on the gridiron by mistake, but it didn't take long for him to catch on.
"I started playing and I didn't know what to do," he said. "I started playing running back and for my seventh and eighth grade year I stayed there and that was pretty easy because all I had to do was run to the other endzone."
Wilson, who now stands at six-foot-three, 240 pounds and reports a 4.7 40-yard dash, was bigger than most of the freshmen he played with when he got to Haltom High School. It didn't take long for head coach Scott Hafley to see that Wilson had a special talent.
"Coaches can work a lot of years and not coach someone with this much talent," Hafley told TigerSportsDigest.com in November. "When he plays the game he plays it with a great amount of passion. He is not just a gamer, because he has things turned on every day of the week. This is the caliber of kid that will play at the NFL level. He is that good."
Wilson said that he played some on the offensive line and came off the edge on defense during his sophomore year, and that was when everyone else recognized what Hafley had seen. The standout performer logged 80 tackles and six sacks, and was named the 5-5A Sophomore of the Year.
That opened up the floodgates for when college coaches could begin officially contacting 2010 prospects last September and Wilson landed several early offers.
Wilson followed that up with another outstanding season as a junior where he was in on 87 tackles with 12 for loss, and registered nine sacks in the Buffaloes disappointing 2-8 campaign.
That has sent even more offers his way and the number has grown so much to where Wilson can't even keep count.
"A lot of good schools have offered and pretty much every school I can think of has offered me," he said. "All of these big schools in the SEC, ACC, Big 12 have offered, and honestly, I don't know what to do."
One of the many schools that have offered Wilson, who says his offer total is somewhere in the neighborhood of 40, is LSU.
Wilson actually got to speak with several of LSU's coaches on Monday as head coach Les Miles, defensive coordinator John Chavis, defensive line coach Brick Haley and wide receivers coach D.J. McCarthy all expressed their strong interest.
"I spoke with the head coach and all of the defensive coaches on Monday," said Wilson, who holds offers from the likes of LSU, Texas, Texas A&M, Oklahoma, Florida, USC and many others. "They passed the phone around and I also talked to the coach in my area.
"They were saying how they watched me on film and how they need a guy like me that can play hard. They were just telling me to keep working hard in the classroom and to work hard for my coaching staff. They said that whenever I'm ready I have a place waiting on me."
The opportunity to get to talk to LSU's coaches was a positive step for both parties. With Wilson being from another country and having only a small family here in America, he cares about much more than wins and losses on the field.
"If I had grown up here and I had a favorite university growing up then it would all be over," Wilson said. "I would have committed. But, I honestly don't have a favorite school so I have a list of questions that I will ask coaches and that will help me feel comfortable with a school."
Feeling comfortable with a school is important to Wilson considering all of the trials and tribunes he has had to deal with during his childhood.
The country he grew up in was one that has been entrenched in constant conflict and was on the brink of civil war back in 2003. Then when his father had a stroke, Wilson's mother decided it was time to get her husband the best medical care she could give him, while at the same time giving her son a chance to get away from the conflict and get an education that will help him fulfill his dreams in life.
All of that combined has given Wilson a different perspective on the recruiting process and he has formed a list of questions that he will ask coaches that will help him with one of the biggest decisions he will have to make.
"Do you take time to talk to your players when they are having a bad day? What is the best thing about your school? What are you going to provide for me when I'm not playing football such as help with my studies? How do the players get along with the coaches? It's really questions like that to make me feel comfortable," Wilson said. "The school I choose is going to be a home away from home and that is kind of scary for a kid from Africa that goes to a different environment and leaves mom and dad at home."
As for where that school will be? Well, Wilson hasn't even begun to put a lot of thought into that.
He admits that he is still in awe by the amount of attention that he has gotten, but did say that he likes what he's heard from LSU.
"They were pretty excited about me and I said if they're fired up about me then that's a good thing," he said. "I don't know a lot about LSU, but I know they won a national championship. If you win a national championship then you obviously have good players and do the right things. I hear good things about them and I want to get down there to see for myself. It's kind of hard with my mom working, but I'll get there at some point."


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as the sun comes up on a stormy morning down by the harbour, a little glimmer of light breaks through giving me hope for what lies silently behind the darkness all around me.
Great shot. Looks very dramatic.
wow thanks Torfinnn and hey you were quick……:)
– Juilee Pryor
great atmosphere – and I love light holes (sic) LOL
hey thanks lightsmith….. and yes the lightholes in the sky are how all the light gets in….. maybe that's why I like lighthouses so much…. they can poke holes in the sky and save all the ships and that has to be a good thing….:)
– Juilee Pryor
ooooh very nice Juilee. I love the little table and chairs in the foreground… really gives you a good scope of the size of the lighthouse! Cool!
hi jemima…. and thanks heaps… this is one of my local lighthouses….. it stands proud on top of a hill and it really dominates the landscape around the harbour…….. I walk around here lots and I just love it….
– Juilee Pryor
great shot very dramatic and dark the sky is amazing
thanks Trevor I'm really pleased with the sky in this one…. and I'm glad you like it as well…..
– Juilee Pryor
just a wonderful ominous feel to all of these… i went backwards… so it was fun to see this one last… love the middle layer of charcoal sky………. coolness………….b
thanks butch…. I think I like this one the best actually…. the sky is so dramatic it just seems to set of the deco sort of architectre of the old lighthouse…..I was so lucky to get that little flash of light though……so glad you like theses shots…….:)
– Juilee Pryor
indeed…. and not a fractal in sight
ahh ha fraactals hey…. are you getting interested in fractals now…. there are some really interesting things being done with fractals here from time to time….I'd never really paid much attention to fractals before I saw them here to be honest……..:)
– Juilee Pryor
i was being facetious and a bit bitchy…. i'm over looking at fractals…… and no.. i'm not getting into them… ha
bloody hell butch that's a relief….. only Patricia B and Gregoryno6 are any good at it from what I've seen. Glad to hear that your going to leave them to it and get on with your own unique stuff…….:)
Reminds me of the wonderful work of Roybarry……….. Gorgeous moody, broody light………..
thanks heaps Linda….. I love a moody sky……:)
– Juilee Pryor
Great feel to this Juilee. Well done.
thanks Chanel2….this one is my favorite of the lighthouse photo's…. it's so still and balanced yet tense somehow…. and the sky looks like it has been ripped right open to reveal whatever is there just beyond sight……. :)
– Juilee Pryor


text: Tweet Jobs Companies & Reviews Companies Salaries Interviews Hiring? Post a Job Director of Media Relations Salaries in Grand Forks, ND 1 Salaries Change location: US - All Cities – Grand Forks, ND Area — Grand Forks, ND Sort: Popular Most Reports Salary Salaries in $ (USD) Average Min Max Director of Media Relations University of North Dakota (2 Grand Forks Salaries) $42,980 $39k $47k $42,980 $39k $47k Embed this report Anonymized Range [?] If we only have one or two salaries posted for at , showing that salary information may risk employee anonymity. So in that case we generate an anonymous salary range by adding and subtracting a small percentage from the posted salary. The small percentage difference offers additional anonymity while still minimizing the difference between the range and the employee's actual salary.


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Cleanup Day Activities in Central Israel
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Saving the Sabras
11.24.2014 | 2 Kislev, 5775
Iran and the bomb: The future of negotiations
Iranians push for Palestinian resistance at Jerusalem Day rally in Tehran
IAEA asks for 1 million euros to oversee Iran nuclear deal extension
US reviewing extension of Iran diplomacy after 'tangible progress'
Deadline looming, US engages Iran in unprecedented direct talks
Sanctions law poses obstacle in final diplomatic push with Iran
US will ask Iran to 'cease and desist' rocket shipments to Gaza
Congress suggests nuclear deal with Iran not sufficient without grand bargain
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Will the Islamic Republic face economic collapse?
US declines to meet Iran 'half way' in final diplomatic push over nuclear crisis
Israel should ensure West 'keeps eyes open' on Iran
06/07/2011 17:11
'No western offer will stop Iran's uranium enrichment'
Mahmoud Ahmadinejad 311.
(photo credit:MCT)
TEHRAN - No offer from world powers could persuade Iran to stop enriching uranium, Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said on Tuesday.At a news conference held a day after the United Nations' atomic watchdog said there was new evidence about possible military dimensions to Iran's nuclear work, Ahmadinejad accused IAEA chief Yukiya Amano of following Washington's orders and said his comments had "no legal value".RELATED:'Iran ready for EU's offer of fresh nuclear
negotiations'Ahmadinejad: Iran to attend new nuclear talks in
Turkey'Iran sends submarines for reconnaissance in Red
Sea'"With America's orders (the IAEA) has written some things in a report that are against the law and against the agency's regulations. These have no legal value and aside from harming the agency's reputation it will have no other effect," Ahmadinejad told reporters.Iran has says its nuclear program is entirely peaceful and has called international sanctions aimed at persuading it to halt uranium enrichment illegal.Amano said on Monday the agency had received "further information related to possible past or current undisclosed nuclear-related activities that seem to point to the existence of possible military dimensions to Iran's nuclear program". Ahmadinejad denies sanctions are hitting Iran's economy and has insisted Tehran will not give up what it considers its sovereign right to enrich uranium, a process that can make fuel for power plants or, if processed much further, provide bomb material."We will continue our path," he said, adding that Iran would continue to cooperate with the IAEA "as long as they move based on justice".Asked whether the world powers that have held talks with Tehran in the past to seek an end to the nuclear impasse could offer any incentive to stop Iran's enrichment, he answered with the one word: "No".Two rounds of talks between Iran and the five permanent members of the UN Security Council, the United States, Russia, China, Britain and France, plus Germany, in Geneva in December and in Istanbul in January, did not reach any substantive result.Iran has said its right to enrich uranium must be recognised, something Western diplomats said was an unacceptable pre-condition to substantive talks.
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Tuesday the NBA awarded the Los Angeles Lakers with a $4.85 million disabled player exception for injured guard Steve Nash. In essence the Lakers gain a spending tool to add one player thru waiver claims or free agency making up to salary $4.85 million. 141 more words
Tags » Steve Nash
Lakers Given $4.85 Million Disabled-Player Exception for Steve Nash Injury
Prior to the season, It was discovered that Steve Nash's back problems would result in him being sidelined indefinitely. Now, The Lakers will have an opportunity to sign another player following the NBA's grant of half of Nash's salary… 94 more words
Report: Lakers working on a one-year deal with Earl Clark
Earl Clark had his best NBA season with the Lakers back in 2013, posting averages of 7.3 points and 5.5 rebounds while starting in 36 of his 59 appearances. 199 more words
First day at the gym!
Okay so I did it, I've signed up and I've had my first personal training session! It was scary but also exciting. It was an hour long session where I got to meet my trainer who I'm so thankful, so far, is amazingly nice, and very encouraging. 242 more words
KD X Nash
Steve Nash and reigning NBA MVP Kevin Durant share their childhood dreams of stardom and how they developed the mentality that led them to greatness. … 242 more words
Lakers granted $4.85 million disabled-player exception for Steve Nash injury
The Los Angeles Lakers just gained a little bit of flexibility to add some help. Before the season, it was announced that Steve Nash would miss the entire year with recurring back problems. 154 more words
LeBron James, Kobe Bryant speak out on Ferguson decision
The Associated Press succinctly summed up the troubling news that came out of Ferguson, MO on Monday night.
194 more words
A grand jury declined Monday to indict white police officer Darren Wilson in the death of Michael Brown, the unarmed, black 18-year-old whose fatal shooting sparked weeks of sometimes-violent protests and inflamed deep racial tensions between many African-Americans and police.


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High school softball: 5A/4A state tournament pairings
Shutterstock photo
Class 5A
Thursday's championship games
At Valley Complex
Layton (23-4) vs. Taylorsville (19-4), 2:30 p.m.
Lehi (24-6) vs. Layton/Taylorsville winner, 6 p.m.
Note: If Lehi loses 5 p.m. game, a second championship game will follow 15 minutes later.
Class 4A
Thursday's championship games
At Valley Complex
Spanish Fork (25-5) vs. Salem Hills (21-8), 2:30 p.m.
Bonneville (25-3) vs. Spanish Fork/Salem Hills winner, 5 p.m.
Note: If Bonneville loses 5 p.m. game, a second championship game will follow 15 minutes later.
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QftM Card 105 � ONUA: Onua vs. Manas
Posted by
on February 19, 2005 at 11:09 AM CST:
After collecting many masks, Onua must tunnel back towards the village of Onu-Koro to find his own shrine, Onu-Suva and claim the Golden Mask. But before his quest can be completed, he must face a mighty and fearsome cave dweller, the Manas. It will take all of Onua's skill, strength, and determination to emerge victorious!
Build up you Game Action hand before attempting a Great Mask Challenge.
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Dying Too Young: Trends show poverty plays a role, many deaths are preventable
Here are some trends found in a review of child deaths in Oklahoma: * Poverty often plays a role. "If they died from a car wreck ... a drowning, intentional abuse or sudden illness ... a commonality that you see more times than not is that this family is poor," said Annette Wisk Jacobi, a state Health Department official who has served for years on the state Child Death Review Board. "A lot of the time we're looking at children left alone or left with a child not old enough to care for everyone else or ... left with somebody who is not a very good care provider. ... As the economy kind of goes south, we're going to see more of this."
In many child murder cases, the killer is unemployed or financially stressed from reasons such as divorce, court records show. One out-of-work defendant awaiting trial admitted to police he became frustrated caring for his two stepchildren and infant son in a motel room day after day while his wife worked. He said he slapped, threw, kicked and stomped his 2-year-old stepdaughter Liliana because she wouldn't eat her lunch. * The number of child deaths in Oklahoma each year dropped from more than 1,000 in the early 1980s to fewer than 800 in recent years. * Almost 100 children have been homicide victims since the start of 2006, according to the state medical examiner. But those statistics can be misleading. A drowning death caused by neglect was listed by the medical examiner as manner unknown. And a smoke inhalation death — where the batteries for the smoke alarms had been used for toys — was considered an accident. Many deaths are considered to be from natural causes. * Some deaths from possible abuse or neglect go unpunished. No arrests were made in 17 of 47 child homicides studied in 2007 by the Child Death Review Board, according to its latest report. Prosecutors have told the board they sometimes can't identify a perpetrator because too many people were around a child around the time of an injury. * Dozens of deaths could have been prevented, especially those caused by parents and infants sleeping together. In case after case, an autopsy found a baby died after a sleeping parent rolled over on him or her. Alcohol or drugs are sometimes involved.
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Radian Audio Appoints Upper Midwest Reps
Orange, CA (February 3, 2009) — Radian Audio Engineering, a leading Southern California-based manufacturer of loudspeaker systems and speaker components for permanently installed and touring live sound applications, has appointed new factory representatives for the Upper Midwest region of the United States. The company has appointed Next Generation Marketing for the N. Illinois and Greater Wisconsin regions and Mitron Marketing to cover North Dakota, South Dakota, Minnesota, parts of western Wisconsin, Iowa and Nebraska.
Commenting on Next Generation Marketing, which is headquartered in Lake Zurich, Illinois and under the leadership of Tom Parnell, Timothy Thornton, Director of Sales and Marketing at Radian Audio, says, "I worked with Tom Parnell 'many moons' ago with another manufacturer. Tom has an extensive list of industry contacts and successful projects where he has had direct involvement. It is great to be working with someone so plugged into the local market and we look forward to a great 2009 with Tom on the team."
Thornton says of Mitron Marketing, which is based in Forest Lake, Minnesota and is led by Don Wierman, "Based in one of the most remote and coldest territories in the USA — this time of the year, anyway — Don is a seasoned professional who knows his market and is well liked in the territory. We are looking forward to working with Don throughout his six-state territory."
Based in Southern California, Radian Audio Engineering is a leading manufacturer of loudspeaker systems and speaker components for permanent installed and touring live sound applications. To learn more about our products telephone (714) 288-8900, visit www.radianaudio.com or e-mail us at email@example.com.
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text:
Where the lives of the cats you followed in the books become the real thing; and so much more! Everyone is welcome here, so join in the fun today!
free, forum, warriorclan, warriors, erin, hunter, roleplay, warrior, cats, tribe, role, #play, written, clans
Free forum : Here at A. K. A. Duel Academy we play Yu-Gi-Oh! . Come and join us. have fun!
Convo's R Here
darkhikaridevil, role, #play, convo, convo's, darksupersonic14, anime, writing
Free forum : A role-play site for fans of homestuck. Canons and ocs welcome.
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We only do everything
#play, station, only, everything
The official home for the wrestling e-federation Ring of Chaos.
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New ep forum. May be temporary or permanent depending on how things play out. All are welcome. I'm not sure if all the levels are gone, but I have all the ones that were there a few weeks ago backed u
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A Sailor Moon Role-play forum with canons from the original cast to choose from, new plot, and new villains! Step right in and make yourself at home 3
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An immersive, active role-play website based on the "Warriors" series by Erin Hunter, though the characters are wolves.
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A small forum for deviations. Role-Play, plots and schemes, etc.
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Make friends and play games together. This forum is for Fantasy Life players to find each other and play together.
Free forum : We have been on this island for many years, the humans have gone and not returned. This is good because that means no more death no more experiments, and we can rest
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A fun place to rp
Where Nalini Singh's fans can meet, greet, and talk about her books!
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Free forum : Rule the entire planet, that is ripe for the taking. Take over different areas with nightmare frames, and even warships! ! . Gain a unique geass power that reflects your goal. You can even gain immorality, the possibilities are endless.
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Gandhi Jayanti sees 92 prisoners being tested on the MahatmaOn the occasion of Gandhi Jayanti, 92 inmates of Taloja Central jail in Kharghar appeared for the Gandhi Peace Exams. The exams were conducted by Bombay Sarvodaya Mandal. According to Bombay Sarvodaya Mandal chief TRK Somaiya, the exam was ... DNA India, 1 month ago
OVER 90 MUMBAI PRISONERS IN INDIA SIT FOR GANDHI PEACE EXAM - NAM News Network, 1 month ago
Taloja jail inmate gets 76 out of 80 in Gandhi exam - Times of India, 1 month ago
Yerawada jail lets inmates speak to kin on telephone
PUNE: The Yerawada central prison on Thursday started a single-line telephone service to enable prisoners to talk to their family members. The move, prison officials say, will help inmates manage their stress levels and stay in touch with their kin ...Times of India, 1 month ago
Nashik jail inmates will soon be able to call up home
NASHIK: Two phone lines are being installed at the Nashik Road Central Prison to let prisoners talk to their families. The set up, which will be ready in a month's time, will save the inmates' family members the trouble of travelling all the way to ...Times of India, 2 months ago
Cellphone recovered from Yerawada jail was used by four inmates
A cellphone was recovered from the Anda cell in May. A probe into the recovery of a cellphone from the Anda cell of Yerawada Central Jail in May has revealed that the phone was used by at least four inmates lodged in the high security cell. In ...Indian Express, 2 weeks ago
Cops to probe role of Salem aide in murder bid on builder's son
By Santoshee Gulabkali Mishra The Thane Police Crime Branch is probing the alleged involvement of arrested gangster Abu Salem's aide Mohammad Hasan Mehandi Hasan Ali Shaikh, commonly known as Hasan Ali, in connection with the alleged conspiracy ...Indian Express, 2 weeks ago
Raut alleges threat from Mohol gang
NAYANA PUJARI CASE TRIAL Prime accused in rape-murder says gang members resent being delayed on court premises as Raut's hearings take longer; have threatened to kill him In a new twist to the prolonged saga of the Nayana Pujari gangrape-murder ...Pune Mirror, 3 weeks ago
Govt to install more than 200 jammers in state jails
Move will put an end to practice of smuggling cell phones into prison, say officials. The Maharashtra government has decided to install 275 jammers in jails across the state. The College of Engineering, Pune, has been appointed as a consultant in ...Mumbai Mirror, 1 month ago
Kin of Underworld Dons Spice up Assembly Polls
MUMBAI: The bylanes leading to Dagdi Chawl in Byculla are crowded again after a gap of five years. Dagdi Chawl, better known as the residence of gangster Arun Gawli, is famous for its jubilant Navratri celebrations. This year, there is additional ...New Indian Express, 1 month ago Don Arun Gawli's Daughter Geeta to Spice up M'rashtra Assembly Polls New Indian Express, 1 month ago Dons' Kin Spice up Maharashtra Polls New Indian Express, 1 month ago
Mary Kom disappointed
Mary Kom M C Mary Kom's hometown is missing the screening of the biopic on the boxing champion, as no theatre in Manipur is screening the film due to a ban by insurgency outfits. The boxer is unhappy that while people everywhere are seeing the film ...Indian Express, 2 months ago
Chhota Shakeel's goons arrested
Men were about to take out rival gang member The Mumbai police crime branch (CB) has arrested two alleged members of the Chhota Shakeel gang. The men, armed with a firearm and live rounds, were attempting to bump off two gang members of a rival gang led by ...Asian Age, 2 months ago Mumbai police arrest two men of Chhota Shakeel gang Rediff.com, 2 months ago
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Welcome to Read The Constitution, Stupid and, no, the title of the website isn't aimed at you personally. The original idea was to orient the site to members of the federal government as a sort of put-on. However, over the recent past it has become clear that the problem is not simply one of poorly educated politicians, but rather includes the general body politic. This seems to be a result of an educational system that ignores the role of the Founders and the documents and discussion associated with the establishment of the Republic. Accordingly, Aristotle's fourth century BC admonition that the least initial deviation from the truth is multiplied later a thousandfold is precisely what Jefferson was warning against. In order to understand our Founding documents, we must understand their meaning as originally intended and not what we, with a considerably different grammar and dictionary, believe them to mean. And the only way to attain that end is to familiarize oneself with their arguments, in their words, and with the meanings intended at the time. Absent such an understanding we will have lost our government of laws and replaced it with a government of wants and desires.
The 55 delegates who attended the Constitutional Convention in Philadelphia were a distinguished body of men who represented a broad cross section of 18th-century American political, military, and civil leadership.
Between 1781 and 1785 there were attempts to correct the perceived weaknesses of the Articles of Confederation, but they all failed to secure the required unanimous consent of the state legislatures.
Do you have questions about the Constitution, The Founders, or the history of the founding? This Q&A, taken from Sol Bloom's, 1937, The Story of the Constitution, may have the answer in a handy short form.
From the first moment that my mind was capable of contemplating political subjects, I never, till this moment, ceased wishing success to a well-regulated republican government. The establishment of such in America was my most ardent desire.
James Madison, speech to the Virginia Ratifying Convention, June 1788
The U. S Constitution was written in the same Pennsylvania State House where the Declaration of Independence was signed and where George Washington received his commission as Commander of the Continental Army. Now called Independence Hall, the building still stands today on Independence Mall in Philadelphia.
Article V - Amendment Process - United States Constitution
The Congress, whenever two thirds of both Houses shall deem it necessary, shall propose Amendments to this Constitution, or, on the Application of the Legislatures of two thirds of the several States, shall call a Convention for proposing Amendments, which, in either Case, shall be valid to all Intents and Purposes, as Part of this Constitution, when ratified by the Legislatures of three fourths of the several States, or by Conventions in three fourths thereof, as the one or the other Mode of Ratification may be proposed by the Congress; Provided that no Amendment which may be made prior to the Year One thousand eight hundred and eight shall in any Manner affect the first and fourth Clauses in the Ninth Section of the first Article; and that no State, without its Consent, shall be deprived of its equal Suffrage in the Senate.
English Constitutional and Legal History, Colin Rhys Lovell (New York, NY: Oxford University Press, 1961)


text:
The development of the compound, called WEHI-539, is an important step towards the design of a potential new anti-cancer agent. WEHI-539 has been designed to bind and block the function of a protein called BCL-XL that normally prevents cells from dying.The death and elimination of abnormal cells in the body is an important safeguard against cancer development. But cancer cells often acquire genetic changes that allow them to bypass cell death, which also reduces the effectiveness of anti-cancer treatments such as chemotherapy.
The research was supported by the Australian Research Council, the National Health and Medical Research Council, the US Leukemia and Lymphoma Society, Cancer Council Victoria, the Australian Cancer Research Foundation and the Victorian Government.
Vanessa Solomon | EurekAlert!
Further information:
Further reports about: > Australian workers > Bcl-xL > Cancer > Chemical Biology > WEHI-539 > anti-cancer agent > cell death > chemical engineering > leukaemia > lymph glands > lymphoma > pancreatic cancer > synthetic biology
Primates indispensable for regeneration of tropical forests
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Koji Uehara drawing interest from Rangers, Twins, Tigers, and Pirates
Jul 25, 2011, 12:16 PM EST
According to Dan Connolly of the Baltimore Sun "there's growing speculation that Koji Uehara will be moved before the July 31 trade deadline" and the Rangers, Twins, Tigers, and Pirates are among the teams to express interest in the Orioles reliever.
Uehara has quietly been one of the most dominant pitchers in baseball since moving to the bullpen full time last season. He was a solid but injury prone mid-rotation starter, but as a reliever he has a 2.35 ERA and ridiculous 113/13 K/BB ratio in 88 innings while holding opponents to a .187 batting average.
It doesn't get much better than that and sure enough his 2.51 xFIP since the beginning of last season ranks third among all relievers with at least 80 innings. Uehara isn't a household name and as a 36-year-old with injury baggage he'd come with some risk, but if healthy he's an elite reliever and has a reasonable $4 million option for 2012.
Connolly writes that the Orioles "are looking for major league-ready starting pitching" in return.
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Rhoen says to reach out to dissenting shareholders
FRANKFURT Jan 24 (Reuters) - Rhoen-Klinikum will reach out to shareholders who blocked Fresenius from buying the German hospitals chain to persuade them to support Rhoen in forging a new alliance with peers.
Rhoen's Chief Executive told journalists on Thursday that he would sound out dissenting shareholders such as rival hospital operator Asklepios and medical gear supplier B.Braun to see what could allay their concerns.
He would also discuss collaboration deals that Rhoen could strike with rivals if a merger cannot be agreed on.
"However, a tie-up based on cooperation agreements is not as robust (as a merger)," CEO Martin Siebert said.
He also said that McKinsey consultants have mapped out a plan whereby Rhoen's troubled Giessen-Marburg hospital could return to profitability by end-2014 by cutting 250 jobs. (Reporting by Andreas Kroener and Ludwig Burger)
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text:
Stream a Floating Points-Produced Track from Fatima's Upcoming LP
- Words: Derek Opperman
- Photo: Sebastian Hallqvist
The release date is rapidly approaching for Yellow Memories, Fatima's highly anticipated debut LP featuring production work from the likes of Knx., Flako, and Floating Points, among others. In preperation for its imminent release, Fatima has offered up a stream of "Do Better," a slick joint that finds Floating Points layering an orchestrated bed of soul-jazz horns and live-played drums.
Following a stream of album track "Ridin Round" last week, Fatima's "Do Better" tune is now available to check out in full below; her Yellow Memories LP is set to see a release on May 12 via Eglo.
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