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    Category Astronomy/Space

    Canadian Co. gets U.S. patent for Space Elevator

    August 15, 2015, Categories  Physics, Technology/Electronics, Astronomy/Space

    Company in Canada gets U.S. patent for space elevator

    20 km Space Tower

    This is the present-day realm of creative thinking over space elevators, in the use of a giant tower to carry us to space. Scientists working on space elevators are thinking about materials and designs that can be used to access space as an alternative to rocket technology. A sign of the times is the upcoming Space Elevator Conference 2015 which takes place this month in Seattle.

    Imagine, said The Spaceward Foundation, the space elevator, serving as a track on which electric vehicles called “climbers” can travel up and down carrying about 10 tons of payload. “There are no intense gravity-loads during the trip, no acoustic vibration, no onboard fuel, nor any of the rest of the drama (and cost) associated with rocket launches,” it added.

    Company in Canada gets U.S. patent for space elevator

    Canadian company, Thoth Technology ...

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    Astronomer Creates Music using Star Oscillations

    August 15, 2015, Categories  Astronomy/Space

    Astronomer creates music using star oscillations

    Astronomers have long known that stars can vibrate like peeling bells. This observation has ushered in an entire sub discipline of astronomy known as astroseismology, in which astronomers attempt to better understand the structure of their charges by studying the way they vibrate. Sheet music for the composition. Credit: arXiv:1507.07307 [physics.pop-ph]

    Astronomer Burak Ulaş, with the Izmir Turk College Planetarium in Turkey has taken his work into a musical dimension, using star oscillations as a source for a musical composition. He describes what he has done along with sheet music and an audio recording of his work to the preprint server arXiv—along with a shout-out to other pioneers in the field, from Kepler to Pythagoras to modern composer scientists Jenő Keuler and Zoltán Kolláth...

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    Astronomers discover ‘young Jupiter’ exoplanet

    August 14, 2015, Categories  Astronomy/Space

     

    One of the best ways to learn how our solar system evolved is to look to younger star systems in the early stages of development. Now, a team of astronomers has discovered a Jupiter-like planet within a young system that could serve as a decoder ring for understanding how planets formed around our sun. The first planet detected by the Gemini Planet Imager is 100 light-years away but shares many of the characteristics of an early Jupiter.

    The new planet, called 51 Eridani b, is the first exoplanet discovered by the Gemini Planet Imager, a new instrument operated by an international collaboration headed by  Professor Bruce Macintosh...

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    NASA helps track the Wildfires

    August 14, 2015, Categories  Technology/Electronics, Astronomy/Space, Environment/Geology

    Brushfire

    Wildfires in the United States burn an average of 7.3 million acres of land each year. The annual cost of fire suppression nationwide has averaged nearly $1 billion since 1984, but in six of the past 10 years the cost has approached $2 billion a year. Large catastrophic wildfires have become commonplace, especially in association with extended drought and extreme weather. The demand for timely, high-quality fire information has increased and peaks each summer when interagency fire operations respond to numerous, simultaneous major fires. Credit: NASA

    Our handle on these wildfires is improving as a result of a new satellite-based tool developed by researchers at the University of Maryland with support from the NASA Applied Sciences Program and NOAA...
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