Incorrect orbits let scientists test how clocks change speed in a gravitational field

BY EMILY CONOVER 

SATELLITE SNAFU 

Two satellites of the European Galileo network (one illustrated) were launched in incorrect orbits, a mistake that allowed scientists to test Einstein’s theory of gravity.

An orbital oopsie has led to new proof of Albert Einstein’s physics prowess.

In 2014, two satellites intended for Europe’s Galileo network, the equivalent of the United States’ GPS network, were placed into orbit incorrectly, causing them to travel around Earth in ellipses rather than circles. That wasn’t ideal for the satellites’ originally intended navigational use, but scientists realized the wayward satellites were perfect for another purpose: testing Einstein’s theory of gravity, the general theory of relativity.

According to general relativity, gravity affects not just space, but also time. The deeper within a gravitational field you are, the slower time passes (SN: 10/17/15, p. 16). So a clock at a higher altitude will tick faster than one closer to Earth’s surface, where Earth’s gravity is stronger. The satellites’ orbital mishap allowed the most precise test yet of this effect, known as gravitational redshift, two teams of scientists report in a pair of papers in the Dec. 7 Physical Review Letters.

As the two misplaced satellites move in their elliptical orbits, their distance from Earth periodically increases and decreases by about 8,500 kilometers. Using the precise atomic clocks on the satellites, the scientists studied how that altitude change affected the flow of time. The clocks sped up and slowed down by tiny fractions of a second as expected, agreeing with the predictions of general relativity within a few thousandths of a percent, the teams report.

Citations

• S. Herrmann et al. Test of the Gravitational Redshift with Galileo Satellites in an Eccentric Orbit. Physical Review Letters. Vol. 121, December 7, 2018, p. 231102. doi: 10.1103/PhysRevLett.121.231102.
• P. Delva et al. Gravitational Redshift Test Using Eccentric Galileo Satellites. Physical Review Letters. Vol. 121, December 7, 2018, p. 231101. doi: 10.1103/PhysRevLett.121.231101.

Further Reading

• E. Conover. A star orbiting a black hole shows Einstein got gravity right — again. Science News. Vol. 194, August 18, 2018, p. 12.
• E. Conover. In a first, Galileo’s gravity experiment is re-created in space. Science News. Vol. 193, January 20, 2018, p. 9.
• T. Siegfried. Einstein's genius changed science's perception of gravity. Science News. Vol. 188, October 17, 2015, p. 16.

{ https://www.sciencenews.org/ }

16-12-2018 om 12:13 geschreven door peter  

Watch Russian Tu-160s drill with Venezuelan jets from INSIDE strategic bomber’s cockpit (VIDEOS)

© Ministry of Defence of the Russian Federation

{ https://www.rt.com/ }

16-12-2018 om 11:40 geschreven door peter  

Dat spacetripje komt nu wel erg dichtbij - HLN.be

RAKETVLIEGTUIG VOOR TOERISTEN BEREIKT VOOR HET EERST ÉCHT DE RUIMTE

Brecht Herman 

Brad Pitt, Justin Bieber, Katy Perry, Leonardo DiCaprio, Angelina Jolie en zo’n zeshonderd andere doodgewone - weliswaar behoorlijk rijke - stervelingen staan sinds gisteren een stevige stap dichter bij een reis naar de ruimte. Ze boekten jaren geleden voor 175.000 à 220.000 euro een retourtje bij Virgin Galactic, het commerciële ruimtevaartbedrijf dat deel uitmaakt van de Virgin Group van de flamboyante miljardair Richard Branson. Weinigen die geloofden dat het er ooit echt van zou komen, maar intussen zou het vooral verbazen mocht het niét gebeuren.

Drie keer zo snel als het geluid

Gisteren voerde Virgin Galactic een succesvolle vierde test uit met SpaceShipTwo. Het vliegtuig bereikte een hoogte van 82,7 kilometer. Volgens CEO George Whitesides is dat de ruimte, hij valt daarvoor terug op de 80-kilometergrens die de Amerikaanse luchtvaart hanteert. Nochtans is 100 kilometer een breder aanvaarde grens. Hoe dan ook: gisteren was een belangrijke dag voor het ruimtetoerisme - “een dag waar we al lang op wachtten”, zei Whitesides. Aan boord van SpaceShipTwo bevonden zich, behalve twee ervaren piloten, nog een dummy en ladingen om het gewicht van zes ruimtetoeristen te simuleren. Bij een vorige test had de raket 41 seconden gebrand, goed voor een maximumhoogte van 50 kilometer. Nu lieten de piloten zich 60 seconden lang omhoogstuwen, tot ze bijna drie keer zo snel als het geluid gingen. Even waren ze gewichtloos, voor ze veilig terugkeerden richting begane grond. De data die op hogere hoogte en aan hogere snelheid verzameld werden, moeten Virgin Galactic in staat stellen om hun commercieel ruimtetuig verder op punt te stellen. “Dit is een onwaarschijnlijk gevoel: vreugde, opluchting en goede hoop voor wat er zit aan te komen”, zegt Branson. “We werken nu het resterende deel van ons testprogramma verder af. We gaan de raketmotor nog langer laten branden om nog sneller en hoger te vliegen, zodat we duizenden private astronauten een nieuw zicht kunnen geven op onze planeet en de kosmos.”

Achttien toeristen per week

Veiligheid heeft de hoogste prioriteit in die plannen. Geen overbodige luxe: in 2007 stierven bij een explosie drie technici van een andere firma toen ze een systeem voor het ruimtetuig aan het testen waren. Bij een testvlucht gelijkaardig aan die van gisteren kwam in 2014 een piloot om het leven toen SpaceShipTwo ontplofte. Whitesides: “We denken veel na over mogelijke risico’s en we beseffen dat alles veilig moet zijn. Maar als we geen enkel risico nemen, kunnen we ook geen vooruitgang boeken.” Wanneer precies de eerste toerist richting ruimte gaat, ligt nog niet vast. Maar recent zei Branson dat hij verwacht dat hijzelf binnen enkele maanden, “niet binnen enkele jaren”, een ruimtetoerist wordt. Het plan is om zijn kinderen Holly en Sam, dertigers, mee te nemen. “Snel daarna zullen de eerste ruimtepassagiers volgen.” Het plan is om één vlucht per week te organiseren. Op termijn moeten extra vliegtuigen het mogelijk maken om drie vluchten per week - goed voor 18 toeristen - te organiseren.

AP 

De landing van het raketvliegtuig in de woestijn.

Virgin Het uitzicht uit SpaceShipTwo, een raketvliegtuig voor ruimtetoerisme.

{ https://www.hln.be/ }

16-12-2018 om 01:51 geschreven door peter  

Search and rescue operations might soon call on foldable drones to find victims

 BY ALEXANDRU MICU

A new shape-shifting drone promises to offer rescue teams robotic help even in those hard-to-reach areas.

The drone in it’s T-shape configuration (more on that later).
Image credits UZH.

Teams digging through collapsed or damaged buildings are often the only chance of salvation for those trapped after fires, earthquakes, or similar events. It’s obviously dangerous and laborious work. Not only are such structures very unstable, but they’re usually also very hard to navigate (on account of all the fallen rubble).

Needless to say, having drones scour collapsed buildings ahead of human teams would be the safest course of action. However, drones would often have to enter such sites through narrow points — a crack in a wall, a partially open window, through bars — something the typical size of a drone does not allow. A team of researchers from the Robotics and Perception Group at the University of Zurich and the Laboratory of Intelligent Systems at the Lausanne Federal Polytechnic School (EPFL) plans to address this issue.

The little drone that folded

“Our solution is quite simple from a mechanical point of view, but it is very versatile and very autonomous, with onboard perception and control systems,” explains Davide Falanga, researcher at the University of Zurich and the paper’s first author.

The drone’s most obvious advantage over counterparts is its ability to morph in shape to tackle cramped environments. and guarantee a stable flight at all times. The team says they’ve drawn inspiration from birds that fold their wings mid-air to navigate narrow passages. In a very similar fashion, the drone can squeeze itself to pass through gaps and then go back to its previous shape while flying. The drone can also transport objects, including during this morphing process.

Both teams collaborated closely to design the drone — a quadrotor with four propellers that rotate independently, each mounted on mobile arms outfitted with servo-motors that can fold around the frame. It also sports a video camera. What really keeps the drone aloft during these foldings is a control system designed and programmed by the team. It keeps tabs on each propeller’s position in real time, adjusting their thrust as the drone weaves and bobs through the air.

The drone’s standard configuration is the traditional quadcopter X-shape (like these drones here), with the four arms stretched out and the propellers at the widest possible distance from each other. When faced with a narrow passage, the drone can morph into an H-shape, with all arms lined up along one axis. It can also take on an O-shape (with all arms folded as close as possible to the body) or a T-shape, which can be used to bring the onboard camera as close as possible to objects that the drone needs to inspect.

“The morphing drone can adopt different configurations according to what is needed in the field,” adds Stefano Mintchev, co-author and researcher at EPFL.

The researchers plan to further improve the structure of their drone so that it can fold in all three dimensions. They also want to develop software that will make the drone truly autonomous, so it can find its own way through rubble and collapsed buildings in real-life scenarios. “The final goal is to give the drone a high-level instruction such as ‘enter that building, inspect every room and come back’ and let it figure out by itself how to do it,” says Falanga.

• The paper “The Foldable Drone: A Morphing Quadrotor that can Squeeze and Fly” has been published in the journal IEEE Robotics and Automation Letters.

{ https://www.zmescience.com/ }

16-12-2018 om 01:37 geschreven door peter  

Is Elon Musk HIDING something? Mystery 'object' seen near SpaceX craft before 'feed CUT'

A MYSTERIOUS object has been spotted on the SpaceX Dragon’s live feed bearing similarities to an infamous "spy plane", before the live feed was reportedly "cut".

By Emmet McGonagle

The cargo spacecraft was on its way to the International Space Station when eagle-eyed viewers noticed something strange on the SpaceX live feed.

Conspiracy duo Blake and Brett Cousins shared the discovery on their YouTube channel thirdphaseofmoon, with Blake claiming the footage “could change history”.

In the video, a large dark triangular object moves past the SpaceX Dragon, floating upwards into the atmosphere at a startling speed.

The Cousins’ report the live feed "was cut" before the camera angles changed just seconds after the object was spotted.

{ https://www.dailystar.co.uk/ }

16-12-2018 om 01:22 geschreven door peter  

Virgin Galactic's SpaceShipTwo Reaches Space for 1st Time in Historic Test Flight!

16-12-2018 om 00:42 geschreven door peter  

'Smoking Gun' Planet: This Neptune-Size Alien World Is Evaporating in Record Time

16-12-2018 om 00:20 geschreven door peter  

New Steven Greer Huge Alien Disclosure of Close Encounters of the 5th Kind

Steven Greer shows how advanced trans-dimensional ET technologies interface with the coherent meditative and thought states during Close Encounters of the 5th Kind (CE-5) events. Understand how ET craft and beings can appear around us in ways that are astonishing and very close and very usually overlooked. For many years people have been seeing UFO’s in the skies and in space and it is an undeniable fact that our earth has been visited by extraterrestrial life forms in the past and present. Close Encounters of The Fifth Kind was first coined by Dr. Steven Greer and is the fifth type of contact on the Hynek’s scale.

{  http://www.latest-ufo-sightings.net/ }

15-12-2018 om 18:28 geschreven door peter  

For NASA astronomers, this was not a good year. In June, a review board found that the agency's prized observatory—the already overdue and vastly overbudget $8.8 billion James Webb Space Telescope (JWST)—was still years away from taking flight and capturing the faint light of the universe's first stars. The holdup: torn sunshields and loose bolts. Also in trouble was the next big astrophysics mission in line, the Wide Field Infrared Survey Telescope (WFIRST), intended to pin down the nature of mysterious dark energy by surveying wide swaths of the sky. Not even off the drawing board, WFIRST was predicted to burst its $3.2 billion budget by $400 million, another review panel found—not a plus for a mission that the administration of President Donald Trump was already thinking of canceling.

Yet astronomers are about to look skyward and dream even bigger dreams. The decadal survey in astrophysics, which sets priorities for future missions by NASA, the Department of Energy, and the National Science Foundation, began last month. Dozens of astronomers, broken into committees, will identify science goals and develop a wish list of telescopes, both on the ground and in space, that could best address them. One of the toughest tasks will be to decide which—if any—of four proposed successors to the JWST and WFIRST most deserves to fly as a NASA flagship observatory. It would be launched in the 2030s to L2, a gravitationally balanced spot between the sun and Earth.

In a special online presentation, Science examines those dream telescopes. The Large UV Optical Infrared Surveyor (LUVOIR), a 15-meter-wide giant with 40 times the light-collecting power of the Hubble Space Telescope, is a bid to look back at the universe's first galaxies, and to answer the question: Is there life elsewhere in the universe? The Habitable Exoplanet Observatory (HabEx) would also focus on that question, but with a smaller mirror. HabEx would fly in tandem with a separate spacecraft carrying a starshade the size of a soccer field. By blocking the glare of a star, the starshade would reveal Earth-like exoplanets, enabling HabEx to scrutinize their faint light for signatures of life. The Lynx Xray Observatory would gather x-rays from the universe's first black holes to learn how they help galaxies form and evolve. And the Origins Space Telescope, with machinery to chill its telescope to just 4° above absolute zero, would study a little-explored kind of infrared radiation emanating from the cold gases and dust that fuel star and planet formation.

Whichever concept rises to the top, researchers hope it has a smoother path to space than the missions chosen in previous surveys. The 2001 survey picked the JWST as its top priority, but that telescope will be lucky to meet its scheduled launch in 2021, 2 decades later. WFIRST was the top pick of the 2010 survey, but it won't fly before 2025. There's a general sense that the initial proposals were immature and unrealistic, says Roger Blandford of Stanford University in Palo Alto, California, who chaired the 2010 survey. "There's frustration all around."

This time, NASA wants the concepts on a firmer footing. Not only did the agency identify the four flagship concepts early, back in 2015, but it has since funded teams to work up rough designs for each one. In June 2019, the teams will deliver to NASA a report that includes two concepts—one expensive and big, the other constrained and relatively affordable at less than $5 billion in most cases. (Here, Science examines the larger concepts.)

"This prepreparation will put the survey in a better situation to evaluate the possibilities," says Fiona Harrison, a high-energy astrophysicist at the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena who was named last month as co-chair of the survey along with Robert Kennicutt of Texas A&M University in College Station. The product of the decadal survey—a prioritized list of missions delivered in 2020—is supposed to be consensual, in part so that agencies and scientists can lobby Congress for funding with a unified voice. But competition among the four flagships will be fierce.

LUVOIR's backers tout its wide appeal as a general-purpose observatory in the mold of Hubble. LUVOIR's instruments cover the parts of the spectrum where the universe is brightest, and the huge size of its mirror means it can peer the farthest, at the faintest objects, with the sharpest vision. "It transcends astrophysics," says Jason Kalirai of the Space Telescope Science Institute (STScI) in Baltimore, Maryland. Critics argue that LUVOIR's huge mirror will lead to a huge price tag and inevitable delays, as the JWST's 6.5-meter mirror already has.

Proponents of the cheaper HabEx hope it will ride high on surging enthusiasm for exoplanets—and a concern for simplicity and thrift. But flying in formation with a distant starshade is an untested technique. And though HabEx can study a few nearby planets in detail, its smaller mirror—4 meters compared with LUVOIR's 15 meters—means more distant worlds will be out of reach. LUVOIR and HabEx will compete head-to-head for the committee's attention, and HabEx and LUVOIR team member Chris Stark of STScI says there won't be a need to launch both. "There are only so many nearby stars."

Origins would look back in time to see how dust and molecules coalesced to create the first galaxies and black holes and how the disks around young stars clump into exoplanets. But the JWST and the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array in Chile can capture some of the same wavelengths, squeezing Origins's discovery space.

Lynx would take up the mantle of NASA's aging Chandra X-ray Observatory, zooming in on hot gas swirling into a black hole or jetting from the center of a galaxy. That would placate x-ray astronomers still smarting from the low rating their International X-ray Observatory proposal received in the 2010 decadal survey. "We got robbed at the last decadal," says STScI x-ray astronomer Rachel Osten. "Is it time for x-rays?"

Whichever mission wins the decadal's favor, funders will ask: How do we know it won't be another JWST, swallowing up budgets and delaying other projects? Study director Dwayne Day of the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine (NASEM) in Washington, D.C., which organizes the decadals, says the survey is taking a sophisticated approach to estimating costs, hoping "to avoid sticker shock, committing to something that is too expensive to afford."

Day says project teams usually estimate costs by tallying labor, materials, and testing. "It's good, but it leaves out unforeseen circumstances, threats." So, for the past decade NASEM has been paying The Aerospace Corporation of El Segundo, California, to apply a cost model called CATE (for Cost And Technical Evaluation) to any proposals a decadal wishes to consider.

CATE draws on a database that goes back decades and contains details of cost and performance for more than 150 NASA missions and 700 instruments. When presented with a new mission, CATE can say how similar missions have fared in the past. The model is particularly powerful in assessing the things that can go wrong. "The best forecasters can't have hands on all the unknown unknowns," says Debra Emmons, a senior manager with Aerospace in Chantilly, Virginia. For example, if a sensor takes longer than expected to develop, or if an international partner delivers an instrument late, the project can be delayed and costs can rise. "[CATE] assesses technical threats, monetizes them, and makes a forward projection," she says. Paul Hertz, NASA's astrophysics chief in Washington, D.C., calls it "a great addition to the tool set."

The project teams are wary of the exercise, fearing that if they produce a scientifically bold and technically challenging proposal, CATE might judge it to be risky and expensive, Emmons says. And NASA wants the four project teams to be ambitious. "The missions had better be hard to do because the questions are hard," Hertz says.

But with the still-grounded JWST on everybody's mind, astronomers are eager to ensure that the winner of the great space telescope bake-off is at once dreamy and real. Blandford says: "It gives a rationale for making these terrible decisions."

• For more on these telescopes, also see here.

{ http://science.sciencemag.org/ }

15-12-2018 om 18:15 geschreven door peter  

For NASA astronomers, this was not a good year. In June, a review board found that the agency's prized observatory—the already overdue and vastly overbudget $8.8 billion James Webb Space Telescope (JWST)—was still years away from taking flight and capturing the faint light of the universe's first stars. The holdup: torn sunshields and loose bolts. Also in trouble was the next big astrophysics mission in line, the Wide Field Infrared Survey Telescope (WFIRST), intended to pin down the nature of mysterious dark energy by surveying wide swaths of the sky. Not even off the drawing board, WFIRST was predicted to burst its $3.2 billion budget by $400 million, another review panel found—not a plus for a mission that the administration of President Donald Trump was already thinking of canceling.

Yet astronomers are about to look skyward and dream even bigger dreams. The decadal survey in astrophysics, which sets priorities for future missions by NASA, the Department of Energy, and the National Science Foundation, began last month. Dozens of astronomers, broken into committees, will identify science goals and develop a wish list of telescopes, both on the ground and in space, that could best address them. One of the toughest tasks will be to decide which—if any—of four proposed successors to the JWST and WFIRST most deserves to fly as a NASA flagship observatory. It would be launched in the 2030s to L2, a gravitationally balanced spot between the sun and Earth.

In a special online presentation, Science examines those dream telescopes. The Large UV Optical Infrared Surveyor (LUVOIR), a 15-meter-wide giant with 40 times the light-collecting power of the Hubble Space Telescope, is a bid to look back at the universe's first galaxies, and to answer the question: Is there life elsewhere in the universe? The Habitable Exoplanet Observatory (HabEx) would also focus on that question, but with a smaller mirror. HabEx would fly in tandem with a separate spacecraft carrying a starshade the size of a soccer field. By blocking the glare of a star, the starshade would reveal Earth-like exoplanets, enabling HabEx to scrutinize their faint light for signatures of life. The Lynx Xray Observatory would gather x-rays from the universe's first black holes to learn how they help galaxies form and evolve. And the Origins Space Telescope, with machinery to chill its telescope to just 4° above absolute zero, would study a little-explored kind of infrared radiation emanating from the cold gases and dust that fuel star and planet formation.

Whichever concept rises to the top, researchers hope it has a smoother path to space than the missions chosen in previous surveys. The 2001 survey picked the JWST as its top priority, but that telescope will be lucky to meet its scheduled launch in 2021, 2 decades later. WFIRST was the top pick of the 2010 survey, but it won't fly before 2025. There's a general sense that the initial proposals were immature and unrealistic, says Roger Blandford of Stanford University in Palo Alto, California, who chaired the 2010 survey. "There's frustration all around."

This time, NASA wants the concepts on a firmer footing. Not only did the agency identify the four flagship concepts early, back in 2015, but it has since funded teams to work up rough designs for each one. In June 2019, the teams will deliver to NASA a report that includes two concepts—one expensive and big, the other constrained and relatively affordable at less than $5 billion in most cases. (Here, Science examines the larger concepts.)

"This prepreparation will put the survey in a better situation to evaluate the possibilities," says Fiona Harrison, a high-energy astrophysicist at the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena who was named last month as co-chair of the survey along with Robert Kennicutt of Texas A&M University in College Station. The product of the decadal survey—a prioritized list of missions delivered in 2020—is supposed to be consensual, in part so that agencies and scientists can lobby Congress for funding with a unified voice. But competition among the four flagships will be fierce.

LUVOIR's backers tout its wide appeal as a general-purpose observatory in the mold of Hubble. LUVOIR's instruments cover the parts of the spectrum where the universe is brightest, and the huge size of its mirror means it can peer the farthest, at the faintest objects, with the sharpest vision. "It transcends astrophysics," says Jason Kalirai of the Space Telescope Science Institute (STScI) in Baltimore, Maryland. Critics argue that LUVOIR's huge mirror will lead to a huge price tag and inevitable delays, as the JWST's 6.5-meter mirror already has.

Proponents of the cheaper HabEx hope it will ride high on surging enthusiasm for exoplanets—and a concern for simplicity and thrift. But flying in formation with a distant starshade is an untested technique. And though HabEx can study a few nearby planets in detail, its smaller mirror—4 meters compared with LUVOIR's 15 meters—means more distant worlds will be out of reach. LUVOIR and HabEx will compete head-to-head for the committee's attention, and HabEx and LUVOIR team member Chris Stark of STScI says there won't be a need to launch both. "There are only so many nearby stars."

Origins would look back in time to see how dust and molecules coalesced to create the first galaxies and black holes and how the disks around young stars clump into exoplanets. But the JWST and the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array in Chile can capture some of the same wavelengths, squeezing Origins's discovery space.

Lynx would take up the mantle of NASA's aging Chandra X-ray Observatory, zooming in on hot gas swirling into a black hole or jetting from the center of a galaxy. That would placate x-ray astronomers still smarting from the low rating their International X-ray Observatory proposal received in the 2010 decadal survey. "We got robbed at the last decadal," says STScI x-ray astronomer Rachel Osten. "Is it time for x-rays?"

Whichever mission wins the decadal's favor, funders will ask: How do we know it won't be another JWST, swallowing up budgets and delaying other projects? Study director Dwayne Day of the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine (NASEM) in Washington, D.C., which organizes the decadals, says the survey is taking a sophisticated approach to estimating costs, hoping "to avoid sticker shock, committing to something that is too expensive to afford."

Day says project teams usually estimate costs by tallying labor, materials, and testing. "It's good, but it leaves out unforeseen circumstances, threats." So, for the past decade NASEM has been paying The Aerospace Corporation of El Segundo, California, to apply a cost model called CATE (for Cost And Technical Evaluation) to any proposals a decadal wishes to consider.

CATE draws on a database that goes back decades and contains details of cost and performance for more than 150 NASA missions and 700 instruments. When presented with a new mission, CATE can say how similar missions have fared in the past. The model is particularly powerful in assessing the things that can go wrong. "The best forecasters can't have hands on all the unknown unknowns," says Debra Emmons, a senior manager with Aerospace in Chantilly, Virginia. For example, if a sensor takes longer than expected to develop, or if an international partner delivers an instrument late, the project can be delayed and costs can rise. "[CATE] assesses technical threats, monetizes them, and makes a forward projection," she says. Paul Hertz, NASA's astrophysics chief in Washington, D.C., calls it "a great addition to the tool set."

The project teams are wary of the exercise, fearing that if they produce a scientifically bold and technically challenging proposal, CATE might judge it to be risky and expensive, Emmons says. And NASA wants the four project teams to be ambitious. "The missions had better be hard to do because the questions are hard," Hertz says.

But with the still-grounded JWST on everybody's mind, astronomers are eager to ensure that the winner of the great space telescope bake-off is at once dreamy and real. Blandford says: "It gives a rationale for making these terrible decisions."

• For more on these telescopes, also see here.

{ http://science.sciencemag.org/ }

15-12-2018 om 18:15 geschreven door peter  

Factory Robot Went Havoc, Impales Worker With Steel Spikes

A factory in China had a robot malfunction, which caused a worker to be impaled. The work in question managed to survive being impaled by 10 metal spikes.

49-year-old Mr. Zhou was working a night shift at a porcelain factory in the Hunan province when he was struck by a falling robotic arm. The accident had him impaled with foot long, half-inch thick metal rods. At first, he was taken to a local hospital before he was transferred to the Xiangya Hospital of Central South University to be handled by specialists due to the nature and severity of his injuries. There were six steel rods fixed on a plate that pierces his right shoulder and chest. Four rods pierced other parts of his body. During the operation, doctors found that one of the rods missed an artery by just 0.1mm.

The reds were troublesome during the operation as they prevented doctors from carrying out X-Rays. This meant the surgery was essentially done blind. Surgeons worked throughout the night to remove all the rods. Mr. Zhou's condition is now stabilized and he will be undergoing treatment and physiotherapy to assist his recovery. He is already doing great however and has regained control of his right arm.

Mr. Zhou was lucky not to suffer the same fate as an American factor worker named Wanda Holbrook. The maintenance technician was killed by a rogue robot who had entered the area she was working in and then crushed her head. At the time, she was inspecting an area where components were assembled. This was when the robot entered the section she was working in, much to her surprise.

These are not the only cases of deaths due to malfunctions and robots going rogue. In 2015, another car industry worker in Germany was also killed by a robot. The 22-year-old male, who is unnamed, was part of a team that was set up the stationary robot at a Volkswagen plant when it grabbed and crushed him against a metal plate. Another case last year, was when a construction worker somehow survived after he was electrocuted, the shock throwing him from his workstation, which caused him to be impaled through the anus by a four-feet steel bar.

There was also the case of Tang Ming, 37 years old, who had accidentally touched live wires on a building site and the shock sent him flying backward onto the protruding metal rod. Rescuers wisely left the pole inside of him and rushed him to the hospital where surgeons managed to extract it. Ming had to undergo seven exhausting hours of surgery at the Sichuan University West China Hospital in Chengdu, capital of China's southwestern Sichuan Province.

{ https://www.disclose.tv/ }

15-12-2018 om 18:03 geschreven door peter  

Real life 'shrink ray' can reduce 3D structures to one thousandth of their original size - and could be used to make the next generation of miniature robots

• The 'shrink ray' can reduce 3D structures to one thousandth of their original size
• Scientists can put all kinds of materials in the polymer before they shrink it
• This could include a variety of materials such as metals, quantum dots or DNA 
• These tiny structures could be be used in many fields, including in robotics 

By PHOEBE WESTON FOR MAILONLINE

MIT researchers have created a real life 'shrink ray' that can reduce 3D structures to one thousandth of their original size.

Scientists can put all kinds of useful materials in the polymer before they shrink it, including metals, quantum dots, and DNA.

The process - called implosion fabrication - is essentially the opposite of expansion microscopy, which is widely used by scientists to create 3D visualisations of microscopic cells.

Instead of making things bigger, scientists attach special molecules which block negative charges between molecules so they no longer repel which makes them contract.

Experts say that making such tiny structures could be useful in many fields, including in medicine and for creating nanoscale robotics. 

MIT researchers have created a real life 'shrink ray' that can reduce 3D structures (pictured) to one thousandth of their original size

'It's a way of putting nearly any kind of material into a 3-D pattern with nanoscale precision,' said Edward Boyden, an associate professor of biological engineering and of brain and cognitive sciences at MIT.

Using the new technique, researchers can create any shape and structure they want, according to the paper published in Science.

The method can create lots of different shapes, including tiny hollow spheres to microscopic chains. 

The researchers shrank hollow linked cubes and an Alice in Wonderland etching using the method. 

Scientists say the technique uses equipment that many biology and materials science labs already have, making it widely accessible for researchers who want to try it.

Currently scientists are able to directly print 3D nanonscale objects.

However, this is only possible with specialised materials like polymers and plastics which have limited applications.

After attaching useful materials to the polymer 'scaffold', they shrink it, generating structures one thousandth the volume of the original. The researchers shrank hollow linked cubes (pictured) using this method

Researchers shrank an Alice in Wonderland etching using the method.  Scientists say the technique uses equipment that many biology and materials science labs already have, making it widely accessible for researchers who want to try it

To overcome this, researchers decided to adapt a technique that was developed a few years ago for high-resolution imaging of brain tissue.

This technique, known as expansion microscopy, involves embedding tissue into a hydrogel and then expanding it.

Hundreds of research groups in biology and medicine are now using expansion microscopy as it enables 3D visualisation of cells and tissues with ordinary hardware.

The new technique involves reversing the process. 

By doing this, scientists could create large-scale objects embedded in expanded hydrogels and then shrink them to the nanoscale.

They call this approach 'implosion fabrication.'

Just like they did in expansion microscopy, the researchers used a very absorbent material made of polyacrylate. This is a plastic commonly found in nappies.

Scientists can put all kinds of useful materials in the polymer before they shrink it such as metals, quantum dots and DNA. Pictured is the machine used to shrink objects 

The polyacrylate forms the scaffold over which other materials can be attached.

It is then bathed in a solution that contains molecules of fluorescein, which attach to the scaffold when they are activated by laser light.

Then, they use two-photon microscopy to target points deep within the structure.

They attach fluorescein molecules to these specific locations within the gel.

These acts as anchors that bind to other types of molecules that are in the structure.

'You attach the anchors where you want with light, and later you can attach whatever you want to the anchors,' Dr Boyden said.

'It could be a quantum dot, it could be a piece of DNA, it could be a gold nanoparticle.'

Researchers think these nanobjects could be used to create better lenses for cell phone cameras, microscopes (stock image), or endoscopes

Once the desired molecules are attached in the right locations, the researchers shrink the entire structure by adding an acid.

The acid blocks the negative charges in the polyacrylate gel so that they no longer repel each other, causing the gel to contract.

Using this technique, researchers can shrink the objects 10-fold in each dimension (for an overall 1,000-fold reduction in volume).

This ability to shrink not only allows for increased resolution, but also makes it possible to assemble materials in a low-density scaffold.

This means it can be easily modified and later the material becomes a dense solid when it is shrunk. 

Researchers think these nanobjects could be used to create better lenses for cell phone cameras, microscopes, or endoscopes. 

Farther in the future, researchers say that this approach could be used to build nanoscale electronics or robots.

WILL GLOBAL WARMING CAUSE SPECIES TO SHRINK?

A study conducted by the University of British Columbia (UBC) in Canada found that over the last century, the beetles in the region have shrunk.

By looking at eight species of beetle and measuring the animals from past and present they found that some beetles were adapting to a reduced body size.

The data also showed that the larger beetles were shrinking, but the smaller ones were not. 

Around 50 million years ago the Earth warmed by three degrees Celsius (5.4°F) and as a result, animal species at the time shrunk by 14 per cent. 

Another warming event around 55 million years ago - called the Paleocene-Eocene Thermal Maximum (PETM) - warmed the earth by up to eight degrees Celsius (14.4°F).

In this instance, animal species of the time shrunk by up to a third. 

Woolly mammoths were a victim of warming climate, shrinking habitat and increased hunting from a growing early-human population which drove them to extinction - along with many large animals

Shrinking in body size is seen from several global warming events.

With the global temperatures set to continue to rise, it is expected the average size of most animals will decrease. 

As well as global warming, the world has seen a dramatic decrease in the amount of large animals. 

So called 'megafauna' are large animals that go extinct. With long life-spans and relatively small population numbers, they are less able to adapt to rapid change as smaller animals that reproduce more often. 

Often hunted for trophies or for food, large animals like the mastadon, mammoths and the western black rhino, which was declared extinct in 2011, have been hunted to extinction. 

{ https://www.dailymail.co.uk/ }

15-12-2018 om 17:50 geschreven door peter  

Scientists are able to shrink objects

{ https://www.disclose.tv/ }

15-12-2018 om 17:36 geschreven door peter  

When David Letterman hosted “The Late Show,” he liked to play a couple of games called “Is This Anything?” and “Will It Float?”. If Dave were back on TV today (and don’t we wish he was), he’d have a field day with the ongoing hole-in-the-space-station controversy which is in the news again this week after two Russian cosmonauts spent eight hours outside the station looking at the hole, scraping off a mysterious yellow substance and trying to come up with an explanation. Was it anything and will the explanation float?

The Soyuz spacecraft hole had to be repaired from outside by two astronauts

 (Image: RT question more)

“Yes, we also observe it [the hole].”

Sputnik News covered Russian Mission Control’s conversations with the two cosmonauts on the space walk earlier this week, the latest step in the mystery that began in August when a small leak was found in the Soyuz capsule attached to the Russian side of the ISS – a leak that was initially blamed on a meteorite (and initially plugged with the finger of an astronaut) but later suspected to have been made while the capsule was still on the ground and somehow managed to be patched well enough to pass inspections. While the hole was plugged from the inside with epoxy, its existence and the conspiracy theories surrounding its yet-unexplained cause forced Roscosmos to schedule the spacewalk to observe the hole from the outside.

Spacewalking is a lot harder than it looks

“There’s nothing, that’s the problem.”

The task was easier planned than done, as cosmonaut Oleg Kononenko pointed out that he and Sergei Prokopyev had no handles, handrails or any other things to hold on to as they made their way 30 meters (100 feet) to the capsule and the spot when they thought the hole might be hidden behind insulation … a trip that took nearly four hours. Once there, they used a knife (this isn’t the Starship Enterprise) to cut a 25-by-25 cm (10-by-10 inch) piece from the insulation to expose the 2 millimeter hole and send videos back to Mission Control.

At this point, the plot thickens.

“The photos taken by cosmonauts have been studied, and no drill traces have been detected on the micrometeorite protection plates.”

While the surface inside showed drill marks suggesting that the hole was manmade, there were no such marks on the other side. The cosmonauts were also seen scraping a mysterious yellow substance from the hole to be taken back to Earth for analysis.

“Some kind of double-flowering yellow. And black ones.”

Was this description lost in Google translation or were the cosmonauts puzzled as they tried to figure out for themselves if this was something used to plug the hole on the ground or when it was found in space after the leak? Or is it something else?

“Return home.”

At that point in the live broadcast, Russian Mission Control quickly ordered the cosmonauts to patch the insulation and get back inside – an order that took over three more hours to follow. Roscosmos head Dimitri Rogozin immediately commended them on a spacewalk that was “unprecedented in its complexity” and will “enter the history of space exploration.”

After eight hours, that yellow stuff was probably starting to look good enough to eat

What about the mysterious yellow-black substance? Neither Rogozin nor Roscosmos had any further comments. The substance will be brought to Roscosmos on December 20th, but the part of the capsule with the hole will be discarded before hitting Earth’s atmosphere, which means the only clues to the cause of the hole are the videos and the strange substance.

What will Roscosmos reveal about it? Is it anything? Will it float?

Dave?

{ https://mysteriousuniverse.org/ }

15-12-2018 om 17:04 geschreven door peter  

It has already been discussed by experts that humans may eventually colonize to Mars, but the idea of starting a family there may not be so easy. There is obviously a specific string of events that need to take place in order to conceive a baby – from fertilization to giving birth – but there may be several challenges involving the environments in space that could affect that process.

While rats, mice, frogs, salamanders, fish, and plants have been experimented on to determine the effects of reproduction in space, the results remain inconclusive. Kris Lehnhardt, who is a physician at the Baylor College of Medicine, explains, “All of our big tech gurus out there who want us to be a multi-planet civilization – this is a key question that no one has answered yet.”

Two of the biggest obstacles for reproducing in space are the lack of gravity and the large amounts of radiation, specifically on Mars. The Red Planet only has around 38 percent strength of Earth’s downward gravitational pull. And the radiation in space is much stronger than here on our planet, as Earth’s magnetic field protects us from a lot of the damaging cosmic particles. Those two things alone could severely damage a fetus.

In the 1970’s, the Soviets sent several rats into space on the Cosmos 1129 satellite and when they returned, it was revealed that although they did mate in space, the females never delivered any babies.

Then a NASA scientist named April Ronca sent several pregnant rats into space and studied how the late stages of their pregnancies affected them by not being on Earth. When they returned, the birth process was pretty much normal, although some rat pups that were exposed to microgravity did have some abnormalities such as inner-ear problems that affected their senses of detecting movement orientation and direction. In addition, rats’ sperm count decreased in spaceflight, while abnormalities increased. However, Ronca wrote, “The available data suggest that numerous aspects of pregnancy, birth and early mammalian development can proceed under altered gravity conditions.”

Another experiment showed that two-cell mouse embryos that were sent into space didn’t develop any further. On the other hand, a Japanese-led study revealed that freeze-dried mouse sperm was able to create embryos after being in space for nine months.

While mice and rats have different and inconclusive results, it’s still unclear whether humans will be able to reproduce in a partial gravity environment that’s much different than our planet’s. According to scientists at NASA’s Langley Research Center, “Humans may encounter reproductive challenges in gravity environments different than Earth’s, as gravitational forces may disrupt mammalian life cycle processes and actively shape genomes in ways that are inheritable.”

Experts believe that sending a mouse colony into lunar orbit to be observed by 600 cameras along with telerobotic animal care could give them a better idea on how humans could eventually reproduce on another planet. The experiment would be called MICEHAB (Multigenerational Independent Colony for Extraterrestrial Habitation, Autonomy and Behavior health) and it would study how spaceflight and partial gravity on at least three generations of mice would affect them, including their health as well as birth rates.

These experiments would be conducted around the late 2020s and would hopefully give scientists a better understanding for when humans to eventually make it to Mars, although human reproduction is much different than that of other mammals.

While all of these experiments are being done on mice and rats, the end question is if and how humans will be able to reproduce on Mars. James Nodler, who is a reproductive endocrinologist, asked, “Is our end point to see if we send up a man and a woman, and they have sex, can they have a baby? Or do we want to say, can we take a whole bunch of embryos, freeze them on Earth, send them to Mars and thaw them?”

Needless to say, it would be extremely difficult to study human reproduction in space without actually sending humans to another planet to do so. While experiments are being done, I think it’s safe to say that it will be many years before we see any baby Martians running around the Red Planet.

{ https://mysteriousuniverse.org/ }

15-12-2018 om 16:49 geschreven door peter  

15-12-2018 om 13:03 geschreven door peter  

Cage Match: Climate Experts Vs. Reality

Temperatures in Greenland and Iceland warmed cyclically until the 1930s, cooled through the 1970s, warmed until about ten years ago – and are now declining again.

Spreadsheet With Data Links

During the 1930s, scientists said the Arctic was melting rapidly, glaciers were collapsing, and predicted 50 feet of sea level rise which would “wipe half of England from the map.”

GREENLAND’S GLACIERS MELTING, SAYS SCIENTIST

“It may without exaggeration be said that the glaciers, like those in Norway, face the possibility Of a catastrophic collapse”

17 Dec 1939, Page 15 – Harrisburg Sunday Courier at Newspapers.com

03 Feb 1934 – “WORLD HEATING UP.” – Trove

Times have changed, and Greenland is gaining ice now.

Greenland Gains Huge Amounts Of Ice For The Second Year In A Row | The Deplorable Climate Science Blog

Greenland Ice Sheet’s 2017 weigh-in suggests a small increase in ice mass | NOAA Climate.gov

NASA and the rest of team climate fraud responded to this quite predictably, by cooling the past and declaring the increase in ice to be the fastest melt on record – and accelerating.

Spreadsheet With Data Links

SCIENCE: Greenland ice sheet melting faster than ever recorded — Thursday, March 29, 2018

Global warming normally occurs someplace where people don’t live and won’t bother to check. In places where people actually live, experts declare the cold weather to be caused by global warming.

Read more at Real Climate Science

Source: 

• https://climatechangedispatch.com/climate-experts-greenland-ice-gain/

 { https://beforeitsnews.com/v3/ }

15-12-2018 om 12:46 geschreven door peter  

Daytime Sighting of Orbs Over Buddhist Temple

{ https://beforeitsnews.com/v3/ }

15-12-2018 om 12:35 geschreven door peter  

CIA secretly created 'remote control' DOGS in the 1960s by surgically implanting electrodes in their brains, declassified documents reveal

• CIA documents reveal that they tested on dogs in mind control experiments 
• Officials have been trying to hide top secret documents for decades 
• Files reveal that the CIA controlled dog's minds using electrodes in their skulls
• 'Behaviour modification' experiments were an illegal mind control project
• Files were released by The Black Vault, a declassified government records site  

By VICTORIA BELL FOR MAILONLINE

The CIA created remote control dogs by surgically implanting electrodes in their brains in 1963, newly released documents reveal. 

US officials have been trying to hide the top secret 'behaviour modification' files for decades, but they have now been released under the country's Freedom of Information laws. 

Experimenters implanted devices inside the skulls of six canines and used electrical stimulation to guide them through an open field, making them run, turn and stop.

The top secret experiments were part of the infamous mind control project MKUltra. 

Scroll down for video 

Mind-control experiments using drugs, hypnosis and electronic devices were carried out by the CIA on dogs in 1963. Officials have been trying to hide the documents for decades but have recently been released under the Freedom of Information Act (Stock image)

The top-secret CIA program conducted hundreds of experiments sometimes on unwitting citizens to assess the potential use of LSD.

They also used other drugs for mind control, information gathering and psychological torture.

John Greenewald, founder of The Black Vault, a site specialising in declassified government records spent twenty years trying to obtain the documents.

The files from the infamous project reveal the government agency also tested humans with psychotropic drugs, electrical shocks and radio waves. 

'The specific aim of the research program was to examine the feasibility of controlling the behaviour of a dog, in an open field, by means of remotely stimulated electrical stimulation of the brain,' the documents state. 

'Such a system depends for its effectiveness on two properties of electrical stimulation delivered to certain deep lying structures of the dog brain: the well-known reward effect, and a tendency for such stimulation to initiate and maintain locomotion in a direction which is accompanied by the continued delivery of stimulation.' 

Researchers implanted a device inside six canines' skulls and guided them through an open field (schematic pictured), making them run, turn and stop. The top secret experiments were part of the infamous mind control project MKUltra

John Greenewald, founder of The Black Vault, a site specialising in declassified government records, put in the FOIA request. This document details plans to drug inmates at a prison hospital then interrogate them

The researchers first tried out a plastic helmet but then settled on a new surgical technique that involved 'embedding the electrode entirely within a mound of dental cement on the skull', the documents state. 

They ran the leads just below the dog's skin to a point between the shoulder blades, where the leads are brought to the surface and affixed to a standard dog harness. 

Some of the dogs suffered side effects from the experiments, including infections caused by the head wound where they embedded the electrode into their brain. 

In one letter an individual, whose name had been redacted, writes to a doctor with advice about experiments in animal mind control. 

The writer of the letter proved to be an expert in the field of animal mind control and had undertaken the successful creation of six remote control dogs.   

'As you know, I spent about three years working in the research area of rewarding electrical stimulation of the brain,' the person writes. 

Pictures of dog brain structures indicating where electrodes would be surgically implanted. The researchers first tried out a plastic helmet but then settled on a new surgical technique that involved 'embedding the electrode entirely within a mound of dental cement on the skull', the documents state

Scientists at first used a plastic helmet (schematic pictured) that delivered the stimulation to the dog's brain but then moved on to embedding the electrode within a mound of dental cement into the skull 

'In the laboratory, we performed a number of experiments with rats; in the open field, we employed dogs of several breeds.'

The letter writer characterises the work with remote-controlling dogs as a success, describing 'a demonstrated procedure for controlling the free-field behaviours of an unrestrained dog.'

The final report, published in 1965, titled 'Remote Control Behaviour with Rewarding Electrical Stimulation of the Brain', was attached to the letter. 

The top-secret CIA program MKUltra conducted hundreds of experiments sometimes on unwitting U.S. citizens to assess the potential use of LSD. They also used other drugs for mind control, information gathering and psychological torture

By 1967, it seems unlikely that remote-controlled dogs were ever used in the field, as the letter writer outlines some of the limitations and challenges to any follow-up program going forward.   

The files are not the only 'Behavioural Modification' document released by The Black Vault involving animals. 

Numerous other files pertain to budgeting and acquisition for animal experimentation. 

One declassified file details, with heavy redactions, the practical possibilities of training and equipping cats for 'foreign situation' field work.

{  https://www.dailymail.co.uk/ }

15-12-2018 om 11:27 geschreven door peter  

“He followed me home. Can I keep him?”

Who can resist that plea from a child that has befriended and been befriended by a stray dog? How about that soulful face of a pooch in a shelter trying to stave off the inevitable demise that millions of dogs face? It seems relatively safe to accept these canines into your house, especially if they’ve had their shots and a bath. However, that wasn’t the case in 1963 when the CIA experimented with implanting devices in the brains of dogs in order to control their movements, influence their actions and perhaps even surveil on unsuspecting humans. Is this enough to drive dog-lovers to tropical fish, or worse … to cats?

“The specific aim of the research program was to examine the possibility of controlling the behavior of a dog, in an open field, by means of remotely triggering electrical stimulation of the brain.”

Newsweek and other news sources revealed classified documents from 1963 that were received this week by John Greenewald, founder of The Black Vault, the vast repository of secret files on all sorts of subjects obtained under the Freedom of Information Act. The long wait attests to both the secrecy of these government projects and the patience required to wait for requests to be processed. In this case, Greenewald spent 20 years attempting to gain access to the files on these canine mind-control experiments conducted in, not surprisingly, Project MKUltra – the infamous project that attempted to manipulate the minds of humans using drugs, hypnosis, sensory deprivation, isolation, abuse and other forms of torture.

Dog brain

According to the redacted documents released as file C00021825, six dogs had electrodes embedded “entirely within a mound of dental cement on the skull” (probably pretty sophisticated for 1963) which with leads inserted under the dogs’ skin and attached to an external harness equipped with a battery pack and a brain stimulator.

“Such a system depends for its effectiveness on two properties of electrical stimulation delivered to certain deep lying structures of the dog brain: the well-known reward effect, and a tendency for such stimulation to initiate and maintain locomotion in a direction which is accompanied by the continued delivery of stimulation.”

A letter written in 1967 and included with the 1965 report (titled “Remote Control Behavior with Rewarding Electrical Stimulation of the Brain” and all names redacted) called the canine mind-control project a success, albeit limited due to then range of the control device – “100 to 200 yards, at most” – and the lack of nearby fields suitable for tests (even back then it was tough to find people to pick up dog poop).

Or … did they use mind control on humans to scoop?

What happened to the six dogs? The report states that after they were made to run, turn and stop in response to electrical currents sent to their brains’ reward centers, some suffered side effects, including infections from the incisions. Based on how animals are treated in other experiments, especially in a time long before PETA, their ending was probably not in a good home chewing on old socks.

A trivial experiment? Was anything in MKUltra trivial?

{ https://mysteriousuniverse.org/ }

15-12-2018 om 11:15 geschreven door peter