Dit is ons nieuw hondje Kira, een kruising van een waterhond en een Podenko. Ze is sinds 7 februari 2024 bij ons en druk bezig ons hart te veroveren. Het is een lief, aanhankelijk hondje, dat zich op een week snel aan ons heeft aangepast. Ze is heel vinnig en nieuwsgierig, een heel ander hondje dan Noleke.
This is our new dog Kira, a cross between a water dog and a Podenko. She has been with us since February 7, 2024 and is busy winning our hearts. She is a sweet, affectionate dog who quickly adapted to us within a week. She is very quick and curious, a very different dog than Noleke.
DEAR VISITOR,
MY BLOG EXISTS ALREADY 13 YEARS AND 2 MONTH.
ON 06/08/2024 MORE THAN 2.161.100
VISITORS FROM 135 DIFFERENT NATIONS ALREADY FOUND THEIR WAY TO MY BLOG.
THAT IS AN AVERAGE OF 400GUESTS PER DAY.
THANK YOU FOR VISITING MY BLOG AND HOPE YOU ENJOY EACH TIME.
The purpose of this blog is the creation of an open, international, independent and free forum, where every UFO-researcher can publish the results of his/her research. The languagues, used for this blog, are Dutch, English and French.You can find the articles of a collegue by selecting his category. Each author stays resposable for the continue of his articles. As blogmaster I have the right to refuse an addition or an article, when it attacks other collegues or UFO-groupes.
Druk op onderstaande knop om te reageren in mijn forum
Zoeken in blog
Deze blog is opgedragen aan mijn overleden echtgenote Lucienne.
In 2012 verloor ze haar moedige strijd tegen kanker!
In 2011 startte ik deze blog, omdat ik niet mocht stoppen met mijn UFO-onderzoek.
BEDANKT!!!
Een interessant adres?
UFO'S of UAP'S, ASTRONOMIE, RUIMTEVAART, ARCHEOLOGIE, OUDHEIDKUNDE, SF-SNUFJES EN ANDERE ESOTERISCHE WETENSCHAPPEN - DE ALLERLAATSTE NIEUWTJES
UFO's of UAP'S in België en de rest van de wereld In België had je vooral BUFON of het Belgisch UFO-Netwerk, dat zich met UFO's bezighoudt. BEZOEK DUS ZEKER VOOR ALLE OBJECTIEVE INFORMATIE , enkel nog beschikbaar via Facebook en deze blog.
Verder heb je ook het Belgisch-Ufo-meldpunt en Caelestia, die prachtig, doch ZEER kritisch werk leveren, ja soms zelfs héél sceptisch...
Voor Nederland kan je de mooie site www.ufowijzer.nl bezoeken van Paul Harmans. Een mooie site met veel informatie en artikels.
MUFON of het Mutual UFO Network Inc is een Amerikaanse UFO-vereniging met afdelingen in alle USA-staten en diverse landen.
MUFON's mission is the analytical and scientific investigation of the UFO- Phenomenon for the benefit of humanity...
Je kan ook hun site bekijken onder www.mufon.com.
Ze geven een maandelijks tijdschrift uit, namelijk The MUFON UFO-Journal.
Since 02/01/2020 is Pieter ex-president (=voorzitter) of BUFON, but also ex-National Director MUFON / Flanders and the Netherlands. We work together with the French MUFON Reseau MUFON/EUROP.
ER IS EEN NIEUWE GROEPERING DIE ZICH BUFON NOEMT, MAAR DIE HEBBEN NIETS MET ONZE GROEP TE MAKEN. DEZE COLLEGA'S GEBRUIKEN DE NAAM BUFON VOOR HUN SITE... Ik wens hen veel succes met de verdere uitbouw van hun groep. Zij kunnen de naam BUFON wel geregistreerd hebben, maar het rijke verleden van BUFON kunnen ze niet wegnemen...
29-08-2019
Mars Helicopter Drone Installed on NASA's Next Red Planet Rover
Mars Helicopter Drone Installed on NASA's Next Red Planet Rover
The little chopper will be the first rotorcraft ever to ply alien skies.
An engineer works on attaching NASA's Mars Helicopter to the belly of the Mars 2020 rover — which has been flipped over for that purpose — on Aug. 27, 2019, at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California.
The first-ever off-Earth helicopter just hooked up with its traveling companion.
Engineers at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) in Pasadena, California, attached the tiny Mars Helicopterto the agency's car-size Mars 2020 rover today (Aug. 28), agency officials announced.
The duo will launch together in July 2020 and touch down inside the Red Planet's Jezero Crater in February 2021. Once on Mars, the solar-powered, 4-lb. (1.8 kilograms) helicopter will detach and begin flying test sorties.
"Our job is to prove that autonomous, controlled flight can be executed in the extremely thin Martian atmosphere," Mars Helicopter project manager, of JPL, said in a statement. (Mars' air is just 1% as dense as that of Earth at sea level.)
"Since our helicopter is designed as a flight test of experimental technology, it carries no science instruments," she added. "But if we prove powered flight on Mars can work, we look forward to the day when Mars helicopters can play an important role in future explorations of the Red Planet."
For example, helicopters could serve as scouts for robots or human pioneers on Mars. Red Planet rotorcraft could also carry instruments and conduct a variety of science work of their own, NASA officials have said.
Mas 2020, which will soon get a catchier moniker via a student naming competition, will hunt for signs of long-dead Red Planet life in Jezero Crater, which hosted a river delta in the ancient past. The rover will also characterize the site's geology, collect and cache samples for future return to Earth and demonstrate gear that will generate oxygen from the carbon-dioxide-dominated Martian air, among other tasks.
"With this joining of two great spacecraft, I can say definitively that all the pieces are in place for a historic mission of exploration," Thomas Zurbuchen, associate administrator of the Science Mission Directorate at NASA's headquarters in Washington, D.C, said in the same statement. "Together, Mars 2020 and the Mars Helicopter will help define the future of science and exploration of the Red Planet for decades to come."
NASA plans to launch another rotorcraft soon as well — Dragonfly, which will soar through the thick atmosphere of Saturn's huge moon Titan. The life-hunting Dragonfly is scheduled to lift off in 2026 and land on Titan's frigid surface in 2034.
Mike Wall's book about the search for alien life, "Out There" (Grand Central Publishing, 2018; illustrated byKarl Tate), is out now. Follow him on Twitter @michaeldwall. Follow us on Twitter@Spacedotcom orFacebook.
In a bid to Expand Military Outreach, US to Launch Space Command Today
In a bid to Expand Military Outreach, US to Launch Space Command Today
In a bid to Expand Military Outreach, US to Launch Space Command Today :- The United States will officially launch the Space Command, also known as SPACECOM, on Thursday with a White House ceremony hosted by President Donald Trump and Vice President Mike Pence.
US to Launch Space Command Today
The SPACECOM is a key step for the US military to establish a proposed sixth branch of the military known as the Space Force. U.S. Air Force Gen. John Raymond will serve as the first head of Space Command (SPACECOM). At launch, Raymond will lead 87 active units handling operations such as missile warning, satellite surveillance, space control, and space support, Gen. Joseph Dunford said at a meeting of the National Space Council earlier this month.
In a press conference on August 20, Vice President Mike Pence said, “The United States Space Force will ensure that our nation is prepared to defend our people, defend our interests, and to defend our values in the vast expanse of space and here on Earth with the technologies that will support our common defence for the vast reaches of outer space.”
He further added, “The United States Space Force will ensure that our nation is prepared to defend our people, defend our interests, and to defend our values in the vast expanse of space and here on Earth with the technologies that will support our common defense for the vast reaches of outer space.”
Trump had directed the Pentagon to create a sixth military branch in June 2018. He said that the establishment of the SPACECOM was crucial in protecting the country’s interests amid pressure from international rivals Russia and China.
Meanwhile, as per the former Deputy Defence Secretary Patrick Shanahan, the SPACECOM will be different from the Space Force but they will work together.
He tweeted, “The Space Force will serve as a force provider for personnel, assets, and capabilities supporting space operations, while Space Command will serve as the operational command that will employ space capabilities and lead space operations. The differences between Space Force and US Space Command will largely parallel those of the other five military services and four functional combatant commands.”
NatureUit een analyse van de schedel van MRD blijkt dat hij ongeveer 3,8 miljoen jaar oud is.
WETENSCHAPTot voor kort was Lucy wellicht het beroemdste lid van het geslacht Australopithecus, een directe voorouder van de mens. Daar brengt het fossiel van MRD waarschijnlijk verandering in. Tenslotte kunnen we dankzij MRD, een mannelijke Australopithecus anamensis, eindelijk een gezicht plakken op een van onze oudste voorouders. Bovendien schudt MRD de evolutionaire tijdlijn door elkaar.
Lucy behoorde tot de Australopithecus afarensis, een soort die volgens de evolutionaire tijdlijn na de Australopithecus anamensis (rechtop) op aarde rondliep. Dat betekent dat Lucy en MRD elkaar nooit ontmoet zouden hebben. Maar nu blijkt uit een analyse van de schedel van MRD dat hij ongeveer 3,8 miljoen jaar oud is. Dat betekent dat de anamensis nog leefde toen zijn opvolger afarensis al bestond. Meer zelfs, de twee soorten zouden maar liefst 100.000 jaar samengeleefd hebben. De familie van MRD van 4,2 tot 3,8 miljoen jaar geleden en de familie van Lucy van 3,9 tot 3 miljoen jaar terug. De overlapping van de twee soorten schudt de evolutionaire tijdlijn - alsook het idee van een simpele, lineaire evolutie - grondig door elkaar.
Dat beschrijven de onderzoekers van het Cleveland Museum of Natural History in niet één maar wel twee papers in het vaktijdschrift Nature. In een eerste artikel omschrijven ze hun vondst, terwijl ze in een tweede artikel uit de doeken doen hoe ze de leeftijd van MRD bepaalden.
De verantwoordelijke voor de evolutionaire ‘chaos’ is Ali Bereino, een Ethiopische boer die in 2016 per ongeluk een schedel opgroef. Hij was eigenlijk een hol aan het graven om zijn pasgeboren geitjes te beschermen tegen hyena’s toen hij opmerkte dat er enkele tanden in het zand begraven waren. Al snel haalde hij er een volledig kaakbeen uit dat hij naar het team van antropoloog Yohannes Haile-Selassi van het Cleveland Museum of Natural History, bracht. Dat team groef uiteindelijk een vrijwel volledige schedel op.
Nature/ Cleveland Museum of Natural HistoryUit een analyse van de schedel van MRD blijkt dat hij ongeveer 3,8 miljoen jaar oud is.
MRD
MRD - genoemd naar de vindplaats Miro Dora, zo’n 50 kilometer ten noorden van Hadar waar Lucy gevonden werd - was een man met een hersengrootte van zo’n 370 kubieke centimeter, vergelijkbaar met die van een chimpansee. Hij had uitstekende jukbeenderen, langwerpige hoektanden en ovale oorschelpen. Op die manier kon er een gezicht gereconstrueerd worden van MRD. Zijn leeftijd werd bepaald door de bodemlaag waarin zijn schedel gevonden werd, te analyseren.
Het grote verschil tutssen MRD en Lucy? Lucy had een rond hoofd terwijl de schedel van MRD smaller en langwerpig is. MRD leek volgens paleontologen nog iets meer op een aap dan zijn opvolger. Toch behoorde hij wel degelijk tot de mensachtigen. “De ruggenwervel van MRD komt niet aan de achterkant van de schedel binnen, zoals bij viervoeters, maar aan de onderkant. Dat bewijst dat de soort op twee benen liep, en dus een mensachtige is”, aldus Fred Spoor, paleontoloog aan het Natural History Museum in Londen.
0
1
2
3
4
5
- Gemiddelde waardering: 0/5 - (0 Stemmen) Categorie:HLN.be - Het Laatste Nieuws ( NL)
YOU WON’T BELIEVE WHAT’S BURIED UNDER THE SAHARA…HIDDEN LOST ANCIENT CIVILIZATIONS BY BRIGHT INSIGHT
YOU WON’T BELIEVE WHAT’S BURIED UNDER THE SAHARA… HIDDEN LOST ANCIENT CIVILIZATIONS BY BRIGHT INSIGHT
I love the Bright Insight’s channel and I’m always happy to share Jimmy’s latest videos, like this one, which dropped last night. Are the sands of the Sahara Desert covering up ancient civilizations..?
Ancient Greek historian, Herodotus (484 – 425 BC) described the Nile River as moving from west to east, not from South to North, as it does today.
Jimmy from the Bright Insight YouTube channel is an Iraq War veteran who got to see some of these ancient wonders of the Middle East with his own eyes but he’s not content to merely point out how incredible they are. He has this to say about Ancient Egypt and the Sahara Desert: “The experts have always claimed that the Sphinxmust be around 4,500 years old, yet recent geological analysis implies that this cannot be the case, as the last time the Nile Delta region had significant rainfall was more than seven thousand years ago…Right in the timeframe of when the Sahara was Green and had ten times the rainfall that it does today…
“The scientific data overwhelmingly suggests that the Sphinx is at least double the age of what we were taught in school, which of course only further adds to the mystery of ancient Egypt, itself but think about what all of this means.
“The ancient ruins and relics that have been found from the Egyptians are concentrated largely around the Nile River and this makes total sense, as civilizations exist where there’s water. “So, combine that with the timeframe estimates of when the Sahara went from a lush green tropical paradise to a massive barren desert, several thousand years ago, well there’s obviously a connection here and going back to what I just pointed out, regarding the ancient Egyptians developing their civilization along the Nile River.
“While taking into account that the Sahara Desert was actually a hospitable environment, made up of rivers and lakes at that same period of time, we should ask ourselves if the old legends, stating that the Nile River once ran from west to east have merits… “Ancient rivers in the Sahara would have likely supported human migration routes. It seems to me that these areas around the rivers [in Northwest Africa] need to be excavated now.”
Je gelooft nooit wat er onder de Sahara begraven ligt. Kijk deze video over verloren beschavingen
Je gelooft nooit wat er onder de Sahara begraven ligt. Kijk deze video over verloren beschavingen+
De grootste woestijn op aarde blijkt een enorme begraafplaats te zijn waar talloze mysterieuze ruïnes en resten van onbekende beschavingen worden gevonden.
Ze zijn in de vergetelheid geraakt en duizenden jaren geleden verzwolgen door het zand. Vanaf hier wordt het vreemd.
In de afgelopen jaren verschenen er allerlei berichten waaruit blijkt dat de Sahara ooit groen en bewoond was.
Oogwenk
Met behulp van satellieten werden er oude riviernetwerken, megameren en sporen van verloren beschavingen ontdekt in en onder de woestijn.
Verder is gebleken dat de Sahara in een oogwenk is veranderd van een grasrijk landschap in dorre woestijn. Wat is er gebeurd?
We learn from our personal interaction with the world, and our memories of those experiences help guide our behaviors. Experience and memory are inexorably linked, or at least they seemed to be before a recent reporton the formation of completely artificial memories. Using laboratory animals, investigators reverse engineered a specific natural memory by mapped the brain circuits underlying its formation. They then “trained” another animal by stimulating brain cells in the pattern of the natural memory. Doing so created an artificial memory that was retained and recalled in a manner indistinguishable from a natural one.
Memories are essential to the sense of identity that emerges from the narrative of personal experience. This study is remarkable because it demonstrates that by manipulating specific circuits in the brain, memories can be separated from that narrative and formed in the complete absence of real experience. The work shows that brain circuits that normally respond to specific experiences can be artificially stimulated and linked together in an artificial memory. That memory can be elicited by the appropriate sensory cues in the real environment. The research provides some fundamental understanding of how memories are formed in the brain and is part of a burgeoning science of memory manipulation that includes the transfer, prosthetic enhancement and erasure of memory. These efforts could have a tremendous impact on a wide range of individuals, from those struggling with memory impairments to those enduring traumatic memories, and they also have broad social and ethical implications.
In the recent study, the natural memory was formed by training mice to associate a specific odor (cherry blossoms) with a foot shock, which they learned to avoid by passing down a rectangular test chamber to another end that was infused with a different odor (caraway).The caraway scent came from a chemical called carvone, while the cherry blossom scent came from another chemical, acetophenone.The researchers found that acetophenone activates a specific type of receptor on a discrete type of olfactory sensory nerve cell.
They then turned to a sophisticated technique, optogenetics, to activate those olfactory nerve cells. With optogenetics, light-sensitive proteins are used to stimulate specific neurons in response to light delivered to the brain through surgically implanted optic fibers. In their first experiments, the researchers used transgenic animals that only made the protein in acetophenone-sensitive olfactory nerves. By pairing the electrical foot shock with optogenetic light stimulation of the acetophenone-sensitive olfactory nerves, the researchers taught the animals to associate the shock with activity of these specific acetophenone-sensitive sensory nerves. By pairing the electrical foot shock with optogenetic light stimulation of the acetophenone-sensitive olfactory nerves, the researchers taught the animals to associate the two. When theylater tested the mice, they avoided the cherry blossom odor.
These first steps showed that the animals did not need to actually experience the odor to remember a connection between that smell and a noxious foot shock. But this was not a completely artificial memory, because the shock was still quite real. In order to construct an entirely artificial memory, the scientists needed to stimulate the brain in such a way as to mimic the nerve activity caused by the foot shock as well.
Earlier studies had shown that specific nerve pathways leading to a structure known as the ventral tegmental area (VTA) were important for the aversive nature of the foot shock. To create a truly artificial memory, the researchers needed to stimulate the VTA in the same way as they stimulated the olfactory sensory nerves, but the transgenic animals only made the light-sensitive proteins in those nerves. In order to use optogenetic stimulation, they stimulated the olfactory nerves in the same genetically engineered mice , and they employed a virus to place light-sensitive proteins in the VTA as well. They stimulated the olfactory receptors with light to simulate the odor of cherry blossoms, then stimulated the VTA to mimic the aversive foot shock. The animals recalled the artificial memory, responding to an odor they had never encountered by avoiding a shock they had never received.
For a long time, it has been a mystery how memories are formed in the brain—and what physical changes in the brain accompany their formation. In this study, the electrical stimulation of specific brain regions that led to a new memory also activated other brain regions known to be involved in memory formation, including an area called the basolateral amygdala. Because nerve cells communicate with one another through junctions called synapses, it has been assumed that changes in synaptic activity account for the formation of memories. In simple animals, such as the sea slugAplysia, memories can be transferred from one individual to another using RNA extracted from the one who experienced them. The RNA contains the codes for proteins made in the nerves of the animal associated with the memory. Memories have been partially transferred in rodents by using recordings of electrical activity of a trained animal’s memory center (the hippocampus) to stimulate similar patterns of nerve activity in a recipient animal. This process is similar to the new report described here, in that stimulating the electrical activity of specific neural circuits is used to elicit a memory. In the case of memory transfer, that pattern came from trained animals, whereas in the optogenetics study, the pattern of electrical activity associated with the memory was built de novo within brain of the mouse. This is the first report of a completely artificial memory, and it helps establish some fundamental understanding of how memories may be manipulated.
Research into memory and efforts to manipulate it have progressed at a rapid pace. A “memory prosthetic” designed to enhance its formation and recall by electrical stimulation of the memory center in the human brain has been developed with support from the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA). In contrast, memory erasure using what has been nicknamed the Eternal Sunshine drug (zeta inhibitory peptide, or ZIP)—after Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, a Hollywood movie with a mnemonic theme—is being developed to treat recollections of chronic pain.
There are legitimate motives underlying these efforts. Memory has been called “the scribe of the soul,” and it is the source of one’s personal history. Some people may seek to recover lost or partially lost memories. Others, such as those afflicted with post-traumatic stress disorder or chronic pain, might seek relief from traumatic memories by trying to erase them.
The methods used here to create artificial memories will not be employed in humans anytime soon: none of us are transgenic like the animals used in the experiment, nor are we likely to accept multiple implanted fiber-optic cables and viral injections. Nevertheless, as technologies and strategies evolve, the possibility of manipulating human memories becomes all the more real. And the involvement of military agencies such as DARPA invariably renders the motivations behind these efforts suspect. Are there things we all need to be afraid of or that we must or must not do? The dystopian possibilities are obvious.
Creating artificial memories brings us closer to learning how memories form and could ultimately help us understand and treat dreadful diseases such as Alzheimer’s. Memories, however, cut to the core of our humanity, and we need to be vigilant that any manipulations are approached ethically.
Well, pack it in kids, we’ve finally gone and done it. We reached grade A, genuine sci-fi dystopia. Scientists have now successfully created and implanted an artificial memory. That is, a memory of an event that never happened created from the ground up and implanted into an animal. They’ve only done it to a mouse so far, so we’ve still got a bit of time before this whole thing starts feeling like a David Lynch movie. But boy, oh boy, this definitely feels like one of those “so focused on if we could, we never stopped to think if we should” type of deals.
According to a recent article in the journal Naturetitled Memory formation in the absence of experience, scientists reverse engineered a memory to map the brain circuits involved in creating it—in this case the association of the smell of cherry blossoms with an electrical shock to the foot—then artificially implanted that memory in a mouse. Tests showed that the mouse behaved as if it actually remembered being shocked in the foot whenever it smelled cherry blossoms, despite the mouse never having been shocked nor been exposed to the scent of cherry blossoms.
Even ones that never happened!
Previous research had shown that it was possible to partially transfer memories from one rodent to another via reproducing the electrical activity associated with a specific memory in one mouse and jolting it into the brain of another mouse. This new experiment is different. This time the memory was created completely artificially from the ground up. This consisted of a few parts.
First, they used a technique called optogenetics. This involves fiber optic cables surgically implanted into the olfactory region of the mice’s brain so that light can be used to turn on proteins associated with specific smells. To do that, the mice had to be genetically engineered to only produce the light-sensitive protein in the region associated with acetophenone—AKA the scent of cherry blossoms. Now they could artificially create the scent of cherry blossoms in the brain of a mouse.
So we’re already into some wacky stuff, but don’t worry. It gets wackier.
The scientists identified the region of the brain responsible for creating an aversion to being shocked in the foot, an area called the ventral tegmental area (VTA). To link the two regions together, scientists then used a virus (yes, that’s correct) to implant those same light-sensitive proteins into the VTA. This way, they could use light to stimulate both regions at once. Fake memories at the speed of light.
And it worked. The mice were then placed in a rectangular chamber, one end of which smelled like cherry blossoms, while the other smelled like caraway. The mice avoided the end that smelled like cherry blossoms, because they remembered being shocked by it. In an article for Scientific American, Robert Marcone puts it this way:
The animals recalled the artificial memory, responding to an odor they had never encountered by avoiding a shock they had never received.
A little poke here, a little twist there, and you’ll remember that time you were the king of France.
Now, this is still a long ways off from being used in humans. But it is an active area of research. Of course it is important to study memory. Dementia and Alzheimer’s disease are nothing but tragedies, and the memory of trauma can take hold over a person’s life and never let go. It’s a very important area of study, but we must be careful. If there was a way to Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind away painful events, would you do it? Maybe not, but someone would. Would you implant a fake memory of a trip around the world, or how about a fake memory of hitting a walk-off home run, just to boost your confidence and self image? How many companies— companies that already specialize in creating false narratives and self images built like houses of cards—are already working to sell you that walk-off home run?
Research like this is like playing with fire. That’s a neutral statement; playing with fire brought us down from the trees and allowed us to build a civilization, overcome the bounds of gravity, and put people on the moon. But it can also burn your house to the ground.
While most of Brazil is focused on the out-of-control fires in the Amazon (and rightly so), a few people are excited about new information and a possible new release of previously classified documents which revealed unbelievable details about an “invasion of UFOs” in 2008 that brought with them “luminous beings.” Why are they calling it an “invasion,” what were these luminous beings and what else might the Brazilian Air Force and government be hiding?
“It all started around 10 pm on a Wednesday night, November 19, 2008, just before Brazil’s match against Portugal, when from her apartment, Mrs. Renata Veloso Guerck Austriaco spotted a hexagonal light object accompanied of two other spherical flying objects that rotated under its orbit. As the UFO approached the Nossa Senhora Aparecida church, the streetlights of the Bela Vista neighborhood had a blackout, extinguishing block by block. From that moment, several claudienses began to observe the strange lights flying over the city and arriving to land in the countryside, along the MG 260 highway.”
That Google translation of Portuguese comes from a recent investigative report in the Brazilian media source saudedomeio.com, which brings readers up-to-date on the original 2008 sighting in Cláudio, a city in the state of Minas Gerais in southeastern Brazil. Police officers called to the scene said “We saw an oval-shaped, rectangular-shaped perched object, the size and appearance of a wheelless minibus, emitting white light, like a xenon headlight. This light came out of an opening that cut through the middle of that object. Then he went up until we lost sight of him.” Multiple witnesses reported seeing the lights over the next few days. (Photograph here.)
In 2015, investigators from Ovni Pesquia (UFO Search) magazine requested and received police documents which revealed much more. On November 20, two officers reported seeing aliens.
“We saw two luminous beings, about three feet tall, gliding through the reeds. We were in the Mitsubishi pickup truck on a back road when Sergeant William saw something in the woods. He turned the car 13533 towards the ‘luminous beings’, as we approached (15 or 20 meters), they began to slide through the reeds. We were about 20 km / h and these continued forward and to the right, it was noticeable that those things ‘walked’ without touching the ground. We saw no feet, no toes, but we saw arms, legs, and oval heads, and though they were bright, they did not illuminate.”
Illustration of another luminous being with oval head
The witnesses believed the aliens controlled their thoughts because they later had headaches, confusion, anxiety and a period of unaccountable time. The report states that other non-military witnesses had similar alien contacts and also reported electrical problems with their cars.
That brings us to new information uncovered in February of 2019 by investigators from Ovni Pesquia. They interviewed the witness who took the photographs (Corporal Rabelo) who revealed he was visited by “military personnel from Lagoa Santa Air Base” who took away his digital photo cards (luckily, he had a backup) and told him what he saw was “artificial gas burning.” Rabelo told the magazine investigators that the “artificial gas” looked more like a “two-story wheelless minibus UFO” that was also seen by another witness they interviewed as well, who told them this:
“It was the size of a truck, a minibus! It made no noise, just floated. I saw the reeds shine, because it was a very bright light. It looked like it had fire inside, very strange color.”
Were the aliens just making a pit stop?
Based on that, UFO Search investigators made yet another request through the Citizen Information Service for the official report, a reported sketch and the photos. That was in late February and, as of this writing of the new report in saudedomeio.com this week, they have received nothing and are crying cover-up:
“Will we have news of this “invasion” or will our Brazilian Air Force continue to cover the facts in that mining city? This is the question that doesn’t want to shut up!” }Will they ever get the secret report? Will they get a visit from mysterious men asking questions and taking their photo cards?
Uranus is one of the solar system’s most mysterious planets.
Scientists had long believed that the “ice giant” world has clouds of hydrogen sulfide, a compound that smells bad to people, but they couldn’t be certain.
New telescope observations confirm the planet is clouded by the chemical.
The discovery may help astronomers further unravel the twisted history of the solar system‘s formation.
Foto: NASA/JPL-Caltech A photo of Uranus taken by Voyager 2 in 1986 (edited to show its moon and rings).
Uranus, the seventh planet from the sun, has held a vital (and smelly) secret of the solar system for decades.
An international team of researchers reported on Monday that they’ve discovered evidence that Uranus holds one of the most unpleasant-smelling chemicals known to humankind.
“They found hydrogen sulfide, the odiferous gas that most people avoid, in Uranus’s cloud tops,” according to a press release from Gemini Observatory, a high-power telescope atop a Hawaiian volcano.
Voyager 2was the only spacecraft ever to visit the chilly, blue-green “ice giant.” The probe tried to see which chemicals were in Uranus’ clouds during its 1986 flyby, but it couldn’t tell scientists for certain.
Now, however, astronomers have used an instrument at the Gemini Observatory to “sniff” the planet’s gases from Earth. Their discovery could help write the book on when and where the planets of the solar system formed – and if they ever switched places.
“This is evidence of a big shakeup early on in the solar system’s formation,” Glenn Orton, a co-author of the new study and a planetary scientist at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory, told Business Insider. “There was definitely a migration taking place.”
The journal Nature Astronomy published the findings on Monday.
Why it took so long to detect Uranus’s stinky clouds
Foto: The Gemini North telescope at Mauna Kea, Hawaii, which is part of the Gemini Observatory project.sourceDave Mosher
The reason most people avoid hydrogen sulfide is because the compound is a signature ingredient in the scent of rotten eggs – and farts.
Humans can smell hydrogen sulfide when it makes up as little as three out of every billion molecules in the air, the EPA says. At higher concentrations, such as near volcanic areas, it can be poisonous. Breathing a concentration of a few hundred parts per million can kill a person in about half an hour, according to the Centers for Disease Control.
“If an unfortunate human were ever to descend through Uranus’s clouds, they would be met with very unpleasant and odiferous conditions,” Patrick Irwin, a physicist at the University of Oxford who led the new study, said in the press release. But he added that “suffocation and exposure” to Uranus’ -200 degree Celsius temperatures “would take its toll long before the smell.”
Researchers had long suspected that Uranus’s atmosphere was laced with hydrogen sulfide, and in concentrations dozens of times higher than at Saturn or Jupiter.
They couldn’t be certain, though, since Uranus orbits the sun from 1.85 billion miles away.
The vast distance, aside from making the planet distant and difficult to study, leads to blisteringly cold temperatures that freezes hydrogen sulfide. Hydrogen-sulfide ice can form clouds, but the solid crystals are hard for chemical-analyzing instruments called spectrometers to study. (The method works far better with liquids and gases.)
Irwin and others suspected there were at least whiffs of hydrogen sulfide gas drifting above the clouds. And now, thanks to an extremely sensitive Gemini instrument that can see light invisible to humans, Irwin said scientists “have the fingerprint which caught the culprit.”
Why the discovery might ‘shake up’ ideas about the solar system’s evolution
Foto: An artist’s conception of the dust and gas surrounding a newly formed planetary system. source NASA
Astronomers like Irwin have an interest in hydrogen sulfide on Uranus that goes far beyond the gas’ smell.
The discovery of hydrogen sulfide may help piece together the story of how the solar system formed and arranged itself some 4.6 billion years ago. Figuring out the exact makeup of distant planets could help determine where in the solar system they first formed – and how far they migrated away from the sun afterward.
Like all planets, Uranus and Neptune formed from a giant disk of gas and dust that shrouded the sun some 4.6 billion years ago. The planets are mostly made of heavier elements, and didn’t balloon with lightweight hydrogen and helium gases.
“Uranus and Neptune never had the time to grow into gas giants like Jupiter and Saturn,” Imke de Pater, an astronomer at the University of California Berkeley who wasn’t involved in the study, wrote in an accompanying article in Nature Astronomy. “The composition of a celestial body is a fundamental parameter in determining its formation and evolutionary history.”
The two planets failed to become gas giants (and instead became “ice giants”) for two main reasons.
First, the solar system’s early disk of dust and gas grew more diffuse farther out from the sun. With less material available, it took Uranus and Neptune longer to form.
Second, this slower formation gave the sun more time to blow hydrogen and helium out of the solar system with its stellar winds – before Uranus and Neptune could grow massive enough to capture it with their gravity.
“Giant planets form really fast, in a few million years,” Kevin Walsh, who studies planet formation at the Southwest Research Institute in Colorado, told Space.com in March. “That creates a time limit because the gas disk around the sun only lasts 4 to 5 million years.”
Scientists agree on this much, but Orton said they have “too many theories” about the migration of Uranus and Neptune, which came next.
Foto: A true-color photo of Uranus (left) and a false color image (right) taken at the turn of 1986 by NASA’s Voyager 2 probe. source NASA/JPL-Caltech
One leading idea says the planets coalesced millions of miles closer to the sun, then quickly migrated outward.
But Orton said the newly detected hydrogen sulfide – and a strange lack of ammonia in the Gemini Observatory readings – suggest the planets actually formed farther out, then moved inward. (The ratio of the two molecules suggests the worlds were once even colder than they are today.)
To solve the question once and for all, Orton says researchers need to send spacecraft to plunge through the clouds of Uranus, not unlike how the Cassini probe dove into Saturn. The goal: figure out the exact abundances of hydrogen sulfide and ammonia, among other gases, and use the readings to pin the exact birth locations of Uranus and Neptune.
“We’re working on that now,” Orton said, referring to a proposal for a new Uranus probe.
A massive planetary embryo may have hit Jupiter 4.5 billion years ago.
This Hubble Space Telescope view of Jupiter, taken on June 27, 2019, reveals the giant planet's trademark Great Red Spot, and a more intense color palette in the clouds swirling in Jupiter's turbulent atmosphere than seen in previous years. One new study suggest that the gas giant's dilute core was formed by a massive collision billions of years ago.
About 4.5 billion years ago, a young Jupiter collided head-on with a planetary embryo 10 times more massive than Earth. This giant impact formed Jupiter's dilute core, which contains hydrogen and helium, one new study suggests.
Before NASA's Juno mission launched to orbit and study Jupiter, scientists thought that the planet's core was dense and compact. "Astronomers assumed that Jupiter has a small compact core with a mass ranging from 5 to 20 Earth masses," lead study author Shangfei Liu of Sun Yat-sen University in Zhuhai, China, said in an email to Space.com.
This was assumed because Jupiter started off as a rocky and icy planetary embryo. However, studies using data from Juno found that the planet has an extended, dilute core — a core that is not only made up of rocky material and ice, but also hydrogen and helium. This "also means there is no sharp transition between the core and the envelope as we previously envisioned from planet formation theory," Liu said. This dilute core is something that scientists determined could not form naturally.
According to one new study, Jupiter's dilute core was formed by a collision with a massive, planetary embryo. This impact can be seen in this visualization.
(Image credit: Astrobiology Center, Japan)
"That's why we came up with the impact idea: Jupiter was smacked head-on by another massive planetary embryo (about 10 Earth masses) shortly after its formation," Liu said. "Such a catastrophic collision destroyed Jupiter's primordial compact core, and a dilute-core-like structure was formed."
The cores of both the young Jupiter and the planetary embryo merged in this violent impact, the authors of this new study suggest. The materials from both of these cores partially mixed with Jupiter's gaseous envelope, which can be detected in the planet's structure still today.
According to one new study, led by researcher Shangfei Liu, Jupiter's dilute core was created by a collision with a massive planetary embryo. This figure from the study visualizes that collision.
(Image credit: Shangfei Liu)
When Jupiter began building the massive, gaseous envelope that surrounds its core, "its mass increases about 30 times in a fraction of a million years," Liu said. This process, known as the runaway gas accretion stage, disturbed planetary embryos that were developing nearby.
"Through computational simulations, we show that there is at least 40% chance that Jupiter would collide with another planetary embryo in the next few million years," Liu added.
The team determined that the developing planet that collided with Jupiter must have been about 10 times the mass of the Earth, because "smaller impactors cannot penetrate Jupiter's massive envelope," Liu said. Additionally, the collision must have been head-on, because if the object didn't hit Jupiter directly, it would slowly sink toward the center instead of destroying the planet's core, as it would have less impact energy.
Surprise Discovery Reveals Ancient City of Troy is 5,500 Years Old
The city of Troy has fascinated people for millennia. Once thought to be purely mythological, the lost city emerged as a real place in history when it was discovered in Turkey by Heinrich Schliemannin the 1870s. Archaeologists in Turkey have now made a surprising discovery indicating the ancient city could be 600 years older than previously believed. This could transform our understanding of the historic city and our past.
Experts from the Archaeology Department of Canakkale Onsekiz Mart University (COMU) have been working on the archaeological site of Troy in recent years.
Troy is located in Turkey’s north-western Çanakkale province. It is located on a mound or tell, Hisarlık overlooking the Aegean. Troy has been a UNESCO World Heritage Site since 1988 and in 2018 the Turkish government celebrated the 20th anniversary of the awarding of this accolade.
The ruins of the legendary ancient city of Troy in Turkey.
Troy was immortalized by the legendary Greek poet Homer in his epic poem The Iliad . The work was a key text in the Classical World and is often regarded as the first work in Western Literature. The historicity of the city was proven by German archaeologist Heinrich Schliemann in the 1870s, who is regarded as one of the founders of modern archaeology. The Daily Sabahreports that Troy was the setting of the ‘‘Greek Trojan War in which Spartan and Achaean warriors from Greece besieged the city in 13th century B.C’’.
When Schliemann found the site, he believed that he had found evidence of the Trojan War that was so famously portrayed in the epic poem The Iliad . The German even named gold items he found after characters in the Homeric poem, such as ‘ Priam’s treasure’ and ‘Helen’s jewels’. However, there is much more to the history of the city than the reputed Greek and Trojan war.
Troy was destroyed and rebuilt many times over the millennia. It was built on a very strategic site and was as a result possibly attacked many times by invaders. The city may also have been burnt down accidentally. Moreover, earthquakes also may have destroyed the legendary city.
Since the 19 th century, ‘‘a total of 10 layers of settlements were discovered’’ reports Greece High Definition . Experts have called the layers Troy I to Troy XI. The first layer was found by Schliemann and every layer found since has been numbered and they have yielded many artifacts. These layers all represent settlements from Bronze Age cultures to the Byzantine Empire.
The Original Troy
The new layer which indicates a previously unknown destroyed settlement on the site has been termed Troy 0. Rüstem Aslan of COMU told the Daily Sabbah. "We found traces of burns, pottery and wooden beams in the Troy 0 layer". The archaeologists had found evidence for the earliest occupation of the location.
Based on the evidence found previously it was believed that the city was approximately 4,900 years old and dated to the Bronze Age. However, the latest discovery would indicate that the city was first established around 3,500 BC. This means that the settlement to the south of the Dardanelles dates back an astonishing 5,500 years. According to Greece High Definition , this ‘‘suggests the area may have been used as a settlement more than six centuries earlier than previously known’’.
The Enigma of Troy
Based on the various layers found at the ancient site, it appears the city had a very ancient and complex history. The latest finds, according to Argophila ‘‘may reshape our view of this fascinating ancient city’’. Historians are hoping the new layer at Troy may also provide new information not only on the evolution of the city but also on Bronze Age societies. Given the cultural and historic significance of the storied city, any future investigations will be closely followed around the globe.
Top image: Fresco of the battle of Troy. Credit: quasarphotos / Adobe Stock
The most recent social media movement regarding UFOs and Aliens involves Area 51. The idea is that a few hundred thousand people will attempt to #StormArea51 in search of UFOs and dead/alive alien bodies. Arguably, this can be blamed on various factors such as Bob Lazars appearance on Joe Rogan and an increased public interest in the UFO phenomena in recent years.
The idea of storming Area 51 is a joke, it is unlikely that most anyone will take the movement seriously or actually turn up. The secret military in Nevada base is most famously known for its development of advanced, next generation aircraft. However, some claims over the years have suggested there are other areas (S4) connected to the base that have crashed flying saucers. Bob Lazar being the most credible person to make such claims.
Area 51 itself doesn’t have UFOs, or aliens, and even if they ever did they would have been surely moved after the first unauthorised leak of the base by Bob back in 1989.
Despite the idiocy, illegal and bat-spit craziness of the idea of actively taking control of Area 51 there is something to be said for the baseline concept. Disclosing the secrets that are held by parts of the United States government on UFOs and Aliens, whatever they may actually be.
Tom Delonge, the head of To The Stars Academy (TTSA) took to social media (before deleting the tweets) to give an overview about the nature of the secrecy. TTSA have been working with congress to change the nature of national security policy regarding how UFOs are reported by military pilots.
Interestingly, Tom eludes to the fact the government does have detailed information, technology and ‘biological treasures’ aka dead aliens in jars. TTSA are working within the system to change the system, they aren’t tying to break it. The problem is that illegally storming Area 51 will bring about not much. Maybe a lot of violence. The movement may do better to peacefully demonstrate the request for congress to change policy, so that in time we can all see what the true reality actually is.
Nearly 40,000 fires are burning in Brazil’s Amazon rainforest, the latest outbreak in an overactive fire season. Don’t blame dry weather, say environmentalists. These Amazonian wildfires are a human-made disaster.
Smoke billows from a fire in the Amazon rainforest near Humaita, in the state of Amazonas, in the northwest corner of Brazil, on August 17, 2019.
Nearly 40,000 firesare incinerating Brazil’s Amazon rainforest, the latest outbreak in an overactive fire season that has charred 1,330 square miles (2,927 square km) of the rainforest this year.
Don’t blame dry weather for the swift destruction of the world’s largest tropical forest, say environmentalists. These Amazonian wildfires are a human-made disaster, set by loggers and cattle ranchers who use a “slash and burn” method to clear land. Feeding off very dry conditions, some of those fires have spread out of control.
Brazil has long struggled to preserve the Amazon, sometimes called the “lungs of the world” because it produces 20% of the world’s oxygen. Despite the increasingly strict environmental protections of recent decades, about a quarter of this massive rainforest is already gone – an area the size of Texas.
Deforestation in the Amazon has spiked since the election last year of the far-right President Jair Bolsonaro. Arguing that federal conservation zones and hefty fines for cutting down trees hinder economic growth, Bolsonaro has slashed Brazil’s strict environmental regulations.
There’s no evidence to support Bolsonaro’s view, Garrett says. She said:
Food production in the Amazon has substantially increased since 2004.
The increased production has been pushed by federal policies meant to discourage land clearing, such as hefty fines for deforestation and low-interest loans for investing in sustainable agricultural practices. Farmers are now planting and harvesting two crops – mostly soybeans and corn – each year, rather than just one.
Garrett’s research found that improved pasture management in line with stricter federal land use policies led the number of cattle slaughtered annually per acre to double. She wrote:
Farmers are producing more meat – and therefore earning more money – with their land.
Locations of fires, marked in orange, detected by NASA’s MODIS satellite from August 15 to August 22, 2019.
President Bolsonaro is also pushing forward an ambitious infrastructure development plan that would turn the Amazon’s many waterways into electricity generators.
The Brazilian government has long wanted to build a series of big new hydroelectric dams, including on the Tapajós River, the Amazon’s only remaining undammed river. But the indigenous Munduruku people, who live near the Tapajós River, have stridently opposed this idea.
According to Robert T. Walker, a University of Florida professor who has conducted environmental research in the Amazon for 25 years:
The Munduruku have until now successfully slowed down and seemingly halted many efforts to profit off the Tapajós.
But Bolsonaro’s government is less likely than his predecessors to respect indigenous rights. One of his first moves in office was to transfer responsibilities for demarcating indigenous lands from the Brazilian Ministry of Justice to the decidedly pro-development Ministry of Agriculture.
And, Walker notes, Bolsonaro’s Amazon development plans are part of a broader South American project, conceived in 2000, to build continental infrastructure that provides electricity for industrialization and facilitates trade across the region.
For the Brazilian Amazon, that means not just new dams but also “webs of waterways, rail lines, ports and roads” that will get products like soybeans, corn and beef to market, according to Walker. He said:
This plan is far more ambitious than earlier infrastructure projects that damaged the Amazon.
If Bolsonaro’s plan moves forward, he estimates that fully 40 percent of the Amazon could be deforested.
3. Road-choked streams
Roads, most of them dirt, already criss-cross the Amazon.
That came as a surprise to Cecilia Gontijo Leal, a Brazilian researcher who studies tropical fish habitats. She wrote:
I imagined that my field work would be all boat rides on immense rivers and long jungle hikes. In fact, all my research team needed was a car.
Perched culverts disrupt the water flow of Amazonian streams, isolating fish.
Image via Catesby Holmes.
Traveling on rutted mud roads to take water samples from streams across Brazil’s Pará state, Leal realized that the informal “bridges” of this locally built transportation network must be impacting Amazonian waterways. So she decided to study that, too. She said:
We found that makeshift road crossings cause both shore erosion and silt buildup in streams. This worsens water quality, hurting the fish that thrive in this delicately balanced habitat.
The ill-designed road crossings – which feature perched culverts that disrupt water flow – also act as barriers to movement, preventing fish from finding places to feed, breed and take shelter.
4. Rewilding tropical forests
The fires now consuming vast swaths of the Amazon are the latest repercussion of development in the Amazon.
Set by farmers likely emboldened by their president’s anti-conservation stance, the blazes emit so much smoke that on August 20 it blotted out the midday sun in the city of São Paulo, 1,700 miles (2,736 km) away. The fires are still multiplying, and peak dry season is still a month away.
Apocalyptic as this sounds, science suggests it’s not too late to save the Amazon.
Tropical forests destroyed by fire, logging, land-clearing and roads can be replanted, say ecologists Robin Chazdon and Pedro Brancalion.
Using satellite imagery and the latest peer-reviewed research on biodiversity, climate change and water security, Chazdon and Brancalion identified 385,000 square miles (997,145 square km) of “restoration hotspots” – areas where restoring tropical forests would be most beneficial, least costly and lowest risk. Chazon wrote:
Although these second-growth forests will never perfectly replace the older forests that have been lost, planting carefully selected trees and assisting natural recovery processes can restore many of their former properties and functions.
The five countries with the most tropical restoration potential are Brazil, Indonesia, India, Madagascar and Colombia.
Editor’s note: This story is a roundup of articles from The Conversation’s archives.
It's just over 50 years since the the Apollo 11 mission first landed humans on the moon, and (finally) the world's space agencies are now setting their sights on a new, ambitious target. It's quite possible that the next generation of astronauts may include the first person to set foot on Mars.
But if that's going to be the case, there's plenty of work to do yet. Successfully landing on Mars will mean overcoming a whole new set of challenges.
"We are not born to live in space – for us, space is still a hostile environment," says Tommaso Ghidini, head of the structures, mechanisms and materials division at the European Space Agency (ESA).
While it took days to the reach the moon, it's months or even years for the red planet. A zero gravity environment, loneliness and isolation, and a dangerous environment beyond the reach of traditional medical care all add up to make the journey to Mars one filled with risk.
For starters, astronauts on their way to Mars will need to deal with the higher levels of radiation that come with a journey outside the Earth's atmosphere and magnetic field. According to the ESA's ExoMars Trace Gas Orbiter, one single journey to Mars could see astronauts racking up 60% of the total radiation they should be exposed to in their entire lives – much more than their counterparts on the International Space Station, and several hundred times more than a human back on Earth would face in the same period. Increased radiation exposure is linked to a number of cancers, particularly leukaemia, so future Mars missions will need to develop new ways to cut the levels of carcinogens that astronauts are subjected to.
The solution, according to Ghidini, is some elegant engineering. Hydrogen-containing substances are proven to be good at protecting against radiation, which would mean water could be used as a protective layer within Mars-bound spacecraft. But water is both heavy and bulky, and very expensive to transport into space.
So the ESA is planning to use the fluids that are already onboard – like drinking water for the astronauts or propellants – and store them around areas where the astronauts sleep to give them the best radiation for the longest time. "That way, the water that you have to bring anyway is doing another noble function – protecting the astronauts," Ghidini says.
Water-lined space suits, with fluids concentrated around blood-producing areas of the body, which are already being tested on the ISS, would also be deployed to reduce radiation exposure.
A prolonged lack of gravity, both in space and on Mars, is another problem. As new bone forms along lines of stress; regular weight bearing exercise (even if it's just carrying your own body weight) is needed to stop bone withering away. As space is close to a zero G environment, astronauts experience little stress on their bones, and so fall victim to osteoporosis, a condition where bones can thin and fracture more easily.
While osteoporosis is a common condition on Earth, the near zero G environment in space could cause a new problem for astronauts' bones: they may be at risk of shattering, rather than fracturing as they might here on Earth. Astronauts will need to have a way of replacing any bone that may beyond repair.
The answer, says Ghidini, could lie in 3D bioprinting, where human skin, bones, and even organs could be printed on-demand in spacecraft or on the planet's surface.
Having on-demand replacement bones and organs available to Mars astronauts is one thing, but having the skills onboard the spacecraft when you need them to do the surgery is another.
"Once you have started the mission, you cannot abort it – you can't come back if you have a medical issue. You have to be able to heal the astronaut," Ghidini says.
Using robotic surgery equipment remotely operated by Earth-bound surgeons would seem like the ideal solution to onboard medical emergencies, but there's a 40-minute lag between a communication from Earth reaching Mars due to the distances involved – not the near real-time link that telemedicine would need.
Instead, one of the Mars crew would need to be the designated surgeon. If an emergency did strike, medical experts on earth could build a simulation of the astronaut-patient, which could be used by the astronaut-surgeon to practice on via an augmented reality (AR) headset, until they felt skilled enough to undertake the real surgery. The ISS has already tested the use of AR to help walk astronauts through new projects.
Space is a lonely place, so mental health is crucial.
Getty Images/iStockphoto
But the health problems that could dog a Mars mission would not only be physical: trapped in a small box floating through empty space with the same handful people for years would put a strain on anyone.
Keeping astronauts in good mental health is another priority for the ESA's researchers. The International Space Station is already seeing the first fruits of its work into mental health in the shape of an AI-equipped robot known as CIMON. It could eventually be used to help monitor and improve an astronaut's mood.
Keeping astronauts entertained is another way of helping their mental health hold up. Food, according to Ghidini, will be one source of distraction for the space travellers.
"We need to have, from an eating perspective, something that is more like an event – it's more social, it's even cultural. It's something where you stay together, you use your creativity, and you relax," he says.
That means cooking. Astronauts could be able to use 3D printing used to create meals with a sense of occasion, a break from a non-stop diet of pouches of dehydrated food. Ghidini's team has already 3D printed a pizza to show how on-demand food could help break the monotony of space dining.
Technologies developed as part of the race for space have now become commonplace: the CT scanner that was developed to test the structural integrity of materials used in the shuttle is now found in hospitals worldwide, while filters developed to recycle astronauts' urine inspired the filters used around the world to purify contaminated or unclean water.
Ghidini hopes that technology created for future Mars missions will eventually be used to improve the conditions for people here. And those next-generation technologies will have to be greener, too.
"We want to go to Mars in a respectful manner, and avoid the mistakes we have done on Earth. We want to go and do recycling on a massive scale – that's the way you do a mission like that, there is no other way. You have to recycle all the equipment, you have to use the resources you find in situ, and that is another lesson we need to bring back to Earth," Ghidini says.
Perhaps space travel will ultimately lend humanity a better perspective on its home planet.
"We are going to Mars because, first of all, we want to protect the Earth much better. Mars was an Earth before, and then it aged incredibly fast – we don't know why – and became what it is today, a cold desert with a mainly CO2 atmosphere. We want to understand what happened to Mars in order to avoid that it happens on Earth."
Explorations on Mars could point the way to new opportunities back on Earth.
Here's yet another reminder that alien worlds are far stranger and more diverse than our own solar system might suggest.
Astronomers just found a giant exoplanet three times more massive than Jupiter that loops around its host star on a highly elliptical path.
If this alien planet, known as HR 5183 b, were magically dropped into our solar system, its orbit would reach inside that of Jupiter but extend way out beyond the path of Neptune, discovery team members said.
This animated graphic shows the bizarre looping orbit of the alien planet HR 5183 b as compared to the orbits of planets in our own solar system. It takes between 45 and 100 years to complete one orbit, scientists say.
(Image credit: W. M. Keck Observatory/Adam Makarenko)
"This planet is unlike the planets in our solar system, but more than that, it is unlike any other exoplanets we have discovered so far," Sarah Blunt, a graduate student at the California Institute of Technology (Caltech) in Pasadena and lead author of a new study announcing the existence of HR 5183 b, said in a statement.
"Other planets detected far away from their stars tend to have very low eccentricities, meaning that their orbits are more circular," Blunt added. "The fact that this planet has such a high eccentricity speaks to some difference in the way that it either formed or evolved relative to the other planets."
HR 5183 b orbits a star that lies about 100 light-years from Earth. Blunt and her colleagues found the planet using the radial velocity method, which looks for the gravitational tugs a world exerts on its host star.
The research team has been watching the parent star with several different telescopes since the 1990s. That's not long enough to capture a full orbit of the newfound world, which takes between 45 and 100 Earth years.
But the astronomers were still able to confirm HR 5183 b's existence, showing that the radial-velocity method can identify planets even with such partial information.
"This planet spends most of its time loitering in the outer part of its star's planetary system in this highly eccentric orbit; then, it starts to accelerate in and does a slingshot around its star," study team member Andrew Howard, an astronomy professor at Caltech, said in the same statement.
"We detected this slingshot motion," Howard added. "We saw the planet come in, and now it's on its way out. That creates such a distinctive signature that we can be sure that this is a real planet, even though we haven't seen a complete orbit."
The magnitude of HR 5183 b's gravitational tug allowed the team to calculate the planet's mass: about three times that of Jupiter.
The exoplanet almost certainly started life on a circular path but then had its orbit reshaped by a gravitational encounter, probably with a similarly sized neighbor world, study team members said.
HR 5183 b reinforces a cosmic truth: Our Milky Way galaxy is studded with a staggering array of planets. There are worlds with three parent stars and "rogues" that zoom through space alone, forever in the dark. There are huge "hot Jupiters" that circle their parents in just a few Earth days, and there are big worlds like HR 5183 b that take decades to complete a lap.
"Copernicus taught us that Earth is not the center of the solar system, and as we expanded into discovering other solar systems of exoplanets, we expected them to be carbon copies of our own solar system," Howard said.
"But it's just been one surprise after another in this field," he added. "This newfound planet is another example of a system that is not the image of our solar system but has remarkable features that make our universe incredibly rich in its diversity."
The new study will appear in The Astronomical Journal.
Mike Wall's book about the search for alien life, "Out There" (Grand Central Publishing, 2018; illustrated byKarl Tate), is out now. Follow him on Twitter @michaeldwall. Follow us on Twitter@Spacedotcom orFacebook.
Starhopper is passing the test-flight torch to orbital prototypes.
Starhopper's biggest leap was also its last.
SpaceX's first prototype for its Mars-colonizing Starship vehicle aced its final test flight today (Aug. 27), rising several hundred feet off the ground at the company's facility in the tiny South Texas town of Boca Chica.
Starhopper lifted off just after 6 p.m. EDT (2200 GMT; 5 p.m. local Texas time), reached a hover altitude and then flew sideways to touch town at a separate nearby landing pad. The entire flight lasted just 57 seconds.
"Congrats SpaceX team!!" SpaceX CEO Elon Musk wrote on Twitter just after the flight.
SpaceX launched its Starhopper rocket prototype on its highest flight ever on Aug. 27, 2019. The reusable hopping rocket flew from one pad to the other, with a targeted 500-foot (150 meters) ceiling at SpaceX's South Texas test site near Boca Chica Village.
(Image credit: SpaceX)
SpaceX launched its Starhopper rocket prototype on its highest flight ever on Aug. 27, 2019. The reusable hopping rocket flew from one pad to the other, with a targeted 500-foot (150 meters) ceiling at SpaceX's South Texas test site near Boca Chica Village.
(Image credit: SpaceX)
SpaceX launched its Starhopper rocket prototype on its highest flight ever on Aug. 27, 2019. The reusable hopping rocket flew from one pad to the other, with a targeted 500-foot (150 meters) ceiling at SpaceX's South Texas test site near Boca Chica Village.
(Image credit: SpaceX)
SpaceX launched its Starhopper rocket prototype on its highest flight ever on Aug. 27, 2019. The reusable hopping rocket flew from one pad to the other, with a targeted 500-foot (150 meters) ceiling at SpaceX's South Texas test site near Boca Chica Village.
(Image credit: SpaceX)
SpaceX launched its Starhopper rocket prototype on its highest flight ever on Aug. 27, 2019. The reusable hopping rocket flew from one pad to the other, with a targeted 500-foot (150 meters) ceiling at SpaceX's South Texas test site near Boca Chica Village.
(Image credit: SpaceX)
SpaceX launched its Starhopper rocket prototype on its highest flight ever on Aug. 27, 2019. The reusable hopping rocket flew from one pad to the other, with a targeted 500-foot (150 meters) ceiling at SpaceX's South Texas test site near Boca Chica Village.
(Image credit: SpaceX)
SpaceX launched its Starhopper rocket prototype on its highest flight ever on Aug. 27, 2019. The reusable hopping rocket flew from one pad to the other, with a targeted 500-foot (150 meters) ceiling at SpaceX's South Texas test site near Boca Chica Village.
(Image credit: SpaceX)
The ceiling for today's flight was 150 meters (about 500 feet), SpaceX founder and CEO Elon Musk said via Twitter this week. That limit was imposed by the U.S. Federal Aviation Administration, which grants licenses for launches and test flights.
So, today's leap was quite a bit higher than Starhopper's three previous forays off of terra firma. The first two, conducted in early April, produced barely any separation between the craft and the ground; Starhopper was tethered for safety's sake both times. The prototype was first unleashed on July 25; the vehicle rose an estimated 65 feet (20 m) into the Texas sky.
Starhopper is powered by a single Raptor, the next-generation engine that SpaceX is developing for use on Starship and its giant rocket partner, Super Heavy. The 100-passenger Starship will have six Raptors and the Super Heavy will sport 35, with space for two more on the rocket, Musk has said.
Those numbers could change, however. The billionaire entrepreneur has promised to give a Starship design update soon after Starhopper's final flight.
Starhopper now hands the test-flight reins to two orbital prototypes, which SpaceX calls Starship Mk1 and Mk2. The company is building Mk1 in Boca Chica and Mk2 on Florida's Space Coast, reasoning that a little intra-company competition will improve the final Starship design.
Both Mk1 and Mk2 will be powered by at least three Raptors, Musk has said. The test launches of these prototypes will pave the way for operational Starship flights, which could begin as early as 2021.
Those first few commercial liftoffs will probably loft communications satellites. But the first passenger trip could follow shortly thereafter; Japanese billionaire Yusaku Maezawa has booked a Starship flight around the moon, with a target launch date of 2023.
Mars missions will be next, if all goes according to plan. Indeed, that's SpaceX's ultimate goal; Musk has repeatedly said that he founded the company back in 2002 primarily to help humanity colonize the Red Planet and become a multiplanet species.
Starhopper's flying days may be done, but the stubby prototype will be retasked rather than put out to pasture.
"Yes, last flight for Hopper. If all goes well, it will become a vertical test stand for Raptor," Musk said via Twitter on Saturday.
Mike Wall's book about the search for alien life, "Out There" (Grand Central Publishing, 2018; illustrated byKarl Tate), is out now. Follow him on Twitter @michaeldwall. Follow us on Twitter@Spacedotcom orFacebook.
In the early 1990s, one thing was fairly certain about the expansion of the universe. It might have enough energy density to stop its expansion and recollapse, it might have so little energy density that it would never stop expanding, but gravity was certain to slow the expansion as time went on. Granted, the slowing had not been observed, but, theoretically, the universe had to slow. The universe is full of matter and the attractive force of gravity pulls all matter together. Then came 1998 and the Hubble Space Telescope (HST) observations of very distant supernovae that showed that, a long time ago, the universe was actually expanding more slowly than it is today. So the expansion of the universe has not been slowing due to gravity, as everyone thought, it has been accelerating. No one expected this, no one knew how to explain it. But something was causing it.
Eventually theorists came up with three sorts of explanations. Maybe it was a result of a long-discarded version of Einstein's theory of gravity, one that contained what was called a "cosmological constant." Maybe there was some strange kind of energy-fluid that filled space. Maybe there is something wrong with Einstein's theory of gravity and a new theory could include some kind of field that creates this cosmic acceleration. Theorists still don't know what the correct explanation is, but they have given the solution a name. It is called dark energy.
What Is Dark Energy?
More is unknown than is known. We know how much dark energy there is because we know how it affects the universe's expansion. Other than that, it is a complete mystery. But it is an important mystery. It turns out that roughly 68% of the universe is dark energy. Dark matter makes up about 27%. The rest - everything on Earth, everything ever observed with all of our instruments, all normal matter - adds up to less than 5% of the universe. Come to think of it, maybe it shouldn't be called "normal" matter at all, since it is such a small fraction of the universe.
This diagram reveals changes in the rate of expansion since the universe's birth 15 billion years ago. The more shallow the curve, the faster the rate of expansion. The curve changes noticeably about 7.5 billion years ago, when objects in the universe began flying apart as a faster rate. Astronomers theorize that the faster expansion rate is due to a mysterious, dark force that is pulling galaxies apart.
Credit: NASA/STSci/Ann Feild
One explanation for dark energy is that it is a property of space. Albert Einstein was the first person to realize that empty space is not nothing. Space has amazing properties, many of which are just beginning to be understood. The first property that Einstein discovered is that it is possible for more space to come into existence. Then one version of Einstein's gravity theory, the version that contains a cosmological constant, makes a second prediction: "empty space" can possess its own energy. Because this energy is a property of space itself, it would not be diluted as space expands. As more space comes into existence, more of this energy-of-space would appear. As a result, this form of energy would cause the universe to expand faster and faster. Unfortunately, no one understands why the cosmological constant should even be there, much less why it would have exactly the right value to cause the observed acceleration of the universe.
This image shows the distribution of dark matter, galaxies, and hot gas in the core of the merging galaxy cluster Abell 520. The result could present a challenge to basic theories of dark matter.
Another explanation for how space acquires energy comes from the quantum theory of matter. In this theory, "empty space" is actually full of temporary ("virtual") particles that continually form and then disappear. But when physicists tried to calculate how much energy this would give empty space, the answer came out wrong - wrong by a lot. The number came out 10120 times too big. That's a 1 with 120 zeros after it. It's hard to get an answer that bad. So the mystery continues.
Another explanation for dark energy is that it is a new kind of dynamical energy fluid or field, something that fills all of space but something whose effect on the expansion of the universe is the opposite of that of matter and normal energy. Some theorists have named this "quintessence," after the fifth element of the Greek philosophers. But, if quintessence is the answer, we still don't know what it is like, what it interacts with, or why it exists. So the mystery continues.
A last possibility is that Einstein's theory of gravity is not correct. That would not only affect the expansion of the universe, but it would also affect the way that normal matter in galaxies and clusters of galaxies behaved. This fact would provide a way to decide if the solution to the dark energy problem is a new gravity theory or not: we could observe how galaxies come together in clusters. But if it does turn out that a new theory of gravity is needed, what kind of theory would it be? How could it correctly describe the motion of the bodies in the Solar System, as Einstein's theory is known to do, and still give us the different prediction for the universe that we need? There are candidate theories, but none are compelling. So the mystery continues.
The thing that is needed to decide between dark energy possibilities - a property of space, a new dynamic fluid, or a new theory of gravity - is more data, better data.
What Is Dark Matter?
By fitting a theoretical model of the composition of the universe to the combined set of cosmological observations, scientists have come up with the composition that we described above, ~68% dark energy, ~27% dark matter, ~5% normal matter. What is dark matter?
We are much more certain what dark matter is not than we are what it is. First, it is dark, meaning that it is not in the form of stars and planets that we see. Observations show that there is far too little visible matter in the universe to make up the 27% required by the observations. Second, it is not in the form of dark clouds of normal matter, matter made up of particles called baryons. We know this because we would be able to detect baryonic clouds by their absorption of radiation passing through them. Third, dark matter is not antimatter, because we do not see the unique gamma rays that are produced when antimatter annihilates with matter. Finally, we can rule out large galaxy-sized black holes on the basis of how many gravitational lenses we see. High concentrations of matter bend light passing near them from objects further away, but we do not see enough lensing events to suggest that such objects to make up the required 25% dark matter contribution.
One of the most complicated and dramatic collisions between galaxy clusters ever seen is captured in this new composite image of Abell 2744. The blue shows a map of the total mass concentration (mostly dark matter).
However, at this point, there are still a few dark matter possibilities that are viable. Baryonic matter could still make up the dark matter if it were all tied up in brown dwarfs or in small, dense chunks of heavy elements. These possibilities are known as massive compact halo objects, or "MACHOs". But the most common view is that dark matter is not baryonic at all, but that it is made up of other, more exotic particles like axions or WIMPS (Weakly Interacting Massive Particles).
Take heart, Pluto-is-a-planet believers. You have a comrade at NASA. In fact, it’s the head honcho himself – Jim Bridenstine, the current NASA Administrator. While on a recent tour of the University of Colorado Boulder’s Aerospace Engineering Sciences Building, Bridenstine unexpectedly blurted this out:
“Just so you know, in my view, Pluto is a planet. You can write that the NASA administrator declared Pluto a planet once again. I’m sticking by that, it’s the way I learnt it, and I’m committed to it.”
OK, we just wrote it, Jim. However, does it really mean anything? Is Pluto officially a planet again? Will science textbooks and science fair solar system models be forced to change once more? What about some of the other so-called dwarf planets – at least one of which is actually larger than Pluto? Should they start lobbying?
A “dwarf planet” is a celestial body that (a) is in orbit around the Sun, (b) has sufficient mass for its self-gravity to overcome rigid body forces so that it assumes a hydrostatic equilibrium (nearly round) shape, (c) has not cleared the neighbourhood around its orbit, and (d) is not a satellite.
The IAU further resolves: Pluto is a “dwarf planet” by the above definition and is recognized as the prototype of a new category of Trans-Neptunian Objects.
The reason for Pluto getting voted off the planetary island by the IAU is that it has not used its gravitation to clear the area around it of space debris. The International Astronomical Union, founded in 1919, is an organization of the world’s astronomers whose mission is “to promote and safeguard the science of astronomy in all its aspects” and whose primary purpose is to hold scientific meetings. However, deeper down in its mission statement, it also takes on the responsibility of serving as “the internationally recognized authority for assigning designations to celestial bodies and surface features on them.” Did we get to vote on this? Can we vote them out now?
One astronomer thinks so. Planetary scientist Alan Stern, leader of NASA’s New Horizon’s mission – the one that sent back all of those fabulous photos of Pluto – had this to say about the IAU.
“My conclusion is that the IAU definition is not only unworkable and unteachable, but so scientifically flawed and internally contradictory that it cannot be strongly defended against claims of scientific sloppiness, “ir-rigor,” and cogent classification. The New Horizons project, like a growing number of the public, and many hundreds if not thousands of professional research astronomers and planetary scientists, will not recognise the IAU’s planet definition resolution of Aug. 24, 2006.”
Stern was, and still is, mad enough to invent a new word to describe the lack of stiff scientific discipline (ir-rigor) by the IAU in knocking Pluto out of the planet club. Bridenstine is no astronomer (hence not a member of the IAU) and his only qualifications for the NASA administrator job were that he’s a former Republican congressman who once ran the Air and Space Museum in Tulsa. He’s also a former climate change skeptic who has since publicly admitted he’s changed his mind about that, so perhaps he can get the IAU to change ITS mind about Pluto. He can use those NASA New Horizon photos showing Pluto’s mountain ranges and plains, evidence of avalanches, plutoquakes and possible liquid oceans, and its nice spherical shape, which many scientists now believe are all better signs that a space rock is qualified to be a planet.
Senator Vows A Disclosure on Aliens and UFOs If He Takes the White House
Senator Vows A Disclosure on Aliens and UFOs If He Takes the White House
Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders promised to tell the American public anything he learns about UFOs or aliens if elected president next year. The senator, who’s seeking the Democratic nomination to take on President Donald Trump, did the pledge in an interview recently released.
When pressed whether he would be open about alien knowledge with the public if he takes the White House, he said that his wife would demand to let the public know. Sanders explained that his wife is not a UFO nut, but she always asks information about the subject and even asks if he does have any access.
When questioned if he does have any access, Sanders responded that he honestly doesn’t, but he will declassify any information concerning aliens or UFOs.
The idea of aliens and UFOs has become an increasingly hot topic online in recent months. It started earlier this summer with the launching of the Facebook event titled “Storm Area 51, They Can’t Stop All of Us,”
The event ended up getting the attention of the Air Force after it racked up hundreds of thousands of Facebook users who signed up to raid the secret military facility in Nevada.
The Air Force made a warning to the would-be raiders that they are ready to defend the base that serves as their open training range.
The event page and its backup were shut down recently by Facebook because of violations to “community standards.”
Beste bezoeker, Heb je zelf al ooit een vreemde waarneming gedaan, laat dit dan even weten via email aan Frederick Delaere opwww.ufomeldpunt.be. Deze onderzoekers behandelen jouw melding in volledige anonimiteit en met alle respect voor jouw privacy. Ze zijn kritisch, objectief maar open minded aangelegd en zullen jou steeds een verklaring geven voor jouw waarneming! DUS AARZEL NIET, ALS JE EEN ANTWOORD OP JOUW VRAGEN WENST, CONTACTEER FREDERICK. BIJ VOORBAAT DANK...
Druk op onderstaande knop om je bestand , jouw artikel naar mij te verzenden. INDIEN HET DE MOEITE WAARD IS, PLAATS IK HET OP DE BLOG ONDER DIVERSEN MET JOUW NAAM...
Druk op onderstaande knop om een berichtje achter te laten in mijn gastenboek
Alvast bedankt voor al jouw bezoekjes en jouw reacties. Nog een prettige dag verder!!!
Over mijzelf
Ik ben Pieter, en gebruik soms ook wel de schuilnaam Peter2011.
Ik ben een man en woon in Linter (België) en mijn beroep is Ik ben op rust..
Ik ben geboren op 18/10/1950 en ben nu dus 73 jaar jong.
Mijn hobby's zijn: Ufologie en andere esoterische onderwerpen.
Op deze blog vind je onder artikels, werk van mezelf. Mijn dank gaat ook naar André, Ingrid, Oliver, Paul, Vincent, Georges Filer en MUFON voor de bijdragen voor de verschillende categorieën...
Veel leesplezier en geef je mening over deze blog.