For this week's Photoshop Contest, I asked you to design some upgrades to the human body to make life better or easier. Some of your entries are sort of good ideas! OK, who am I kidding? They're ridiculous. More »
This week it came to light that BP had photoshopped—poorly—an official image of their crisis command center. Apparently, that wasn't an isolated incident. Let's take a closer look at this view from a helicopter, shall we? More »
I am just starting out in Instrumentation and was looking at a DP level transmitter today that is monitoring the water level in the bottom of a flare. The transmitter measures off a bridle that has about 8 inches in between the HP and LP taps. My question is: why do we have to fill both impulse tu
Ever watched a science fiction movie and groaned when the science is spun, folded, and mutilated? Sure, outrageous science is fun, but so is making fun of it.
In that spirit, we’re happy to announce DISCOVER’s panel at Comic-Con 2010, in sunny San Diego. If you’re at the convention tomorrow (Thursday) night, come by for a little discussion we’re calling “Abusing the Sci of Sci-Fi.” It will run from 6-7 pm, in room 5AB.
The panel will be moderated by DISCOVER’s Bad Astronomy blogger Phil Plait, who will talk with five sci-fi movers and shakers about their favorite moments in good and bad sci-fi science. The panelists include two other DISCOVER bloggers: physicist Sean Carroll of Cosmic Variance and NASA scientist and Eureka advisor Kevin Grazier, who blogs here at Science Not Fiction.
These scientists will be joined on stage by three people who actually make the sci-fi happen: Jaime Paglia (producer and writer for Eureka), Zack Stentz (producer for Fringe and writer for the upcoming movie Thor), and Bill Prady (executive producer of The Big Bang Theory).
Related Content:
DISCOVER: The Science and the Fiction, a gallery of sublime and ridiculous science in sci-fi
Discoblog: World Science Festival: The Science of Star Trek
Discoblog: Scientists to Hollywood: Please Break Only 1 Law of Physics Per Movie
I’ve written many times about the gender disparity in science. It’s important to support girls who are interested in STEM — Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math. I just found a new site that I think helps: Smart Girls at the Party. It’s done by SNL alumna Amy Poehler, who cracks me up, and two other women. They make videos where they interview young women interested in STEM, and the videos are, well… see for yourself.
Find more videos like this on Smart Girls at the Party
This video made me laugh; it’s supportive and funny, snarky and warm. I think a lot of young girls would really like it… though caveat emptor, I am not nor ever have been a young girl. I welcome comments from women and girls on this. What do you think?
We've all seen reflection used in photography—like when a lake doubles as a mirror to the sky. For this week's Shooting Challenge, we're going a step more complicated and using the principles of refraction. More »
Firefighters have extinguished a fire that raged for more than 15 hours after two oil pipelines exploded in the port of Dalian in northeast China, the Xinhua news agency said on Saturday.
The end of fossil fuel use, especially oil and coal, is a moment that has arrived. Lately world news seems to be stories of one fossil fuel disaster after another. The Gulf of Mexico cap on the well is probably not going to hold, as it was found to be leaking last weekend. There was a coal mine disaster and cave in again in China this weekend. An oil pipeline at a busy Chinese port exploded late last week, causing a massive fire that burned for 15 hours before being put out Saturday. Officials said no one was killed. Story at MSNBC.
The following peak oil news is from Solveclimate and the Guardian. I am on vacation this week so enjoy some news you might have missed.
Lloyd’s of London, one of [London's] most respected institutions has warned of “catastrophic consequences” for businesses that fail to prepare for a world of increasing oil scarcity and a lower carbon economy.
The Lloyd’s insurance market and the highly regarded Royal Institute of International Affairs, known as Chatham House, says Britain needs to be ready for “peak oil” and disrupted energy supplies at a time of soaring fuel demand in China and India, constraints on production caused by the BP oil spill and political moves to cut CO2 to halt global warming.
“Companies which are able to take advantage of this new energy reality will increase both their resilience and competitiveness. Failure to do so could lead to expensive and potentially catastrophic consequences,” says the Lloyd’s and Chatham House report Sustainable energy security: strategic risks and opportunities for business.
The insurance market has a major interest in preparedness to counter climate change because of the fear of rising insurance claims related to property damage and business disruption.The review is groundbreaking because it comes from the heart of the City and contains the kind of dire warnings that are more associated with environmental groups or others accused by critics of resorting to hype.
It takes a pot shot at the International Energy Agency which has been under fire for apparently under-estimating the threats, noting: “IEA expectations [on crude output] over the last decade have generally gone unmet.”
The report the world is heading for a global oil supply crunch and high prices owing to insufficient investment in oil production plus a rebound in global demand following recession. It repeats warning from Professor Paul Stevens, a former economist from Dundee University, at an earlier Chatham House conference that lack of oil by 2013 could force the price of crude above $200 (£130) a barrel.
It also quotes from a US department of [...]
We've previously covered how, despite camera ubiquity, amateur and journalistic reports of police, security guards, and other authority figures of varying legitimacy intimidating harmless photographers continue to pop up. Popular Mechanics explains why this harassment isn't just wrong, but illegal. More »
Scientists, using three NASA satellites, have created a first-of-its-kind map that details the height of the world's forests. More »
Shelby: CJS Bill Sustains Human Space Flight
"U.S. Senator Richard Shelby (R-Ala.), ranking member of the Commerce, Justice, Science, and Related Agencies Appropriations Subcommittee (CJS), today announced subcommittee approval of the fiscal year 2011 CJS Appropriations bill, which restores significant funding for NASA's human space flight program. Following today's action by the subcommittee, the bill will now go to the full Appropriations Committee for consideration."
Information on a 500KVA Alternator Name Plate
It’s not just the sequoias—the towering firs, hemlocks, and other trees of the Pacific Northwest make its forests the tallest in the world, matched only by those in Southeast Asia. That’s according to a study by NASA, which has completed the first survey of the heights of forests throughout the world.
The map, created by NASA’s ICESat, Terra, and Aqua satellites, does more than give bragging rights to West Coast residents. For one thing, it could help scientists who are trying to predict while wildfires might strike, as well as those who want to determine what kind of forests make the best carbon sinks.
The map could also provide a means of monitoring the effects of climate change and deforestation on the world’s forests. Deforestation and land change use is responsible for 20 percent of the world’s emissions, and 48 percent of the world’s deforestation occurs in Brazil, according to a 2008 report by the World Resources Institute [The Independent].
Michael Lefsky and colleagues spent years compiling the data, which they describe in the journal Geophysical Research Letters.
Lefsky used data from a laser technology called LIDAR that’s capable of capturing vertical slices of surface features. It measures forest canopy height by shooting pulses of light at the surface and observing how much longer it takes for light to bounce back from the ground surface than from the top of the canopy. Since LIDAR can penetrate the top layer of forest canopy, it provides a fully-textured snapshot of the vertical structure of a forest — something that no other scientific instrument can offer [National Geographic].
The team had to combine the data from a quarter-billion laser pulses to make this map. In these images, the data is rounded off: The smallest points represent regions of about 2 square miles, and the color comes from the average tree height there, not the absolute tallest individuals.
Interestingly, the forest map was just a byproduct of the measurements these satellites could take. ICESat, for instance, carries LIDAR capabilities because its main function is to measure the mass of ice sheets, while the Aqua satellite studies the water cycle. When NASA launch future satellites with more sophisticated imaging technology for vegetation, the forest map could get even better.
“This is a really just a first draft, and it will certainly be refined in the future,” said Lefsky [National Geographic].
Related Content:
80beats: Drop in Illegal Logging Left 42 Million Acres of Forest Standing Tall
80beats: Truce Between Green Groups & Timber Companies Could Save Canadian Forests
80beats: The Latest Threat to the Amazon Rainforest: Hackers
80beats: Papua New Guinea’s Forests Falling Fast
Image: NASA Earth Observatory/Image by Jesse Allen and Robert Simmon/Michael Lefsky
From Geeks are Sexy:
R136a1 may sound like a lame attempt to create a more secure webmail password, but it's actually the biggest star ever discovered. The British astronomers who found it said this week that though it's currently 265 times larger than our Sun, it may well have bee
hi all this is rajeev, i'm fresher in instrumentation, doin project in NTPC, 4 x 500 MW project, can anyone provide notes for basic Instrumentation
From msnbc.com: Innovation:
It's a modern-day version of Marco Polo's journey halfway around the world — but is anyone at the controls? A team of Italian engineers on Tuesday launched what has been billed as the longest-ever test drive of driverless vehicles: an 8,000-mile
A few weeks ago, the New York Times highlighted the work of Brazilian artist Rivane Neuenschwander. The article focused in part on her piece “I Wish Your Wish”, shown below.
The conceit of the piece is rather lovely. As described in the article, the piece “is derived from a tradition popular among pilgrims to the Church of Nosso Senhor do Bonfim in Bahia, who bind ribbons to their wrists or the church’s front gate in the belief that when the ribbons fall off or disintegrate, their wishes will be granted.” I had the pleasure of seeing this piece at the 2008 Carnegie International, and being completely charmed, I found a wish I loved, picked the ribbon, and tied it on.
Two years ago.
And that damned wish will just not fall off:
I’m assuming that the pilgrims in Bahia did not use modern synthetic materials, but sadly, Neuenschwander did.
How do you interpret this callout in the print: At datum C perpendicularity of .015 to Datums A and B?
I'm manufacturing a new geometry sailing hull. I'm manufacturing in Canada , using
the company name " Venture Hulls Canada Incorporated". This hull design will be a
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From Forbes.com: Technology News:
The efficiency with which we send a message around the world or receive one from a distant land makes letter-carrying, airmail and driving across town to hang out with a friend seem such dirty, carbon-intensive exercises. So 20th century. It's e
Please let me know what is the suitable way of earthing a building with many electrical equipments. my way is to lay a copper strip around the building and connect all equipments separately to that copper strip and connect that copper strip into one earth rod from one point.
my doubt is, what h
