Only two manmade objects have traveled beyond the far edges of the solar system: NASA’s Voyager 1 and Voyager 2.

Beyond the heliosphere, the bubble of space created by the Sun, lies the interstellar void of space between stellar systems in our galaxy.

For years, astronomers have suggested that the heliosphere is shaped like a comet, with a characteristically long tail that helps act like a shield that blocks incoming cosmic rays.

But according to new research, its shape could look far more peculiar than that: like a “deflated croissant,” according to a NASA statement. Less comet and more like a chewed up piece of gum, or maybe something vaguely biological from the movie “Annihilation.”

To construct the model, a team of astronomers took a closer look at data collected by NASA’s Interstellar Boundary Explorer (IBEX). The mission analyzed energetic neutral atoms as cosmic rays travel from the Sun and outwards towards the heliopause, the theoretical boundary past which solar winds can’t penetrate, some ten billion miles from Earth.

The team also considered data about charged particles being reflected towards the inner solar system, courtesy of NASA’s Cassini mission, as well as measurements from NASA’s New Horizons mission. Astronomers found that the further solar wind moved away from the Sun, it interacted with an increasing amount of material from interstellar space.

With all this data in hand, the team then got to work to come up with a 3D model of the heliosphere, as detailed in a paper published in the journal Nature Astronomy in March.

The result looks far more peculiar than the elegant comet-like shape from conventional models. Two jets shoot out of the center of this “croissant,” caused by the solar magnetic field. The overall shape is far smaller, rounder, and narrower than the conventional model.

Knowing the shape of the heliosphere could prove to be helpful in figuring out whether other star systems could also be shielded by a similar bubble, and thereby harbor life. The heliosphere stops most galactic cosmic rays from penetrating through — the ones that get through can prove dangerous, particularly to astronauts.

Astronomers are hopeful that NASA’s upcoming Interstellar Mapping and Acceleration Probe (IMAP) could shed more light on the actual shape of our solar system’s heliosphere. The probe, slated for launch in 2024, will attempt to measure how energetic particles behave and interact with solar wind.

READ MORE: Uncovering Our Solar System’s Shape [NASA]

More on the heliosphere: It’s Official: NASA Is Considering an Interstellar Mission

The post NASA Imaged the Bubble Around the Solar System and… Yikes appeared first on Futurism.

Original post:
NASA Imaged the Bubble Around the Solar System and… Yikes

A letter sent out to employees of Chinese state-owned travel companies claims that two experimental coronavirus vaccines are safe and effective despite not having completed phase three clinical trials, as Quartz reports.

Phasethree trials generally involve administering vaccine candidates to tens of thousands of participants, to establish their safety and effectiveness, before clearing them for widespread use.

Experts warned Quartz that claims about the safety and effectiveness of a vaccine shouldnt be made until thorough testing is complete.

Even if the vaccine itself is benign, if people think they are protected when they are not, they can expose themselves to risks they would otherwise avoid and increase their chances of falling ill, Alex John London, director of the Center for Ethics and Policy at Carnegie Mellon University, told Quartz.

Three out of six pharmaceutical companies currently conducting phase three trials of coronavirus vaccines are in China. The letter to the state-owned travel companies was penned by a subsidiary of one of these companies, called SinoPharm, according to Quartz.

The company began late stage trials in Abu Dhabi involving up to 15,000 volunteers earlier this month, according to Reuters.

Chinese authorities claim that a vaccine will be ready for widespread use before the end of the year, The Wall Street Journal reports an extremely tight deadline that,realistically, may not be met. In the case of SinoPharm, phase three trials will take anywhere between three to six months, Reuters reports.

If proven clinically safe and effective still a big if the next hurdle will be to mass produce and distribute the vaccine,which is a major challenge in itself.

View post:

China Is Giving People a COVID Vaccine That Isn't Done Being Tested - Futurism

Blast Off

At exactly 7:50 am EDT this morning, NASA successfully launched its Perseverance rover mission to Mars. The rover, with its Ingenuity Mars Helicopter in tow, blasted off from Cape Canaveral, Florida atop a United Launch Alliance Atlas V rocket.

A small earthquake prior to launch luckily didnt cause any delays, as CNN reports.

This is the first time in history where were going to Mars with an explicit mission to find life on another world ancient life on Mars, noted NASA administrator Jim Bridenstine during a press briefing at NASAs Kennedy Space Center.

Perseverance, NASAs fifth Mars rover, will spend the next seven months speeding hundreds of millions of miles toward Mars. Landing at the Jezero Crater, a suspected ancient dried up lake, is scheduled for February 18, 2021. The rover will then, if everything goes according to plan, deploy its experimental helicopter roughly two months later.

The launch follows two other successful launches intended to explore the Red Planet. China launched its Tianwen-1 rover mission last week. And the United Arab Emirates also launched a spacecraft to study Martian weather from orbit.

Perseverance is stuffed to the gills with scientific instruments, ranging from a device called MOXIE meant to test whether future visitors could produce oxygen from the Martian atmosphere, to SuperCam, a powerful laser capable of identifying organic compounds in rocks and soils.

The rover will also be the first robot to be able to hear its surroundings on the Red Planet thanks to a pair of microphones.

Additionally, Perseverance will collect rock samples and put them into a small glass tube with the goal of another mission retrieving them at a later date.

READ MORE: NASA launches Mars rover to look for signs of ancient life [AP]

More on Perseverance: On Tomorrows Launch, NASA Is Sending Spacesuit Chunks to Mars

See the rest here:

NASA Blasts Off Most Sophisticated Mars Mission in Human History - Futurism

Top United States infectious disease expert Anthony Fauci told a House panel today that he is cautiously optimisticthat a COVID vaccine will be made available in the US in late fall or early winter, CNN reports.

We hope that by the time we get into late fall and early winter, we will have in fact a vaccine that we can say that would be safe and effective, he told a House subcommittee that was formed to investigate Trumps response to the coronavirus pandemic.

One can never guarantee the safety or effectiveness unless you do the trial, but we are cautiously optimistic this will be successful, he added.

Fauci said that vaccines currently in development showed a healthy response, triggering a neutralizing antibody response thats comparable to the response in those who had already recovered from COVID-19.

The news comes after a large-scale phase three trial of a vaccine developed by biotech Moderna kicked off on Monday, becoming the first US-based coronavirus vaccine to do so. About 30,000 adult volunteers will be part of the trial across 89 US research sites.

In a Thursday ABC News interview, Fauci stressed the importance of wearing masks to not only protect us against COVID-19, but also help protect us against influenza during this years upcoming flu season.

Go out there and get your flu shot when the flu vaccine becomes available, he added.

More here:

Fauci Says He's "Cautiously Optimistic" There'll Be a COVID Vaccine This Year - Futurism

An eerily prescient moment in the landmark cyberpunk film Akira about nuclear destruction predicts the cancellation of the 2020 Tokyo Olympics. By preternatural coincidence, I taught the film in my Cyberpunk in Asia class on March 11the anniversary of the 2011 Fukushima nuclear disaster, and the last day of in-person classes. Distracting students from an apocalyptic turn of events with Akira felt both poignant and ironic.

But more poignant, while researching the class, I was returned to a piece of trivia I had almost forgot: Upon visiting Singapore for an essay in WIREDs second-ever issue in 1993, William Gibson described the city-state as Disneyland with the Death Penalty.

In some ways, I wasnt at all surprised my rabbit hole led me, well, home. Of course my interest in cyberpunk dystopias, divergently set in the future, yet always gesturing to a nostalgic, grimy past, converges in the tiny island I grew up on. A cyberpunk dystopia itself, Singapore takes pride in its emergence as a global capitalist exemplar while treating its colonial past as precious.

WIRED OPINION

ABOUT

Jerrine Tan was born and raised in Singapore. She has a PhD in English from Brown University and currently teaches Global Anglophone Literature in the English department at Mount Holyoke College.

Gibson emerged just as cyberpunk was on the rise. His landmark novel Neuromancer (1984) followed Ridley Scotts Blade Runner (1982) and preceded Katsuhiro Otomos Akira (1988), which are both set in 2019. For over 30 years, the year 2019 served as cyberpunks primary placeholder for the future. Rewatching Akira recently, I had an experience with the uncanny. Reflected in Akiras futuristic, oppressive Neo Tokyo was my home. The future was already here.

Like Neo Tokyo, much of what we see of Singapore is brand spanking new. Towering skyscrapers adumbrate the skyline as inequality undergirds society. Both cities exist as islands that rely on vast networks of connections; both are run by an all-seeing government with a distaste for protest. In his WIRED essay, Gibson refers to the island country as Singapore Ltd., micromanaged by a state that has the look and feel of a very large corporation. Indeed, capital is the citys lifeblood. Without any natural resources, Singapore exists as a financial hub and relies on trade to sustain itself. Singapores immune reaction to Gibsons piece was, of course, to ban WIRED.

In describing Singapore as Disneyland, Gibson pays homage to French philosopher Jean Baudrillards Simulacra and Simulations. (Incidentally, Simulacra is the only bookfittingly hollowed out to be used as a tool of concealmentfeatured in The Matrix, which was heavily influenced by Neuromancer.) In the simulacrum, what begins as an image of the real eventually reveals that the image is all there is. Ergo, the image does not merely conceal or distort the real, but reveals that there is no real at all. Gibson describes the sensation of trying to connect psychically with the old Singapore [as] rather painful, as though Disneyland's New Orleans Square had been erected on the site of the actual French Quarter, obliterating it in the process but leaving in its place a glassy simulacrum. In 2020, this is only more true of Singapore.

Last year, Singapore opened the snaking Lornie Road Highway. Erecting its eight lanes required clearing vast forested areas as well as the Bukit Brown cemetery, which housed thousands of grave sites of early migrants, and possibly the bodies of victims of the Japanese Occupation. It had been placed on the World Monuments Watch list, and the United Nations special rapporteur for cultural rights had demanded it be preserved, to no avail. Despite calls by the public to preserve it, the old National Library built before independence was demolished to make way for a tunnel that would save commuters five minutes. Visiting home last December, I found that a beloved park near where I grew up had been butcheredone side of the hill carved open, the lily pond full of fish filled in. New expressway, I was told. As a foreigner, Gibson intimated that the absence of the past in Singapore incited psychic pain. As a citizen, watching a resolute obliteration of the past in progress, I am haunted by gaping fish.

Read the original here:

The Fantasy and the Cyberpunk Futurism of Singapore - WIRED

Final Countdown

If humanity continues down its current path, civilization as we know it is heading toward irreversible collapse in a matter of decades.

Thats according to research published in the journal Scientific Reports, which models out our future based on current rates of deforestation and other resource use. As Motherboard reports, even the rosiest projections in the research show a 90 percent chance of catastrophe.

The paper, penned by physicists from the Alan Turing Institute and the University of Tarapac, predicts that deforestation will claim the last forests on Earth in between 100 and 200 years. Coupled with global population changes and resource consumption, thats bad new for humanity.

Clearly it is unrealistic to imagine that the human society would start to be affected by the deforestation only when the last tree would be cut down, reads the paper.

In light of that, the duo predicts that society as we know it could end within 20 to 40 years.

In lighter news, Motherboard reports that the global rate of deforestation has actually decreased in recent years. But theres still a net loss in forest overall and newly-planted trees cant protect the environment nearly as well as old-growth forest.

Calculations show that, maintaining the actual rate of population growth and resource consumption, in particular forest consumption, we have a few decades left before an irreversible collapse of our civilization, reads the paper.

READ MORE: Theoretical Physicists Say 90% Chance of Societal Collapse Within Several Decades [Motherboard]

More on societal collapse: Doomsday Report Author: Earths Leaders Have Failed

Read more from the original source:

Physicists Say There's a 90 Percent Chance Civilization Will Soon Collapse - Futurism

According to World Health Organization (WHO) director-general Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, the COVID-19 pandemic is easily the most severe global health crisis that the organization has ever seen.

Ghebreyesus backed his claim by citing citing the sheer scale of both confirmed coronavirus cases and the global death toll, New Scientist reports. To date, there are over 16.2 million confirmed cases worldwide and just shy of 649,000 patients have died.

COVID-19 has changed our world, Ghebreyesus said during a Monday press briefing. And the pandemic, he added, has shown what humans are capable of both positively and negatively.

During his address, Ghebreyesus said that the guidelines for how to prevent transmission havent changed in the six months since the WHO declared the coronavirus a global emergency.

Keep your distance from others, clean your hands, avoid crowded and enclosed areas, and wear a mask where recommended, Ghebreyesus said.

He then went on to praise countries that either nipped their outbreaks in the bud like Vietnam and New Zealand and those that managed to wrestle large outbreaks back under control: Canada, China, Germany, and Korea.

But clearly not every country got its rear in gear: While he didnt list any by name, Ghebreyesus didnt understate the ongoing severity of the pandemic.

The pandemic continues to accelerate, he said. In the past 6 weeks, the total number of cases has roughly doubled.

See the rest here:

WHO Calls COVID-19 the "Most Severe" Health Crisis in Its History - Futurism

Summer Blockbuster

Ever since the first-ever image of a black hole was published last year, physicists have been scrambling to learn as much about it as they can.

One of their astonishing new claims is that the swirling rings of light trapped in the orbit of the black hole Pwehi can serve as a sort of historical record, New Scientist reports. The rings of photons could be like the rings of a tree or even, tantalizingly, like frames of a movie that show the history of the universe.

The scientists studying Pwehi, who hail from a long list of universities, published work on those swirling rings back in March. In it, they argue that that the sequence of photon rings can tell them how the black hole formed, help them study its properties now, and even serve as a testing ground for theories like Einsteins general relativity.

Together, the set of subrings are akin to the frames of a movie, capturing the history of the visible universe as seen from the black hole, reads the paper.

While probing the rings could reveal many secrets about black holes, the researchers say there are limits to its value as a historical record of the universe. Each ring, New Scientist reports, is only six days older than the last, and eventually they pass the black holes event horizon and get gobbled up.

Were not going to see dinosaurs, Harvard astronomer Michael Johnson,who worked on the research, told New Scientist.

READ MORE: Black holes are hiding movies of the universe in their glowing rings [New Scientist]

More on the black hole image: The M87 Black Hole Now Has an Epic Name

Continued here:

We May Be Able to Extract "Movies" of the Universe From Black Holes - Futurism

What was supposed to be a socially-distanced, drive-in Chainsmokers concert quickly degraded into the sort of packed, close-quarters event one might have attended in the Before Times.

Now, New Yorks Department of Health says it will investigate the July 25 concert as a health hazard, NBC News reports. The close quarters and spotty mask-wearing make it all but certain that concertgoers walked away from the Southampton venue with more than memories of a mediocre EDM-pop band its reasonable to expect that many will have caught COVID-19 as well.

Videos from a concert held in Southampton on Saturday show egregious social distancing violations, New York Governor Andrew Cuomo tweeted. I am appalled. The Department of Health will conduct an investigation. We have no tolerance for the illegal & reckless endangerment of public health.

Its easy to joke. These are people who went out during a pandemic and risked it all to see The Chainsmokers, after all. And the opener we are not kidding was the CEO of Goldman Sachs, who performed a DJ set.

But the concert is also a damning indictment against trying to open too many businesses or lift too many restrictions as the pandemic continues.

I am greatly disturbed by reports concerning the drive-in concert held in your town this past weekend, which apparently involved thousands of people in close proximity, out of their vehicles, a VIP area where there was no pretense of a vehicle, and generally not adhering to social distancing guidance, New York health commissioner Howard Zucker wrote to Southampton supervisor Jay Scheiderman. I am at a loss as to how the Town of Southampton could have issued a permit for such an event, how they believed it was legal and not an obvious public health threat.

View post:

Officials Are Investigating The Chainsmokers for Spreading the Coronavirus - Futurism

The Dramatic Health and Game Changers in Medicine teams have gathered a distinguished group of experts to discuss the discovery of the smallpox vaccine and its influence on vaccines for other diseases, including COVID-19.

Dr. Arthur Boylston, professor emeritus of pathology at the University of Leeds and a senior teaching fellow at Oxford University joins this episode, alongside Dr. Paul Goepfert, Professor of Medicine and Microbiology and Director of the Alabama Vaccine Research Clinic (AVRC). Also featured are: Dr. Alice Phillips, a pediatrician at Cook Children's Physician Network in Fort Worth, TX; Dr. Michael S. Saag, Director of the UAB Center for AIDS Research and a professor of Medicine at University of Alabama/Birmingham, whose recent experience surviving COVID-19 has been featured on NPR and NBC News; and Dr. Paula Traktman, Professor and Dean of Graduate Studies at the Medical University of South Carolina, and formerly affiliated with the Medical College of Wisconsin.

Dramatic Health, a national healthcare video company, is the producer of the six-part podcast series Game Changers in Medicine. The series premiered in July with an episode about Vitamin K and an enterprising Boston house doctor. That episode, a series backgrounder, and additional material about the podcast series are available at http://www.gamechangersinmedicine.com, and the podcast can be accessed wherever you find your podcasts.

Contact: Mark G Auerbach at [emailprotected].

SOURCE Dramatic Health, Inc.

http://www.gamechangersinmedicine.com

Continued here:

New Game Changers In Medicine Podcast Showcases The Backstory Of The Smallpox Vaccine - PRNewswire

The old Jardiniere space is cooking again with the opening of Baia, a plant-based Italian eatery serving elevated pastas and pizzas. Plus, head over to Mill Valley where an epic outdoor beer garden is serving local brews, hard kombucha, and wines on tap.

You'll also crack up while watching Quack, Shotgun Player's new show on themes such as cancel culture and white male privilege; catch skyline and bridge views from a new stretch of the Bay Trail; and buy birthday cake cookies at a pop-up that aims to feed kids while schools are closed.

Whether you're vegan or not, order plant-based Italian food for pickup or delivery from Baia. The new eateryhoused inside Jardiniere's former spaceoffers animal-product-free dishes like cacio e pepe pizza, caprese salad, garlic knots, and gnocchi. Bring your order to nearby Patricia's Green for a picnic, daily from 4pm to 10pm. // baiasf.com

Buy a raffle ticket to support women and communities of color, and win a curated box of Bay Areamade artisanal goods if you're lucky. The Essential Kit for Uncertain times includes a mug from @peopleiveloved, pain alleviating fragrant tea from @flowerheadtea, earrings from @annamonetjewelry, a silk bracelet from @stellafluorescent, and moisturizer from @rootsblooms. Raffle proceeds benefit The Adabi Healing Shelter and The Loveland Foundation. // Enter and donate on theessentialkitforuncertaintimes.com.

Learn about urgent societal issuesthink immigration, women's liberation, mass incarceration, climate anxiety, and coerced laborduring the new weekly series UC Press Now: Urgent Conversations, kicking off this Monday. 11am PST, through September 7. // Register on gopassage.com.

Virtually view Root Division's Diasporic Futurism - Part 1 The Present Future. Curated by GLTTR Collective, the multidisciplinary exhibit explores imagination, identity, and finding joy during systemic upheaval with the goal of centering and celebrating Black voices, experiences, and art; online through Saturday. // rootdivision.org

Hear about "doctor dogs" from New York Times bestselling author Maria Goodavage. During this Rotary Club of San Francisco meeting, you'll learn how dogs can detect disease and help people suffering from physical and mental conditions, and even get an update on research into if dogs can detect COVID-19; Tuesday noon to 1:30pm PST. // sfrotary.com

Catch a panel discussion and screening of Susan Stryker and Victor Silverman's Emmy Awardwinning 2005 documentary, "Screaming Queens" to commemorate the 1966 Compton's Cafeteria riot; Wednesday 6pm PST. // Details on Facebook

Enjoy Golden Gate and Bay Bridge views on a new mile-long Bay Trail expansion. The scenic stretch, opened in late July, connects Oakland to Richmond and is the perfect place for a socially distanced walk, run, or bike ride. // baytrail.org

Attend Magic Theatre's virtual gala fundraiser, Springing Forward. After the virtual happy hour and cocktail demo, watch performances and guest appearances, enter a raffle, and honor the recipients of this year's Sam Shepard Legacy Award; Thursday at 6pm PST. // Register and donate at mobilecause.com.

Stream Quack, Shotgun Players' production that addresses cancel culture, anti-vaxxers, white male privilege, toxic diet culture, and fame; live virtual shows Thursday through Sunday. // Pay what you can, tickets on shotgunplayers.org.

After hiking on Mount Tam, stop by the Junction, a new Mill Valley beer garden serving up local brews, hard kombucha, wine on tapand PizzaHacker pies on a 5,000-square-foot patio. Weekdays from 3pm to 9pm, weekends 11am to 9pm. // thejunc.com

Watch "Rebuilding Paradise," a new documentary by Academy Awardwinning director Ron Howard that tells the story of the 2018 wildfire in Paradise, California and explores themes of community and resilience. // Stream through the Roxie Theater.

Join choreographer Alonzo King for a conversation on Climate Change Through the Artist's Eyes. Thursday at 4pm PST. // Register on climateone.org

Join The Walt Disney Family Museum for an evening with award-winning composer and songwriter Alan Menken, and sing along during a free performance of hits such as "Under the Sea" and "Be Our Guest" featuring Hamilton creator Lin-Manuel Miranda. Proceeds will benefit the museum's youth initiatives. VIP chat 5pm to 5:30pm PST, performance 5:30 to 6pm PST Thursday. // Register on mobilecause.com.

Support 111 Minna Gallery by RSVPing for their three-day live streamed Fun-Raiser. Expect live music, 80s DJ sets, comedy, cooking and cocktail making classes, yoga, political discourse, and plenty of art, of course; Thursday through Saturday. Donate at gofundme.com. // Details on 111minnagallery.com and @111minnagallery

Tour Napa Valley Museum's virtual exhibition, "Lucy Liu: One of These Things Is Not Like the Others," featuring the actress' wood sculptures, silkscreens, and large paintings inspired by Shunga, a form of erotic Japanese art; through September 27. // $5 suggested minimum donation, napavalleymuseum.org

Get your groove on outdoors with Discology, a socially distanced DJd dance sesh happening in gorgeous natural environments in cities nationwide. In SF this week, parties will. go down at the Sutro Baths Cave, atop Strawberry Hill, Mount Davidson, and the Rose Garden in Golden Gate Park; Thursdays at 6:15pm PST. // Register on discology.io

Tour Creativity Explored's new exhibit, The park "a darling walk for the mind," featuring works by more than 20 artists; Thursday at 1pm PST. // Register and find details on creativityexplored.org.

Order up espresso drinks, Neighbor Bakehouse pastries, and Dynamo Donuts at Linea Coffee Roasting's new Potrero Hill Cafe. Wednesday through Sunday, 7am to 3pm. // Details on Instagram.

Grab cookies from Frolic and Detour's pop-up at Deli Board. Order ahead for 'grammable boxes of flavors as birthday cake, chocolate espresso passionfruit, and masala chai molasses. Ten percent of birthday cake cookie sales will help provide meals to children during the school closure; Saturday from noon to 2pm. // Order ahead on frolicanddetourbakery.com

Zoom The Playwrights Center of San Francisco's 5th annual PCSF Playoffs. Watch two rounds of four staged readings on Saturdays of August, then vote for your two favorite plays in each round. 3pm and 4:30pm PST Saturday. // Register (free) on playwrightscentersf.org.

On your way to the beach, check out the window installation at The Great Highway art gallery in the Outer Sunsetor make an appointment to go inside and see the gallery's first significant art collab, "Restructuring in Progress", which showcases color and line painting installations by Mel Prest and machine-made sculptural work by Andrew Kleindolph. Twenty-five percent of sales will benefit SURJ Bay Area; through August 16. // thegreathighway.com

Volunteer during car-free Valencia Street. If you've already taken advantage of alfresco dining and extra outdoor space on Thursday through Sunday evenings, why not help keep the shared space safe? DM @welcometomannys to help enforce distancing and mask-wearing; Thursday through Sunday from 4pm tp 10pm. // Details on Instagram

See more here:

22 Fun Things to Do This Week (8.3.20) - 7x7

Playground Global CTO Peter Barrett: 'A dating app looks less appealing than contributing in some way'

Take one glance at Playground Globals portfolio and a theme emerges: The firms investments are forward-looking, longer-term plays, a strategy that runs counter to the fast-return ethos that permeates certain Silicon Valley sectors.

The Palo Alto-based VC firm is banking on the future with investments in capital-intensive and technically complex pursuits, including robotics, autonomous driving, metallic 3D printing and infrastructure. Its an investment strategy that isnt for the faint of heart.

So, how does a firm that embraces futurism handle the present-day disruption of COVID-19? It looks ahead, of course.

When co-founder and CTO Peter Barrett joined TechCrunch this week for an Extra Crunch Live panel, the pandemic dominated the conversation. The executive noted that a new and common thread has emerged throughout the many discussions among Playground executives and the startups in which it has invested.

Priorities are shifting toward finding ways to be of service.

Everything feels different these days. Recent months have caused many in Silicon Valley to reconsider their investment priorities, roll up their figurative sleeves and begin the process of helping the world survive and, eventually, recover from the seemingly endless COVID-19 pandemic. Like many others, Playground finds itself at a crossroads determining how it can be of service, while examining the ways in which a crisis like this can be addressed.

One thing that underscores this pandemic is a realization that we need to be doing other things if we want to avoid being stuck inside for six months to a year, Barrett said. The biggest trend is a recognition that we need to make the investments that give us agency over our biology, and to build the tooling and infrastructure, so the parade of maladies which is behind COVID wont have the same consequences that COVID-19 has.

The pandemic has also driven people to reflect on what they want to do with their lives, Barrett said, suggesting that this phenomenon could influence which startups emerge from this period as well as what venture capitalists choose to invest in.

If youre an entrepreneur, I think a dating app looks less appealing than contributing in some way, Barrett said, adding that entrepreneurs are looking at areas that put us in a position where we really dont have to be stuck inside because of a certain kilobase virus.

Playground has a number of startups that are in position to offer some support, though, as is the nature of the firms tendency toward long runways. Most, however, appear better positioned to consider how we can prepare ourselves for the inevitability of some future pandemic, rather than the one were currently battling. Click through to read the highlights and watch a video with our entire conversation.

Playgrounds portfolio is amix of companies that are building thingson a longer timescale thathave the capital andpatience toweather this pandemic, Barrett said.

However, in the near term, there are categories of companies that have an opportunity to be of service and grow their business.

Read this article:

How one moonshot VC approaches investing in the COVID-19 era - TechCrunch

Its a fearful thought for fans of jagged-edged futurism, but Netflixs Black Mirror might be just one of those things that never quite becomes part of the post-Covid new normal. Creator Charlie Brooker has been quite clear that the last thing on his mind in the current climate is stories about societies falling apart, which pretty much rules out 50% of the finest sci-fi anthology show since The Outer Limits. Fortunately all is not lost, for James Ward Byrkits Coherence is here to tide you over.

The film-makers 2013 debut centres on eight friends who gather for a dinner party in a California home on the night that a comet is due to pass by. There are tensions from the start: Em (Emily Baldoni) has turned down her boyfriend Kevins request to join him on a work trip to Vietnam, and is nervous that his vampy ex Laurie has also been invited along to the gathering. It is clear that Mike (Nicholas Brendon) has a drinking problem, while another guest, Beth, has a bizarre habit of offering ketamine-laced tincture to anyone who fancies it, which may or may not be adding to the general sense of dysphoria and dislocation.

The evening begins amicably enough, but then a power cut puts the wind up the party guests, shutting down wifi and, apparently, mobile phone connectivity. Two of the partygoers begin investigating nearby homes to try to establish if anyone in the neighbourhood has a working telephone. So far, so stereotypical cabin in the woods scenario, and yet standard horror tropes are soon swapped out for far more cerebral sci-fi stylings. The pair who departed soon return with a strange box containing Polaroid-style photographs of each of the party guests, and a set of numbers written on the back, along with an apparently innocuous table tennis paddle. Inside one of the other homes, they have glimpsed a group of people who look remarkably like themselves. Em meets Kevin at their car, but there is something about him she doesnt quite recognise, while nobody seems to be able to escape from this dark and discombobulating purgatory. The spectre of Schrdingers cat looms sphinx-like over the entire proceedings did everyone accidentally dab too much of the aforementioned dubious keta-tincture?

Byrkit shoots and edits the whole thing as if we are witnessing a particularly phantasmagorical reality TV show, complete with shaky cameras, the odd blurry shot, and characters talking over each other, along with sudden cuts to black. The result is reminiscent of the found footage subgenre that was once so popular in Hollywood, but without the ridiculous contrivance of that style that requires the viewer to believe that obsessive amateur videographers are lurking around every corner to document the moment.

There are also shades here of Melancholia, which came out two years previously and featured a mysterious new planet that exerts strange influences on the people of Earth. And yet Byrkits mis-en-scne is far more contained and claustrophobic than Lars von Triers whimsical fantasy. This is a science fiction story that could easily be performed on stage, so limited are the locations.

The intrigue stems from an increasing realisation that some of the company are trying to game their new reality. Guests keep coming up with new excuses to leave the house and head out into the night, like a cheesy 80s horror flick in which everyone is determined to split up and get immediately murdered by something bestial. And yet the discovery of new boxes with differently numbered photographs and random objects suggests almost all the partygoers have their own reason to be slipping out the door at the optimum moment.

Squint a little, and perhaps viewed through ones fingers and from a strange angle behind the nearest sofa, and Coherence could easily be a one-off feature-length episode plucked from Black Mirror. Its no San Junipero or USS Callister, but it doesnt lag far behind. Like an Agatha Christie whodunnit that exists wholly in the connective tissue between alternate dimensions, this is a twisted quantum chamber piece of meta-doppelgangers and sliding doors moments if those sliding doors had the potential to cause major injury that will more than likely inspire repeat viewings. If only to work out exactly what the hell is going on.

Go here to read the rest:

My streaming gem: why you should watch Coherence - The Guardian

UFO Task Force

The Pentagons Unidentified Aerial Phenomenon (UAP) Task Force, a program dedicated to investigating UFO sightings, is ready to start reporting some of its findings to the public, The New York Times reports.

The news comes after the Senate released a committee report last month outlining spending for the unusual task force.

Determining whether aliens exist is not the main objective, unfortunately. The main goal, as outlined in the report, is to investigate any links [UFOs] have to adversarial foreign governments, and the threat they pose to U.S. military assets and installations.

Just last week, Senator Marco Rubio (R-FL), chairman of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, suggested to local news station CBS Miami that another country like China or Russia could have made some technological leap, explaining previous sightings near US military bases.

News about the Pentagons efforts to collect and investigate UAP encounters first broke in a 2017 New York Times investigation, accompanied by several videos of mysterious encounters with still-unexplained flying objects.

The report also found that the Defense Department had been running investigations as part of its Advanced Aerospace Threat Identification Program since 2007.

Over the last few years, the Pentagon has started officially releasing the videos and previously classified reports about the encounters as well.

Congress has also recently turned up the pressure on the task force in an effort to have all data relating to the mysterious encounters released to the public.

It no longer has to hide in the shadows, Luis Elizondo, the former military intelligence official, who was in charge of a preceding program dedicated to UAPs, told the Times. It will have a new transparency.

READ MORE: No Longer in Shadows, Pentagons U.F.O. Unit Will Make Some Findings Public [The New York Times]

More on the program: Congress Is Trying to Force the Military to Release More UFO Info

Continue reading here:

The Pentagon's UFO Task Force Is Finally Ready to Report Findings - Futurism

Researchers have found evidence of gigantic waves of sand, often referred to as megaripples, slowly moving around on the surface of Mars, as Science reports.

Megaripples arent unique to Mars; they can be found in deserts back here on Earth as well. But the Red Planets colossal sand dunes, believed to have formed hundreds of thousands of years ago, could be a sign that winds on Mars are even stronger than previously believed.

In a paper published last month in the Journal of Geophysical Research: Planets, the team suggests that megaripples may be migrating thanks to small grains of sand knocking into larger grains, dragging them into motion.

The new research goes against current atmospheric models that largely suggest winds couldnt be strong on Mars enough to move these mega sand structures. In other words, a thin atmosphere may allow for surprisingly strong winds.

Using images taken by NASAs Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter, the international team of scientists had a closer look. By focusing on two sites near the Martian equator, they analyzed a total of 1,100 megaripples.

Scientists previously believed that these megaripples on the Red Planet were first formed a long time ago, when a thicker atmosphere allowed for much heavier winds, and were now stationary.

But to their astonishment, they found that the megaripples do in fact appear to move albeit at the slow paceof roughly 10 centimeters per Earth year. According to Science, thats about as fast as megaripples in the Lut Desert in Iran.

The surprising takeaway: Winds could be strong enough after all, despite the thin Martian atmosphere. A past climate with a denser atmosphere is not necessary to explain their accumulation and migration, the team concluded in their paper.

And thats bad news for future astronauts visiting the Red Planet, as windy conditions could end up messing with habitats and solar panels.

Nonetheless, its an astonishing new discovery about our planetary neighbor.

We can now measure processes on the surface of another planet that are just a couple times faster than our hair grows, Ralph Lorenz, a planetary scientist at the Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory, who was not involved in the study, told Science.

READ MORE: Giant waves of sand are moving on Mars [Science]

More on Mars: NASAs Next Rover Will Bring First-Ever Microphone to Mars

Read the rest here:

Astronomers Say Megaripples Are Moving Across the Surface of Mars - Futurism

The Big Quiet

The world has been both literally and figuratively standing still during the ongoing pandemic, scientists say. Lockdowns around the globe have drastically reduced human activity, and as a direct result, the ground is shaking far less a silver lining for those studying seismic signals.

In fact, an international team of researchers have found that seismic vibrations generated by humans have fallen by as much as 50 percent globally, according to a new paper published in the journal Science yesterday.

The 2020 seismic noise quiet period is the longest and most prominent global anthropogenic seismic noise reduction on record, the researchers noted in their paper.

Thanks to this quiet period, scientists were able to get an unprecedented listen to seismic signals from natural sources, including small earthquakes and volcanic eruptions.

While the reduction is strongest at surface seismometers in populated areas, this seismic quiescence extends for many kilometers radially and hundreds of meters in depth, the researchers wrote. This provides an opportunity to detect subtle signals from subsurface seismic sources that would have been concealed in noisier times and to benchmark sources of anthropogenic noise.

The researchers collected data from 268 seismic stations in 117 countries, examining frequency ranges normally associated with human activity. The quiet period started in China in late January 2020, coinciding with the spread of the coronavirus and shelter-in-place orders, with Europe and the rest of the world following in March to April 2020.

The noise level we observe during lockdowns lasted longer and was often quieter than the Christmas to New Year period, the researchers noted in their paper, a period that normally is the most seismically quiet.

READ MORE: Coronavirus lockdowns hushed seismic noise around the world [Axios]

More on the research: The Earth is Standing Still During the Pandemic. Literally.

See the rest here:

Thanks to COVID, the Earth's Surface Is Shaking 50 Percent Less - Futurism

Saturday at 8am on WCLK's The Local Take I talk with Devin Barrington-Ward about what "Defund The Police" actually means. Last month I moderated a panel discussion for the Center for Civil and Human Rights for the non-profit organization Equal Dignity.

The panel was made up of various activist from across the nation around to answer the question What doesDefund The Police Really Mean?One of the panelists was a young activist from right here in Atlanta. Devin Barrington-Ward is the founder and managing director for The Black Futurists Group. His organization is a social justice innovation firm that works on public policy, community organizing, the media and other tools to ensure an equitable and liberated future for Black people.

I asked Barrington-Ward to tell us exactly what his organization does, and why havent we had an organization concerned about our future before now.

He explained how he came to be involved with public policy after working with Stacy Abrams on her 2006 race for the Georgia House of Representatives. He thinks this is the best way to bring out change. In high school he participated on the debate team and while he was great at making his point, this didn't change anything. He began to look for ways to use those skills to make real change.

The Black Futurists Group was focusing on defunding the police even before it became a hashtag. He shared that police department budgets have waste that can be used to help citizens ratheer than locking them up. He suggests using technology to reduce unnecessary police interactions such as traffic stops. Funds from police departments could be used to provide more counselors in public schools. Instead of policing students, help them become better citizens.

Kiplyn Primus talks with Devin Barrington-Ward from The Black Futurists Group on WCLK's The Local Take.

For more information on The Black Futurists Group

To view the National Center for Civil and Human Rights Panel Discussion on Defund The Police

For more information on Devin Barrington-Ward

Read the rest here:

The Local Take: Black Futurists Re-Imagine The Police - WCLK

Blast Off

At exactly 7:50 am EDT this morning, NASA successfully launched its Perseverance rover mission to Mars. The rover, with its Ingenuity Mars Helicopter in tow, blasted off from Cape Canaveral, Florida atop a United Launch Alliance Atlas V rocket.

A small earthquake prior to launch luckily didn’t cause any delays, as CNN reports.

“This is the first time in history where we’re going to Mars with an explicit mission to find life on another world — ancient life on Mars,” noted NASA administrator Jim Bridenstine during a press briefing at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center.

Red Rover

Perseverance, NASA’s fifth Mars rover, will spend the next seven months speeding hundreds of millions of miles toward Mars. Landing at the Jezero Crater, a suspected ancient dried up lake, is scheduled for February 18, 2021. The rover will then, if everything goes according to plan, deploy its experimental helicopter roughly two months later.

The launch follows two other successful launches intended to explore the Red Planet. China launched its Tianwen-1 rover mission last week. And the United Arab Emirates also launched a spacecraft to study Martian weather from orbit.

Science Squared

Perseverance is stuffed to the gills with scientific instruments, ranging from a device called MOXIE meant to test whether future visitors could produce oxygen from the Martian atmosphere, to SuperCam, a powerful laser capable of identifying organic compounds in rocks and soils.

The rover will also be the first robot to be able to “hear” its surroundings on the Red Planet thanks to a pair of microphones.

Additionally, Perseverance will collect rock samples and put them into a small glass tube — with the goal of another mission retrieving them at a later date.

READ MORE: NASA launches Mars rover to look for signs of ancient life [AP]

More on Perseverance: On Tomorrow’s Launch, NASA Is Sending Spacesuit Chunks to Mars

The post NASA Blasts Off Most Sophisticated Mars Mission in Human History appeared first on Futurism.

View post:
NASA Blasts Off Most Sophisticated Mars Mission in Human History

Holy Hack

State-backed Chinese hackers allegedly targeted both the Vatican and the Catholic Diocese of Hong Kong in a months-long attack.

The attacks, first spotted by the cybersecurity firm Recorded Future, occurred as the Vatican and Chinese government prepare for a round of diplomatic negotiations, according to The Associated Press. China called the accusation “groundless speculation,” but Recorded Future suggests that state-backed hacker group RedDelta attempted to give China a leg up in the upcoming talks.

Aggressive Negotiations

In September, the Vatican and Chinese government are slated to begin renegotiations of a 2018 diplomatic agreement about bishop appointments within the country, according to AP News. The deal is a key part of the two parties’ relationship.

“The suspected intrusion into the Vatican would offer RedDelta insight into the negotiating position of the Holy See ahead of the deal’s September 2020 renewal,” reads Recorded Futures’ report.

Underground Catholicism

Catholicism has been a problem for the Chinese government: AP News reports that the country’s 12 million Catholics are split in half between a Chinese-backed sect and an underground church that remains loyal to the Pope.

The 2018 deal — and the upcoming renewal — was an attempt to unite the two factions. The original agreement recognized the status of seven state-appointed bishops who hadn’t been approved by the Vatican, smoothing over relations between the two.

READ MORE: Vatican allegedly hacked by China ahead of key talks [The Associated Press]

More on the Vatican: Trolls Immediately Attack Vatican Minecraft Server

The post China Allegedly Hacked the Vatican, Other Catholic Computer Systems appeared first on Futurism.

Read the original here:
China Allegedly Hacked the Vatican, Other Catholic Computer Systems

Volcano Cloud

The European Space Agency’s Mars Express, a camera-equipped Mars orbiter, is keeping close tabs on a mysterious “elongated cloud” appearing over the 20 kilometer tall Arsia Mons volcano near the Red Planet’s equator.

The spacecraft, and other ones like it, have been following the strange cloud’s evolution since 2009. Now, new images revealed this week by the ESA show that the cloud has persisted.

Martian Mystery

Scans suggest that the mystery cloud is not linked to volcanic activity in any way — the last time Arsia Mons was active was about 50 million years ago, according to NASA. Instead, scientists suspect it’s a cloud made up of water ice flowing down the sloping sides of the volcano.

The cloud, as spotted in the latest images taken on July 17 and 19 by Mars Express’s Visual Monitoring Camera (VMC), appears to be up to 1,800 kilometers in length.

Rapid Daily Cycle

And it doesn’t last long, either. Each Martian year, around the time of Mars’ southern solstice — the equivalent of December 21 here on Earth — the cloud grows for a few hours each day and quickly fades away again.

“This elongated cloud forms every Martian year during this season around the southern solstice, and repeats for 80 days or even more, following a rapid daily cycle,” Jorge Hernandez-Bernal, PhD candidate at the University of the Basque Country, and lead author of an ongoing study into the cloud, said in an ESA statement. “However, we don’t know yet if the clouds are always quite this impressive.”

It’s an unusual observation made possible thanks to the VMC’s wide field of view and highly elliptical orbit.

READ MORE: Mysterious Mars cloud reappears to haunt a volcano on the red planet [CNET]

More on Mars: NASA Blasts Off Most Sophisticated Mars Mission in Human History

The post Strange, Giant Cloud Reappears on Mars appeared first on Futurism.

See original here:
Strange, Giant Cloud Reappears on Mars