NASA Mars Orbiter Beams Back Images of Comet's Tiny Nucleus

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The High-Resolution Imaging Science Experiment (HiRISE) camera on board NASAs Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO) has become the first instrument orbiting Mars to beam back images of comet Siding Springs nucleus and coma. And by default, it has also become the first ever mission to photograph a long-period comets pristine nucleus on its first foray into the inner solar system.

Interestingly, through analysis of these first HiRISE observations, astronomers have determined that the icy nucleus at the comets core is much smaller than originally thought.

NEWS: Mars Missions Report in After Comet Close Encounter

Telescopic observers had modeled the size of the nucleus as about half a mile, or one kilometer, wide, writes a NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory news release. However, the best HiRISE images show only two to three pixels across the brightest feature, probably the nucleus, suggesting a size less than half that estimate.

The two observations showcased here are the best two from the HiRISE campaign. The top thumbnails represent images with the full dynamic range, including the nucleus and coma. Comets are composed of a central icy lump of material the nucleus and when the comet becomes heated by solar energy, ices sublime, blasting vapor and dust into space. During this process, the coma forms and the solar wind will sweep some of the vapor and dust into a tail.

The larger bottom images are overexposed photos where the coma has been brightened so astronomers can fully appreciate its extent. The nucleus in these images cannot be seen. The time between left and right images is approximately 9 minutes.

NEWS: Comet Siding Spring Whizzes Past Mars

Three days before closest approach, the MRO slewed to track the incoming comets location. However, its predicted position was slightly out, so mission scientists made some adjustments so the comet would be in HiRISEs field of view when the comet came within 85,000 miles of the Red Planets surface.

This is the first time that a fresh comet from the Oort Cloud a hypothetical region surrounding the sun approximately a light-year away containing a countless number of icy bodies that could become comets if they drop toward the sun has been observed up-close. The comets weve visited in the past with probes are short-period comets that have well-known orbits (like the famous Comet Halley). It is shear luck that Siding Spring, which was only discovered in January 2013, should be so accommodating and fly so close to a planet we just so happen to have an armada of robotic cameras ready to start observing.

PHOTO: Mars and Comet Unite in Stunning Close Approach Photo

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NASA Mars Orbiter Beams Back Images of Comet's Tiny Nucleus

NASA films fascinating SpaceX Falcon 9 reentry, paving way for Mars missions

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As NASA eyes future missions to Mars, it needs to accumulate data on how large-payload rockets behave in atmospheric reentry conditions. A recent collaboration between NASA and SpaceX allowed the space agency to capture some unique data on the reentry of a large rocket under Mars-like conditions in the upper atmosphere. Thermal video of the event is not only full of useful scientific data, its cool to watch.

The video follows the path of the Falcon 9 first stage, which is the largest section of the rocket. Its what launches the payload from the launch pad and takes it most of the way into orbit. After the second stage separates to complete the job, the first stage is either discarded, or recovered. Perfecting a method of landing and recovering the first stage is what SpaceX is working on right now (the Falcon 9R).

The Falcon 9 is a perfect vehicle to provide this sort of reentry data because its first stage is capable of powered descent. Specifically, part of the return procedure is firing the rocket engines in retrograde, or in the direction of travel. NASA calls this supersonic retro-propulsion. This is the part of landing where the rocket slows its descent, and would be an important component of future Mars missions, both manned and unmanned.

If you look at the way the Curiosity rover was landed on Mars, you start to see the problem. It was too heavy for parachutes, as the Martian atmosphere is very thin. It was also too massive for the controlled crash-landings used to get smaller rovers like Spirit and Opportunity to the surface. If you need to get a large payload onto the surface of Mars, you need a way to slow the descent through the use of supersonic retro-propulsion. Curiosity had its rocket-powered sky crane, and that worked well enough, but it wont work for a craft thats very much heavier. Youd need something much more similar to the Falcon 9.

To capture the data from this reentry, NASA outfitted two planes with high-resolution thermal imaging cameras and got them in the air about 50 miles from the Falcon 9s projected path. A NASA WB-57, a twin jet engine high-altitude research aircraft was equipped with a long-range optical infrared camera system capable of full-motion video. The other craft was a Navy NP-3D Orion positioned along a different part of the flight path with a similar infrared optical camera system.

Even without all the associated data points about heat levels and gas plumes, the video of the Falcon 9s descent is fascinating to watch. The change from a tiny point of light to blazing fireball illustrates how much energy it takes to bleed off all that speed from reentry.

NASA says the test data its acquiring by observing SpaceXs Falcon 9 rocket in action is invaluable. It could accelerate the design and testing of NASAs future in-house rockets for long-haul deep space missions and save taxpayers millions of dollars over time. SpaceX is probably happy to have the data as well it could assist Elon Musk and company in the ongoing design and implementation of its fully reusable Falcon 9, which has had several successful test landings.

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NASA films fascinating SpaceX Falcon 9 reentry, paving way for Mars missions

Klotman, chair of Medicine, Named to Institute of Medicine

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By Duke Medicine News and Communications

DURHAM, N.C. Mary E. Klotman, M.D., chairwoman of the Department of Medicine at the Duke University School of Medicine, has been elected as one of 70 new members to the prestigious Institute of Medicine (IOM). Klotman is an expert in infectious diseases and the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV).

Election to the Institute of Medicine is considered one of the highest honors in medicine, said Nancy C. Andrews, M.D., Ph.D., dean of Duke University School of Medicine. Dr. Klotmans election is a notable achievement and recognition of her important contributions as a leader and as a physician-scientist focused on the molecular pathogenesis of HIV-1 infection.

Klotman attended Duke University for both her undergraduate degree in zoology (1976) and her medical degree (1980) and then completed her internal medicine residency and a fellowship in infectious diseases in the Department of Medicine at Duke.

She started her career at Duke in 1985 as an associate faculty member in medicine, before moving to the National Institutes of Health, where she was a member of the Public Health Service. At NIH, she trained and worked in the Laboratory of Tumor Cell Biology under the direction of renowned HIV researcher Robert C. Gallo, M.D.

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Klotman, chair of Medicine, Named to Institute of Medicine

Video – A Look Around The Corner

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Now that its clear where tv and video are going in the near future, its easy to sit back and say the future is sorted out, no need to look further. Just stand by and wait for the long-heralded a la carte future to be built and deployed. But that would miss the fun part. Not the near future, but the future that waits just around he corner.

So with that in mind the New York Video Meetup (www.meetup.com/nyvm) put together a steller presentation of futurists and video activists to explore what lies ahead. The result was a mind-bending hour and a half of presentations and explorations.

The evening, sponsored by AOL, Waywire, and Kaltura took place at AOLs snazzy high

tech HQ across from NYU in lower manhattan.

The first presentation, byDC Vito,the Executive Director of The Lamp showed a combination of technology and business called Media Breaker. The Lamp is a not-for-profit whos goal is to provide tools to empower young people to talk back to media. Vito explains that young people now spend almost 11 hours per day engaged in media, accordingto the Kaiser Family Foundation. Thats amind-blowingnumber. Vito co-founded The LAMP (Learning AboutMultimedia Project) in 2007 to engage teens. What Vito learned was that young people who confronted orcriticizedmedia found that brands, companies, and lawyers would quickly send take down notices to YouTube, removing what was the natural platform for teens as a home of media criticism. Fair use, it turns out, is only fair if you have a lawyer to argue your side.

So Vito and his team built an editing tool, Media Breaker to give teens a web-based, easy to use platform to edit and remix media. Sure, you could use iMovie, Final Cut, or Premier for that. But he added an important layer upload to Mediabreaker and their team of fair-use lawyers will review and almost always defend your video. So teens with an argument to pick with say Kia automotive for what they see as racist use of a hamster, dont have to go it alone.

http://lamplatoon.thelamp.org/

Vito told the Knight Foundation a funder of MediaBreaker; In breaking new ground with the Media Breaker, it is our intent to help create 10,000 little Jon Stewarts engaged, excited and activated users breaking the media and changing the message.

And at NYVM he opened some eyes. Yes, YouTube is powerful, but without an underlying system to support fair use and critical dialog, the content owner with the deepest pockets can easily just suppressdissent.And as content moves across the web, there are new tools and communities to help creators navigate both the technical and businesschallenges. Media Breaker is a great glimpse into the future.

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Video - A Look Around The Corner

Lack of children’s medicine in China – China Take – Oct 17 ,2014 – BONTV China – Video

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Lack of children #39;s medicine in China - China Take - Oct 17 ,2014 - BONTV China
China, BONTV, news, Lack of children #39;s medicine in China China #39;s Ministry of Healthadult medicinemedicinal drugs for children heart diseases, pharmaceutical companies.

By: bontvchina

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Lack of children's medicine in China - China Take - Oct 17 ,2014 - BONTV China - Video

Medicine Buddha- Malika Sellami, Kalki & Synchroshakti (Prod. By Malika Sellami) – Video

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Medicine Buddha- Malika Sellami, Kalki Synchroshakti (Prod. By Malika Sellami)
This is a rendition of the Medicine Buddha Mantra by Malika Sellami, Kalki and myself (Synchroshakti) Medicine Buddha Mantra- TAYATA / OM BEKANDZE BEKANDZE / MAHA BEKANDZE RADZA ...

By: SynchroShakti

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Medicine Buddha- Malika Sellami, Kalki & Synchroshakti (Prod. By Malika Sellami) - Video

Wagon Wheel – David Law & The Beat Drops (Old Crow Medicine Show / Darius Rucker cover) – Video

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Wagon Wheel - David Law The Beat Drops (Old Crow Medicine Show / Darius Rucker cover)
The Beat Drops live at Lansdowne Pub, Boston MA. visit: http://www.fb.com/thebeatdrops | http://www.fb.com/davidlawmusic | http://www.davidlawmusic.com Featuring David Law, Matt Karasch,...

By: David Law

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Wagon Wheel - David Law & The Beat Drops (Old Crow Medicine Show / Darius Rucker cover) - Video

UT, Seton reach agreement linking medical school, clinical care

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The University of Texas and the Seton Healthcare Family said long ago that the formers medical school and the latters teaching hospital would work together to improve patient care, advance medical research and strive to lower the cost of health care.

Now that pledge to cooperate is in writing.

A 118-page affiliation agreement calls for UT and Seton to partner for 25 years, with up to two automatic 10-year extensions.

This cements the partnership between the University of Texas and Seton, Greg Fenves, UTs executive vice president and provost, said Monday.

This is the foundation of which we will put in place a whole set of resources, especially for the poor and vulnerable, said Jesus Garza, Setons president and CEO.

The agreement was released Monday, the same day that Seton began construction on a new teaching hospital adjacent to UTs Dell Medical School, which is also under construction.

UT aims to enroll its first medical students in July 2016. Seton plans to open its new hospital, which will replace University Medical Center Brackenridge, in April 2017.

The affiliation agreement allows UT to partner with other health care providers for training and clinical care that Seton, as a Catholic health system, cannot provide. Officials said that essentially continues the current arrangement.

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UT, Seton reach agreement linking medical school, clinical care

PureTech raises $55M to support medical device, digital health innovation

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A sample of PureTech Healths pipeline

PureTech, which has put itself squarely at the intersection of med tech and digital health innovation, has raised $55 million in a growth stage investment round, according to a company statement. It also added three senior partners from MIT and Harvard Medical School.

It received the new funding with participation from Invesco Perpetual to push ahead its pipeline of digital health and medical devices.

It launched Knode, in 2012. The search engine aggregates data from journals, patents and clinical trials and spits out that information for users searching for experts in any one discipline or condition. A search for Parkinsons disease, for example, produces more than 25,000 hits with scientists listed in order of the number of papers theyve written, the grant money received, patents owned and clinical trials theyve done.

But it also has a large group of technology that combines pharma, digital and medical device technology. Gelesis is developing a smart pill that is treating obesity and diabetes and is taken like a drug but acts mechanically, so it would be regulated like a medical device. Akili Interactive Labs, which is working on a way to use gaming to remotely diagnose and treat cognitive disorders like ADHD and Alzheimers disease. Akili currently has 10 clinical studies underway, according to an emailed statement from PureTech Ventures Founder Daphne Zohar. She added that it will soon be analyzing the data from the first couple of studies. For a more detailed interview with Zohar, check out this link.

The senior partner additions include:

Dr. H Robert Horvitz, a Nobel Laureate and David H. Koch Professor at MIT. His lab at MIT is all about exploring some of the most complex questions in biology of how genes control human development and behavior.

Joi Ito, director of the MIT Media Lab, is also on the boards of several companies such as Sony and Mozilla. Ito has also been working on Akili. The maker movement is particularly interesting to him and he took part in a conversation on the subject at the SouthxSouthwest Festival earlier this year.

Dr. Raju Kucherlapati is the Paul C. Cabot Professor in the Harvard Medical School Department of Genetics, co-founder of Millennium Pharmaceuticals and Abgenix, and a member of President Obamas Commission for the Study of Bioethical Issues.

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PureTech raises $55M to support medical device, digital health innovation