Astronomers Find The Biggest Explosion Ever Seen In The Entire Universe – Forbes

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Evidence for the biggest explosion seen in the Universe comes from a combination of X-ray data from... [+] Chandra and XMM-Newton. The eruption is generated by a black hole located in the cluster's central galaxy, which has blasted out jets and carved a large cavity in the surrounding hot gas. Researchers estimate this explosion released five times more energy than the previous record holder and hundreds of thousands of times more than a typical galaxy cluster.

The Universe, everywhere we look, is full of cataclysmic events and transient outbursts.

The Crab Nebula, as shown here with data from five different observatories, shows how material gets... [+] ejected from a supernova. The material shown here spans about 5 light-years in extent, originating from a star that went supernova about 1,000 years ago, teaching us that the typical speed of the ejecta is around 1,500 km/s. The total energy output of an event like this is approximately 10 billion times the present energy output of the Sun.

They come in all sorts of varieties, from supernovae to black holes to merger events and more.

Zw II 96 in the constellation of Delphinus, the Dolphin, is an example of a galaxy merger located... [+] some 500 million light-years away. Star formation is triggered by these classes of events, and can use up large amounts of gas within each of the progenitor galaxies, rather than a steady stream of low-level star formation found in isolated galaxies. Note the streams of stars between the interacting galaxies.

Whether in light, particles, or gravitational waves, energy output is the great comparator.

In this artistic rendering, a blazar is accelerating protons that produce pions, which produce... [+] neutrinos and gamma rays. Photons are also produced. Extreme events in energy are generated by processes occurring around the largest supermassive black holes known in the Universe when they're actively feeding.

Supernovae releaseup to 1044 joules (J) of energy: totaling the Sun's entire lifetime output.

For the real black holes that exist or get created in our Universe, we can observe the radiation... [+] emitted by their surrounding matter, and the gravitational waves produced by the inspiral, merger, and ringdown. The most energetic black hole mergers seen by LIGO are thousands of times more energetic than supernovae.

LIGO's black hole mergers were even more energetic: up to ~1047 J.

The second-largest black hole as seen from Earth, the one at the center of the galaxy M87, is shown... [+] in three views here. At the top is optical from Hubble, at the lower-left is radio from NRAO, and at the lower-right is X-ray from Chandra. These differing views have different resolutions dependent on the optical sensitivity, wavelength of light used, and size of the telescope mirrors used to observe them. These are all examples of radiation emitted from the regions around black holes, demonstrating that black holes aren't so black, after all.

But the most extreme, energetic outbursts arise from jets emitted by supermassive black holes.

The galaxy Centaurus A is the closest example of an active galaxy to Earth, with its high-energy... [+] jets caused by electromagnetic acceleration around the central black hole. The extent of its jets are far smaller than the jets that Chandra has observed around Pictor A, which themselves are much smaller than the jets found in massive galaxy clusters.

Accreted matter gets accelerated by these behemoths, ejecting particles all the way into intergalactic space.

The active galaxy IRAS F11119+3257 shows, when viewed up close, outflows that may be consistent with... [+] a major merger. Supermassive black holes may only be visible when they're 'turned on' by an active feeding mechanism, explaining why we can see these ultra-distant black holes at all.

Smashing into the surrounding gas and plasma, they can carve cavities that span millions of light-years.

This infrared light image showcases the large Carina nebula, which houses Eta Carinae at the lower... [+] left. The gas and dust loops visible arise not only from material blown off from Eta Carinae itself, but also from the material of the larger star-forming region that spawned it millions of years ago. This is a miniature version, on the scale of a single star cluster, of what's happening on intergalactic scales in galaxy clusters.

The most extreme one ever was just discovered in the Ophiuchus galaxy cluster, 390 million light-years away.

The radio data of the Ophiuchus galaxy cluster reveals the presence of supermassive black holes (in... [+] white), but also an extraordinarily large population of gas and ultra-hot plasma, at temperatures in excess of tens of millions of K.

NASA's Chandra X-ray telescope found an enormous source of X-rays there, 15 times our galaxy's diameter.

The X-ray data, shown here in pink and overlaid atop the infrared data, transforms this non-descript... [+] cluster of galaxies into an enormously bright and large source in the sky. The X-ray data, even at a distance of 390 million light-years, takes up about a quarter of a degree on the sky: half the size of the full Moon.

Combined with infrared and radio observations, an enormous cavity emerges.

A combination of data from X-ray, radio, and infrared observatories revealed an enormous cavity... [+] spanning ~1.5 million light-years across, corresponding to the largest single-event release of energy ever discovered.

It was carved by an ancient, explosive, supermassive black hole outburst, requiring 5 1054J of energy.

Lynx, as a next-generation X-ray observatory, will serve as the ultimate complement to optical... [+] 30-meter class telescopes being built on the ground and observatories like James Webb and WFIRST in space. Lynx will have to compete with the ESA's Athena mission, which has a superior field-of-view, but Lynx truly shines in terms of angular resolution and sensitivity. Both observatories could revolutionize and extend our view of the X-ray Universe.

A more distant, energetic event likely awaits discovery via ESA's Athena or NASA's Lynx.

An X-ray and radio composite of OJ 287 during one of its flaring phases. The 'orbital trail' that... [+] you see in both views is a hint of the secondary black hole's motion. This system is a binary supermassive system, where one component is approximately 18 billion solar masses and the other is 150 million solar masses. When they merge, they may emit as much energy, albeit in the form of gravitational waves, as this new record-breaking galaxy cluster.

Only supermassive black hole mergers, hitherto unseen, may surpass them.

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Astronomers Find The Biggest Explosion Ever Seen In The Entire Universe - Forbes

How It Works: Astronomy – Observing The Mysteries of Space – Kidzworld

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Understanding the universe beyond earth is a big task, but its easy to get started thinking beyond earths atmosphere if youre interested in learning more. Kidzworld interviewed Alison Klesman, Senior Associate Editor at Astronomy Magazine for tips on getting started. You can be recognizing constellations, following planetary paths, and even helping professional astronomers by adding your observations by the time you finish reading this article!

Many people look up into the night sky and get inspired by the vastness of space but while youre staring out into the stars looking as though youre searching for a ride back to your home planet, you might be confused about what exactly youre looking at.

When you want to learn more about a topic, ask an expert. Kidzworld contacted Alison Klesman, the Senior Associate Editor at Astronomy Magazine to get her advice about how to begin to make sense of the night sky.

One really good way to get started in astronomy is to go to a local planetarium or science museum, or just visit their websites to check out the activities they offer. These institutions often have talks, observing nights, and extracurricular activities with amateur and professional astronomers who can answer questions and tailor an experience for age and other interests. I personally work a lot with the Adler Planetarium, which has an entire teen program dedicated to teens interested in science.

One of my favorite apps is called Star Walk it uses your devices GPS to recreate the sky in real time as you hold it up and move around. Its a great way to identify constellations, stars, and deeper-sky objects, right when youre looking at them. It also has a list of whats up right now in the sky and information about the visible planets, sun- and moonrise/set, and a lot more. You can also enter an object you want to find, and the display will point you in the right direction as you move it until you get there!

Alternatively, Skymaps.com has free printable (or downloadable) night sky charts that are updated each month to show the sky overhead. And the bookThe Stars: A New Way to See Themby Hans Augusto Rey (the same H.A. Rey who wrote Curious George!)has been recommended to me many times as a great starter guide.

For younger kids, two of my favorite resources are the NASA Kids Cluband ALMA Kids.

You know by now that the sun rises in the east and sets in the west. But did you also know that, because the earth rotates in a constant direction, the planets 168 and stars in the night sky do as well?

Check out this 5-minute video that explains how to get into the right position to observe the night sky and how to read astronomical chart directions.

Start with this free download of a card deck that helps you identify and memorize the constellations from a Professor Environmental, Geographical, & Geological Sciences at Bloomsburg University in Pennsylvania

Create your own star wheel, or planisphere, or you can visit their interactive sky chartonline for a view of the night sky personalized to your location.

If you have a smart device, download a free app like Night Sky, Star Chart, and Sky Safari that use your GPS location and phones camera to help you identify exactly what youre seeing when you look up.

You might already know that you can use the position of the sun in the sky to tell the approximate time during the day, but did you know that you can also tell time at night by looking at the stars? As the earth turns, the planets appear to follow the same line at night the ecliptic that the sun travels across the time during the day.If the earth moved in a steady, unchanging line, the stars would stand still, and would be in relatively the same place every night. But because the earth is on an axis and tilts toward or away from the sun depending on the season, that path varies depending on the time of year. Thats where a star clock comes in. A star clock uses the positions of The Big Dipper and Cassiopeia depending on the time of year to help you figure out approximately what time it is! Not only is it a great tool, its also a fun project.

Alison at Astronomy Magazine pointed out that not all discoveries have been made by professionals. Some discoveries have even been made with the naked eye (without a telescope).

One of my very favorite citizen science projects is called Zooniverse. Their website has a whole host of activities. Each project is designed to be easy to understand and easy to use, although some are better for younger audiences and some are better for older kids. No telescope is required at all basically, this site lets users look at real data to help real scientists do things like find extrasolar planets, characterize glitches or noise in their data so they dont think its a real find, and theres even currently a project that lets users look at old constellation maps to determine which constellations the drawings are trying to show.

Many of Zooniverses discoveries have come from amateur astronomers young and old. Specific ones I can think of are the green pea galaxies, Hannys Voorwerp, and a four-planet extrasolar system around a Sun-like star 597 light-years away.

The International Astronomical Union also has some good suggestions for getting involved in astronomy and astronomy research. And, again, checking out a local planetarium or astronomy club is a great way to find out whether there are more local, hands-on projects that need participants.

Additionally, the American Meteor Society allows people to submit reports if they see fireball meteors at any time. Submitted reports help the society to identify where the meteor came from and where any potential material that might have hit the ground is located. Thats pure chance, of course, but anyone who sees a fireball can report it.

The editorial team at Astronomy Magazine publishes weekly reports for astronomy hobbyists called The Sky This Week highlighting one thing to look at in the sky each night for every week of the year.

For kids just starting out, the best way to find out about upcoming NASA launches is to go to the source. Visit NASAs launch scheduleor NASA TV, to observe NASA launches, landing, spacewalks, news, and footage from inside the space station.

Alison also suggests checking out the American Meteor Societys calendar of meteor showers and The Old Farmers Almanacs list of upcoming astronomical events.

Are you a super-star-gazer with thoughts of going "to infinity and beyond" or are your feet planted firmly on the ground? Tell us your stargazing stories in the comments below, and share this article with your star-struck friends and family members!

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How It Works: Astronomy - Observing The Mysteries of Space - Kidzworld

For The First Time, Astronomers Have Detected an Exoplanet Using Radio Waves – ScienceAlert

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A boring, unremarkable star 26 light-years away has turned out to be not so boring after all. Astronomers have found that it has a planet - not just any planet, but one with a mass only about five times Earth's mass - using a wild new method inspired by Jupiter's auroras.

Radio wave activity from the star, called GJ 1151, has been linked to an interaction between the star's magnetic field and an orbiting planet - much like Jupiter's magnetic field is known to interact with the planet's moon, Io.

It's a method that could help us find way more of the hard-to-find rocky exoplanets like Mercury, Venus, Earth, and Mars.

"We adapted the knowledge from decades of radio observations of Jupiter to the case of this star," said astronomer Joe Callingham of the Netherlands Institute for Radio Astronomy (ASTRON).

"A scaled-up version of Jupiter-Io has long been predicted to exist in star-planet systems, and the emission we observed fits the theory very well."

Currently, there are two main ways exoplanets are detected. There's the transit method, like NASA's TESS spacecraft uses. That's when a planet passes between us and its star as it orbits, causing slight dips in the star's light.

Then there's the radial velocity method. This detects the faint wobble in a star's position as it is tugged on by the planet.

But the interaction between Jupiter and Io is interesting. It produces a signature emission in radio wavelengths that are mostly polarised in a circular fashion, and which, in the lower frequencies, can be more powerful than those wavelengths from the Sun.

The Sun's magnetic field isn't strong enough, and the distances are too great, to produce a similar effect from its interaction with the planets in the Solar System, but red dwarfs are different. These very long-lived, small, dim stars have much more powerful magnetic fields than the Sun's, and planets can get much closer.

It was expected that a red dwarf star's close-orbiting planet might produce a similar but more powerful emission than that produced by Jupiter and Io.

"The motion of the planet through a red dwarf's strong magnetic field acts like an electric engine, much in the same way a bicycle dynamo works," explained astronomer Harish Vedantham of ASTRON. "This generates a huge current that powers aurorae and radio emission on the star."

So Vedantham and an international team of astronomers set out to look for circularly polarised low-frequency radio waves. They used data from a survey conducted using LOFAR, a telescope array in the Netherlands that scans the skies in low radio frequencies, and identified several emissions that fit the bill, lining up with red dwarf stars.

One of them was GJ 1151. It was the perfect candidate for further study.

Many red dwarfs, especially those detectable in radio wavelengths, are extremely turbulent, lashing the space around them with stellar flares, rotating extremely fast, and/or interacting with a binary companion.

GJ 1151 rotates extremely slowly - once every 130 days. It's unusually peaceful for a red dwarf. And binary companions can be hidden, so a separate team conducted careful observations using the High Accuracy Radial Velocity Planet Searcher instrument on the Italian Telescopio Nazionale Galileo in Spain.

They detailed their painstaking search and findings in a separate paper,where they rule out other companion stars, brown dwarfs, or giant planets that might also explain the results.

"Interacting binary stars can also emit radio waves," said astronomer Benjamin Pope of New York University.

"Using optical observations to follow up, we searched for evidence of a stellar companion masquerading as an exoplanet in the radio data. We ruled this scenario out very strongly, so we think the most likely possibility is an Earth-sized planet too small to detect with our optical instruments."

That planet's exact mass is still to be determined, but it's likely to be a rocky planet, orbiting the star every one to five days. That's pretty tight, and probably a bit too close to the star to be hospitable.

But it also offers a new way to search for potentially habitable worlds.

In both the transit and radial velocity methods, the effects of the planet's orbits on the star are very, very slight. So the more massive the planet, the more likely we are to detect it. That means most of the exoplanets detected are on the large end of the scale - gas and ice giants, like Jupiter, Saturn, Neptune, and Uranus.

Smaller exoplanets are more elusive. But this amazing new method demonstrates that they can be detected by analysing a star's radio signals. In fact, the team expects "many tens" of such detections will be made based on the remainder of the LOFAR survey data; they're currently working on that research.

In turn, this will help us understand the magnetic field environment of exoplanets, and what that means for the search for alien life.

"The long-term aim is to determine what impact the star's magnetic activity has on an exoplanet's habitability, and radio emissions are a big piece of that puzzle," Vedantham said.

"Our work has shown that this is viable with the new generation of radio telescopes and put us on an exciting path."

The papers have been published in Nature Astronomy and The Astrophysical Journal Letters.

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For The First Time, Astronomers Have Detected an Exoplanet Using Radio Waves - ScienceAlert

Hubble finds hints the Sombrero galaxy had a turbulent past – Astronomy Magazine

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New data from the Hubble Space Telescope reveals the popular Sombrero galaxy may have had a more violent past than previously thought. Based on the number of metal-rich stars Hubble spotted in the galaxys extended halo, astronomers think the seemingly serene Sombrero galaxy could have once went through a major merger with another galaxy.

The Sombrero has always been a bit of a weird galaxy, which is what makes it so interesting, Paul Goudfrooij, a scientist for the Space Telescope Science Institute, said in a press release.

The Sombrero galaxy is a go-to target for amateur observers, largely due to the stunningly smooth brim of its disk, which appears to us nearly edge on. This is where the Sombrero gets its name. But, as with most galaxies, the Sombreros stars extend far beyond the galaxys disk. This area of space surrounding the sombrero is called the halo.

Halos are usually packed with old, metal-poor stars. But using Hubble, astronomers resolved tens of thousands of stars in the Sombreros dim halo. They surprisingly found it contains many more younger, metal-rich stars than expected.

Utilizing models and simulations, scientists investigated different ways the metal-rich stars could have ended up in the Sombreros halo. Based on the evidence, astronomers speculate that billions of years ago, the galaxy merged with another galaxy of similar mass.

Oddly, the Sombrero galaxys disk and halo dont show any other signs that such an event happened though. Both have a silky smooth appearance, which doesnt seem to suggest a turbulent past. The team will continue to observe the Sombrero galaxy, especially when the powerful James Webb Space Telescope is launched in 2021.

The findings were published February 12 in the Astrophysical Journal.

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Hubble finds hints the Sombrero galaxy had a turbulent past - Astronomy Magazine

Multi-spectral view of stellar nursery reveals spectacular interplay of stellar winds and supernova shocks – Astronomy Now Online

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Combining optical, X-ray and infrared views of a star-forming region in the Large Magellanic Cloud provides a spectacular look at the effects of high-speed winds blown away from massive, fast-burning stars that die young in fiery supernova blasts. At the centre of this region, known as LHA 120-N44, the star cluster NGC 1929 shines with the light of massive stars that produce intense radiation and stellar winds. Data from the Chandra X-ray Observatory, shown in blue, reveal high-temperature regions where winds and supernova shock waves have created huge cavities. Infrared data from the Spitzer Space Telescope, seen in red, show where dust and cooler gas is present. Visible light from the European Southern Observatorys MPG/ESO 2.2-metre telescope in Chile reveal the stars themselves and the clouds of gas and dust that surround them. The multi-spectral view led astronomers to a better understanding of why superbubbles like N44 give off powerful X-rays. It appears that X-rays are generated by supernova shock waves hitting the walls of the cavities and by material evaporating from those cavity walls.

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Multi-spectral view of stellar nursery reveals spectacular interplay of stellar winds and supernova shocks - Astronomy Now Online

Las Cruces astronomers to analyze Jupiter’s atmosphere thanks to NASA grant – KRWG

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The atmosphere of Jupiter is a colorful swirl of cloud bands in brown, yellow, red and white with an enormous red spot. To unlock some of the atmospheres mysteries on the gas giant planet, New Mexico State University researchers this week received a three-year, $283,800 grant from NASAs New Frontiers Data Analysis Program.

The New Frontiers research program, within NASAs Planetary Science Division, is aimed at enhancing the scientific return from New Frontiers class missions. The mission NMSU astronomers have chosen to investigate is the Juno mission, which is currently in orbit around Jupiter.

We proposed to analyze some infrared images and spectra of Jupiters atmosphere to try to understand the circulation patterns and the waves, and the transition between orderly and chaotic circulations in Jupiters atmosphere, said Nancy Chanover, astronomy professor and principal investigator on the project.

The team of researchers working with Chanover includes co-investigators Jason Jackiewicz, associate professor of astronomy; Wladimir Lyra, assistant professor of astronomy; and Ali Hyder, astronomy Ph.D. student.

The atmosphere of Jupiter is the largest in the solar system. Its called a gas giant because its atmosphere is made up of mostly hydrogen and helium gas, like the Sun. Each of the professors is approaching the data from a different perspective. Chanovers perspective is from the upper cloud deck of Jupiter, Jackiewicz studies the interior of Jupiter and vertical motions within the atmosphere, and Lyra creates numerical simulations of fluids of all astrophysical kinds.

My part is in the modeling of the atmosphere. In this case, we are going to apply my models to the atmosphere of Jupiter to better understand and explain the observations recorded by Juno, Lyra said as he described some of his previous simulations and how they could apply to the Jupiter project.

This a previous model, so you can see as the simulation proceeds, more vortices form, they grow, they merge with other ones, they tease each other. In the end, youre going to have one large vortex. So we are applying the same kind of calculations to the atmosphere of Jupiter.

As part of Jackiewiczs research, the NASA-funded Jovian Interiors from Velocimetry Experiment (JIVE) in New Mexico project, he has been using the Dunn Solar Telescope to measure winds in Jupiter's atmosphere, in particular vertical motions, with a very specific technique he pioneered. The data from Juno are being supplemented with observations from JIVE.

It's exciting that we can obtain data from observations carried out right here in New Mexico that complement the NASA Juno space data, providing us with new constraints about how the atmosphere of Jupiter is dynamically linked to interesting features like vortices, said Jackiewicz.

Little is known about the interior composition and structure of gas giant planets like Jupiter. One of NASAs planetary science goals is to understand how the suns family of planets originated and evolve.

The Juno images provide us sort of with east, west and north south motions of the clouds and Jasons data will provide us with the vertical motions of the clouds, Chanover said. Using that three-dimensional dataset, we will really be able to probe whats driving these vortices in the atmospheric circulation.

Ph.D. student Ali Hyder will be working with the team on all aspects of the research as part of his doctoral thesis.

Jupiters atmosphere is a dynamic and ever-changing system where we can observe fluid dynamic phenomenology on a scale inaccessible on Earth, so it provides a very unique environment in which to study such phenomena, Hyder said. Being part of this project, I will be working on all aspects of numerical modeling, the actual development of the code, modification of the model, analysis of the results from the numerical simulation, and the data reduction of the observations as well.

Results of this research will be published in peer reviewed journals and the new data generated through the mapping of some images or the inclusion of these other datasets will be archived in the Atmospheres Node of NASAs Planetary Data System (PDS), located at NMSU.

Chanover also leads that project, which is responsible for the acquisition, preservation and distribution of all non-imaging atmospheric data from all planetary missions (excluding Earth observations).

Once the data are archived in the PDS, they are accessible by any investigator worldwide, Chanover said. It really provides value to the existing mission data that are in the archive, because now were adding what is known as derived data or a kind of new data generated as a result of those mission data. So were adding another layer on top of the primary mission data.

The blending of different research specialties to make new discoveries about Jupiter is an important part of the project for Chanover.

One of the reasons I'm really excited about this project is because its a true collaboration among three faculty members in our department who come from varied academic research areas.

The collaborative nature is also a benefit for Hyder as a graduate student.

It is a really big deal for me to get exposure to such a varied domain of expertise, which is quite unusual for a single project, Hyder said. So Im getting information regarding the atmosphere, regarding the interior, and regarding numerical astrophysics all together.

Information from NMSU

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Las Cruces astronomers to analyze Jupiter's atmosphere thanks to NASA grant - KRWG

This Is Why There Are So Few Black Physicists And Astronomers (And How To Fix It) – Forbes

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The importance of representation cannot be overstated when it comes to fostering a sense of... [+] belonging. Under-representation among black professors, postdocs, graduate students and undergraduate students in Physics and Astronomy is a problem that demands a specific, focused, concerted effort if we wish to change the status quo.

Over the past 20 years, the number of bachelor's degrees awarded in physics has more than doubled: from just under 4,000 per year in the late 1990s to nearly 9,000 per year today, according to the most recent data. By many metrics, racial representation is on the rise as well. Black Americans earned more than twice as many STEM degrees as they did 20 years ago. But in physics, the percentage of Black Americans earning Bachelor's degrees has plummeted over that same interval, even as Hispanic representation has nearly quadrupled.

Today, across all STEM fields, representation of Black Americans is lowest in physics and astronomy: ~3% in physics (down from more than 5% in 1999) and ~2% in astronomy. In a landmark, first-of-its-kind study, the American Institute of Physics developed a national task force to elevate the representation of Black Americans in physics and astronomy: TEAM-UP. Their full report has just been released, and it uncovers not only the causes of this under-representation, but how to fix it.

While the percentage of Black Americans who earn STEM degrees at the Bachelor's level has increased... [+] across all fields over the past few decades, overall gains and overall representation remain lowest in the fields of Physics and Astronomy.

The big question that TEAM-UP sought to answer was simple:

Why are there so few black physicists and astronomers?

By assembling a team of physicists, astronomers, and education researchers, they endeavored to understand the experiences of current undergraduates, to evaluate the overall landscape of the prevailing culture in those fields in particular, and to uncover what impedes or promotes not only success in those fields, but the culture change necessary for enabling those successes. It was the first comprehensive study of Black American physics undergraduates ever undertaken.

Through surveys, interviews, site visits and more, what they concluded was as sobering as it was unsurprising. The reasons Black Americans aren't earning Bachelor's degrees isn't because they're unmotivated, uninterested, unintelligent or incapable. Instead, it's due to elements that are prevalent in society in general and in physicsand astronomy in particular.

Over the past 25 years, the percentage of Bachelor's degrees awarded to Hispanic Americans has... [+] increased tremendously, but the percentage awarded to Black Americans has dropped dramatically over that same interval. This difference cannot be explained by population changes alone.

One of the most informative parts of the TEAM-UP report arose from studying specific physics departments at a number of individual colleges in detail, including colleges where the representation of Black Americans among physics and astronomy majors is exemplary. Every specific field has its own problems and cultural issues that are unique to that particular environment, and by studying just one particular field in detail, they could identify the factors that are most impactful for eithernourishing or neglecting the needs of Black Americans in physics and astronomy.

The big takeaway was that there are only two main factors in determining the level of representation of Black Americans in obtaining physics and astronomy degrees:

Those two factors, environment and economics, are the only ones that mattered.

In 1946, Albert Einstein gave a talk at Lincoln University in Pennsylvania: the United States' first... [+] degree-granting historically black college or university. Fostering a sense of belonging in a supportive environment is an irreplaceable boon to student success if present, and a catastrophic hindrance if absent.

What makes an environment supportive or unsupportive? A few examples some from the TEAM-UP report and some from beyond it can help make that clear. Imagine that you're a physics student, an undergraduate, in a classroom full of people where most of them look like one another, but not like you. Imagine that you're working hard, you're doing well in your classes, you're learning new things, and you're even beginning to do research.

If your department has the ability to be financially supportive, perhaps you'll get the opportunity to attend a conference and present the research that you've been working on. Perhaps you'll get the opportunity to meet others in your field, including peers, potential mentors, and even people whom you may end up working with down the line. But even seemingly small obstacles, particularly if they're common to your experience and appear frequently (what are known as microaggressions), can completely undermine that sense of belonging. Here are three scenarios that illustrate how.

Although physics in particular is a field notorious for students behaving in a discouraging and... [+] derogatory fashion towards other students, black undergraduates were approximately 20% more likely than their white counterparts to report being on the receiving end of this type of interaction.

Scenario 1: You're in class, the most advanced difficult class you'll take this semester. The professor is solving problems on the board, and poses a question to the class. You know the answer, so you raise your hand, and the professor calls on you. You give the answer you believe to be correct, but another (white) student elsewhere in the room derisivelycorrects you, and nobody else in the room comes to your defense.

Scenario 2: You're at a conference, your very first one, where you're about to present your research alongside other scientists of all levels (students, post-docs, professors, etc.) in your specific field. As you arrive, you start looking around for anyone you recognize and come up empty. A minute later, a (white, senior) professor comes up to you with a bewildered look on his face, and asks you, "Are you the help?"

Scenario 3: You're at a large conference, about to present your research to an audience that includes members of the press for the first time. There's a paper and an accompanying press release to go with it, and you get a large number of questions. Over the next few days, a few stories come out in various media outlets. While most of them get the science right, one of them also includes a number of unprofessional statements with racially charged overtones, including remarks on how "articulate" you are.

When a junior member of the community who's also an under-represented minority in that community... [+] attends a conference, the impact of inclusivity and a sense of belonging, or lack thereof, can have an enormous influence on whether that student continues in the field or not.

I want you to think, for a minute, about what a terrible situation this is for the young aspiring physicist or astronomer, and how there's not a way to win. If you express anger or outrage, even over what's clearly unacceptable behavior, other people may become afraid and categorize you as a "dangerous black man" or a "ghetto black woman" in their mind. If you know your answer is correct and you dig into your position, you risk further ridicule and alienation.

If you attempt to gently correct someone who assumes that you're an employee of the venue the conference is at, you risk them becoming defensive and deeming you a problematic person. And in the final scenario, you may even jump through all the hoops of crafting messages to the offending article's author or their editor, only to find even years later that the original offensive messages are still unchanged and uncorrected. As the TEAM-UP researchers noted:

Regular exposure to unsupportive peers and faculty who make discriminatory comments, intentionally or unintentionally, will likely derail a student's success in the field... and this is more likely for minoritized students in STEM compared with other fields.

Decades of compiled data show a lack of gains in the percent of Bachelor's degrees awarded to Black... [+] Americans versus Hispanic/Latinx Americans. In physics and astronomy in particular, the differences are stark and imply some systematic differences in how students of various races experience a degree program in those fields.

Fortunately, there is something positive and low-effort that each of us can do. Rather than view the solution as "closing a gap" between young black scientists and the rest of the field, we can think about the solution as "opening a space" for them. That means making an effort to say to them, in some way, "you have a home here," "you are welcome here," "your presence here is valued," and "you are included."

Imagine how differently the first scenario would have played out if the professor, upon hearing the white student's remarks (which turned out to be wrong, by the way), had scolded that student for their inappropriate behavior? A counter-conversation, even after the fact, can be remarkably affirming for under-represented students. Imagine how the second scenario would have played out differently, if only the default assumption in the mind of the offending professor had been, "you belong here."

If we can actively set up and establish better norms for what positive behaviors are, the field can become more inclusive in a long-term, sustainable manner.

While the number of Bachelor's degrees earned by black students have risen across the board in STEM... [+] fields in recent years, their representation in physics and astronomy lags far behind most other such fields, at ~3% in physics and ~2% in astronomy.

One of the simplest ways to become more inclusive is to assume, as your default, that black physicists and astronomers exist and deserve to be there. Assume that they know what they're doing and are highly capable, but that they need support. Support on those two important fronts of fostering an environment that supports their presence within it and in providing financial support for black students and their supporting institutions can help change things tremendously.

And there's a lot to combat. Compared to their white peers, black students were more likely to feel socially isolated in their physics classes or labs (49% to 34%), to feel discouraged due to interactions with other students (35% to 29%), and less likely to feel like their department created a supportive environment (74% to 85%). Perhaps most troublingly, the same percentage of black and white physics students saw others treated negatively in class because of their race or ethnicity, but black students reported experiencing that negative treatment far more frequently (32% to 11%).

In terms of students who have reported personally experienced negative treatment on the basis of... [+] race, approximately one-third of black students report such an experience, compared to just one-in-nine white students.

The TEAM-UP report, of course, goes much farther in making recommendations for fostering the academic and career success of black students. There are entire sections devoted on how to be a supportive, engaged faculty member or mentor, including simple actions such as reaching out to black students, following up on their progress, and making sure there are multiple people checking up on them, demonstrating their investment in that student's success.

The report also makes specific recommendations across five key areas to support the success of black students:

Of all STEM fields, black students are least well-represented in astronomy, where under 2% of... [+] Bachelor's degrees are awarded to them. Here, black students attend and present their work at the American Astronomical Society's general January meeting.

By 2030, TEAM-UPbelieves the number of Black Americans who get physics or astronomy degrees can be doubled versus today's figures. In addition to the relatively small behavioral and structural recommendations that they make in their report, they stress the need for financial support as well, recommending:

A consortium of physical sciences societies should be formed to raise a $50M endowment from foundations and individuals to support minoritized students with unmet financial need in physics and astronomy and to support the implementation of this report's recommendations by departments.

But even without donating, all of us can play an effective role in combating these structural inequalities simply by making an effort to be inclusive.

The presence of even a single individual who is focused on inclusivity and fostering a sense of... [+] belonging can make a remarkable difference in the success of their students, but this is an unsustainable path to creating a long-term cultural shift in the field.

Make an effort to support black students in the classroom. Reach out to them. Invite them to study sessions. Tell them explicitly about opportunities. When you see them at a conference, introduce them to others that you know. Invite them for drinks and to social events. Send the simple message, wherever you can, that "you are welcome here" and "you belong here."

Many of the black physicists and astronomers today were brought into the field because of positive interactions with professors and students. If we can transform the field to make that the cultural norm and clearly, this applies to more fields than just physics and astronomy we can better advance, serve, and promote the physical sciences for the benefit of humanity. Advancing and supporting under-represented minorities is a critical component of that, and one that we can all contribute to simply by sending that one universal message we all yearn to hear: your presence here is genuinely valued.

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This Is Why There Are So Few Black Physicists And Astronomers (And How To Fix It) - Forbes

Mystery Object Could Be Second ‘Minimoon’ Ever Detected Around Earth, Astronomers Say – Newsweek

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Astronomers have spotted a small, mysterious object orbiting the Earth which could be the second "minimoon" detected in orbit around our planet.

The object, which has been designated the provisional name 2020 CD3 by the International Astronomical Union's Minor Planet Center, was first observed on February 15 by astronomers Kacper Wierzchos and Teddy Pruyne at the Catalina Sky Surveywhich operates from the University of Arizona's Lunar and Planetary Laboratory in Tucson.

Since then, a team at the international Gemini Observatory have managed to capture a fascinating full color image of the object.

At present, it is not clear whether 2020 CD3 is natural in origina small space rock known as a "minimoon," for exampleor man-made technology, such as a satellite or other piece of space debris.

If the former hypothesis is correct, the discovery would be particularly significant given that only one natural satellite other than the moon has previously been detected around the Earth.

This object, dubbed 2006 RH120, is a nearly 10-foot wide asteroid which normally orbits the sun but was temporarily captured by the Earth's gravitational pull in 2006, before being shot out into space again.

"Either way [2020 CD3] is a very compelling object and needs more data to determine what it is," Grigori Fedorets, lead astronomer of the Gemini observations from Queen's University Belfast in the U.K., said in a statement.

"If it will be indeed of natural origin, it would be the second temporary moon discovered in space, establishing a population," Fedorets told Newsweek. "It will provide more knowledge about the composition of the smallest asteroids in the solar systemof which not much is knownlinking in to the overall fundamental question of the formation of the solar system."

The Gemini imagecaptured by the Gemini North telescope located at the summit of Maunakea in Hawaii on February 24shows 2020 CD3 as a tiny spot of light amidst the light trails of several stars. The image was created by combining three different images that were snapped with different color filters.

"The stars are trailing because this object is moving relative to the background stars and the 8-meter Gemini North telescope was tracking on this object," Fedorets said.

Capturing images of fast-moving, small objects like this with large telescopes similar in size to Gemini is a challenge.

"Obtaining the images was a scramble for the Gemini team because the object is quickly becoming fainter as it moves away from Earth. It is expected to be ejected from Earth's orbit altogether in April," John Blakeslee, Head of Science at the international Gemini Observatory, said in a statement.

According to Fedorets, astronomers are now trying to learn more about the object to determine what it is and where it might have come from. For example, determining the the reflectivity of 2020 CD3 can help scientists to decipher whether it is man-made or natural in origin, given that man-made objects, such as space rocket debris, tend to more reflective than pieces of rock for example.

While only one minimoontiny asteroids measuring up to around 80 inches in diameterhas ever been confirmed around the Earth, scientists think there may actually be thousands of these objects in orbit around our planet at any one time, according to a study published in the journal Frontiers in Astronomy and Space.

These may often go undetected by traditional asteroid surveys because they are so small, faint and fast-moving. Nevertheless, upcoming observatoriessuch as the Vera C. Rubin Observatorymay be able to detect further minimoons

We expect to find a population of these objects once the Rubin Observatory is operational," Fedorets said. "Stay tuned!"

This article was updated to include additional comments from Grigori Fedorets.

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Mystery Object Could Be Second 'Minimoon' Ever Detected Around Earth, Astronomers Say - Newsweek

Raytheon and the National Science Foundation radio astronomy facilities to detect dusty asteroids in space – Yahoo Finance

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MCKINNEY, Texas, March 3, 2020 /PRNewswire/ -- Raytheon Company (NYSE: RTN), the National Radio Astronomy Observatory and the Green Bank Observatory entered a cooperative research and development agreement to detect and characterize near-earth asteroids large enough to cause significant damage.

The Raytheon-NRAO/GBO collaboration will integrate a radar transmitter into the Green Bank Telescope and use the National Science Foundation's Very Long Baseline Array as a receiver to provide a very detailed radar image. The GBT and the VLBA will each point at the same celestial body, such as the moon, to conduct radar experiments. This approach increases the probability of detection and characterization of objects out to the orbit of Jupiter and possibly farther. To put this in perspective, objects around Mars are hard to detect, and Jupiter is hundreds of millions of miles farther than that.

"Very energetic dusty asteroids we're talking from several hundred feet to miles in size don't reflect sunlight very well, and that makes them incredibly difficult, if not impossible to detect in our solar system," said Art Morrish, vice president, Raytheon Advanced Concepts & Technologies. "We're collaborating with the NRAO to combine radio astronomy and radar techniques to bring new capabilities to the astronomical community to solve problems like this."

"Using the radio astronomy facilities of the National Science Foundation in these new research areas is incredibly exciting," said Tony Beasley, director of the National Radio Astronomy Observatory and Associated Universities Inc. vice president for Radio Astronomy Operations. "This partnership between Raytheon and NRAO/GBO is one of several promising research and technology collaborations we're exploring that may greatly benefit our next-generation Very Large Array project."

The NRAO and the GBO are facilities of the National Science Foundation, operated under cooperative agreement by Associated Universities, Inc.

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About RaytheonRaytheon Company (NYSE:RTN), with 2019 sales of$29 billionand 70,000 employees, is a technology and innovation leader specializing in defense, civil government and cybersecurity solutions. With a history of innovation spanning 98 years, Raytheon provides state-of-the-art electronics, mission systems integration, C5Iproducts and services, sensing, effects, and mission support for customers in more than 80 countries.Raytheonis headquartered inWaltham, Mass.Follow us onTwitter.

Media ContactDana Carroll310.647.4352

saspr@raytheon.com

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Mea culpa: Betelgeuse and its dusty convective pulsations – SYFY WIRE

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Betelgeuse has been in the astronews a bit lately, hasnt it? Normally one of the very brightest stars in the sky, in October it started dimming, and by January had faded to roughly a third of its normal brightness. Astronomers have known for a long time that Betelgeuse periodically fluctuates in brightness, but this was a historic low point for the star.

Because its so bright, has a recognizable name, is easy to spot as one of the anchor points in the easily recognizable constellation of Orion, and also may one day explode as a supernova, this behavior got a lot of press.

Ive written about it several times over the past couple of months: When it was first announced that this dip in brightness was really substantial, again when images revealed that only one half of the star appeared to be dimming, and then just a few days ago when the star started to brighten again.

I talked about why Betelgeuse behaves this way, too. I mentioned that its temperature has dropped, which can make it dimmer, for example. I also wrote about how convection gas rising and falling in the star affects its brightness. Welp, for those of you who know your Latin, the title of this article may give away what I have to say next: I was wrong. While the convection plays a role, thats not whats going on here, at least not in a major way.

Im embarrassed by my error, but thats mitigated a little bit at least by the fact that whats happening inside Betelgeuse is actually pretty dang complicated, and not well understood.

Betelgeuse is a red supergiant, a star born with probably 20 times the mass of the Sun. For a few million years it fused hydrogen into helium in its core, powering the star. When it ran out of hydrogen, it started fusing helium into carbon. This generates a lot more energy, and the outer layers of the star responded by swelling up hugely. The star is currently well over a billion kilometers across, hundreds of times larger than the Sun. Because the surface area is huge the star is extremely bright, but that energy gets spread out so much that the star cools, turning it red.

What happens on the surface depends very much on how energy gets from the core to the surface, and that depends on physical conditions inside the star. The important ones are the density of the gas (which in turn depends on the stars mass and radius), its temperature, and its opacity: how easily light passes through it. That last one is important! If the gas is opaque it can absorb more energy from below, and that affects how the energy moves through the gas. Sometimes it moves via radiation; literally photons of light moving from atom to atom inside the star. Under other conditions the gas will start to convect; hot gas rises to the surface, cools, and falls back down inside the star.

But other things can happen, too. Under some conditions common inside red supergiants the star can literally pulse, with the outer layers expanding and contracting over some time period. Betelgeuse does this on a timescale of about 420430 days. This is a well-known period that Betelgeuse has followed for centuries. When it does this the amount of surface area increases and decreases, changing the stars brightness; its this change that astronomers were expecting in this last cycle.

Ill note again here that in my last article I wrote it was the convection doing this. Thats not correct; its a separate process. But heres where things get odd.

Why did Betelgeuse dim so much? I wrote in previous articles that it may be due to dust and it turns out this is looking very much like the correct reason.

A paper just came out by astronomers Emily Levesque* and Philip Massey describing observations they made of Betelgeuse very recently (on 15 February; this paper was done incredibly quickly!). What they found is very surprising: While the stars temperature has dropped as it dimmed, as expected, it hasnt gone down by very much, probably only about 50 Celsius and at most 100. That will make the star dimmer by eye, but not nearly enough to account for what was actually seen.

So why did the star drop so precipitously in brightness? They postulate that its dust. This is made of tiny grains of material created inside stars like red supergiants, and in copious amounts. Some dust is made out of long molecules of carbon (basically soot), some is more silicaceous (rocky), or some aluminum oxide. It depends again on whats going on inside the star.

Dust made of very small grains tends to absorb blue light better than red but what they found is that the color of Betelgeuse isnt changing by very much at all. What they think is happening is that the dust from Betelgeuse is made up of bigger grains, which are more agnostic about the color they absorb. Astronomers call this gray dust, and if the dust Betelgeuse makes has a grain size of roughly half a micron that would explain things pretty well and other observations of the star show it is surrounded by vast clouds of dust with about this grain size (in fact, stars like this lose a lot of mass this way, and Betelgeuse is likely far less massive now than the original 20 Suns it started out with a few million years ago).

This might explain why in the images one half of Betelgeuse is dimmer than the other. Dust production happens in the upper atmosphere, but it may not be global, that is, made everywhere all over the star. Its certainly possible that parts of the star make more dust than others, and thats why the image isnt symmetric. Dust from half the star was blown out, getting between us and its surface, dimming that part.

That explains a lot but theres still something really weird. If the dimming is due to dust, then why did Betelgeuse start to brighten again right on time in the 420 - 430 day cycle? Thats not clear. Dust production is tied to the pulsations, so they might be related here. Perhaps, with only half the star dimmed by dust, the increase we see is due more to the half of the star not enshrouded. Its getting brighter on schedule, and thats enough to see the star brighten. That could also be aided by the expansion of the cloud of dust, which would get more transparent as it gets bigger and its density drops, removing its ability to absorb light as efficiently.

And convection may still play a role here too. As gas rises and falls it affects the temperature, and the dust production, and the opacity. All of these things are tangled together and very difficult to disentangle. So to be clear what I said in that article was wrong, but maybe not completely wrong. Just mostly.

Ill be honest: I hate making mistakes like that, but when I do I try to correct them as openly as I can. But heres a funny thing: Because of that mistake I contacted Emily and wound up learning a lot more about the star, about how complicated this all is, and that astronomers are still pretty puzzled over whats happening in the upper reaches of red supergiants like Betelgeuse. So some good came of this.

Theres still a lot to understand about it. We dont know for sure why it got so dim; perhaps further observations will support the large-grained dust idea. It seems likely. But then theres another 5-year cycle in its brightness thats not understood, and who knows what else is going on inside this ridiculously enormous beast.

So ponder all that next time you go outside and take a peek at Orion, now high to the south right after sunset. Give a look tonight if you can! You can point right at Betelgeuse, and see for yourself what all the fuss is about. Remember, this isnt just arguing over esoterica; its trying to understand actual things going on in the sky, some of which have made their way into our stories and our lives.

*Full disclosure: Emily an expert in Betelgeuses behavior is also a friend of mine, and generously talked to me for like 40 minutes over the weekend about the star. She also literally wrote the book on this: Astrophysics of Red Supergiants.

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Mea culpa: Betelgeuse and its dusty convective pulsations - SYFY WIRE

A bright, sodium-laced fireball over Spain – SYFY WIRE

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On 22 February 2020, at 23:22 UTC, a bright, slow fireball dropped out of the Spanish sky. We use the term fireball for exceptionally bright meteors, and this one glowed at magnitude -9 a hundred times brighter than Venus! That must have been quite a sight.

A lot of people did see it, in fact, and it was also caught on cameras as part of the SMART network: Spectroscopy of Meteoroids in the Atmosphere with Robotic Technologies. These are automated cameras in Spain pointed skyward specifically to catch bright meteors and triangulate on their 3D trajectories. The principal investigator of SMART, Dr. Jose M. Madiedo, analyzed the data and was able to find out quite a bit about the rock that burned up.

It entered the atmosphere at 43,000 kilometers per hour (about 12 km/sec, which is pretty slow for a meteoroid) and started to glow when it was about 70 km up, burning up completely over the Mediterranean Sea when it was still 29 km above the ground. Backtracking the path it took into space, he was able to determine the orbit of the object was similar to that of asteroids.

When I saw this on Twitter via the MeteorNews feed, I didn't know much about SMART, but as soon as I saw this video I got excited:

This shows the fireball from a couple of different cameras and locations (including, cleverly, the constellations marked at the end of the video). I laughed when I watched; at first it looks like the meteor is entering from the top center, but that's not it at all! A few seconds later the actual meteor enters the frame. For a moment I thought it was a reflection inside the camera (common for bright objects) but then I realized the SMART network does something even more: It takes real-time spectra of the meteors.

That's where you break up the light of an object into individual colors (wavelengths), sometimes into very fine bins of thousands of colors. Different atoms and molecules glow at characteristic wavelengths, so by examining the spectrum of an object you can tell what's in it.

That's what you first see in that Spain fireball video; not the meteor itself but the spectrum of it! The light is dispersed along a line on either side of the meteor itself, and the different "lines" (the specific colors in the spectrum) can be seen as the meteor brightens.

I was curious about the spectrum, so I contacted Dr. Madiedo, and he told me that the brightest feature, the one you see first, is from sodium. Thats a little surprising; if this is a rocky bit from an asteroid Id expect to see something more like carbon or silicon.

But it turns out that abundance of an element is not the only thing that makes it bright in a spectrum. Meteoroids like this don't have a lot of sodium in them, but sodium glows very vigorously and at lower temperatures than other elements. In fact, with meteors, it's usually the first element seen in spectra, when the solid bit of rock first starts to heat up. Other elements need higher temperatures before they glow, which is why later on you see more lines start to appear. This has been known for a long time, and is called and I love this differential elemental ablation (ablation is when the material on the meteoroid starts to melt and blow off due to the high pressure of ramming through Earths air).

Sometimes, meteors leave material behind them that glows for some time. Called a persistent train, the glow is mostly from sodium as well (though it's also due to it interacting with ozone high in the atmosphere; the entire story is a bit complicated but very cool).

There's also a phenomenon called airglow, seen only in very dark skies, where the sky itself appears to glow. Some of that is from sodium in the upper atmosphere, roughly 70 km up, glowing after sunset. That sodium actually comes from meteors! A hundred tons or so of meteoroids burn up in our atmosphere every day, and a tiny bit of that is sodium, which can stay suspended for quite some time. Energized by sunlight during the day, it releases that energy at night as a soft yellow glow.

Although you might think that irritates astronomers, it's actually useful. Our atmosphere moves around a lot, distorting astronomical images. Astronomers can compensate for that using a technology called adaptive optics. They create artificial stars in the sky using lasers that excite those sodium atoms, creating a bright spot in the sky. As the atmosphere moves that artificial star distorts; sophisticated computers measure that distortion through a telescope and then actuate pistons under a telescopes mirrors to deform it, literally changing the shape of the mirror to compensate for the atmospheric distortion. This can sharpen images considerably, even getting better resolution than Hubble Space Telescope!

So how about that? We can study meteors burning up in our atmosphere by studying their sodium, and then use that sodium to help us observe other objects, too. There's a touch of poetry to that, I think.

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A bright, sodium-laced fireball over Spain - SYFY WIRE

Samsung is Working on a Blockchain-Based Payments Solution for Banks and Merchants – CoinDesk – CoinDesk

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Samsung's enterprise technology arm is building a blockchain-based settlements solution for merchants and banks.

The Korea Herald reported Wednesday that Samsung SDS had signed a memorandum of understanding with Israeli fintech solutions provider Credorax to develop the solution, aimed to create efficiencies by automatically logging payments data on bank records and ledgers.

The product, which hasn't yet been named publicly, will work on Samsung SDS' Nexledger Universal platform, the proprietary blockchain first unveiled in 2017. Work processes will be automated using AI technology from Brity Works, another Samsung SDS company.

Hong Won-pyo, Samsung SDS president and chief executive, said to local media the agreement with Credorax, which has already provided solutions to companies across the European Union and broader economic area, will enable the Korean tech company to gain a foothold in the region's payments sector.

"Together with Credorax, which specializes in payments solutions, Samsung SDS will try to expand its business in the European sectors that seek digital transformation,"he said.

Credorax did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

Samsung SDS changed its articles of association in February to include e-finance as one of its main business areas. SDS' value grew by $3.7 billion in 2019, an above-average growth rate for the broader tech sector. Speaking to the Korea Herald, Chief Strategy Officer Im Soo-hyun attributed the company's good fortunes to successful inroads into AI and blockchain technology.

In November 2019, Samsung SDS announced it would enhance privacy on Nexledger through a partnership with Israeli-based QEDIT to integrate zero-knowledge proofs into the platform. A medical-claims processing system built on top of the Nexledger platform, launched at the end of last year.

The leader in blockchain news, CoinDesk is a media outlet that strives for the highest journalistic standards and abides by a strict set of editorial policies. CoinDesk is an independent operating subsidiary of Digital Currency Group, which invests in cryptocurrencies and blockchain startups.

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Samsung is Working on a Blockchain-Based Payments Solution for Banks and Merchants - CoinDesk - CoinDesk

Readying the Blockchain Industry for the Next Wave of Adoption – Cointelegraph

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Who knows whats responsible for the current bull run? It could be the upcoming halving, it could be the Chicago Mercantile Exchanges debut of institutional-grade crypto-backed options, or it could even be the coronavirus. Whatever the reasons, it seems safe to say that the crypto winter is well and truly behind us. If this trend continues, it will only be a matter of time before we begin to see a fresh wave of adopters, eager to capitalize on the growth of crypto as it blooms into a new season.

Its fair to say that the crypto scene has evolved significantly since the last big boom at the end of 2017. At that time, Binance was still in startup mode, there were far fewer ways to onramp from fiat, and liquidity was a significant challenge. These days, its a different story. Newcomers to cryptocurrencies have many more points of entry, and the influx of institutional and pro traders means that most of the top-ranking coins enjoy high liquidity.

Unfortunately, we havent seen the same rapid evolution from a technological standpoint. If we look at the cryptocurrency rankings from December 2017, the month that Bitcoin (BTC) hit its all-time high, the top-ranking coins are approximately the same ones today as they were then.

There have been some incremental developments. Bitcoin is now handling the same transaction volume as it did at the peak of the 2017 bubble, but without the eye-watering $50+ fees that transactions were incurring at the time. However, it still lacks the fundamentals in terms of speed and scalability to become an everyday medium of exchange.

Related: The Burst of the Bitcoin Bubble: An Autopsy

Back in 2017, Ethereum (ETH) was the second-ranking coin and most popular smart contract development platform, both of which still stand true today. Unfortunately, Ethereums scalability challenges of 2017 also remain today. The most famous incident illustrating the platforms lack of capacity was CryptoKitties.

Related: Blockchain's Scaling Problem, Explained

At the height of the crypto boom in December 2017, the craze for digital cats increased Ethereums transaction volume sixfold, causing network congestion and rising transaction fees for all users. The incident even proved significant enough to make mainstream media headlines.

Now, Ethereum faces similar issues due to stablecoin transaction volumes. Tether (USDT) is now the most traded cryptocurrency by volume, outpacing even Bitcoin. Tether started wrapping its tokens i.e., issuing USDT based on Ethereum in early 2018, and has been increasing the amount issued over time. In July 2019, the transaction volume of ETH-based USDT overtook that of USDT for the first time. By September, there were over four and a half times as many ETH-based USDT transactions as USDT.

Related: Wrapped Crypto Tokens, Explained

As with CryptoKitties, the sharp increase in Ethereum-based USDTs transaction volume led to network congestion and rising transaction fees. One estimate calculated that Tether transactions alone were attracting $21,000 in transaction fees per day, with all users seeing a 152% increase in gas prices compared to three months prior.

Nobody knows whether or not Bitcoin and Ethereum will continue to dominate the blockchain space in the future. The long-promised ETH 2.0 upgrade could still be years away. However, Ethereum remains a focal point for developers due to its buzzing ecosystem of decentralized applications, or DApps, which provide a vast amount of value to the crypto and blockchain communities.

So, at least in the short term, we need a remedy for these scalability challenges. EOS, Tron and other blockchains claim to have found this remedy in the form of delegated proof-of-stake. The problem with dPoS is that it solves scalability at the expense of decentralization, and in turn, the security of the network.

Related: The History and Evolution of Proof of Stake

This is where interoperable bridges come in. There are many blockchains that are faster than Ethereum and Bitcoin but dont have the same user numbers, making them less desirable as a development platform. However, bridges enable developers on Ethereum or other, slower blockchains to tap into the speed and processing capacity of their faster cousins.

A bridge allows any token from one blockchain to pass into another blockchain for processing. A burn-and-mint protocol keeps the token supply constant across both networks, meaning the token could cross the bridge multiple times without any impact on circulating supply.

Nodes supervise the bridge traffic in a similar way to proof-of-work miners. Bridge transactions are usually grouped into blocks, validated by nodes, and sent to each blockchain to keep records of token movements. The nodes are incentivized for their participation with rewards.

Related: Blockchain Interoperability, Explained

Assuming the two blockchains involved in a bridge are decentralized, scalability doesnt need to come with the cost of centralization. Furthermore, the solution works to the benefit of all network participants. If USDT transactions were processed via an interoperable bridge with a high-speed blockchain, USDT users would benefit from far faster processing and lower fees both important to active traders, which make up a large proportion of USDT users.

This would free up processing capacity and reduce fees on the Ethereum network, making it a more desirable place for developers and users. DApp developers could also use the bridge to give their users the same super-fast, low-fee experience. Nodes would also have a new opportunity for revenue by participating as bridge transaction validators, which aligns with the hardware and validation activities theyre already undertaking.

Perhaps the best part is that none of these benefits come at the expense of damaging the existing Ethereum ecosystem. While the long-awaited upgrade may still materialize and enable a faster and more scalable version of Ethereum, bridges provide a much-needed workaround in the meantime without any tradeoffs.

Blockchain interoperability is still in its infancy. Wanchain were the first to launch a bridge between Bitcoin and Ethereum in 2018, but it hasnt yet gained widespread adoption. The Syscoin Bridge followed in January of this year, bringing its high throughput Z-DAG architecture to Ethereum. Most recently, RSK announced it had launched a bridge that also operates between Bitcoin and Ethereum.

History tells us that each time the crypto markets enter a sustained bull run, the general public sits up and takes notice, leading to increased awareness and adoption of blockchain. Thanks to interoperable bridges, the next wave of crypto adopters have the opportunity to enjoy a user experience that doesnt involve all the teething problems their predecessors endured.

The views, thoughts and opinions expressed here are the authors alone and do not necessarily reflect or represent the views and opinions of Cointelegraph.

Jagdeep (Jag) Sidhu is the lead core developer and co-founder of the Syscoin platform. As an expert in blockchain technology, Jag also specializes in machine learning, artificial intelligence, client/server development and distributed systems, with nearly 20 years of software development experience. Jag holds a bachelor of technology in computer science from the British Columbia Institute of Technology with a major in AI and digital image processing and a minor in client/server computing.

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What Do the Richest Men in the World Think of Crypto and Blockchain? – Cointelegraph

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For the past decade, blockchain, Bitcoin (BTC) and other cryptocurrencies have disrupted everything they have touched including banking, hedge funds, law enforcement, health care and real estate to name a few. Blockchain technology and cryptocurrencies are set to revolutionize many industries, yet this is only the beginning.

However, despite the overall enthusiasm and excitement around cryptocurrencies and blockchain technologys capacity to revolutionize the world as we know it, many of the worlds richest men have expressed mixed opinions.

For instance, some billionaires, like Warren Buffett, are known to be staunch Bitcoin critics while others, like Tim Draper, are avid supporters. In 2018, for instance, Buffett predicted that Bitcoin, in particular, will have a bad ending.

On the other hand, billionaire investors like Tim Draper, Michael Novogratz and David Marcus have maintained a bullish stance on cryptocurrencies and blockchain technology. Here is Forbess list of the worlds wealthiest individuals and their opinions on cryptocurrencies and blockchain technology.

Jeff Bezos is the worlds richest man with a net worth of $130 billion according to the 2019 Forbes list. The founder of Amazon, the e-commerce colossus, has been rumored countless times to have invested in Bitcoin. Plus, Binance CEO Changpeng Zhao has been quoted saying that he expects Bezoss online retail giant to be the catalyst for the next Bitcoin bull run.

However, none of the rumors have been confirmed, and Amazon has denied any plans to accept Bitcoin or any other crypto on its platform. The only blockchain-positive development associated with Jeff Bezos is amazons cloud computing arm 2018 partnership with a blockchain startup called Kaleido.

With a net worth that exceeds $100 billion, Bill Gates has featured among the worlds richest for quite some time. Although Gates had earlier shown enthusiasm for Bitcoin in 2014, where he told Bloomberg in an interview that Bitcoin was better than any currency, he has since retracted his remarks, noting that the anonymity of digital currencies is not good for transactions.

Furthermore, during a 2018 interview with CNBC, Gates said: Bitcoin and ICOs are completely speculative. However, like most critics, he added that blockchain, the underlying technology behind most cryptocurrencies, has its merits.

Buffett is a longtime critic of Bitcoin and cryptocurrencies. Before the 2018 Berkshire Hathaway annual shareholders meeting, the longtime investor called Bitcoin a mirage that is probably rat poison squared and not a currency.

However, in a recent interview, Tron CEO Justin Sun outlines that Buffett was very open to new technologies. This came after Sun had a charity lunch with the Oracle of Omaha just a month ago, during which the young CEO tried to explain cryptos potential to Buffett.

Even though Buffett went as far as accepting Ton (TRX) from Sun, Buffett maintained that he does not own any crypto and reiterated that he will never own crypto since it has zero value.

With a business empire that spans over 70 brands including Sephora and Louis Vuitton, Bernard Arnault has featured among the worlds richest since 1985 when he bought Christian Dior. Since then, his luxury brands have grown, posting record sales especially in 2018 according to Forbes.

Although there are no official comments of Arnault about Bitcoin or blockchain technology, reports show that the billionaire teamed up with Microsoft Azure and ConsenSys last year to develop a blockchain platform that will track products produced by LVMH.

Other blockchain and crypto-related reports about Arnault include one, in which he rejected involvement in setting up a Belgian crypto trading company called Abesix Belgique.

Larry Ellison, the co-founder of Oracle, is worth over $50 billion and is listed as the worlds seventh-richest richest man. He is one of the few billionaires who have been vocal about Bitcoin and issued positive remarks about the merits of blockchain technology.

In a 2017 article by Business Insider, Ellison is quoted saying that blockchains are often thought of in the context of Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies: But increasingly, companies outside of finance are using blockchain technology to replace long-held authentication practices in law, real estate and shipping.

After Facebooks debacle with the launch of its stablecoin cryptocurrency called Libra, a lot of people have expressed concern that if all of Facebooks users adopted Libra as a currency, most of the worlds fiat currencies would be compromised.

However, while onlookers are concerned about the threat Libra would bring to local currencies including Bitcoin, Zuckerberg maintains that when we do things that are going to be very sensitive for society, we want to have a period where we can go out and talk about them and consult with people and get feedback and work through the issues before rolling them out.

Since 2018, Zuckerberg has held a positive stance particularly toward blockchain technology, saying: The technology powering Bitcoin could help improve Facebook in the future.

Apart from being listed among the top ten richest people in the world, Michael Bloomberg is currently running for as a presidential candidate for the Democratic Party in the 2020 United States presidential elections. Unlike other high ranking politicians, such as the U.S. President Donald Trump, who expressed negative opinions about Bitcoin and Facebooks Libra last year, Bloomberg has shown a somewhat positive view on crypto and blockchain technology.

Bloomberg is quoted saying: Cryptocurrencies have become an asset class worth hundreds of billions of dollars, yet regulatory oversight remains fragmented and undeveloped. He also added: For all the promise of the blockchain, Bitcoin and initial coin offerings, theres also plenty of hype, fraud and criminal activity.

With reports of surging popularity in the polls, Bloombergs policies on financial reforms are in the spotlight. The former New York mayor recognized cryptocurrencies as an asset class and has included policies in his campaign that will protect consumers from crypto-related fraud and clarify the responsibilities of crypto regulators with a framework to define initial coin offerings.

Ray Dalio, the founder of Bridgewater Associates, has recently spoken in an interview with CNBC where he echoed concerns about the state of the global economy as have many Bitcoin investors and supporters, saying: Were in a spot in monetary policy where you can no longer stimulate the same way you did before.

However, instead of advising those who are concerned about a coming global economic downturn to turn to Bitcoin, Dalio believes that gold is a much better safe haven than Bitcoin. In Dalios opinion: There are two purposes of money: a medium of exchange and a store-hold of wealth. And Bitcoin is not effective in either of those cases now.

In the interview, Dalio pointed out that Bitcoin is still too volatile to sufficiently act as a proper store of value.

Recently, Elon musk has been in the spotlight for his cryptic tweets about Bitcoin. However, the CEO and founder of Tesla finally revealed that he is "neither here nor there on Bitcoin. Although Musk sees the value of Bitcoin, he believes that it is mostly used to perform illegal transactions:

This sort of gets the crypto people angry, but there are transactions that are not within the balance of the law.

He further added that although he sees crypto as an effective replacement for cash, he did not see it as a primary replacement. Granted, Musk does not fully endorse cryptocurrencies, however, he admits that there is a change coming to the financial industry and that banks need to watch out.

According to a 2018 article by Bloomberg, Jack Ma issued a warning over cryptocurrencies, declaring Bitcoin to be a potential bubble. The founder of the giant e-commerce Company Alibaba and chairman of Ant Financial, a Chinese-based financial conglomerate, has revealed in the past that he pays special attention to Bitcoin and blockchain technology especially toward their capacity to establish a cashless society.

Even recently, during the 20th annual China Association of Science and Technology, Ma maintained his stance on Bitcoin being a possible bubble and pointed out blockchain as the key that opens a treasure of chest of effective new technological tools.

Mike Novogratz, CEO and founder of crypto merchant bank Galaxy Digital Holdings and the former manager of the Fortress Investment Group, correctly predicted that Bitcoin would hit the $10,000 mark by the end of 2017.

Popularly known as Novo, the unlikely crypto hero has maintained that: Bitcoin is going to be the digital gold. According to Novogratz, Bitcoin is the only one of the coins out there that gets to be a legal pyramid scheme. Just like gold is.

To put his money where his mouth is, it is reported that Novogratz has invested about 30% of his fortune in cryptocurrencies. Despite making a huge loss on Bitcoins historic plunge in 2018 where his Galaxy digital Holdings reportedly lost $136 million, Novogratz remains undeterred.

He is quoted by Bloomberg saying that despite the frustration of investors losing money, the company has a business that can break even and that they have plenty of cash to run the business for a long time. Recently, the billionaire reiterated that he is even more bullish on BTC despite Bitcoins price struggle with volatility.

In September 2019, venture capitalist Tim Draper doubled down on his previous prediction of Bitcoin hitting $250,000 by 2022 when he added that those predictions were conservative.

Draper has maintained a bullish stance on Bitcoin since June 2014 when he bought Bitcoin that had been seized and auctioned off by the U.S. Marshals service. The total amount of the Bitcoin he owned at the time was estimated to be worth $19 million.

Recently, Draper spoke to CNBC where he revealed that six months ago, he pulled his wealth out of public stock markets to hold more of it in his Bitcoin portfolio. In regards to the worldwide stock market plummeting due to coronavirus concerns, Draper revealed that his exposure was limited.

After Bitcoins price surge in 2017, Tyler and Cameron became the first Bitcoin billionaires. The two brothers and founders of Gemini, a crypto exchange, claim to own about 1% of the total Bitcoin in circulation.

Despite the seeming bad blood between the twins and Facebooks founder, Mark Zuckerberg, the Winklevoss twins have revealed in interviews that they believe Facebooks Libra is positive news for the crypto space. Furthermore, according to a CNBC report, last year, the twins talked with Mark Zuckerberg before Facebooks announcement of its Libra stablecoin. Currently, the Winklevoss brothers are counted among the worlds top Bitcoin millionaires.

Bill Harris, the former CEO and co-founder of PayPal, is known for being one of the harshest Bitcoin critics. In an article he wrote in 2018, the former CEO of PayPal called Bitcoin a scam, adding that its a colossal pump-and-dump scheme, the likes of which the world has never seen.

During an interview with CNBC, Harris explained his position by pointing out that there is no relation between value and usefulness in the Bitcoin and crypto space. However, like most critics, Harris agrees that blockchain technology has terrific applications.

View post:

What Do the Richest Men in the World Think of Crypto and Blockchain? - Cointelegraph

UK Startup Puts Haitian Farmers and Their Crops On the Blockchain – Cointelegraph

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A UK tech company recently announced a blockchain ecosystem for farmers in Haiti, bringing clarity to the supply chain while bolstering sales.

Agriledger, a blockchain outfit based in the UK, was responsible for building this new ecosystem. Their goal was ensuring that farmers receive adequate pay for their crops, a Feb. 28 post from Spring Wise stated.

The solution being delivered to Haiti in the fresh fruit value chain is the blueprint for a number of target markets locally and globally, a representative from Agriledger told Cointelegraph.

The approach is to create trade and financial opportunities for farmers but then to all types of producers. The goal is to allow them to retain ownership of their products much longer in the value chain.

Agriledgers blockchain-based solution assigns farmers enrolled in the system with a digital ID number. With this ID, farmers become part of the digital supply chain.

Agriledger additionally allows these Haitian farmers to tokenize their products, granting them greater access to peer-to-peer dealings.

Agriledgers blockchain underpinnings have allowed for a far more transparent solution than what has previously existed in the region. Parties can now trust the validity of data they interact with, which smooths the process of acquiring loans and other financial services for the participating farmers.

The ecosystem also touts digital wallets and payments, bolstering the additional benefits of convenience and speed.

Looking toward the future, Agriledger aims to build a software-as-a-service (SaaS) platform in which suppliers and retailers can interact.

The customer will have a window into the provenance of the product and its journey of quality, and, should the retailer allow, a view of the financial distribution of the individual product and its beneficiaries, the representative said of the system.

Supply chain management continues to grow as a hot use case for Blockchain technology. Just a few weeks ago, Avril Group, an agro-industrial partnership specializing in nutrition, started using IBMs Food Trust blockchain network for its supply chain.

UPDATE March 3, 22:30 UTC: This article has been updated with information Cointelegraph received from Agriledger after initial publication.

Read more here:

UK Startup Puts Haitian Farmers and Their Crops On the Blockchain - Cointelegraph

New Research Confirms Blockchain’s Effectiveness for Improved Data Sharing in the Retail Industry – Yahoo Finance

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Auburn University RFID Lab Partners with GS1 US and Industry to Explore the Use of RFID and Blockchain to Improve Supply Chain Efficiency

AUBURN, Ala. and EWING, N.J., March 4, 2020 /PRNewswire/ --The Auburn University RFID Lab, in collaboration with GS1 US, completed a proof-of-concept that demonstrates the effectiveness of blockchain and radio frequency identification (RFID) technologies to improve serialized data sharing in the retail industry. Participating companies included: Nike, PVH Corp., Herman Kay, Macy's, Kohl's, Mojix, Avery Dennison, SML, IBM and Collaboration, LLC. The complete findings are available in a new white paper titled "Chain Integration Project (CHIP) Proof of Concept."

The researchers examined the exchange of serialized product data between paired brands and retailers. The findings confirmed that a blockchain network was capable of sharing item-level data encoded in RFID tags between the participants. According to the white paper, the automation of serialized product data exchange using blockchain can potentially eliminate the need for human audits and counting, increasing the productivity and efficiency of the retail supply chain. As documented in Project Zipper, a 2018 Auburn University RFID Lab study and a precursor to CHIP, the presence of serialized data in the supply chain has grown rapidly as more brands adopt RFID tags and infrastructure to collect information on individual items owing through their facilities. However, industry stakeholders reported poor item-level visibility due to a lack of data sharing. CHIP provides evidence that blockchain technology, in combination with a GS1 data-sharing standard called EPCIS (Electronic Product Code Information Services), allows partners totransmit data more directly and efficiently, while maintaining ownership of their data.

"CHIP is truly groundbreaking because it provides a vision into the future of information exchange in retail," said Justin Patton, director, the Auburn University RFID Lab. "By exploring the intersection of RFID and blockchain technology, we've taken an important step in our mission to help rid the retail supply chain of costly errors and inefficiencies caused by outdated processes and legacy systems."

"More widespread data sharing can unite the retail supply chain, however, blockchain technology is only as useful as the data that is shared by industry stakeholders," said Angela Fernandez, vice president of community engagement, GS1 US. "Now that CHIP has confirmed the viability of using EPCIS to communicate serialized item data across the supply chain, adhering to a GS1 Standards-based framework is more important than ever."

Later this year, the Auburn University RFID Lab will launch a follow-up pilot study, focusing on the financial implications of data exchange automation. Participants and researchers will more specifically test how a blockchain-based, serialized data solution can help eliminate claims and chargebacks that occur between brands and retailers.

For more information about CHIP, please visit https://rfid.auburn.edu/. To learn more about the role of GS1 Standards to support blockchain implementations, please visit http://www.gs1us.org/blockchain.

About the Auburn University RFID LabThe Auburn University RFID Lab focuses on the business value of RFID and other sensor identification technologies. Founded in 2005, the Lab works to bridge the gap between industry and academia. The Lab is uniquely partnered with most of the leaders driving RFID adoption across retail and aviation with projects from Delta Airlines, Walmart, JC Penney, Bloomingdale's, Boeing and many others. Additionally, the Lab maintains educational touring facilities and hosts over 1,000 visitors per year to learn about the technology and test for feasibility in various environments. Finally, the lab houses the ARC program, which is the most widely used program for validating RFID tag performance and quality globally. For more information, visit https://rfid.auburn.edu.

About GS1 US GS1 US, a member of GS1 global, is a not-for-profit information standards organization that facilitates industry collaboration to help improve supply chain visibility and efficiency through the use of GS1 Standards, the most widely used supply chain standards system in the world. Nearly 300,000 businesses in 25 industries rely on GS1 US for trading partner collaboration that optimizes their supply chains, drives cost performance and revenue growth, while also enabling regulatory compliance. They achieve these benefits through solutions based on GS1 global unique numbering and identification systems, barcodes, Electronic Product Code (EPC)-based RFID, data synchronization and electronic information exchange. GS1 US also manages the United Nations Standard Products and Services Code (UNSPSC).

For more information, please visit http://www.gs1us.org.

View original content:http://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/new-research-confirms-blockchains-effectiveness-for-improved-data-sharing-in-the-retail-industry-301016125.html

SOURCE GS1 US

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New Research Confirms Blockchain's Effectiveness for Improved Data Sharing in the Retail Industry - Yahoo Finance

Blockchain For Good: How The United Nations Is Looking To Leverage Technology – Forbes

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The United Nations logo is seen at the United Nations Headquarters in New York (Photo by Angela ... [+] Weiss / AFP) (Photo by ANGELA WEISS/AFP via Getty Images)

Recently, the United Nations was recognised for its use of blockchain technology in Forbes secondBlockchain 50 List. The 75-year-old organization, which has an important role to play in global humanitarian efforts, has been looking to leverage the emerging technology in several areas.

From assisting in the fight against climate change to disbursing funds to Syrian refugees using blockchain-verified iris scans instead of ID cards, the UN has looked to advance its cause with the help of a technology that is still finding its niche.

The idea of blockchain for good is not a foreign one, as the technology has such far-reaching disruptive potential that it has often been aimed at charitable exercises and situations where good can be achieved, or at least featured, through this new technology.

The UN, at the top rung of global efforts to further humanitarian causes, has proven its willingness to get on board with blockchain technology to be a more effective force. In fact, United Nations secretary-general Antnio Guterres hassaidthe intergovernmental giant needs to embrace blockchain.

It has become apparent that we currently sit on the precipice of a new industrial revolution that will be predicated on the advancement of new and currently emerging technologies. Artificial intelligence, Internet of Things, blockchain and others are all finding their feet in this new digital age.

For blockchain especially, it is being spread across many different sectors, with its impact being heavily felt, and sought, in the financial sector thanks to the cryptocurrency side of things. However, enterprises have also started recognizing the potential for the technology to bolster business, and the UN is not letting this slide by them either.

For the United Nations to deliver better on our mandate in the digital age, we need to embrace technologies like blockchain that can help accelerate the achievement of Sustainable Development Goals,saidGuterres in the statement provided exclusively toForbes.

For the UN, its focus is on achieving the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). First set in 2015, the 17 SDGs, including ending poverty and responsibly producing and consuming goods, are expected to be completed in the 2030s.

There are five blockchain projects in the United Nations Innovation Network set up to facilitate inter-agency cooperation. For example, the United Nations International Telecommunications Union and Food and Agriculture Organization have partnered to track pig supply chains in Papua New Guinea; the United Nations Capital Development Fund is exploring blockchain for remittances in Nepal; and the United Nations Development Programme is using blockchain to track the cocoa supply chain in Ecuador. But there are also other areas of blockchain usage.

The United Nations International Childrens Education Fund is also looking to the power of blockchain to bolster its work, but it is honing in on the other side of things cryptocurrencies.

The Unicef Crypto Fund, a prototype that lets the agency accept bitcoin and ether donations and invest them directly into blockchain startups, waslaunchedin October of last year and immediately had uptake from the cryptocurrency community as a donation of 1 Bitcoin and 10,000 Ether came from from the Switzerland-based Ethereum Foundation.

And again, this move from UNICEF is not just to try and profit from the volatile and exciting Bitcoin investing market, but rather than attempt to keep up with the digital age.

We dont see the Crypto Fund so much as being crypto,saidChristina Lomazzo, head of blockchain for UNICEF. What we really see it as is being ready for a digital future. Were going to need to be ready to deal with digital assets whether that be Bitcoin or Ether or some other government-backed digital currency. It could be any of those, but this is really helping us build up the muscles to understand how to live or how to on-board digital assets.

And, even though there is an entrance into cryptocurrency for the UN in this instance, those at the Ethereum Foundation, have also pointed out the benefits of being on the blockchain.

The Unicef Crypto Fund provides an amazing opportunity for us to work collaboratively with Unicef teams around the world,saidAya Miyaguchi, executive director of the Ethereum Foundation, which will be providing technical support to Unicef and its blockchain portfolio as part of the investment. Unicef has a network of 190 offices across the world that brings to the Ethereum ecosystem the ability to work with leading minds in regions that could benefit the most from Ethereum technology.

Of course, all of this work being done with blockchain currently is still very much experimental and quite theoretical. The potential has been seen, but there is still a long way to realize the goals or to even feel the direct impact that blockchain can have in humanitarian cases.

However, one use case that has come to the fore is the use of blockchain-verified iris scans for Syrian Refugees.

Syrian refugees in Jordans Azraq camp are now receiving aid, and paying for their food through a retina scan that is recorded on the blockchain, rather than through ID cards which come with their own issues.

We feel this is a starting point,saidWFPs director of innovation, Robert Opp. There are a number of potential uses of blockchain that could dramatically change the way we reach people in terms of our efficiency, effectiveness and security.

Misappropriation of funds is an issue across the whole humanitarian sector, so its little wonder that other agencies are also studying blockchain, said Yoshiyuki Yamamoto, special adviser for blockchain at the U.N. Office for Project Services (UNOPS).

In 2012, former Secretary General Ban Ki-moon said 30 percent of all U.N. development assistance was lost to corruption.

If we dont know where 30 percent of the money is, thats a big concern for everyone, said Yamamoto.

See the rest here:

Blockchain For Good: How The United Nations Is Looking To Leverage Technology - Forbes

The New Superheros: Theyll Use Gaming And Blockchain To Solve Climate – Forbes

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Can a Superhero Inspired Game Solve the Climate Crisis?

I sit down with ecopreneur Alfie Rustom to learn about his plans to motivate superhero fans to restore climate through gaming. Bioman's Forest Garden is a farming simulation game that empowers players to take constructive action against climate change; in both digital and real realities.

What is Bioman?

Bioman is a new visionary superhero franchise that explores what it means to be human in the 21st century. It evolves our understanding of our relationship with nature and technology. The eponymous novel was unleashed on Earth Day 2018 and was listed by the publishing industry's gold standard, Kirkus Reviews, as one of the best books of 2018. You can think of it as Avatar meets Spiderman.

Why does the world need another superhero?

The world doesn't need just another superhero, the world needs a cadre of superheroes that are aligned with a purpose beyond the box office. A purpose-driven superhero franchise with global reach could help mobilize a global population currently in danger of being paralyzed by eco-anxiety.

Tell us more about eco-anxiety, and how gaming can help?

According to the U.N., we now have less than 11 years to prevent catastrophic climate change. And, as extreme weather events start sweeping across the globe, worry about the climate crisis is affecting more and more people. Today, 70% of Americans are "worried" about climate change and 51% feel "helpless." With no framework for treatment, eco-anxiety is fanning the flames of our global mental health crisis.

What if a game could be designed that transforms feelings of learned helplessness around climate change into feelings of hope. And gives us the strength to take on the challenge of solving climate change.

We saw a hint of this story potential with James Camerons eco-myth, Avatar. Where we were given a view of what life connected with nature could look like. I struggle to think of any other media franchise that is doing this.

Sounds great, but what kind of game can alleviate eco-anxiety?

I see eco-anxiety as a form of learned helplessness. Psychologists know that we can transform learned helplessness through setting and achieving goals. This provides a sense of control over outcomes especially as players begin to meet those goals on a consistent basis.

Games are perfect for this first step. With gaming being the fastest growing media platform in the world, we can reach the greatest number of people. And games, unlike standard two-hour movies, can be played for years with new content being delivered continuously.

Specifically, in Bioman's Forest Garden you are a climate refugee in a camp on the edge of a forest devastated by industrialization and climate change. The player has to use robots and drones to transform the dying forest into a biodiverse and bountiful forest garden.

Based on principles of sustainable agroecology the game teaches players how to plant and nurture forest gardens. Players then harvest the plants to craft food, medicine and other goods that are in short supply in the camp.

In addition, we will generate real-world impact through our partnership with Tree Nation. The partnership will allow players to plant real trees through the game and monitor the CO2 offset. CO2 leaderboards will gamify tree-planting.

Finally, the game is social and designed to get players to collaborate in the game to tackle the worst effects of climate change. We also will offer an opportunity for our players to come together in the real world to volunteer in urban gardening/farming projects.

How will you use blockchain?

Blockchain will serve as a ledger that maintains ownership of non-fungible tokens (NFTs). These tokens are attached to individual digital assets within a game. This allows digital collectible items to be bought and traded with clear provenance of the asset. This eliminates the risk of fraud and provides the potential for digital assets to be used interchangeably between games.

Cryptokitties was the ground-breaking blockchain game that allowed people to buy digital cats breeding them to create more unique and rare cats. Cryptokitties showed the possibilities of how these assets can be used across games, creating an ecosystem of independent developers building new experiences on top of it. According to some estimates, the game had 1.5 million users who were responsible for $40 million worth of transactions on its platform. Individual cryptokitties have sold for more than $300,000 a piece.

In comparison, in games like Fortnite, players spend money on digital assets like cosmetic skins, dance moves, etc. that they dont own. And, if the game shuts down then they will lose all their investment in the game assets. NFTs eliminate platform risk.

Where are you now?

The game is in pre-production and Im partnering with one of the top mobile free-to-play game designers in the world. He designed FarmVille and is passionate about permaculture and sustainable farming. Farmville generated 700 million installs and over a billion dollars in revenue. With that player base and those revenues, we can generate a significant impact.

The movie adaptation of the critically acclaimed novel is in the final stages of development. The former chief creative of DC comics consulted on the script and the film is slated for release on Earth Day 2022.

See more at http://www.defendnature.com

Excerpt from:

The New Superheros: Theyll Use Gaming And Blockchain To Solve Climate - Forbes

Can the Blockchain Address the Vulnerabilities that Lurk Alongside the Potential of 5G? – JD Supra

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Can the Blockchain Address the Vulnerabilities that Lurk Alongside the Potential of 5G? - JD Supra

A digital loonie may be on the way and thanks to blockchain, money will never be the same again – Toronto Star

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Emerging technologies such as blockchain and cryptocurrencies are compelling subjects for Alex Tapscott. The author, public speaker and venture capital investors new book Financial Services Revolution, How Blockchain is Transforming Money, Markets and Banking, was co-authored with his father Don Tapscott. The Star spoke to the younger Tapscott recently about uses for blockchain, security concerns and possibility of the Bank of Canada introducing a digital loonie.

Can you explain what blockchain is?

Simply put, blockchain is the most important computer science innovation in a generation and its ushering in a new era for the internet an internet of value. You see, when you use the internet to send information youre sending a copy and retaining an original (think email). That works for information but not money, financial assets or anything that requires scarcity. So we still rely on middlemen. After all, when I send you money you need to know I dont still have a copy. Historically weve needed an intermediary to establish trust. Blockchain solves this problem. For the first time in human history we have a digital medium for value that will enable individuals to transact and store value in virtually every kind of asset peer to peer in a private, secure and trustless way without the need for middlemen like banks.

What are the most promising uses of blockchain?

Blockchain will do for capital and assets what the internet did for newspapers, film, and TV. It will force us to rethink the deep structure and workings of many industries, starting with finance.

In this next shift, not only could the U.S. dollar be displaced by a synthetic alternative or a Chinese crypto-yuan, but virtually every marketplace from securities like stocks and bonds, to insurance, accounting, audit and venture capital, as well as new assets like our identities, never before owned and monetized as assets by individuals will be made virtually unrecognizable.

Do you think Facebooks proposed currency Libra will materialize?

When Facebook announced its plan to create digital money called Libra, incumbents immediately pushed back. Even though Facebook has marketed Libra mainly as a way to bank the unbanked a noble cause, to be sure it wants to deploy this coin across its platform, for use in all forms of commerce online and off, which would position Facebook as a powerful new player in the global financial system. It could change how, where, and with whom billions of people spend and save, borrow and loan, and otherwise finance and insure their lives and livelihoods and current legislators, regulators, and masters of the universe are having none of it. This is a watershed moment. Facebook is one of the largest landlords of our digital economy, and its actions are far-reaching.

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First, Facebook is placing itself in the crosshairs of lawmakers and regulators as they wrestle for control over finance, money, and influence among citizen users. Second, by wading into the massive, complex world of financial services, Facebook is pitting itself against big banks as well as bit tech. Does anyone expect Jeff Bezos to allow Libra on Amazon, without launching an alternative? Finally, Libra, like bitcoin, could forever alter the traditional role of fiat money in the global economy. Just as cellular technology allowed billions to leapfrog land lines, Libras blockchain-based platform has the potential to leapfrog the traditional banking infrastructure of today.

In Financial Services Revolution, theres much discussion of international transfer of funds being deliberately and unnecessarily slow. How hard will it be for existing financial institutions to be convinced to give up their profit margins on these?

With paradigm shifts, leaders of the old are often last to embrace the new, if they survive to embrace it at all. So why did Blockbuster not create Netflix, and why did Sears not create Amazon? One reason is the innovators dilemma, where disrupters of old paradigms have trouble disrupting themselves. But leaders of todays banking giants need to understand that theyre standing on a burning platform where the risk of taking a leap into the unknown is actually lower than the risk of staying put because eventually that platform will be engulfed and collapse.

Do recent major hacks on digital currencies that use blockchain, including Ethereum Classic last year, pose a confidence problem?

Blockchains are highly secure but they are not unhackable. If I say theyre unhackable Ill surely get hacked tomorrow! However, large established blockchains such as bitcoin, Hyperledger and even Ethereum have proven highly resilient to attack. Certainly they are far more secure than traditional methods for storing data, which have proven very vulnerable think Equifax, Target or the Democratic National Committee.

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Do you think there will ever be a digital loonie, as the Bank of Canada recently speculated?

Yes. In fact the Bank of Canada has said if commercial currency initiatives like Facebooks Libra become more popular they will have no choice but to launch them. They shouldnt wait for someone else to do it first. This is a once-in-a-generation opportunity for our central bank to show leadership in digital transformation.

Processing speed is important in financial transactions but Blockchain-based transactions are slow. Will this be problematic?

Not all blockchains are created equal. While its true that bitcoin is a heck of a lot slower than other payment systems like Visa or Mastercard, numerous new blockchains are stepping up to address these bottlenecks. The most promising one is Cosmos which allows different blockchains to interoperate, radically improving their scalability. (By the way, I should disclose that Im an investor in Cosmos.)

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Does the amount of energy usage required for mining bitcoin and other currencies using blockchain technology concern you?

For bitcoin it is a valid concern, though I would point out that according to a recent study 74 per cent of bitcoin mining is powered by renewable energy. However, we shouldnt view this as some reason blockchain or cryptocurrencies are a bad idea, but rather as an implementation challenge to be overcome. We have a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to harness a radically powerful new technology to transform the economy as we know it and usher in a financial industry that is more resilient, private, efficient and secure.

This interview has been edited for length and clarity.

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A digital loonie may be on the way and thanks to blockchain, money will never be the same again - Toronto Star