Op-ed | The costs of extreme weather and climate are soaring. Commercial space data should be a bigger part of the solution
Thursday, 29 July 2021 12:28
Weather forecasting has made steady progress during the past several decades, yet the financial costs of extreme weather are staggering and getting worse. Part of the problem is that forecast improvements for the most impactful types of weather, including hurricanes, tornadoes, flooding and winter storms, have been slower to materialize, often resulting in fluctuating forecasts and large uncertainties even at short lead times.
How the Galileo Project will search the skies for alien technology
Thursday, 29 July 2021 11:49
Can we find alien technology? That is the ambitious goal of the Galileo Project, launched this week by Harvard astrophysicist Avi Loeb with substantial private financial backing.
The project is far from the first attempt to detect signs of civilisations beyond Earth. Loeb has been criticized in the past for his dismissive approach to previous efforts to find extraterrestrial life and his argument that an alien artifact passed through our solar system in 2017.
So why do Loeb and his collaborators think they have a chance of finding something where others have failed? There are three triggers that suggest they might.
Exoplanets, "Oumuamua, and UFOs
First, years of painstaking observations have shown that many stars host Earth-like planets. There is a real chance these "exoplanets" might be home to alien civilisations.
Second, five years ago, an interstellar visitor, dubbed "Oumuamua, tumbled though our solar system. It was a skinny object about 400 meters long, and we know from its speed and trajectory that it arrived from outside our solar system. It was the first time we had ever seen an interstellar object enter our neighborhood.
GeoOptics to launch next-generation Earth science constellation
Thursday, 29 July 2021 11:13
WASHINGTON — GeoOptics is planning to deploy of constellation of dozens of smallsats over the next five years to collect weather and other Earth science data for government and commercial customers.
The Pasadena, California-based company announced July 29 that it will start launching next year a line of satellites called CICERO-2 that are upgraded versions of the CICERO satellites it has previously launched to collect global navigation satellite system (GNSS) radio occultation data used in weather forecasting.
Astronomers detect light from behind a black hole for the first time
Thursday, 29 July 2021 10:28
Gas, dust and light that get sucked into a black hole are lost forever - so it shouldn't be possible to see light from behind a black hole.
But that's just what astronomers spotted while observing a supermassive black hole at the center of a galaxy 800 million light-years away.
While studying a series of X-ray flares emitted by the black hole, Stanford University astrophysicist Spacecom Leader Discusses the Value of Partnerships in Defending Space
Thursday, 29 July 2021 10:28
Army Gen. James H. Dickinson said today that the role of the Space Force is to organize, man, train and equip space forces, while Spacecom employs those forces in operations.
Both Spacecom and the Space Force were created because of the threat from adversaries in the space domain and the need to protect and defend space assets from those adversaries, he said.
Dickinson noted that the 'Metaverse': the next internet revolution?
Thursday, 29 July 2021 10:28
Imagine a world where you could sit on the same couch as a friend who lives thousands of miles away, or conjure up a virtual version of your workplace while at the beach.
Welcome to the metaverse: a vision of the future that sounds fantastical, but which tech titans like Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg are betting on as the next great leap in the evolution of the internet.
The metavers Tesla quarterly profits top $1 bn for 1st time
Thursday, 29 July 2021 10:28
US electric carmaker Tesla reported its first-ever quarterly profit above $1 billion Monday as it reiterated its 2021 production targets despite supply chain upheaval.
Record deliveries of electric cars during the period allowed Elon Musk's company to garner earnings of $1.1 billion in the quarter, up from $104 million in the year-ago period as revenues nearly doubled to $12.0 billion. Senate confirms Kendall to be Air Force Secretary
Thursday, 29 July 2021 10:28
Frank Kendall won confirmation from the Senate July 26 to be the 26th Secretary of the Air Force, placing an official with decades-long service in defense issues in the top civilian job at a time when the department is navigating new global challenges and wide-reaching modernization efforts.
The vote reflected both Kendall's well-known record in previous active duty and policy jobs and his What happens to marine life when oxygen is scarce
Thursday, 29 July 2021 10:28
In September of 2017, Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution postdoctoral scholar Maggie Johnson was conducting an experiment with a colleague in Bocas del Toro off the Caribbean coast of Panama. After sitting on a quiet, warm open ocean, they snorkeled down to find a peculiar layer of murky, foul-smelling water about 10 feet below the surface, with brittle stars and sea urchins, which are usually Wearable brain-machine interface turns intentions into actions
Thursday, 29 July 2021 10:28
A new wearable brain-machine interface (BMI) system could improve the quality of life for people with motor dysfunction or paralysis, even those struggling with locked-in syndrome - when a person is fully conscious but unable to move or communicate.
A multi-institutional, international team of researchers led by the lab of Woon-Hong Yeo at the Georgia Institute of Technology combined wirel Earth's 'vital signs' worsening as humanity's impact deepens
Thursday, 29 July 2021 10:28
The global economy's business-as-usual approach to climate change has seen Earth's "vital signs" deteriorate to record levels, an influential group of scientists said Wednesday, warning that several climate tipping points were now imminent.
The researchers, part of a group of more than 14,000 scientists who have signed on to an initiative declaring a worldwide climate emergency, said that go Companies compete for payload to make air from moondust
Thursday, 29 July 2021 09:18
ESA is challenging companies in its Member States to design a compact plant to demonstrate the manufacture of oxygen on the Moon. Industrial teams are competing this summer to propose and prove designs through testing, with the winner set to be declared in September. This small piece of technology will evaluate the prospect of building larger plants to produce propellant for spacecraft, air for astronauts and metallic raw materials for equipment.
Companies compete on payload to make air from moondust
Thursday, 29 July 2021 09:18ESA is challenging companies in its Member States to design a compact plant to demonstrate the manufacture of oxygen on the Moon. Industrial teams are competing this summer to propose and prove designs through testing, with the winner set to be declared in September. This small piece of technology will evaluate the prospect of building larger plants to produce propellant for spacecraft, air for astronauts and metallic raw materials for equipment.
Competing companies developing payload to make air from moondust
Thursday, 29 July 2021 09:18ESA is challenging companies in its Member States to design a compact plant to demonstrate the manufacture of oxygen on the Moon. Industrial teams are competing this summer to propose and prove designs through testing, with the winner set to be declared in September. This small piece of technology will evaluate the prospect of building larger plants to produce propellant for spacecraft, air for astronauts and metallic raw materials for equipment.
Juice takes the heat
Thursday, 29 July 2021 07:00
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ESA's Jupiter Icy moons Explorer, Juice, has successfully completed rigorous thermal tests simulating the extreme coldness of space and the warmth of the Sun at ESA’s test centre ESTEC, in The Netherlands.
The spacecraft underwent a month of round-the-clock testing and monitoring in the Large Space Simulator, which recreates the vacuum of space and is able to simulate both hot and cold space environments. The spacecraft was subjected to temperatures ranging from 250 degrees to minus 180 degrees Celsius, showing that it can survive its journey in space.
Juice will launch in 2022 to our Solar System’s largest planet.