This seems like a rather important discovery — where there’s water, there *could be* living microorganisms. We’re staying tuned to this . . .
View a NASA Video about “Cold Faithful”.
Image above from NASA – an infrared false-color view of the “Cold Faithful” Geyser on Enceladus.
Due to rearrangement of the Defense Budget, a couple of the candidate Unmanned Combat Aerial Vehicle (UCAV) programs will be replaced by more up-to-date technologies and mission requirements. From GovExec.com:
Replacing the Joint Unmanned Combat Air System –consisting so far of two Boeing X-45A prototype smart aircraft and a Northrop Grumman X-47A demonstrator –with a longer range unmanned aircraft will save $158 million next year.
Although NGC’s X-47A project is discontinued, it must have been great to be a part of the development team that flew the Pegasus prototype. What a rush a cool toy like this must bring . . .
Press the > button to play. The .wmv file size is about 4 MB.
UPDATE: I’ve been advised that some browsers can’t view the file. If you aren’t able to see the video, you can download it.
Crocus is a genus of perennial flowering plants that grows from a corm (a tuber or root), which is native from the Aegean, across Central Asia. Often referred to as “Dutch” Crocus, these were only seen in Europe after the 16th century. The spice saffron is obtained from the stamens of Crocus sativus, a fall-blooming species. The name of the genus is derived from the Latin adjective crocatus, meaning saffron yellow.
I photographed this little beauty where it lives in a whiskey barrel planter in the backyard yesterday.
By the way, saffron and rosemary in rice is an elegant side dish, but that’s another blog.
Know Thy Star
The Sun is a star — a main sequence star whose business is to fuse hydrogen atoms into helium atoms. Fusion is a steady but somewhat unstable and potentially violent thermonuclear process. During fusion, solar mass, heat and pressure force hydrogen atoms to combine to become helium atoms. This transformation of atomic states produces energy in the form of multispectral photons (visible light, heat, x-rays, ultra-violet, cosmic rays, magnetic flux, radio-frequency emissions and more). We all know the effects of UV on skin disease, and lately, the effects of magnetic flux on the electrical grid. The Sun, like fire, can be good and bad.
One day, far in the future, the Sun will run out of hydrogen to fuse and will become a red giant star as it attempts to fuse it’s residual helium into even heavier elements – but since it is a relatively small star, it falls short of the mass and energy needed to do so. The Sun will gradually expand to an unsustainable maximum where it suddenly collapses, and then goes nova, literally exploding its outer shell into space while its high-density core remains and will become a white dwarf star. The explosion and collapse will occur in about five billion years. In the meantime, the Sun will continue its steady fusion process and occasional chaotic behavior, which (as meteorologists and stockbrokers know) cannot accurately be predicted.
Yogi Berra’s Law: “You can observe a lot just by watching.”
Over the last four hundred years, astronomers and others have recorded their observations of the Sun; they observed a phenomenon known as “sunspots” and jotted down when they saw them, how many there were and how big, of course. Galileo, among other observers, often drew sketches of the solar disc depicting sunspot orientation. The historical records from this period are quite compelling.
Image: A sketch of the sun made by Galileo in June 1613 (NASA).
And those records appear in the graphic below (courtesy NASA) along with subsequent observations. You should notice that the number of sunspots (which corresponds to the intensity of solar activity) shrinks and grows over an eleven year (or so) cycle. Some cycles have greater intensity than others. You should also notice a gap in this behavior where the graphic is labeled “Maunder Minimum,” during the years (approximately) between 1645 and 1715. During that 70 year period, less than one sunspot per year (on average) was observed. During that same period, the Earth experienced what is called the “Little Ice Age” where winters were bitterly cold.
Let’s review:
Science makes a lot of assumptions based on observations. Maybe it’s the things we can’t observe that makes the Sun behave the way it does. There is evidence that the Sun’s rate of rotation oscillates over time, its magnetic fields wander and vary in strength, and of course has occasional Coronal Mass Ejections (prominences). The Sun may actually be, to a somewhat lesser degree than most, a variable star; some variables’ light and radiation fluctuate by 100 to 1 over short periods of time (months or years our time). Were the Sun to be in that category, however, it is doubtful that there would be any life on Earth. The following images in ultraviolet light clearly illustrate the contrasts in solar activity from the last sunspot cycle in the run up to maximum (courtesy SOHO):
Conclusions:
One more thing – the Antarctic Ozone Hole gets larger in the antarctic spring and smaller in the antarctic fall. Sunshine opens the hole, darkness closes it. The hole also grows and shrinks in direct proportion to the number of sunspots. No surprise here is there? Could the “chlorofluorocarbon emissions cause atmospheric ozone depletion” meme also be a myth?
Global Warming doomsayers ought to re-think what really affects the climate and stop beating their broken drum. Do the numbers and have a closer look at our stellar companion, the greatest of all climatological influences, the giver of life, and, ultimately the taker as well.
Reference for Maunder Minimum data: Wikipedia – Maunder Minimum
UPDATE: Read more about Correlating Sunspots to Global Climate in a subsequent article.
What a difference 117 years made to this serene little cove on Santa Catalina Island. This is a shot taken circa 1889 from a hill west of the bay looking toward the old Hotel Metropole. Photo credit COLA Public Library Website
And this is a shot of the bay we took last September from about the same place:
This next shot was taken from the bay looking toward the location of the old Hotel Metropole seen in the top picture (the old Metropole burned down years ago). The new Hotel Metropole hotel is located amongst the clutter just behind the tall palm trees in the center of the photo.
Break out the red-blue 3D glasses and check this stereo picture of the Sahara Impact Crater. What? You don’t have a pair? Well, just send Rainbow Symphony a self-addressed-stamped envelope and they’ll send you a free pair!
From SpaceWeather.com
KEBIRA IMPACT CRATER: Sometimes asteroids miss, and sometimes they don’t. Planetary scientist Farouk El-Baz of Boston University has just announced the discovery of a 19-mile-wide impact crater in the Sahara desert. He named it Kebira, an Arabic word meaning “large.”
Kebira is so large that it is actually difficult to see from ground level. Satellite images show it better. Using Landsat 7 data, Frank Reddy of Astronomy Magazine created this 3D anaglyph:
View with red-blue glasses for 3D effect.
“Desert sands, wind, and ancient rivers have eroded the dark, 100-million-year-old sandstone, but the crater’s rings and central uplift still stand out,” says Reddy. “El-Baz thinks this is the source of a yellow-green desert glass found throughout the region.
SpaceWeather.com offers a larger 3D view of the crater.
FOSE stands for Federal Office Systems Expo, and is a yearly trade show held in Washington, D.C. FOSE is currently in progress at the D.C. Convention Center. EWeek notes that a big demand this year is for IT and information services. To put the article in perspective, recall Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld’s recent remarks about losing the media war. Last December, Rumsfeld also indicated a need to improve our military cyberspace capabilities.
The exhibition floor at this year’s FOSE, the annual technology fair for the federal government, is decorated with big, rugged gear, reminding attendees that we are still at war, and there’s money to be made.
The Department of Defense, which had an operating budget of $430 billion last year, reports that it manages more than twice the dollar volume of the world’s largest corporation, and it carries 500 times more inventory items than Home Depot. This year, the department’s IT needs are greater than ever.
