Kepler Space Telescope Finds Lots of Possible Planets
- NASA has announced that the Kepler telescope has found
more than 1,200 extrasolar planet candidates in its first
four months of operation. While what the telescope has found
are just signals indicating the likelihood of a planet,
NASA expects that 80% of them will eventually be fully confirmed.
Many of the type of planets Kepler is finding are also smaller
and more Earth-like than many of the extrasolar planets
found in the past. "We think we're seeing about 200 multi-planet
systems," said astronomer Daniel Fabrycky, of the University
of California, Santa Cruz. "That really blew us away." Of
those 1,200 candidates , 54 seem to reside in life-friendly
orbits around their parent stars. If these figures pan out
it would seem to increase the possibility of eventually
finding a planet with at least a primitive form of life.
Pterosaurs Were Big Boys - A new study by Japanese
scientist Tai Kubo suggests that some pterosaurs - flying
reptiles from the era of the dinosaurs - may have weighed
in at up to 320 pounds. That nearly 10 times heavier than
any flying bird today. Kubo used the fossilized footprints
left by pterosaurs to estimate their weight. After examining
the tracks left by living animals like crocodiles, lizards,
tortoises and a frog, he was able to come up with a formula
that related the fore and hind limb foot sizes to their
weights. He then applied it to fossilized track ways that
were thought to be made by pterosaurs. Kubo would eventually
like to extend the method to make estimates of the weight
of dinosaurs from their foot prints.
Bat Buddies - A recent study has shown that
Bechstein's bats can maintain friendships similar to the
kind of friendships maintained by humans. The study, published
in the Proceedings of the Royal Society B, found
that the bats, like elephants, dolphins, some carnivores
and certain primates, have the ability to maintain long-term
friendships in highly dynamic social environments. The study
found that these friendships were not based solely on size,
age or blood relationship. Study author Gerald Kerth noted
that these relationships in many ways mirror human ones.
Notwithstanding all of their "daily chaos, the bats are
able to maintain long-term relationships," he said. The
idea that, these bats, with such tiny brains can maintain
friendships calls into question the theory that humans have
developed such large brains in order to keep track of social
relationships.
Lucy and Friends Walked Upright - An arched fossilized
foot bone found in Ethiopia suggests that human ancestors
started walking upright at least 3.2 million years ago.
The bone belonging to a member of the species Australopithecus
afarensis (the same species as the famed Lucy fossil)
shows that the hominid's foot had an arch. This would have
allowed the foot to provide leverage to push off the ground
at the start of a stride and also help absorb the shock
when it contacted the ground again. It also means that Australopithecus
afarensis was no longer a tree dweller. An older species,
Ardipithecus ramidus, a human ancestor from 4.4 million
years ago, is known to have a flatter, ape-like feet and
probably only walked upright part of the time.
Sun's Unseen Companion in News Again - Scientists
continue to argue over the possibility that our Sun has
an unseen companion star. Astrophysicists John Matese and
Daniel Whitmire from the University of Louisiana at Lafayette
have proposed that a giant planet or small brown dwarf star
orbits with the sun far beyond the orbit of Pluto. Its gravitational
influence may explain why regularly the inner solar system
gets plummeted with asteroids. Matese and Whitmire call
their hypothetical object Tyche. As Tyche passes
close to the Oort cloud of asteroids, dwarf planets and
comets at the edge of the solar system, a few are dislodged
and travel on a path toward the sun. In the past one or
more of these have hit Earth and they may be responsible
for mass extinctions on our planet. Matese and Witmire's
theory is similar to one proposed many years ago for an
object named Nemesis. The Nemesis theory proposed
a star in a different location and of a different type,
however. Many scientists are skeptical of both theories
noting that such an incredible claim would require an incredible
level of proof. Matese and Witmire hope that the Wide-Field
Infrared Survey Explorer (WISE) space telescope, which just
completed its mission, may have picked up evidence of Tyche's
existence and WISE researchers plan to check the data for
any sign of the unseen planet/star
Humans Would Ace Neanderthals in Marathon - A
study by anthropologist David Raichlen of the University
of Arizona and some colleagues suggest that while our extinct
relatives, the Neanderthals, had strength on their side,
modern humans would easily outrun them in a race. Raichlen
used research that suggests that the energy cost of running
at a given speed is directly related to the length of certain
limb bones. The longer the bones are, the more energy needed
to run. Applying this formula to human and Neanderthal skeletons
the researchers found that homo sapiens have the
edge on endurance and distance running. Scientists speculate
that this is because homo sapiens spent thousands
of years running down prey on the hot savannahs of Africa,
while Neanderthals spent most of their time in colder climates
catching animals using different techniques.
Science Quote of the Month -
"It requires a very unusual mind to undertake the analysis
of the obvious." - Alfred North Whitehead
What's
New at the Museum:
The Headshrinkers of South America -
Only one group traditionally practices the art of taking
a trophy human head and reducing it in size to that of a
man's fist.>Full Story
The Biggest Bomb - Is there anything
more powerful than an H-bomb? What would the effects of
an H-bomb be on a metropolitan area such as New York? -
Jacobn
The largest H-Bomb
ever detonated in history was the Tsar Bomba tested
by the Soviet Union on October 30, 1961. It exploded with
a force equivalent to 50 megatons of TNT. In theory the
bomb's design could have yielded as much as 100 megatons,
but was scaled down to limit the fallout. Even as it was
the detonation was so powerful that the pilot of the plane
that dropped the bomb received a fatal dose of radiation
despite being 28 miles away.
Though such power
is impressive, a bomb that large is not really a useful
military weapon. Because of its size it required a special
aircraft to deliver it and it could not be put on top of
inter-continental ballistic missile (ICBM). From a military
point of view it made more sense to build many smaller nuclear
weapons (perhaps 1 megaton or less). If deployed over a
large area they could be much more effective than the one
big Tsar Bomba.
Watch
our mini-documentary on Tsar Bomba
So what would
happen to New York if it were hit by a standard one megaton
H-Bomb that might be delivered by an ICBM? Usually such
warheads were designed to detonate in the air above the
target to get the most bang-for-the-buck. A device exploding
8,000 feet above the ground would create a flash of heat
that would set most combustible materials on fire up to
a distance of 8.5 miles and most wood ablaze to a distance
of over four miles. If you set the bomb off directly over
the Empire State Building, Central Park along with any wooden
structures in lower Manhattan would be in flames. A blindingly
bright fireball would form and anybody seeing it out to
a distance of 50 miles (the distance to West Point, New
York) would be blinded either temporarily or permanently.
Anybody with skin exposed to the flash would suffer extreme
burns if they were within about six miles (this includes
most of Manhattan along with parts of New Jersey and Staten
Island.
The flash would
be followed by a shock wave traveling outward at the speed
of sound. This would level all buildings, including skyscrapers,
within a distance of a little more than a mile. This would
be an area the width of the island and from Central Park
down to about Greenwich Village. Wooden buildings would
be demolished over most of the island. Between the flash,
blast wave and following firestorm it is estimated that
everybody within a mile and a half of the Empire State Building
would be killed. On the rest of Manhattan and much of the
surrounding area within about 5 miles of ground zero the
casualty rate would be around 50 percent. Interestingly
enough the fallout from an air detonation would be a much
smaller factor that the heat and the blast as much of the
radioactive dust would decay before falling to the ground.
(Note that a bomb produced by terrorists would not nearly
be as powerful, but might have a greater fallout as it would
be exploded close to the ground).
So is there a
weapon more powerful than an H-Bomb? In theory an anti-matter
bomb would be enormously more potent. While an H-Bomb converts
matter to energy with an efficiency of less than one percent,
anti-matter coming in contact with matter would turn into
energy with 100 percent efficiency. However, anti-matter
isn't easy to obtain. In Dan Brown's bestselling book Angels
& Demons he suggests anti-matter is stolen from CERN,
the European Nuclear Research Center, to create a bomb.
However, if all the anti-matter produced by CERN in the
last 30 years was preserved and brought together it would
only amount to about to 10 billionths of a gram and would
have the power of a kitchen match.
There are other
agencies with plans to produce anti-matter in larger volumes
(like NASA - it would make a great fuel for a spaceship
since it is a lot of potential energy in a small package)
but the cost of using it to make a bomb would still be far
more than building a regular nuclear bomb of the same power.
Also for military purposes it is important to have a weapon
that can be handled safely and only goes off when you want
it too. Since anti-matter will explode whenever it contacts
matter, storing it is difficult and should the storage mechanism
ever break down a large explosion would result. Even so,
the Air Force has expressed some interest in anti-matter,
not in order to build an anti-matter bomb itself, but to
use anti-matter as a trigger for a regular nuclear bomb.
In
History:
Morris K. Jessup - On March 2, 1900, Morris
K. Jessup was born in Rockville, Indiana. Jessup, an astronomer
and wrote several books in the 1950's on UFOs, including
The Case for the UFO, UFO and the Bible, and
The Expanding Case for the UFO. Jessup is perhaps
best known for his connection with "The
Philadelphia Experiment"a supposed incident where a
US warship, in a test of an invisibility device during WWII
led to a disaster for the crew. Jessup was sent a copy of
his own book Case for the UFO, with notes scribbled
in by a "Carlos Allende" who claimed knowledge of government
secrets including the misguided experiment. Unfortunately,
Jessup, depressed over personal problems, committed suicide
in 1959. There are those who still believe that he was silenced
by government agents because he "knew too much."
In the
Sky:
Mercury/ Jupiter Conjunction - If you never seen
the planet Mercury this month will be a good time to observe
it. Starting on March 8th Mercury can be seen in the western
sky early each evening. Each night it will get a little
closer to the planet Jupiter (which will be the brightest
star-like object in the sky) until it is only two degrees
way on March 15 (Your fist held out at arm's length is about
10 degrees wide). After that Mercury will continue to rise,
while Jupiter gets lower in the sky. Mercury will appear
dimmer as time goes on as less and less of its surface will
be in sunlight with each passing day, so catch it early
on!
Please
check local listing for area outside of North America.
Nova: Hunting the Edge of Space: Hour 1 - From Galileo's to today's, telescopes have opened grand vistas onto our
galaxy and beyond.On PBS: March 23
at 9 pm; ET/PT.
Nova: Hunting the Edge of Space: Hour 2 - Huge
new telescopes are poised to penetrate the enigmas of dark
matter and dark energy. On PBS: March 23 at 10 pm on PBS;
ET/PT.
Explosions Gone Wrong - Explosions Gone Wrong - Sometimes deadly, always incredible, the biggest
and baddest explosions ever caught on video from every corner
of the globe. On the Discovery Channel: Mar 05, 10:00 pm; Mar 06, 1:00 am; ET/PT.
Solving History with Olly Steeds Lost City of Gold - Journalist Olly Steeds follows new clues and treks deep into the remote
Andes Mountains in search of the legendary city of gold.
On The Science Channel: Mar 08, 8:00 pm; Mar 08, 11:00 pm;
Mar 10, 3:00 am; ET/PT.
Last Mysteries of the Titanic - Academy Award winner James Cameron leads a film team of underwater explorers
on a series of historic dives to document the innermost
spaces of the world's most famous shipwreck. The team will
use four mini-robots and a seafloor-to-satellite data system.
On The Science Channel: Mar 10, 8:00 pm; Mar 10, 11:00 pm;
ET/PT.
Ancient Aliens: Aliens and the Third Reich - If ancient aliens visited Earth in the remote past, could they have
given us advanced technology, past down through human history?
And could this technology have helped the Third Reich build
mysterious weapons and crafts far beyond the limits of 20th
century science? During World War II, there were reports
that the Germans built an operational flying saucer, known
as the Hanebu, which was said to use mythical technology
found in ancient Indian texts. Another craft was rumored
to have been constructed with the help of psychics and mediums
who claimed to have received detailed blueprints from extraterrestrial
beings. Is it possible Hitler's quest for world domination
was aided and abetted by ancient extraterrestrial technology
that was rediscovered? And could the allegedly rebuilt alien
devices developed in Germany have played a role in America's
ability to land a man on the moon? On The History Channel:
March 3rd 11PM; ET/PT.
Exploer: Lost Mummies of New Guinea - Nat Geo embarks on an expedition to Papua New Guinea to understand human
mummification. Our goal is to find a well-preserved mummy
to gain clues into this incredible form of mummification
in the tropics. On The National Geographic Channel: March 5th 7:00 PM; ET/PT.
Giant Crystal Cave - Hidden deep beneath the surface of the earth is one of the greatest
natural marvels on the planet: a giant crystal cave. NGC
follows an international team of scientists to unlock the
secrets of the cave. On The National Geographic Channel: March 6th 7:00 PM; ET/PT.
Finding Atlantis - Could the fabled lost city of Atlantis have been located? Using satellite
photography, ground-penetrating radar and underwater technology,
experts are now surveying marshlands in Spain to look for
proof of the ancient city. On The National Geographic Channel: March 13th 9:00 PM; March 15th 8:00 PM & 11PM; ET/PT.
Kepler Space Telescope Finds Lots of Possible Planets
- NASA has announced that the Kepler telescope has found
more than 1,200 extrasolar planet candidates in its first
four months of operation. While what the telescope has found
are just signals indicating the likelihood of a planet,
NASA expects that 80% of them will eventually be fully confirmed.
Many of the type of planets Kepler is finding are also smaller
and more Earth-like than many of the extrasolar planets
found in the past. "We think we're seeing about 200 multi-planet
systems," said astronomer Daniel Fabrycky, of the University
of California, Santa Cruz. "That really blew us away." Of
those 1,200 candidates , 54 seem to reside in life-friendly
orbits around their parent stars. If these figures pan out
it would seem to increase the possibility of eventually
finding a planet with at least a primitive form of life.
Sea
Serpent Art - Check out this sculpture by reader and
artist Brian Blacknick. Be careful, there's always a bigger
predator around than you! For details on how he created
this work see his blog at 
