11/20/13
11/18/13
11/13/13
A New Threat from Space
On February 15, 2013, the world was awakened with the fear of a new space threat. The Chelyabinsk meteor entered Earth's atmosphere over Russia at about 0920 local time with an estimated speed of 18.6 km/s (66,960 km/h).
It quickly became a super-bright fireball over the southern Ural region. In fact, the light from the meteor was brighter than that of the sun. Observers felt intense heat from the fireball.
The Chelyabinsk meteor's shallow angle of entry almost allowed it to skip off the upper atmosphere and continue in heliocentric orbit. However, the angle of entry was just steep enough to allow atmospheric friction to slow its initial velocity below the earth escape speed of 11 km/s and below Earth orbital speed of 7.9 km/s.
This resulted in the object exploding in an air burst over Chelyabinsk Oblast, at a height of about 23.3 km.
The explosion generated a great deal of heat and a bright flash. In addition the event produced many small fragmentary meteorites and a powerful shock wave. Fortunately, the atmosphere absorbed most of the energy, estimated as the equivalent of approximately 440 kilotons of TNT. This is 20 to 30 times more energy than released at Hiroshima at the end on WW II.
This event demonstrated that a small asteroid could pose a bigger danger than previously thought. Astronomers have mapped about 1,000 such objects-between 10 meters and 50 meters in diameter in near-earth orbit, similar to the 20-meter-dimater asteroid that exploded over Chelyabinsk. However, astronomers think there are a million of these rocks that have not yet been detected.
Prior to the Chelyabinsk event experts thought near Earth asteroids had to be at least one kilometer in diameter to be a significant threat to Earth. The unexpected explosive force of the Chelyabinsk meteor has shifted more of the concern to smaller bodies with diameters between 10 and 50 meters.
This reassessment has increased the threat to human life from asteroids. Furthermore, small asteroids cannot be detected in advance of Earth encounter.
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Personalized Plate Cooking
The Plate Cooker is intended for busy working folks who can’t spend much time on cooking. It reflects a unique Korean culinary culture: preference for soup and rice as a breakfast, and cooking and freezing the food over weekends. This food is then heated and consumed over the upcoming week.
According to the research conducted by the designer, people tended to heat the frozen rice and other foods in the microwave to pack as lunch and if they heated all the food at once, some dishes were left cold. This Plate Cooker allows you to warm up various foods together all at once and easily cook simple meals in an efficient way.
Love it!
Designer: Ranhee Chung
       
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The e-Bike we’ve all been waiting for
Named after the 13th element that composes its unibody frame, the electric Bike 13 is both a feat of functional engineering and aesthetic integrity. Its hybrid engine is packed tightly within a robust yet lightweight, compact frame. Also built into the frame is a self-locking mechanism that freezes the rear wheel when parked to deter theft. It’s pure e-bike… nothing more and nothing less than what you need. Let’s crowdfund this thing cause I want one for Christmas!
Designer: Francois Baptista
        
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Incredible Technology: How Future Space Missions May Hunt for Alien Planets
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 Following a three-year competition, NASA recently selected the Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite (TESS) project at MIT for a planned launch in 2017.Credit: MIT KAVLI Institute for Astrophysics and Space Research |
Over the next decade, NASA and the European Space Agency (ESA) aim to launch a handful of spacecraft that should discover thousands of additionalexoplanets and characterize some of the most promising — the most apparently Earthlike — new finds in detail.
These future missions are all following in the footsteps of Kepler, whose observations have revealed that the Milky Way galaxy is jam-packed with alien planets. The instrument has spotted more than 3,500 planet candidates to date; just 167 of them have been confirmed by follow-up observations so far, but mission scientists expect about 90 percent will end up being the realdeal
. [Gallery: A World of Kepler Planets]Kepler's original planet-hunting activities came to an end this past May when the second of its four orientation-maintaining reaction wheels failed, robbing the spacecraft of its ultra-precise pointing ability. But the instrument may continue its planet search in a modified and limited fashion, as part of a possible future mission dubbed K2.
NASA is expected to make a final decision about K2, and Kepler's ultimate fate, around the middle of next year. By then, the first member of
the exoplanet new wave will already be aloft — Europe's Gaia mission.
ESA's Gaia spacecraft is slated to blast off from French Guiana next month; its launch window extends from Dec. 17 through Jan. 5.
Gaia will head to a gravitationally stable spot about 900,000 miles (1.5 million kilometers) from Earth called the sun-Earth Lagrange Point 2. Over the next five years, the spacecraft will repeatedly measure the position, movement and brightness changes of more than 1 billion Milky Way stars — about 1 percent of the galaxy's total.
"This huge stellar census will provide the data needed to tackle an enormous range of important problems related to the origin, structure and evolutionary history of our galaxy," ESA officials write in a description of the Gaia mission. [7 Ways to Discover Alien Planets]
Exoplanet science should be one of the fields that benefits. The Gaia mission, whose total cost is 740 million euros (about $990 million), could potentially detect tens of thousands of new planetary systems, researchers say.
ESA will likely launch another exoplanet mission, called Cheops (short forCHaracterizing ExOPlanets Satellite), four years after Gaia gets off the ground.
Like Kepler, Cheops will watch for exoplanet "transits," gathering data when alien worlds cross the face of their parent stars from the instrument's perspective. But the similarities mostly end there. While Kepler stared at more than 150,000 stars simultaneously, Cheops will target one star at a time. And its chief aim is the follow-up study of known exoplanets, rather than the discovery of previously unknown worlds.
"Knowing when to look, and at which star, will make Cheops extremely efficient at providing first-step characterization of low-mass exoplanets by measuring accurate radii and densities," David Ehrenreich, of the University of Geneva, said Nov. 6 during a presentation at the second Kepler Science Conference at NASA's Ames Research Center in Moffett Field, Calif.
Another key goal of Cheops, Ehrenreich added, is "collecting the 'golden targets' for future in-depth characterization by, for instance, the James Webb Space Telescope."
Cheops' total cost is about $134 million (100 milllion Euros), Ehrenreich said. Formal adoption of the mission is expected in the next few months, with launch targeted for late 2017.
Amazing Photos of Natural Disasters
1. Eyjafjallajokull Volcano, 2010 (Iceland)
In March 2010, the Eyjafjallajokull volcano in Iceland exploded to life, spewing lava, magma, rock, and clouds of ash into the sky above it. The disaster grounded airlines, stranding holiday travelers and business passengers across Europe and North America. (Photo by Ragnar Th. Sigurdsson).
2. A Landslide Closed Highway 1 in California, 2011 (US)
On March 17, 2011, a large portion of the southbound lane near Rocky Creek Bridge in Monterey County, California broke away, leaving a large hole in the road. Fortunately, no one was injured.
3. A Massive River of Lava Flowing into the Ocean Shortly Before Dawn (US)
The earliest reliable written records of historical activity date back to about 1820, and the first well-documented eruption occurred in 1823. Although Native Hawaiians are thought to have first settled on the island around 1,500 years ago, oral records predating European arrival on the island are scarce and difficult to interpret.
One pre-contact eruption in particular, a dramatic event in 1790, formed the volcano's present day caldera and was responsible for the death of a party of warriors, part of the army of Keōua Kuahu'ula, the last island chief to resist Kamehameha I's rule. Their death is evidenced by a set of footprints preserved within Hawaii's Volcanoes National Park, which is listed on the National Register of Historic Places.
Kilauea has been the site of 61 separate eruptions since 1823, easily making it one of the most active volcanoes on Earth.
Photo by Miles Morgan
4. Undersea Volcano in Tonga, 2009 ( Polynesian)
The 2009 Tonga undersea volcanic eruption was a volcanic activity that began on March 16, 2009 near the island of Hunga Tonga, approximately 11 kilometers from the Tongan capital of Tongatapu.
Four days after the start of the eruption a strong earthquake measuring 7.6 on the Richter scale also struck the region. There has been no corroboration of a direct link connecting the volcanic eruption and earthquake.
Photo by Lothar Slabon
5. A Volcano Erupting During Storms in the Middle of the Night, 2008 (Chile)
This image by UPI photographer Carlos Gutierrez shows a volcano erupting during storms in the middle of the night on May 3, 2008 in Chaiten, Chile. The Chaiten Volcano, located some 800 miles south of the capital Santiago, was considered inactive since it had not erupted for hundreds of years. Thousands of citizens were evacuated from the area.
6. Running From The Tsunami, 2004 (Indonesia)
The 2004 Indian Ocean earthquake was an undersea earthquake that occurred on Sunday, December 26, 2004 with an epicenter off the west coast of Sumatra, Indonesia.
The earthquake was caused when the Indian Plate was subducted by the Burma Plate and triggered a series of destructive tsunamis along the coasts of most landmasses bordering the Indian Ocean, killing over 230,000 people in fourteen countries and inundating coastal communities with waves up to 98 ft. high.
The Sumatra–Andaman Tsunami was one of the deadliest natural disasters in recorded history. Indonesia was the hardest-hit country, followed by Sri Lanka, India, and Thailand.
7. Hurricane Force Winds, 2012 (US)
Hurricane Sandy developed from a tropical wave in the western Caribbean Sea on October 22, quickly strengthened, and was upgraded to Tropical Storm Sandy six hours later. Sandy moved gradually northward toward the Greater Antilles and increasingly intensified.
Sandy was the deadliest and most destructive hurricane of the 2012 Atlantic hurricane season, as well as the second-costliest hurricane in United States history. At least 286 people were killed along the path of the storm in seven countries.
In Jamaica, winds left 70% of residents without electricity, blew roofs off buildings, killed one person, and caused about $100 million (2012 USD) in damage. In Haiti, Sandy's outer bands brought flooding that killed at least 54 people, caused food shortages, and left about 200,000 homeless. In the Dominican Republic, two died. In Puerto Rico, one man was swept away by a swollen river. In Cuba, there was extensive coastal flooding and wind damage inland, destroying some 15,000 homes, killing 11, and causing $2 billion (2012 USD) in damage. In The Bahamas, two died amid an estimated $700 million (2012 USD) in damage. In Canada, two were killed in Ontario and an estimated $100 million (2012 CAD) in damage was caused throughout Ontario and Quebec.
8. Eruption of Mount St. Helens, 1980 (US)
In 1980, a major volcanic eruption occurred at Mount St. Helens, a volcano located in Washington in the United States. The eruption was the only significant one to occur in the contiguous 48 states since the 1915 eruption of Lassen Peak in California.
9. The Largest And Deadliest Wildfires in California (US)
The 2009 California wildfires were a series of 63 wildfires that were active in the state of California during the year 2009.
The fires burned more than 336,020 acres of land from the beginning of July through late November following red flag warnings, destroying hundreds of structures and killing two people.
The Station Fire north of Los Angeles was the largest and deadliest of these wildfires, burning 160,577 acres and killing two firefighters.
10. Amazing View of Alabama's Tornado, 2011 (US)
Fierce storms have obliterated large areas of land from Mississippi to Georgia in the U.S., wiping out homes and businesses.
Meteorologists in Alabama say that 35 tornadoes blew across the state in one week, killing 236 people.
11. A House Drifting On The Ocean, 2011 (Japan)
Two days after the 9.0 magnitude earthquake and subsequent tsunami, a Japanese home which was adrift miles from the coast of Japan was visually inspected by a helicopter-based search and rescue team from the aircraft carrier USS Ronald Reagan.
Given the situation, ships and aircraft from the Ronald Reagan Strike Group provided humanitarian assistance off the coast of Japan.
This U.S. Navy photo by Mass Communication Specialist 3rd Class Dylan McCord was taken in the Pacific Ocean near Sendai, Japan on March 13, 2011.
12. Mobilizing in the Middle of the City by Boat, 2005 (US)
Hurricane Katrina was the costliest natural disaster, as well as one of the five deadliest hurricanes, in the history of the United States.
Hurricane Katrina formed over the Bahamas on August 23, 2005 and crossed southern Florida as a moderate hurricane, causing some deaths and flooding there before strengthening rapidly in the Gulf of Mexico.
On Monday morning, August 29, in southeast Louisiana, Katrina caused severe destruction along the Gulf coast from central Florida to Texas, much of it due to the storm surge.
The highest death toll occurred in New Orleans, Louisiana. Eventually, 80% of the city and large tracts of neighboring parishes became flooded, and the flood waters lingered for weeks. However, the worst property damage occurred in coastal areas, including all Mississippi beachfront towns which were over 90% flooded in a matter of hours, causing boats and casino barges to ram buildings, pushing cars and houses inland, and forcing water 6–12 miles from the beach.
13. A Huge Crack in the Highway After an Earthquake, 2012 (Philippines)
On February 6, 2012, at least 52 people were killed when a 6.9-magnitude earthquake hit Negros and Cebu (Philippines), causing landslides, creating huge cracks in highways, and violently shaking buildings.
Rescuers dug with picks and shovels trying to reach dozens of people trapped under houses that collapsed.
14. Buildings Collapsed After an Earthquake, 2010 (Haiti)
On January 12, 2010, the Haiti earthquake was a catastrophic magnitude 7.0 MW earthquake with an epicenter near the town of Léogâne, approximately 25 km. west of Port-au-Prince, Haiti's capital.
The earthquake caused major damage in Port-au-Prince, Jacmel, and other settlements in the region. Many notable landmark buildings were significantly damaged or destroyed, including the Presidential Palace, the National Assembly building, the Port-au-Prince Cathedral, and the main jail. The government of Haiti estimated that 250,000 residences and 30,000 commercial buildings collapsed or were severely damaged.
Image by Jean-Claude Coutausse
15. A Young Man Marooned by Flood Waters Seen from a Helicopter, 2010 (Pakistan)
On August 9, 2010, at least 15 million people were directly impacted by flooding following a monsoon, and it is estimating that 20 million people were left homeless during flooding in the Rajanpur district in Pakistan.
Photo by Stringer
16. Ash Clouds Above The Buang Valley on The Upper Ridge of the Mayon Volcano, 1984 (Philippines)
A nighttime view from Legaspi City on September 14, 1984 shows incandescent lava flows descending from the Mayon volcano in the Philippines. The flows traveled about 4 km. to the lower flanks of the volcano, adjacent to previous flows from eruptions in 1968 and 1978.
17. Monsoon Rain on The Januma River, 2006 (India)
The last monsoon rain in India was registered on June 17, 2013. More than a dozen people lost their lives due to record downpours in Uttarakhand state, situated in the foothills of the Himalayas.
Those floods and landslides in northern India killed at least 1,000 people, with thousands more missing. Also, the floods destroyed roads, bridges, electrical poles, and communication networks.
About 800 pilgrims sought refuge in the stone temple, which was built in the eighth century and stands 11,759 feet above sea level. The temple is dedicated to Shiva, the Hindu god of destruction. That's the irony of life, right?
18. Supercell Thunderstorm in Montana, 2010 (US)
Photo by Sean Heavey.
19. Double Cyclone, 2006 (Iceland)
Photo by Jesse Allen.
20. Lightning Storm in Roswell, New Mexico, 2010 (US)
Photo by Mark Wilson.
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