for starters...

Planck Telescope is the coldest object in space

Sun, 05 Jul 2009 19:04:17 -0400

Planck Telescope is the coldest object in space:

Now that the Planck Telescope has reached its operating temperature of 273.05C, it’s the coldest object in space - colder even than the cosmic radio background.

Ancient Ecosystem Found in Ice Pocket Life never ceases to amaze...

Fri, 17 Apr 2009 10:43:09 -0400

Ancient Ecosystem Found in Ice Pocket

Life never ceases to amaze me. It seems to be able to exist under any conditions - even without any input from the sun. I wouldn’t be surprised at all if one of our probes to Mars/Jupiter/Europa/Titan/etc finds microbes thriving in the harshest of environments. They’re out there somewhere!

Divinations - by Mastodon off of Crack The Skye These guys are...

Fri, 10 Apr 2009 10:40:33 -0400

Divinations - by Mastodon off of Crack The Skye

These guys are putting out the best metal these days, hands down. Loved them in the intro the Aqua Teen movie, too.

NASA Announces New Mission to Jupiter and its Four Moons

Wed, 18 Feb 2009 21:19:48 -0500

NASA Announces New Mission to Jupiter and its Four Moons:

This is definitely a mission worth waiting for. NASA announced today that they’re planning a new mission to Jupiter, set to depart in 2020 and arrive in 2026, in conjunction with the ESA. The mission would also visit Jupiter’s four moons, Io, Europa, Ganymede, and Callisto. From the article:

Europa has a surface of ice, and scientists theorize it has an ocean of water beneath that could provide a home for living things. Ganymede, the largest moon in the solar system, is the only moon known to have its own internally generated magnetic field and is suspected to have a deep undersurface water ocean. Scientists long have sought to understand the causes of the magnetic field. Callisto’s surface is extremely heavily cratered and ancient, providing a clear indication of a record of events from the early history of the Solar System. Finally, Io is the most volcanically active body in the solar system.

Unbelievably cool. Just 17 years until we see the first pictures!

Strange Asteroid Stalks the Earth

Tue, 27 Jan 2009 13:29:13 -0500

Strange Asteroid Stalks the Earth:

The Universe Today gives word that a 10m diameter asteroid has been discovered following the earth in a nearly identical orbit. It never strays by more than 0.1au, although it poses no danger to us (closest approach will be 644,000 km from the Earth - outside of the Moon’s orbit). For the moment, at least, the earth has a mini-Moon!

Teleporting a Quantum State to Distant Matter

Sat, 24 Jan 2009 18:09:11 -0500

Teleporting a Quantum State to Distant Matter:

This month’s issue of Science carries news that physicists have succeeded in ‘teleporting’ matter over the distance of 1 meter through quantum entanglement. Although researchers were able to entangle photons successfully about 10 years ago, no one had succeeded in entangling full atoms before. In this experiment, two ytterbium ions were entangled such that the exact quantum state of one atom instantaneously transmitted to the other atom upon measurement.

I’ve long thought that quanutm entanglement is just about the strangest physical phenomena out there. It just boggles the mind. As Richard Feynman once said, ‘if you think you understand quantum mechanics, you don’t understand quantum mechanics.’ Exactly.

Hello Meow - by Squarepusher off of Hello Everything I just...

Mon, 05 Jan 2009 14:24:55 -0500

Hello Meow - by Squarepusher off of Hello Everything

I just purchased my first Squarepusher album (Hard Normal Daddy), although I’ve been mesmerized by his music for some time now. I think this video does a great job of showing why I love Squarepusher. Hope you enjoy!

Mars Rovers Roll On To Five Years

Sat, 03 Jan 2009 10:19:17 -0500

Mars Rovers Roll On To Five Years:

As of today, the Mars Rovers Spirit and Opportunity are entering the sixth year of their 3 month mission. It’s amazing what good engineering can do.

Peak Lithium

Fri, 02 Jan 2009 16:53:05 -0500

Peak Lithium:

In all the hubbub over Peak Oil, other potential shortages are being ignored. An interesting one that the Next 100 blog covers is Peak Lithium. Lithium is the critical ingredient in our best battery technologies, and society is becoming more and more reliant on its availability. Seeing as batteries are the major limiting factor in many of the newest, coolest technologies this poses a real problem.

My hope is that we develop a new type of small transportable power source or energy storage medium in the near future, but this seems unlikely at the moment. Batteries have fallen way behind our other technologies. Just goes to show that you can innovate with Physics relatively easily, but Chemistry products are much harder to develop (and don’t even mention Biology…).

Nothing Weighs Something

Thu, 18 Dec 2008 11:18:32 -0500

Nothing Weighs Something:

More exciting research into Dark Energy, as found in BBC News.

“Putting all of this data together gives us the strongest evidence yet that dark energy is the cosmological constant, or in other words, that ‘nothing weighs something’,” said Alexey Vikhlinin, who led the research from the Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory in Cambridge, US.

Nothing weighs something — how cool is that? Since I learned about it back in college, I’ve always been fascinated that only 5% of the mass in the universe is made up of what we call ‘matter’ - the stuff we can see. The other 95%? Not really sure…

Global Temperature for November Fourth Warmest on Record

Thu, 18 Dec 2008 11:13:18 -0500

Global Temperature for November Fourth Warmest on Record:

The NOAA just released the climate report for the month of November - doesn’t look so good…

For November alone, the month is fourth warmest all-time globally, for the combined land and ocean surface temperature. The early assessment is based on records dating back to 1880.

Also…

Arctic sea ice extent in 2008 reached its second lowest melt season extent on record in September.
The 2008 Atlantic hurricane season was the third most costly on record in current dollars, after 2005 and 2004, and the fourth most active year since 1944. This was the first season with a major hurricane (Category 3 or above) each month from July through November.
The United States recorded a preliminary total of just under 1,700 tornadoes from January - November. This ranks 2008 second behind 2004 for the most tornadoes in a year, since reliable records began in 1953.

Tuck: The light at the end of the stacks

Fri, 05 Dec 2008 17:20:40 -0500

Tuck: The light at the end of the stacks

National Geographic News: Alien-like Squid With...

Fri, 28 Nov 2008 09:46:31 -0500

National Geographic News: Alien-like Squid With ‘Elbows’ Filmed at Drilling Site

NASA Prepares for New Juno Mission to Jupiter

Tue, 25 Nov 2008 07:42:29 -0500

NASA Prepares for New Juno Mission to Jupiter:

We’ll have to wait 8 years, but this is bound to be a pretty cool mission. I think it could be improved by a couple of flybys of Jupiter’s moons, but I guess you can’t have everything.

Tuck: A grey day viewed from the library…

Sun, 16 Nov 2008 13:13:19 -0500

Tuck: A grey day viewed from the library…

All good things must come to an end. As winter sets in the...

Sun, 16 Nov 2008 09:01:51 -0500

All good things must come to an end. As winter sets in the Phoenix lander is no longer getting the sunlight it needs to continue operations. After several months of world-changing research the Phoenix mission has come to an end. Thanks Phoenix.

Tuck: ManEc review session

Fri, 14 Nov 2008 21:03:07 -0500

Tuck: ManEc review session

‘I Choose’ by The Offspring off of Ixnay on the Hombre Got some...

Fri, 14 Nov 2008 20:57:28 -0500

‘I Choose’ by The Offspring off of Ixnay on the Hombre

Got some downtime this evening (for the first time in months) so figured I’d post a song. This is a great track from The Offspring. I got this album back in high school while working at the school radio station, WPAA, and I still listen to it regularly. Enjoy!

Going on Sabbatical

Sun, 31 Aug 2008 10:56:52 -0400

So, in two days I begin my fall term of classes at Tuck. It still remains to be seen how busy I’ll be, but my strong suspicion is that I won’t have much time for posting new music up here. I hope to return to it as soon as possible.

I’m pretty sure that Beck’s new album Modern Guilt is going to be the one to see me through the term. Although it clocks it at only a little more that 30 minutes, it’s still the best album that I’ve heard in years. Go pick it up.

I was going to put up another song from my collection today. ...

Sun, 17 Aug 2008 19:50:05 -0400

I was going to put up another song from my collection today. But, seeing that tuneage blogged one of my favorite recently-discovered albums, I’ve decided to reblog their submission. My description wouldn’t have been as interesting anyway…

tuneage:

DJ Shadow - “Building Steam With A Grain Of Salt”

Grandiose. Epic. Anthemic. Gigantic. These words hardly describe the downbeat for this Godfatherly trip/hop and ambient composition. It is truly bigger than that. As soon as I hear it, I have the strange desire to stab my hands and arms into soft earth and dig. Not so much fast or out of control, but deep, deliberately and with great care. I dig and dig, and as I move past the mantle of our planet the song begins to engulf me. At some point around 4 minutes, there is no Earth, no me, and no DJ Shadow. There’s just the steam.