Map of the Universe

Scientists at University of California Santa Cruz have simulated a map of the universe using world's most powerful supercomputing facility at NASA AMES Research Center, in Mountain View, California. This simulation took four years to develop! It takes into the account the effects of dark matter and dark energy in formation and evolution of our universe and "is based on the latest version of a “map” of the early universe that was created nearly 10 years ago by a satellite called the Wilkinson Microwave Anisotropy Probe, or Wmap". Learn more here.

WMAP has mapped the Cosmic Microwave Background (CMB) radiation (the oldest light in the universe), produced the first fine-resolution full-sky map of the microwave sky, and determined the age of the universe to be 13.73 billion years old to within 1% error, which is 0.12 billion years, among other findings!

References:
[1] http://www.mysanantonio.com/life/article/UC-scientists-map-out-the-universe-2195884.php#ixzz1ZSYrVW5a

[2] http://map.gsfc.nasa.gov/

Another satellite is falling

As we just had sighs of relief after NASA's UARS satellite entered the Earth into the Southern Pacific ocean on September 24, 2011 without causing any harm, we learn about another dead satellite that is expected to fall back to the Earth in early November! This time it is the ROSAT satellite of the German Space Agency. ROSAT was launched in 1998 and was decommissioned in 1999 after its star tracker failed and caused its on-board camera to point directly to the Sun! UARS of NASA that was launched in 1991, was originally planned to be a three-year mission only. However, UARS was operational for fourteen years, till 2005 when it was decommissioned due to budget cuts. Yet, some consider UARS's decommissioning controversial since the mission was studying the ozone layer! I have come to believe there is no way out of having conspiracy theorists, even if the mission goes 11 more years than the original plan and enters the earth six years after it being over.

I guess as time goes by, we will have more and more of such incidents, considering so many satellites that are up there, commercial and non-commercial ones. Maybe this opens up a whole new industry and field of study for cleaning the space junk for de-orbiting them and sending them away from the Earth or re-entering them safely back to Earth.

References:

http://www.space.com/13111-falling-satellite-rosat-november-crash.html
http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/uars/index.html
http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/uars/uars_science.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Upper_Atmosphere_Research_Satellite

Why the West, and less so the rest?

We often pride in the Eastern culture, history, past achievements, but why is it that the West has prospered more than the rest of the world? When writing, medicine, first civilizations were in places like Babylon, Mesopotamia, Egypt, why their current state is not as advance and prosperous as the west? I always wondered about this question. I initially thought the west has learned from experiences and mistakes of the rest, took the lessons learned, and prospered. But could not the owners of those mistakes do the same? Historian Niall Ferguson answers this question by summarizing the ingredients of the west's prosperity as:

1- Competition
2- Scientific revolution
3- Property rights
4- Modern medicine
5- The consumer society
6- The work ethic

Learn more here:
http://www.ted.com/talks/niall_ferguson_the_6_killer_apps_of_prosperity.html

Gamification to the rescue!

I know grown men in late thirties or in their forties, playing computer games for hours and hours. I never liked such a hobby for myself as an adult, and honesty believed they could do better things with their time. Well, here is their chance to convince me of the great work they can do, with the trainings and expertise they gain from playing games: "Gamers have unlocked protein mystery that baffled AIDS researchers for years". That is, using an online game, gamers predicted the structure of a protein that plays an important rule in how HIV spreads. In other words, they solved an instance of the protein unfolding problem.

Reference:
http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,2817,2393200,00.asp#fbid=wI-RjiePJpA

Was Einstein Wrong?

I have been waiting to hear about the results of the experiments at CERN for a while, ever since I heard about the LHC experiments. Then, there were delays and I lost track and never learned what the outcome was. Now here comes this news! Scientists have detected sub atomic particle moving faster than the speed of light, a finding that undermines Einstein's theory of relativity that claims the speed of light to be a cosmic constant, an upper limit on how fast anything in universe can travel. Now, how much faster was the detected velocity? 60 nanoseconds faster! My intuition tells me the difference is not large enough and might be do to some error, as the article mentions to. But for theoretical physicist, especially those specialized in particle physics, this may be a large enough number!

I guess we have to be careful what we wish for. Do we want to break the light-speed barrier? Are we ready to accept the consequences and live in a world in which time travel would then become possible?


Reference:
http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/09/22/science-light-idUSL5E7KM4CW20110922

Wean

"Wean: 1. to accustom (a child or young animal) to food other than its mother's milk; cause to lose the need to suckle or turn to the mother for food.
2. to withdraw (a person, the affections, one's dependency, etc.) from some object, habit, form of enjoyment, or the like: The need to reduce had weaned us from rich desserts."

Reference:
http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/wean

Citizen Science: Discovery of Two New Planets

Scientific data sets grow at a faster pace than scientists can keep up with them, analyze them carefully, make discoveries, find trends, etc. For this reason Citizen Science, asking and involving citizen scientists and volunteers to perform scientific tasks, has become popular and essential. NASA has embraced the idea of Citizen Science and already has several active projects in which the public can participate. The tasks may vary from collecting ground truth data to finding hay in stacks (it is usually the second case).


One of the most successful citizen science projects of NASA is Zooniverse, composed of several projects like Moon Zoo, Planet Hunters, Galaxy Zoo, Solar Stormwatch, etc.

The SETI Institute, dedicated to finding extraterrestrial life, is asking citizens help find signals of others who might be out there in the universe, using setiQuest, by simply scrolling through signals and images and marking unusual activities and features!

Citizen Science has multiple benefits. In addition to the increased work force and chance of making scientific discoveries, it is educational and inspirational for students and a good tool for educators. In addition, it shows the taxpayer the value of the scientific projects by engaging them in the process, and as a result securing various missions and projects. If government decides to cut the budget on a mission, which the public around the globe is extremely invested in and supportive of, chances are very slim. This was the case for Hubble and its beautiful imagery.

We are already seeing the value of the citizen science. Two new planets, possibly habitable, were discovered by citizen scientists participating in Planet Hunting project! There is much more to be found and learned about.

How can you benefit from citizen science in your work and project? Can you interest and engage the public to help you? The public can be students, researchers, and professors all over the world in your field, anyone outside your own organization.

PAAIA

I spent a nice Sunday afternoon at an event titled Passing the Torch of Success hosted by Public Affairs Alliance of Iranian Americans (PAAIA) at Washington D.C. An inspirational afternoon, full of positive energy in the room, listening to success stories of Iranian-Americans in various fields, influential individuals who paved the way for many others.

Speakers included Christian Amanpour, Anousheh Ansari, Ramin Asgard, Nazie Eftekhari, Nariman Farvardin, Firouz Naderi, Vali Nasr, Faryar Shirzad, and Pardise Sabeti. Amazing set of individuals, who each had many lessons to offer.

In this post, I encourage you to learn about PAAIA, its objectives, and consider participating in their survey and becoming a member.

The America Invents Act

President Obama signs the America Invents Act today, a major change to the U.S. patent laws. By this new regulation, patents will go to the first innovator who filed the application, as opposed to the one who first made the invention without reporting it. It prevents inventors from coming out and claiming the invention, and I assume it prevents so many lawsuits, court, and lawyer fees. I am thinking some firms whose jobs is to challenge and fight for an existing patents may go out of business!


Reference:

http://whitehouse.blogs.cnn.com/2011/09/16/obamas-day-ahead-the-america-invents-act/?iref=allsearch

Save Money and the Planet!

Did you know that you might be spending hundreds of dollars more than you could have spent on gas per year, just because your car's tires are under-inflated? And that your tires may go flat sooner and faster, and worst of all you are contributing to the global warming? What would be the economical and environmental impacts of under-inflated tires just in the U.S.? Can you make a guess? Are you ready to hear it?

"If the nearly 250 million vehicles in the United States have tires that are under-inflated by seven percent, proper inflation could result in national annual savings of $23 billion and 3.3 million tons of carbon dioxide emissions. However, the government estimates that the average vehicle tire is under-inflated by 26 percent, so the potential for savings is far greater."

Just put some air in those tires. It is free!

Reference:
http://www.reuters.com/article/2008/05/14/idUS150498+14-May-2008+BW20080514
http://www.edmunds.com/fuel-economy/edmunds-employees-put-to-the-tire-pressure-test.html

Even Astronauts Commit Suicide!

"I am writing this now though to ask all of us to not let suicide be a taboo topic. It takes too many great people. In 2001, more people died due to suicide (849,000) then to homicide (500,000) and war-related (230,000) deaths combined (World Health Organization data). ", says my friend Loretta in her article titled "Even Astronauts Commit Suicide: A Tribute to a Friend and a Plea".

September 4–10 was the National Suicide Prevention Week. You can learn about suicide risk factors and warning signs here. If you have lost a loved one to suicide, talk about it.

Recycle!

"In just 10 years, citizens of the U.S. wasted enough aluminum cans to reproduce the world's entire commercial air fleet 25 times.", Container Recycling Institute.

in Our Choice, A Plan to Solve the Climate Crisis by Al Gore.

Paucity and snark

I just learned two words: paucity meaning smallness of quantity, scarcity, and snark meaning a mysterious imaginary animal! You may like the context in which I learned them even more. Well, most likely if you are a woman!

"So I'll keep it short and simple: It's not that women "overdo it" but that some men, like poorly cooked pork at a depressing state fair, are "underdone."

To our abundance, they bring paucity; to our enthusiasm, they bring flat-lined skepticism; to our light, they bring the fog of snark.

I'll take excess over scarcity every time. And I won't apologize for it, either."

from When Apologies Don't Work by Gina Barreca,

Reference:
http://www.psychologytoday.com/collections/201109/oops-dealing-mistakes/when-apologies-dont-work

4G Communications and more

I attended another IAAP lecture on 4G Wireless Communications [1]. We hear the term 3G and 4G, etc., but what does characterize 4G technology? Several properties: mobility, which immediately requires it being wireless, broadband (being able to send and receive different types of data), speed, and adhering to requirements of International Telecommunications Union (ITU), a division of United Nation, where telecommunication leaders of all countries meet and set the requirements and standards.

We also learned about how different carriers use different frequencies of the spectrum to avoid interferences. The speaker talked about some companies fighting with agencies such as FAA because their technologies are using frequencies very close to the boundaries of the frequency ranges that are used for GPS technology for aviation for example, among other applications. These concerns have led to deployment of a website for avoiding such problems, called Save Our GPS! [2]

As the time for questions and answers came, and as the topic of interference and FAA came up and there was at least one telecommunication expert in the room, I had to ask about the regulations restricting cell phone use on planes. Even though the speaker was not very happy with all the restrictions FAA puts on telecommunication companies, he immediately answered by saying the minimum effect cell phones on planes have is that they add background noise to the signals. In an ideal case, we expect all devices to use only the frequencies they are designed for. If that happens, there would be no problem. But other times, a technology such as cell phone may try another modulation of the frequency it is designed for, in which case it might be the same frequency that a device on plane is using, and thus cause interference. He suggested you can see the effects of your cell phones interference when you walk in front of your TV using it. I always think about how easily interferences or another problem, not receiving a signal, can occur by thinking about old fashioned radios we had back home. If we moved in front of it or moved the antenna a little here or there, it affected the performance of the radio. So does throwing in more signals, noise, static, or parazit at it.

[1] http://www.iaadc.net/2011/09/lecture-41-4g-wireless-communications/
[2] http://www.saveourgps.org/

GRAIL

The GRAIL mission is set to launch on September 8, 2011 to the moon! GRAIL will help scientists obtain high resolution map of moon's gravitational field [1]. This mission will deploy two spacecrafts in the same orbit around the moon, moving toward and away from each other. Measuring the changes in their relative velocity is the key to obtaining moon's high resolution gravitational map. The same technique was used for the GRACE mission, in orbit since 2002, for measuring the gravitational field of the Earth [3].

"NASA's Twin GRAIL Spacecraft Are Ready For Launch

These images show the various stages of pre-launch preparations of NASA's twin GRAIL spacecraft at Space Launch Complex 17B on Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in Florida. Image credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech." [2]


References:
[1] http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/grail/main/index.html
[2] http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/grail/multimedia/collage20110907.html
[2] http://science.nasa.gov/missions/grace/

World's Smallest Electric Motor

If you work with Micro-Electro-Mechanical (MEMS) devices and you thought that was so cool, you are way out of touch with the latest and greatest (well, not in size) technology! How small do you think is the world's smallest technology? The previous record was 200 nanometers, while a single strand of hair is about 60,000 nanometers!
Now, researchers in Tufts university have built the smallest electric motor, which is one nanometer in size! We humans can now build and control something that small, and at the same time see things millions of light years away. Mind boggling, is not it?


Reference:
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2011/09/110904140353.htm

Compassion

Here is a way to encourage selfish people become compassionate! It is good for you! From building a better immune system to a more cognitive and active brain, to the way you will feel later, if living in a better world is not good enough.

What is compassion and empathy anyways? According to Joan Halifax:

The capacity and ability to see clearly into the nature of suffering, to recognize that one is not separate from that suffering, to engage in activities to transform suffering, without being attached to the outcome. Compassion has enemies such as pity, moral outrage, and fear.

Reference:
http://www.ted.com/talks/joan_halifax.html

Smog Levels

Smog levels in the U.S. are higher than what scientists consider safe for public health. In order to change it and enforce lower emissions, rules and regulations need to be updated. Today, president Obama refused to update 2008 rules and regulations on this issue and postponed this decision till 2013, or after election as the author of this article points out. Read the article to see what the recommended levels by scientists are, and what the enforced and regulated levels were during the Bush and Obama administrations, as well as a general cost-benefit comparison of these different levels.

Reference:
http://blogs.scientificamerican.com/observations/2011/09/02/smog-levels-to-remain-higher-than-scientists-suggest-safe-for-public-health/