earth – Page 30

Over the Antarctic, the Smallest Ozone Hole In a Decade

hypnosec writes “The ozone layer seems to be on a road to recovery over Antarctica; according to Europe’s MetOp weather satellite, which is monitoring atmospheric ozone, the hole over the South Pole in 2012 was the smallest it’s been in the last 10 years. The decrease in size of the hole is probably the result of reduction in the concentration of CFCs, especially since the mid-1990s, because of international agreements like the Montreal Protocol.” Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Kaspersky Update Breaks Internet Access For Windows XP Users

An anonymous reader writes “Yesterday afternoon, Kaspersky Labs released a definition update that blocked all Internet and Intranet access on Windows XP workstations. While there has been no official communication from Kaspersky, their forum is lit up with angry customers relying on each other to find a fix.” Update: 02/05 16:42 GMT by T : Thanks to an anonymous reader, who says that Kaspersky has issued a statement, and a fix (though the fix takes some manual labor to implement). Read more of this story at Slashdot.

With MS Research Help, UN Attempts To Model All of Earth’s Ecosystems

An anonymous reader writes “Microsoft Research and UN scientists have teamed up to build the first general-purpose computer model of whole ecosystems across the entire world. The project was detailed in a recent Nature article [note: yet another expensively paywalled original article] titled ‘Ecosystems: Time to model all life on Earth.'” Read more of this story at Slashdot.

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With MS Research Help, UN Attempts To Model All of Earth’s Ecosystems

This Is How DARPA Will Strip Old Satellites for Parts

There’s a bunch of junk orbiting the Earth right now, a bunch of junk that we put there. But not all of the old satellites that are zooming around the planet are totally useless; plenty still have good stuff in them that could be reused and DARPA wants to start mining them . More »

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This Is How DARPA Will Strip Old Satellites for Parts

An astonishing shampoo-related physics mystery

In the 1960s, when some were exploring the mysteries of outer space and quantum mechanics, one engineer noticed an extraordinary unexplained phenomenon in shampoo. The sudden, energetic, and seemingly spontaneous bursts of liquid that seemed to randomly squirt out from ordinary shampoo were a mystery for forty years. Here’s why your shampoo, while being poured, sometimes leaps up and tries to get you. More »

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An astonishing shampoo-related physics mystery

New Threadlike Carbon Nanotube Fiber Unveiled

Zothecula writes “At about 100 times the strength of steel and a sixth the weight, with impressive electrical conductive properties, carbon nanotubes (CNTs) have promised much since their discovery in 1991. The problem has been translating their impressive nanoscale properties into real-world applications on the macro scale. Researchers have now unveiled a new CNT fiber that conducts heat and electricity like a metal wire, is very strong like carbon fiber, and is flexible like a textile thread.” Read more of this story at Slashdot.

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New Threadlike Carbon Nanotube Fiber Unveiled

Nuclear Rocket Petition On White House Website

RocketAcademy writes “A petition on the White House website is calling for the United States to rapidly develop a nuclear thermal rocket engine. Nuclear rockets are a promising technology, but unless NASA develops a deep-space exploration ship such as Johnson Space Center’s Nautilus X, a nuclear rocket would be wasted. Launching nuclear rockets may pose regulatory and political problems as well. Practical applications may depend on mining uranium or thorium on the Moon.” Read more of this story at Slashdot.

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Nuclear Rocket Petition On White House Website

Telepresence Robot Rundown

DeviceGuru writes “A handful of innovative high-tech startups have recently emerged to create a new market: remote telepresence robots. With one of these robotic Avatars, you can wander around in the remote environment, chatting with coworkers and managers, attending meetings, and solving problems encountered through those interactions. InformationWeek’s Telepresence Robot Smackdown compares five such bots — the MantaroBot TeleMe, VGo Communications VGo, Anybots QB, Suitable Technologies Beam, and Revolve Robotics Kubi — and includes short videos demonstrating each. As the article concludes, ‘bear in mind that what we’re witnessing here is the emergence of a new industry; and if Moore’s Law applies here as it does to so many IT spheres, it won’t be long before these gadgets are inexpensive, commonplace, and far more flexible and intelligent.” Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Star Wars Live-Action Show Could Still Happen

An anonymous reader writes “According to ABC entertainment president Paul Lee: ‘We’d love to do something with Lucasfilm, we’re not sure what yet. We haven’t even sat down with them. We’re going to look at [the Star Wars live-action TV series], we’re going to look at all of them, and see what’s right. We weren’t even able to discuss this with them until [the deal] closed and it just closed. It’s definitely going to be part of the conversation.’ Not only that, but it’s also been announced that some of the 50 completed episode scripts that producer Rick McCallum has previously mentioned have been written by none other than Ron Moore of Star Trek and Battlestar Galactica fame.” Read more of this story at Slashdot.

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Star Wars Live-Action Show Could Still Happen

The Woodward Effect allows for endless supplies of starship fuel

One of the major problems with traveling through space is the need to carry fuel. Scientists have endlessly sought after sources of perpetual, portable fuel for spacecraft. But maybe that was the wrong approach? More »

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The Woodward Effect allows for endless supplies of starship fuel

Ken May

Tag: earth