The Cool Science Stuff Thread

[crazychemgirl]

The sun unleashed a powerful storm early Tuesday morning (Aug. 20), sending an enormous cloud of superheated particles rocketing toward Earth.

The solar eruption, known as a coronal mass ejection (CME), occurred at 4:24 a.m. EDT (0824 GMT) Tuesday and blasted billions of tons of solar particles toward Earth at a mind-boggling speed of 2 million mph (3.3 million km/h).

"Experimental NASA research models, based on observations from NASA's Solar Terrestrial Relations Observatory, show that the CME left the sun at speeds of around 570 miles per second, which is a fairly typical speed for CMEs," NASA officials wrote in an update today. NASA's twin Stereo spacecraft and the Solar and Heliospheric Observatory, operated by NASA and the European Space Agency, captured photos of the solar storm from space.

- read the full article Sun Fires Solar Storm Directly at Earth (from space.com)

very cool... or hot, rather.

 

[thør]

At 12:45 EDT, the first Japanese rocket will be launched into orbit to demonstrate it is possible for a rocket to do its own health checks using artificial intelligence. Yup, that's just over 20 minutes from now.

 

[thør]

Watch live

 

[Colonel Hogan]

Is it just me or does locating a rocket launching facility in a forested mountain valley at the height of forest fire season seem like a particularly bad idea?

Just sayin'

 

[thør]

Is it just me or does locating a rocket launching facility in a forested mountain valley at the height of forest fire season seem like a particularly bad idea?

Just sayin'

They have tank fulls of radioactive water to put the fire out.

 

[Colonel Hogan]

They have tank fulls of radioactive water to put the fire out.

Clever idea, but I don't think the trees will die that fast.

 

[thør]

Clever idea, but I don't think the trees will die that fast.

No, they will take the water up and become radioactive trees.

 

[crazychemgirl]

We're so fucked.

 

[thør]

We're so fucked.

Quit bragging.

 

[Bacigalupo]

No, they will take the water up and become radioactive trees.

 

[thør]

If only. The problem is, they look like any other tree.

 

[trysail]

http://www.npr.org/blogs/thetwo-way...scientists-say-theyve-confirmed-a-new-element



Scientists Say They've Confirmed A New Element
by Eyder Peralta
August 27, 2013

Scientists in Sweden say they have confirmed a new, super-heavy element that was first proposed by Russian scientists in 2004. The element with the atomic number 115 has yet to be named.

In a press release, Lund University says a group of international scientists led by physicists from Lund University, made the element by shooting a beam of calcium, which has 20 protons, into a thin film of americium, which has 95 protons.

For less than a second, the new element had 115 protons.

"A committee comprising members of the international unions of pure and applied physics and chemistry will review the new findings to decide whether to recommend further experiments before the discovery of the new element is acknowledged," the university said.

As for why this matters, Live Science reports:

"Scientists hope that by creating heavier and heavier elements, they will find a theoretical 'island of stability,' an undiscovered region in the periodic table where stable super-heavy elements with as yet unimagined practical uses might exist."​

For now, the AP reports, the element has been dubbed ununpentium, "which refers to the element's 115th place in the periodic table."

The findings appear in the August 27 edition of The Physical Review Letters.

 

[Phelia]

Awesome! Someone will have to update the Tom Lehrer song. Gotta love when a new element is discaaarvard.

 

[parodyluvr75]

According to Lazar, the US government has 100s of pounds of 115 tucked away for anti-grav drive experiments.

 

[HAL_9000]

42,000 hours of construction in 4 minutes:

Oct 2008 to Aug 2013


http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=0e7_1377922579

 

[crazychemgirl]

 

[Bacigalupo]

 

[Sean]

The periodic table as a London Tube Map:

And an explanation: http://www.theguardian.com/science/...round-map-elements-periodic-table?CMP=twt_gu#

 

[Sean]

A recreation of just after the big bang reuslts in something remarkably similar to the CMB

 

[Saint Peter]

You fuckers would not know cool science if it jammed its fist up your butthole.

 

[islandman]

You fuckers would not know cool science if it jammed its fist up your butthole.

Is THAT cool science?

 

[Saint Peter]

Is THAT cool science?

Only if you massage the data.

 

[islandman]

Only if you massage the data.

Always figured you for a hack.

 

[Recidiva]

Only if you massage the data.

There are the Mountains of Pi and the Owie of Butthole

 

[islandman]

The Fist of Pete.