Violent thunderstorms boiled up across Oklahoma, Kansas and Missouri on May 22, 2019, as seen in this animation of infrared images acquired by the GOES-16 weather satellite. Tornadoes, including one that ravaged parts of Jefferson City, MO, are indicated by blue-colored T's. (Note: The animation may take awhile to load. It's worth the wait! Source: CIMSS Satellite Blog)
It certainly has been a wild — and deadly — few weeks for weather.
Since the first and 23rd of May, 340 torna ...read more
The series of paper cells developed by researchers at the University of Washington uses origami folds to absorb the force of impacts. (Credit: Kiyomi Taguchi/University of Washington)
Whether applied to auto collisions or rocket landings, absorbing energy from impacts is a valuable trait, and industries have been working on various solutions for years. For spacecraft, landing safely has entailed everything from inflatable airbag systems to sky cranes to retro-thrusters. But what if the force ...read more
Sara Futch, a graduate student at North Carolina State University, won Best Overall Poster at the Citizen Science Association Conference 2019 for her poster, “Uncovering Connections across Citizen Science Projects: A Social Network Analysis.” Conference attendees selected Sara’s poster via in-person votes during the poster session.
Sara Futch's poster
Here’s more from Sara about her research:
“My name is Sara Futch, and I’m a graduate student in F ...read more
Radar reveals that Mars is hiding past ice caps under the ones visible today. (Credit: SA/DLR/FU Berlin; NASA MGS MOLA Science Team)
Bands of ice and sand at Mars' north pole reveal an ancient climate that swung between warm and cold.
Mars, now dry and dusty, still holds water ice at its poles, and evidence strongly suggests it was once a planet where water flowed freely across the surface.
The Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter’s Shallow Radar (SHARAD) has peered deep into the northern ...read more
(Credit: Choksawatdikorn/Shutterstock)
Some of the smallest creatures in the sea are also some of the most influential. Plankton, a group of microscopic marine organisms that includes bacteria, amoebas and snail larvae, among other things, prop up the base of the oceanic food chain. Every sea creature, from clownfish to whales, ultimately depend on plankton for food.
Now, a new study that peers into a past before human influence shows climate change has upset the distribution of plankton ...read more
The power and propulsion system for the Lunar Gateway will be built by Maxar. Courtesy of Business Wire)
In a talk at the Florida Institute of Technology on Thursday, NASA administrator Jim Bridenstine announced that Maxar Technologies will build the first stage of NASA’s planned Lunar Gateway.
The Gateway, part of NASA's larger Artemis program to return to the moon, is meant to be a waystation of sorts placed in a long orbit around the moon. It will provide a habitat for astronaut ...read more
The telescope, once complete, will be made of hundreds of spherical detectors suspended at the bottom of the sea. (Credit: KM3NeT)
Deep under the Mediterranean Sea, hundreds of watchful eyes hang suspended on cables, waiting for a rare and valuable flash. Their quarry are ghostly neutrino particles, capable of tunneling through light-years of space and a planet's worth of rock without ever coming into contact with matter.
But, here, under the ocean, they just might hit a detector from the ...read more
In the final minutes of Apollo 11’s descent to the lunar surface, five 1201 and 1202 alarms blared in the lunar module. The computer was overloaded with data, and for a brief moment it looked like Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin wouldn’t land on the Moon. As we know, they did; Apollo 11 got a GO to land in spite of the alarms. What we don’t know is the man whose work allowed the crew reboot the computer and save the landing: Hal Laning.
https://youtu.be/LELUXyVDOKk ...read more
Researchers say women are worse at math and word-based tasks at cooler room temperatures. (Credit: ESB Professional/Shutterstock)
“The women’s winter is here. The freeze is upon us,” warns a Game of Thrones parody about men and women's office temperature preferences.
If you have a Y chromosome, you probably haven’t experienced “women’s winter.” As the video explains, women’s winter is “when spring turns to summer and there’s bloss ...read more
(Credit: Photographee.eu/Shutterstock)
Bipolar patients are seven times more likely to develop Parkinson’s disease, according to a new study. Though the news may be disheartening to those suffering from the already-trying condition, the link might also lead to clues about the causes behind the two conditions.
Parkinson’s is a complex disease associated with a gradual decline in dopamine levels produced by neurons, or brain cells. It eventually leads to impaired movements and ot ...read more
