Large Hardon Collider

[Kryssan]

Just put those Russian weather satellites to use already.

[Dimmauk]

Yahoo with a shitty story:



http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20091230/...roid_encounter

I thought Apophis was dead, now the Russians don't even know anything about it, and/or are ignoring our findings.

Is Russia trying to kill us all?

[Mizango]

Nope, they are just extremely late to the party and have no idea what they are talking about. If you read the article the Russians guy says stuff like "Im not exactly sure but I heard somewhere..." when speaking of Apophis. Choosing to completely ignore NASA saying months ago that the new trajectory now makes it extraordinarily improbable that we will be impacted.

This is the equivalent of Yahoo running a headline declaring that Pearl Harbor has just been bombed and that the US was gearing up to retaliate. I dont know whats worse, Yahoo for running it or the people that saw that bs article and didnt bother to read it and are now panicing.

[Dimmauk]

Nope, they are just extremely late to the party and have no idea what they are talking about. If you read the article the Russians guy says stuff like "Im not exactly sure but I heard somewhere..." when speaking of Apophis. Choosing to completely ignore NASA saying months ago that the new trajectory now makes it extraordinarily improbable that we will be impacted.

This is the equivalent of Yahoo running a headline declaring that Pearl Harbor has just been bombed and that the US was gearing up to retaliate. I dont know whats worse, Yahoo for running it or the people that saw that bs article and didnt bother to read it and are now panicing.

I choose B.

And I bought a bunch of Batteries and Water just in case. dammit.

[Woozie]

And I bought a bunch of Batteries and Water just in case.

I'm glad I'm not the only one. And plus, 2012 is only 2 years away so I may as well be stocking up now anyways.

[Kryssan]

Shall we play a game?



Which side do you want?



Fine.









^ That's all I'm hearing from the 2012 thing. Its so overused now its not even funny anymore. Can't wait till we actually get to that year, elections plus end of the world hype will equate to horrible/entertaining news. I think I'll go ahead and start stocking up on migraine pills now.

[Mizango]

Count me in.

[Valkrish]

Party at Mizango's house dec 31 2011

[Kryssan]

Look forward to 2010


A few days old now but a brief synopsis of next year's potentials and pitfalls for those who are casual viewers.


Crossposted below for work stoppages~

From new data at the Large Hadron Collider to deep research budget cuts in the UK and Japan, 2010 could be both the best and worst of times

As we stand on the threshold of a new decade – the teens, the tens, call it what you will – physics is primed, in the immortal words of Charles Dickens, for the best of times and the worst of times. The good news is that collisions have already begun at the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) – the world's biggest ever physics experiment – which is back in action following the magnet disaster of 2008.

With the first high-energy (10 Tev) collisions due by the end of the year – and maximum-energy 14 TeV collisions likely in 2011 – the stage is set for a stream of thrilling new discoveries. Before long we could see clear signs of the Higgs boson (or not) or perhaps even supersymmetry, extra dimensions or other "new physics".

Those findings may have to wait until next year and probably beyond, but you can be sure that the particle-physics world will be abuzz with rumour and counter-rumour. And if the US Congress gives the nod to a request from the Department of Energy, the Tevatron collider may even continue for an extra year beyond retirement into 2011, ensuring that there is a real trans-Atlantic race for the Higgs, for a year at least.

There is also plenty to get excited about in astrophysics and cosmology, particularly following last week's announcement by members of the Cryogenic Dark Matter Search in the Soudan mine in the US that they had tantalizing hints of the first direct detection of dark matter in the form of weakly interacting massive particles. Although the findings are by no means certain, a clear and convincing sign of the nature of dark matter could be imminent. When that comes – as it may do next year – it will be a huge breakthrough for physics.

Down to Earth

Next year should also see interesting findings from the Fermi gamma-ray space telescope. We can also expect plenty of coverage of the end of the space-shuttle era, which is due to come to a close in September with a final flight form the Discovery craft.

But it is not just in "big science" that exciting new physics is taking place. If 2009 is anything to go by, you can expect plenty of further exciting developments in metamaterials, graphene, spintronics and other areas of condensed-matter physics. Much more progress can also be expected in quantum information.

Indeed, we have selected as our own "breakthrough of the year" work carried out by physicists led by Jonathan Home at the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) in Colorado, US, who created the first small-scale device that can be described as a 'quantum computer'. The device, which performs a sequence of 15 logical operations with an overall accuracy of 94%, is a key step towards the development of a practical universal quantum computer.

Lasers will also be centre stage in 2010, which marks the 50th anniversary of their invention by Ted Maiman on 16 May 1960 at Hughes Research Laboratories in California, when he generated coherent pulses of laser light from a fingertip-sized lump of ruby illuminated by a flash lamp. In doing so, he beat a number of other physicists to the goal, including Charles Townes, who had earlier developed the maser – the microwave forerunner of the laser.

Key events to mark the golden laser jubilee are taking place around the world, including a special session at SPIE's Photonics West meeting in San Francisco at the end of January, as well as at CLEO in San Jose in May. As you might expect, we will be marking the anniversary with a special issue of Physics World magazine in May and a series of video interviews with leading laser physicists and engineers as part of the physicsworld.com video series.

Speaking of lasers, 2010 will also see researchers at the huge new National Ignition Facility in the US beginning experiments to focus the energy of its 192 giant laser beams onto a tiny target filled with hydrogen fuel. There is a strong possibility that researchers will be able to reach "ignition" this year – the moment at which the device will produce more energy from fusion than is required to start the reaction. When that happens, it will be the culmination of more than 50 years of research, although releasing that energy in a form that could actually be used by a country's electricity grid is another thing altogether.

Down down

But despite the great progress in physics, researchers in the UK and Japan are still coming to terms with savage cuts to research programmes. In the UK, the Science and Technology Facilities Council (STFC), which has a shortfall of £40m in its budget, is set to tear into its programmes in astronomy, particle physics and nuclear physics.

The council will be axing its funding for over 25 different projects, including the ALICE experiment at CERN, and slashing studentships by over a fifth. Worst of all, these are cuts to high-profile projects that get the public interested in physics in the first place. For the want of £40m they could do irrevocable damage to UK physics at the worst possible time.

The situation is not much better in Japan, where research funds could be cut in half – or possibly even terminated – following the government's decision to slash over $35bn from the 2010 budget. The Spring-8 synchrotron in Hyogo and the B-meson factory at the KEK particle-physics lab in Tsukuba are among those facilities that could be hit, as could the Superkamiokande neutrino experiment at J-PARC as well as Japan's involvement in the Subaru optical and infrared telescope in Mauna Kea, Hawaii. Negotiations will now take place in the ministry of finance with a finalized budget for 2010 set to be made at the end of December.
But let's not end the noughties on too downbeat a note. Physicists in the US appear set for brighter times, with plenty of funds for energy research in particular following President Obama's "recovery and reinvestment" bill.

Work on two big Europe-based projects – the European Spallation Source and the ITER fusion experiment – continues apace, while the European Space Agency is due to launch its CryoSat2 mission to measure the thickness of the Earth's ice sheets in February. And with football's World Cup taking place in South Africa in June, you can be sure that sports physicists will be putting the finishing touches to their latest papers on the aerodynamics of footballs.

Roll on 2010!

[Mizango]

Awesome and sad at the same time hate seeing budget cuts in the Science field. It's like were working with leftovers as is. I for one can't wait until we look more into DM and WIMPs, that would be mind boggling.

[Eliseos]

Awesome and sad at the same time hate seeing budget cuts in the Science field. It's like were working with leftovers as is. I for one can't wait until we look more into DM and WIMPs, that would be mind boggling.

Yep...I'm hoping for more evidence against string theory to be found this year. Physics really needs more avenues of research, a thirty year old theory that hasn't predicted anything so far is just a waste of time and the little money that is being spent on it. Also excited for the fusion experiments, very interested in how those go.

By the way, I finished "Surely You're Joking, Mr Feynman" today. If there was anyone I could ever meet, it would definitely be him. I really wish I was as motivated as he was, in anything he did. From picking padlocks at Los Alomos, to selling his own artwork and music, the man was just good at anything he set his mind to.

[Mizango]

Absolutely.

[Mizango]

http://science.nasa.gov/headlines/y2...ec_voyager.htm

Very interesting article sent to me by Araelus, not sure if you guys have seen this yet but I haven't up until now. I know usually around this time of year with holidays and such, things like this tend to slip through the cracks.

Almost 33 years later and Voyager is still out there doing major work!

[Eliseos]

I still find it amazing that we can still receive signals from them, with how far away they are and how small the crafts themselves are. They had something on the science channel about it, but they didn't really go into much detail.

[Kryssan]

I'm totally laughing at Google's title image for today.





And Voyager is definitely a good chunk of proof of the addage for they don't build them like they used to.

[Mizango]

Awesome! Kepler keeps pumping out the goodies :D


http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases...0104131643.htm

Five New Exoplanets Discovered By NASA's Kepler Space Telescope

ScienceDaily (Jan. 4, 2010) — NASA's Kepler space telescope, designed to find Earth-size planets in the habitable zone of sun-like stars, has discovered its first five new exoplanets, or planets beyond our solar system.

Kepler's high sensitivity to both small and large planets enabled the discovery of the exoplanets, named Kepler 4b, 5b, 6b, 7b and 8b. The discoveries were announced Monday, Jan. 4, by members of the Kepler science team during a news briefing at the American Astronomical Society meeting in Washington.

"These observations contribute to our understanding of how planetary systems form and evolve from the gas and dust disks that give rise to both the stars and their planets," said William Borucki of NASA's Ames Research Center in Moffett Field, Calif. Borucki is the mission's science principal investigator. "The discoveries also show that our science instrument is working well. Indications are that Kepler will meet all its science goals."

Known as "hot Jupiters" because of their high masses and extreme temperatures, the new exoplanets range in size from similar to Neptune to larger than Jupiter. They have orbits ranging from 3.3 to 4.9 days. Estimated temperatures of the planets range from 2,200 to 3,000 degrees Fahrenheit, hotter than molten lava and much too hot for life as we know it. All five of the exoplanets orbit stars hotter and larger than Earth's sun.

"It's gratifying to see the first Kepler discoveries rolling off the assembly line," said Jon Morse, director of the Astrophysics Division at NASA Headquarters in Washington. "We expected Jupiter-size planets in short orbits to be the first planets Kepler could detect. It's only a matter of time before more Kepler observations lead to smaller planets with longer-period orbits, coming closer and closer to the discovery of the first Earth analog."

Launched on March 6, 2009, from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in Florida, the Kepler mission continuously and simultaneously observes more than 150,000 stars. Kepler's science instrument, or photometer, already has measured hundreds of possible planet signatures that are being analyzed.

While many of these signatures are likely to be something other than a planet, such as small stars orbiting larger stars, ground-based observatories have confirmed the existence of the five exoplanets. The discoveries are based on approximately six weeks' worth of data collected since science operations began on May 12, 2009.

Kepler looks for the signatures of planets by measuring dips in the brightness of stars. When planets cross in front of, or transit, their stars as seen from Earth, they periodically block the starlight. The size of the planet can be derived from the size of the dip. The temperature can be estimated from the characteristics of the star it orbits and the planet's orbital period.

Kepler will continue science operations until at least November 2012. It will search for planets as small as Earth, including those that orbit stars in a warm, habitable zone where liquid water could exist on the surface of the planet. Since transits of planets in the habitable zone of solar-like stars occur about once a year and require three transits for verification, it is expected to take at least three years to locate and verify an Earth-size planet.

According to Borucki, Kepler's continuous and long-duration search should greatly improve scientists' ability to determine the distributions of planet size and orbital period in the future. "Today's discoveries are a significant contribution to that goal," Borucki said. "The Kepler observations will tell us whether there are many stars with planets that could harbor life, or whether we might be alone in our galaxy."

Kepler is NASA's 10th Discovery mission. NASA Ames is responsible for the ground system development, mission operations and science data analysis. NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif., managed the Kepler mission development. Ball Aerospace & Technologies Corp. of Boulder, Colo., was responsible for developing the Kepler flight system. Ball and the Laboratory for Atmospheric and Space Physics at the University of Colorado in Boulder are supporting mission operations. The California Institute of Technology in Pasadena manages JPL for NASA.

[wipers]

So NASA thinks the world will still be around in November 2012. That is a good thing. lol Mayan calendar. The earth has been around for 4.5 billion years and people actually think some fucking Mayan calendar can predict the end of the world ? Anyways pretty interesting information released by NASA.

[Kuya]

You guys are nerds! Nerds! First God, now the G-spot. You will never disprove the G-spot you virgin nerds! Nerds!!

[Eliseos]

Nerds!

[Kaylia]

Awesome! Kepler keeps pumping out the goodies :D


http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases...0104131643.htm

Hot jupiters makes me rages.

Every time I see "new planet discoveries", I get all excited only to be let down by expected finds.