the bios on http://cr4.globalspec.com/blog/128/National-Society-of-Black-Engineers-Blog, to learn about African Americans in science and engineering. One person who stuck out was George Washington Carver, but not because he invented peanut butter. Things we didn't know about him were that his parents died when he was young and had to move from home to home, and sometimes the area he moved to didn't have a high school that would allow African Americans to attend. Fortunately the people he lived with then payed for him to have a tutor. I also learned he did not initially go to college for science, but for art. It wasn't until he transferred to Iowa State University did he study this in college. He was the first African American to attend Iowa State, and eventually went on to become a faculty member, until Tulane University offered him a job on their faculty and great research opportunities.
ALICE, A Large Ion Collider Experiment, will study the physics of ultrahigh-energy proton-proton and lead-lead collisions and will explore conditions in the first instants of the universe, a few microseconds after the Big Bang. The photo is the ALICE Inner Tracking System during its transport in the experimental cavern and its insertion into the Time Projection Chamber (TPC) at CERN.
Quick -- who owns the two largest rooftop solar stations in the US? If you guessed General Motors (yup, the car company), you'd be correct. Not content with that, General Motors also has the world's largest rooftop source of power from the sun at its plant in Spain. Who knew!
In the U.S., their rooftop stations are located atop warehouse facilities in both Fontana and Rancho Cucamonga, California, and have been operational for a couple of years now. Electricity generated by the solar array, but not used by the GM facilities, is fed back into the electrical grid for sale to other area residents and businesses. During spring and fall, which in California are periods of high sunshine combined with low air conditioning needs, the system will generate extra electricity for the grid.
Last summer, GM began installing 85,000 solar panels on top of its Zaragoza plant in Spain, covering over 2 million square feet. These will provide over 10 megawatts of power from a renewable energy source that will not only be used by the factory (responsible for over 480,000 vehicles) but also by the local power grid.
Providing "green" energy to the local community's power grid -- and I thought GM just made cars.
Interested in the field of green technology and wondering what areas it might encompass? A good place to start is Chicago's Center for Green Technology.
Tech Club salutes:
Herman B. White
Particle Physicist
Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory (Fermilab)
Dr. Herman B. White has been a particle physics scientist with Fermilab for the past 34 years. His research has covered a range of topics in Particle and Nuclear Physics, as well as work with accelerators and particle beams.
In a 1997 interview, Dr. White made the statement that "[The physicist's] job is to advance knowledge and erase ignorance." His efforts to bring information, concerns, and focus about physics and physical science research have caused him to appear before U.S. Congress, the National Science Foundation, National Public Radio and others. Dr. White's next lecture is at the Adler Planetarium where among other things he'll bring us up to date on the progress of starting the world's newest particle accelerator, the Large Hadron Collider.
But lest you think physicists do nothing but deal with a bunch of stuff we can't even see, their problem solving filters over into our every day lives as well. The World Wide Web was an idea conceived and implemented by a group of high-energy physicists at CERN who wanted to instantly share their ideas and papers with colleagues across the globe. Thanks to their creative solution, the world has become a bit more interconnected.
Related to this week's Photo Fridays' pics, were you aware that 2009 is the International Year of Astronomy?
Astronomy (from the Greek words astron (star) and nomos (law)) is the scientific study of celestial objects (such as stars, planets, comets, and galaxies) and phenomena that originate outside the Earth's atmosphere (such as the cosmic background radiation).
source: Wikipedia
In 2009, 400 years after Galileo first used a telescope to study the skies, the International Astronomical Union and the United Nations are honoring both astronomers and astronomical milestones by proclaiming 2009 as the International Year of Astronomy.
Celebrate the International Year of Astronomy by brushing up on your own knowledge of the skies. Visit the Adler Planetarium's site where they'll be posting a monthly Hot Topic to explore our understanding of the universe and updating their CyberSpace website with space science content and resources about each topic. Both NASA and the International Year of Astronomy also have sites celebrating this year.
To start you off, February's Hot Topic at the Adler is "Our Solar System" where you can read about what Galileo observed when he viewed the universe through that crazy new invention called a telescope.
I have always been fascinated by the universe and appreciate those who not only delve into space but can explain it in such a way that it's understandable to the rest of us. Neil deGrasse Tyson is one such person.
For those of you unfamiliar with his work, Dr. Tyson is an astrophysicist, the Director of the Hayden Planeterium in NYC, host of the PBS science program Nova scienceNOW and author of "Death by Black Hole and Other Cosmic Quandries". In this interview he ruminates on our expanding universe, the risks of asteroids threatening Earth, and death by black hole among other topics. Who wouldn't want to know about that!
I particularly like his view is that Earth is not an isolated planet -- we are connected to the universe. I hope you enjoy his conversation.
[updated]: this is the first time I've embedded Google video; if it doesn't work for you, please leave a comment noting which browser and OS you're using (e.g., IE7 on Vista). kthxbye.
No, it's not a new video game.
If (maybe when?) NASA returns to the moon, the idea of a permanent base camp is not far-fetched. We've all seen the sci-fi movies with dwellings dotting the moonscape, but the reality is how to deal with the logistics needed to transport the necessary building materials.
A team of seven students from the College of Engineering at Virginia Tech have been working on that very problem and devised a solution: use the volcanic ash from moon rocks to create moon bricks. Since actual lunar rock is scarce, the students devised a simulated regolith by using volcanic ash from a deposit on Earth along with various minerals and basaltic glass, similar to rock on the lunar surface.
From Popular Mechanics:
The team combined the faux moon ash with powdered aluminum and mixed the two together in a silica crucible. Then the group put a nickel chromium wire into the mixture and heated it to 2700 degrees F, starting a thermite reaction that spread through the mix and turned it to solid brick. All it takes is heating the mixture to aluminum's melting point, about 1221 degrees F, says the team's adviser, professor Kathryn Logan. "It's very much like a sparkler," she says.
The self-named Masons of Regolith then subjected their results to various tests to see how much pressure the bricks could take before cracking. Turns out they're nearly as strong as concrete! One-square inch of the brick could withstand the gradual application of 2,450 pounds, or nearly the weight of a Ford Focus. Fascinating!
I'm bringing this to your attention because (a) I'm a Virginia Tech grad and (b) to point out that college isn't just studying and writing papers and taking tests. There are some great opportunities within any program of study to expand your knowledge with real-world experience, and I hope all of our college-bound students will chat with their professors and fellow students and seek them out.
The Boston Globe's online edition, boston.com, has a section called The Big Picture, which is found under the News tab and is a photo blog run by their web developer Alan Taylor. To paraphrase Mr. Taylor, inspiration for The Big Picture comes from the rich imagery found in such publications as the old Life Magazine and National Geographic and the stories those photo essays would underscore. Its intent is to highlight high-quality and amazing photos with a focus on current events.
Their recent photo essay is on space, courtesy of the Hubble Telescope. From Mr. Taylor:
As we head into the traditional western Holiday Season, I'd like to present this Hubble Space Telescope imagery Advent Calendar. Every day, for the next 25 days, a new photo will be revealed here from the amazing Hubble Space Telescope. As I take this chance to share these images of our amazing Universe with you, I wish for a Happy Holiday to all those who will celebrate, and for Peace on Earth to everyone.
"... the sharpest view ever taken of the Orion Nebula - a picture book of star formation with massive young stars that are shaping the nebula and pillars of dense gas that may be the homes of budding stars ..."
And if you want to see how the image fits into the universe, The Big Picture provides us with a link to Google Sky.
Bookmark The Big Picture to see some
amazing photos.
Staying awake at night concerned that asteroids might be hurtling towards the Earth, obliterating life as we know it? Well, fear no more. Thanks to the smart folks at the University of Hawaii's Institute for Astronomy and MIT's Lincoln Lab, Pan-STARRS is looking out for us.
The Panoramic Survey Telescope and Rapid Response System (Pan-STARRS) is the world's largest digital camera, and it's to be used to keep an eye out for asteroids heading towards Earth. This 1400 megapixel camera sits atop Mount Haleakala in Maui Island, Hawaii, and will scan the skies looking for rogue objects approaching Earth at a trajectory that's a little too close for comfort.
Finding moving objects isn't the only objective of this project: another focus is its ability to map very large areas of sky to great sensitivity thus producing the deepest and most complete survey of the Solar System so far.
Again, to all Tech Club denizens and others who have an interest in science, astronomy, or space exploration, here's another example of how your passion can translate into a career. Not only are people needed to think of and design these types of tests, but computer programmers are also needed to develop the software necessary to run the instruments to perform the scientists' tests.
Called Juno, the mission will be the first in which a spacecraft is placed in a highly elliptical polar orbit around the giant planet to understand its formation, evolution and structure. Underneath its dense cloud cover, Jupiter safeguards secrets to the fundamental processes and conditions that governed our early solar system.
Understanding the formation of Jupiter is essential to understanding the processes that led to the development of the rest of our solar system and what the conditions were that led to Earth and humankind.
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