Skip to main content

Science Friday: Did Jupiter save Earth from a devastating impact event? | Planet of the Apes Scenario? | Patron Saint of Geeks

Submitted by Tjadendevries on Fri, 09/14/2012 - 9:43pm

Jupiter may have just saved Earth from a devastating impact event

    Something just went down on Jupiter. Monday morning, at 11:35:30 UT, amateur astronomers glimpsed a brief but blazing flash of light in the upper reaches of the planet's cloudy atmosphere. If past observations are any indication, Jupiter may have just sustained a major impact event. If that's the case, the gas giant may have just saved Earth from a devastating cosmic collision.

    The first report of the "impact flash" is believed to have come from amateur astronomer Dan Petersen, who described his observation in a post to CloudyNights.com:

    This morning (9/10/2012) at 11:35:30 UT, I observed a bright white two second long explosion just inside Jupiter's eastern limb, located at about Longitude 1 = 335, and Latitude = + 12 degrees north, inside the southern edge of the NEB [aka the planet's North Equatorial Belt]. This flash appeared to be about 100 miles in diameter. I used my Meade 12 LX200 GPS telescope and a binoviewer working at 400X for the observation, seeing was very good at the time.

    [...]

http://io9.com/5942203/jupiter-may-have-just-saved-earth-from-a-devastating-impact-event

Not really, but who knows ...

A Brain Implant that Thinks

    Researchers have used a neural implant to recapture a lost decision-making process in monkeys—demonstrating that a neural prosthetic can recover cognitive function in a primate brain. The results suggest that neural implants could one day be used to recover specific brain functions in patients with brain injuries or localized brain disease.

    While the results of today's study may take many years to translate into humans, they suggest that even cognitive processes, such as deciding whether or not to grab a cup of coffee or remembering where you left your keys, could one day be augmented by brain chips.

    Paralyzed patients have previously used brain implants and brain-machine interfaces to control robotic arms (see "Brain Chip Helps Quadriplegics Move Robotic Arms with Their Thoughts"). And more than 80,000 Parkinson's patients around the world have a deep-brain stimulation implant, which functions like a pacemaker to reduce their tremors and other movement problems (see "Brain Pacemakers"). In the new study, however, the implants could actually interpret neuronal inputs from one part of the brain and effectively communicate those outputs to another brain region.

    [...]

http://www.technologyreview.com/news/429204/a-brain-implant-that-thinks/

Nikola Tesla: The patron saint of geeks?

    Lots of people don't know who Nikola Tesla was.

    He's less famous than Einstein. He's less famous than Leonardo. He's arguably less famous than Stephen Hawking.

    Most gallingly for his fans, he's considerably less famous than his arch-rival Thomas Edison.

    But his work helped deliver the power for the device on which you are reading this. His invention of the induction motor that would work with alternating current (AC) was a milestone in modern electrical systems.

    Mark Twain, whom he later befriended, described his invention as "the most valuable patent since the telephone".

    Tesla was on the winning side in the War of the Currents - the battle between George Westinghouse and Thomas Edison to establish whether AC or direct current (DC) would be used for electricity transmission. But as far as posterity goes, time has not been kind to Tesla.

    Born in what is now Croatia to Serbian parents, he moved to New York in 1884 and developed radio controlled vehicles, wireless energy and the first hydro-electric plant at Niagara Falls. But he was an eccentric. He believed celibacy spurred on the brain, thought he had communicated with extraterrestrials, and fell in love with a pigeon.

    Over recent decades he has drifted into relative obscurity, while Edison is lauded as one of the world's greatest inventors.

    [...]

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-19503846