2013's First Meteor Shower

For people who are interested in meteor showers : http://www.nasa.gov/topics/solarsystem/features/watchtheskies/quadrantids_2013.html

Tallest building in the world turns into giant fireworks show

Tree relocation - Just awesome !!!

New Kinda matter - "Color-Glass Condensate"

The new kind of matter is called color-glass condensate, and is a liquid like wave of gluons, which are elementary particles related to the strong force that sticks quarks together inside protons and neutrons (hence they are like "glue").

Scientists didn't expect this kind of matter would result from the type of particle collisions going on at the Large Hadron Collider at the time. However, it may explain some odd behavior seen inside the machine, which is a giant loop where particles race around underneath Switzerland and France.

Typical LHC particle tracks:

When scientists sped up protons (one of the building blocks of atoms) and lead ions (lead atoms, which contain 82 protons each, stripped of their electrons), and crashed them into each other, the resulting explosions liquefied those particles and gave rise to new particles in their wake. Most of these new particles, as expected, fly off in all directions at close to the speed of light.

The color-glass condensate's dense swarm of gluons may also sweep particles off in the same direction, suggested Brookhaven National Laboratory physicist Raju Venugopalan, who first predicted the substance, which may also be seen after proton-proton collisions.Entangled gluons in the color-glass condensate could explain how particles flying away from the collision point might share information about their flight direction with each other, Venugopalan said. Courtesy: Yahoo.com, CERN

ENCODE - Encyclopedia of DNA Elements released

A long-term effort to catalogue all the bits of the human genome that do something has released its results. The consortium that created this—442 members in 32 institutes around the world—has used the increasingly impressive tools available for sequencing genomes to mount a systematic analysis of 147 different types of human cell, attempting to say just what each part of the genome is doing in them. Their results confirm on a grand scale what has become clear over the decade since the Human Genome Project first produced a sequence of the three billion “letters” of which the genome is made: there is a great deal more to genomes than their genes. Impressive as it is, ENCODE is far from the last word. For one thing, its expertise and carefully calibrated techniques need to be spread far and wide—to be adopted and made useful by people doing clinical research. And there is more basic research to do. Only six of the 147 cell types looked at in ENCODE were studied in the amount of detail now possible. The others still await their close-up. So far ENCODE has looked only at cells from one person for each of the cell types studied. That is a reasonable simplification; in terms of how the genome works, the difference between what’s turned on and off in a liver cell and a skin cell is far greater than the difference between how one person’s skin cells work and those of their neighbour, however genetically different the neighbour. But it will be helpful to get a sense of differences between your liver cells and your neighbour’s—especially if you are ill and he is healthy. But ... ENCODE has definitely surpassed the original genome-sequencing efforts !!! Courtesy: The Economist

Remote Control Car - Now a reality in China !!!

The BYD Su Rui comes with a large key fob featuring a metal control panel which can be used to start and move the car from a distance of 10 meters. The Su Rui can only creep along at 1.2 mph in remote control mode, but otherwise steers and moves -- including in reverse -- as it would if the owner was behind the wheel. BYD advertises the technology as great for parking in tight spots or bringing the car to you in rainy weather, and far more impressive to your date than opening an umbrella. BYD - the battery maker-turned-carbuilder made a splash four years ago with ambitious plans to sell plug-in hybrids in the United States, winning a vote of confidence from investor Warren Buffet who took a 10 percent stake in the firm. Outside of its remote control, the Su Rui offers a few other tricks, including in-dash digital TV and multihue displays, and most of its specs and technology match up well with similar models from Asian or American automakers.
Courtesy: Yahoo.com

Voyager 1 turns 35, approaches interstellar space...

The craft — one of twin spacecraft (Voyager I & II) sent to explore distant planets — is approaching interstellar space. The primary mission for these satellites was the exploration of Jupiter and Saturn. After making a string of discoveries there -- such as active volcanoes on Jupiter's moon Io and intricacies of Saturn's rings -- the mission was extended. Voyager 2 went on to explore Uranus and Neptune, and is still the only spacecraft to have visited those outer planets. The adventurers' current mission, the Voyager Interstellar Mission (VIM), will explore the outermost edge of the Sun's domain. And beyond. Interstellar Mission searches for the heliopause — the border between the magnetic influence of the sun and the beginning of interstellar space — and exits the solar system.

Below is an image of Voyager I

Below is the image of Voyagers and other satellites nearing Heliopause

Voyager 1 is poised to cross into interstellar space. Both Voyager 1 and 2 are expected to continue to provide critical data for another decade, if not longer — or at least until their energy supplies can no longer power critical subsystems. The mission objective of the Voyager Interstellar Mission (VIM) is to extend the NASA exploration of the solar system beyond the neighborhood of the outer planets to the outer limits of the Sun's sphere of influence, and possibly beyond. This extended mission is continuing to characterize the outer solar system environment and search for the heliopause boundary, the outer limits of the Sun's magnetic field and outward flow of the solar wind. Penetration of the heliopause boundary between the solar wind and the interstellar medium will allow measurements to be made of the interstellar fields, particles and waves unaffected by the solar wind.

The twin Voyager 1 and 2 spacecraft continue exploring where nothing from Earth has flown before. In the 34th year after their 1977 launches, they each are much farther away from Earth and the Sun than Pluto. Voyager 1 and 2 are now in the "Heliosheath" - the outermost layer of the heliosphere where the solar wind is slowed by the pressure of interstellar gas. Both spacecraft are still sending scientific information about their surroundings through the Deep Space Network (DSN)

This artist’s rendering provided by NASA is of the Voyager 1 spacecraft, which was launched 35 years ago Wednesday. (Its twin spacecraft, Voyager 2, was launched Aug. 20, 1977.) Cameras aboard the Voyagers were turned off long ago. The nuclear-powered spacecraft, about the size of a subcompact car, still have five instruments to study magnetic fields, cosmic rays and charged particles from the sun known as solar wind. They also carry gold-plated discs containing multilingual greetings, music and pictures — in the off chance that intelligent species come across them.

TIMELINES
DATE	MILESTONE
1977	Mariner Jupiter/Saturn 1977 is renamed Voyager
1977 Aug.20	Voyager 2 launched from Kennedy Space Flight Center
1977 Sept.5	Voyager 1 launched from Kennedy Space Flight Center Voyager 1 returns first spacecraft photo of Earth and Moon
1979 Mar.5	Voyager 1 makes its closest approach to Jupiter
1979 July.9	Voyager 2 makes its closest approach to Jupiter
1980 Nov.12	Voyager 1 flies by Saturn Voyager 1 begins its trip out of the Solar System
1981 Aug.25	Voyager 2 flies by Saturn
1982	Deep Space Network upgrades two 26-m antennas to 34-m
1986 Jan.24	Voyager 2 has the first-ever encounter with Uranus Deep Space Network begins expansion of 64-m antennas to 70-m
1987	Voyager 2 "observes" Supernova 1987A
1988	Voyager 2 returns first color images of Neptune
1989 Aug.25	Voyager 2 is the first spacecraft to observe Neptune Voyager 2 begins its trip out of the Solar System, below the ecliptic plane
1990 Jan.1	Begins Voyager Interstellar Mission
1990 Feb.14	Last Voyager Images - Portrait of the Solar System
1998 Feb.17	Voyager 1 passes Pioneer 10 to become the most distant human-made object in space
2004 Dec.15	Voyager 1 crosses Termination Shock
2007 Sep.5	Voyager 2 crosses Termination Shock
2012 Sep.9	Voyager enters Interstellar Space

Courtesy: Washington Post, Voyager NASA website