Reginald L. Goodwin's Posts

Force Field...

Posted by Reginald L. Goodwin on April 6, 2015 at 7:01am

Image Source: CNN.com

Topics: Boeing, Force Field, Lasers, Plasma Physics, Science Fiction, Star Trek, Star Wars

I saw this late last month, and thought: "hmm". The plasma is atmospheric, so at this point if it does work (see Wired's caveat emptor below), "raising shields" has to be below a Clarke Orbit. We may or may not achieve the exact effect of writers' imaginations. Certain things we take for granted - automatic doors (via optical electronics), cellular telephones, radio frequency remote control, rocketry - used to be the stuff of science fiction writer's dreams. Along with warp drive, we may have to wait for the science to disprove it, or manifest it.

(CNN) Raise shields!

Boeing has been granted a patent for a force field-like defense system, leading excited sci-fi fans to herald the advent of something previously seen only in the realms of "Star Wars" or "Star Trek."

Filed in 2012, the USPTO has granted the aerospace giant a patent for a "method and system for shockwave attenuation via electromagnetic arc."

On first look, it seems that they're onto something similar to "Star Wars'" deflector shields. The patent describes a system that would detect the shockwave from a nearby explosion and create an area of ionized air -- a plasma field -- between the oncoming blast and the vehicle it was protecting.

The method works, says the patent, "by heating a selected region of the first fluid medium rapidly to create a second, transient medium that intercepts the shockwave and attenuates its energy density before it reaches a protected asset."

By creating a temporary, superheated parcel of air with a laser, microwave or electrical arc, researchers believe that the shockwave would, in theory -- it hasn't been determined how far along Boeing's research into this has got -- dissipate once it hit the plasma field, leaving whatever was on the other side unaffected, or for the blast to at least be mitigated.

Wired: That Boeing Force Field? It Probably Won't Ever Work. Rhett Allain

Phoenix...

Posted by Reginald L. Goodwin on April 5, 2015 at 10:25am

Star Trek "First Contact": The Phoenix

Topics: Dark Humor, Doomsday Clock, Star Trek, Nuclear Power, Treatment

A Fan's Star Trek Treatment, © 2 April 2015, (at least this is the date I started typing away), but this instruction from LOC.gov clarified things for me: i.e. what I can't, and won't claim rights to.

So, Star Trek is definitely not "my baby," I am not a screenwriter; member of SAG nor am I remotely related to Gene Roddenberry. I'm having some tongue-in-cheek fan fun, and hopefully if CBS/Paramount decides to use it, they'll at least give me a byline, but...probably not.

* * * * *

Note: The following follows no known treatment format I'm aware of. Just that with the passing of Leonard Nimoy and the 50th anniversary of the Original Series next year, it got me thinking of some unresolved important things in the Trek timeline I wouldn't mind seeing on television. The strength of Star Trek has always been a positive view of the future; its only flaw other than fantastic, Heisenberg and Relativity-defying technologies (I think) are the missing baby steps taken to societal maturity and tolerance of diversity.

Nerdist reports of two possible new Trek series in the works. Judging from the write ups, one is a re-re-boot of Kirk, Spock, McCoy, Uhura, Chekov, Sulu and Scottie; the other a darker version of the Trek universe in the future when the Federation, like most empires, is bloated, over-extended and falls from galactic grace. I wouldn't mind either, really. I would delight if both story lines were brought to the flat screen and set my DVR accordingly.

However, as I found in the post “Farpoint,” there is a part of the faux human history that is being avoided, perhaps purposely, perhaps because no one has a treatment or script idea centered on it, or we’re just too close to the subject matter: World War III and its aftermath.

From Farpoint: "Nuclear war would be a fool's errand - whether as in Federation we established colonies on off worlds, the conflagration would leave swaths of Earth clearly uninhabitable for thousands of years. Corpses would have no care who actually "won" such an insane engagement. The Trek universe eludes to the discontinued existence of Washington, Moscow and other global capitals, hence the location of the fictional United Federation of Planets in San Francisco." We should see this in a dramatic new Trek series; ponder the term "Mutually Assured Destruction" (M.A.D.), and that we still have an active doomsday clock. Disturbingly, from the press release by the Bureau of Atomic Scientists, we are now 3 minutes to midnight.

Star Trek: Deep Space 9 suggested in a two-part episode rampant inequality in the 21st Century (how prescient), to the point in the United States at least, the uber 1% build “sanctuary cities” for the poor to be warehoused in to eventually die (DS9: “Past Tense” Part I and Part II).

I've always fancied a "Star Trek: Phoenix," as in rising from the ashes of destruction and building something quite different, more democratic and less stratified than our current society and its inequality that is now epidemic - - and reinforced by modern-day cults: commercial, personality, religious types; news pundits and politicians, our own fairy tale beliefs of society and our place and mobility in it. It also happens to have been the name of the first warp ship built by Dr. Zephram Cochrane a lot of fans would remember. Plus, with the exception of the novel Federation, Zephram is almost an afterthought with no back story, that I think would be quite interesting to watch.

For example, even though humanity was in a barbaric state at the end of "Star Trek: First Contact," can you imagine a few of our current loons accepting a pointy eared, bowl-haircut, and green skinned alien with a “live long and prosper” salute? Civilization collapsed on itself; not a single cell phone tower would be up; no malls; the Internet and million player online games in a complete shambles and unresponsive. I could see loud zealots and teenagers in neurosis. I’d expect riots up to the point the Vulcans showed us how to replicate a T-bone steak! Also, as Copernicus and Galileo did with the Heliocentric (correct) view of the solar system, the idea we’re not only not alone in the universe, but there are these intelligent "other" beings that don’t share our cultures; our history; our prejudices; our religions: that would be upsetting and faction-creating. For the sake of moving the story along in Trek, a few billion people suddenly stopped being cruel to each other and started getting along in a fitful flight of magical thinking. In light of current events I see on the evening news, it would light initially an existential powder keg. As a case-in-point, the indictment against Galileo (as of this 2013 post) is STILL in effect!

“Phoenix” would have the feel I appreciated from “Enterprise” (a show that ended too soon), this would be before even a glimmer of a thought of a “Prime Directive.” After a flirt with the sixth extinction event on Earth, this time self-caused, the former United States was apparently fighting an Eastern Coalition that warred with them frequently. Colonel Green - another barely a-mention in the Original Star Trek or Enterprise - used genocide after the war to purify humanity from the ravages of radiation poisoning. The scary part is I could see some political demagogue thinking this quite "rational," and gathering a following in authoritarian fashion. He had been influenced – as I said in Farpoint – by the Optimum Movement, itself an outgrowth of Khan Noonien Singh and his sister and brother genetic supermen. It could be gritty, grimy, and dangerous even involve the current vogue: Zombies of a kind, with a biological explanation. It wouldn't need much high tech technology as we’d be trying to recover what we lost and discover new designs and paradigms. It would be like after any terrible disaster – Earth as “Survivor Island” – as humanity clawed its way up from barbarity and created a new civilization, one less stratified; more fair and just and above all, rational and sane.

Sir Patrick Stewart, Jonathan Frakes, Marina Sirtis, Denise Crosby, LeVar Burton, Gates McFadden, Michael Dorn, Brent Spiner – doing cameos in a two-episode pilot, leading to a confrontation where traditionalists fighting change want to return to the “old ways” – that ahem, plunged humanity back into the dark ages. I could see either Stewart or Frakes shouting “no more!” after an emotional soliloquy about not going back to the previous ignorance and fears, selling the scene. Star Trek, like any great science fiction/fantasy story asks the question through its characters (e.g. Data, Picard, Worf) over again we never tire of: “what does it mean to be ‘human’?” It's a prequel, but for example, I watch Gotham with the full knowledge of how the Batman mythical universe will eventually flesh itself out, villains and all. It's just fun watching the creativity of writers building the bricks of it to its logical conclusion: cape and cowl in one instance; warp drive and aliens in another.

"Phoenix" would then be a story not of warp drives and miracle materializing technologies: but the miracle we survived our own hubris at all to venture forward to the stars. Its impact could be quite powerful as a mirror to ourselves in light of current events; a way to start conversations without partially following the famous dictum of Carl von Clausewitz: "War is merely a continuation of politics"— or "of policy"—"by other means." A few enthusiastic cheerleaders drop the important prepositional phrase at the statement's end.

Shape-Shifting Sensor...

Posted by Reginald L. Goodwin on March 31, 2015 at 6:55am

Image Source: NIST

Topics: Biology, Diagnostics, Engineering, Medicine, Nanotechnology

Scientists working at the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) and the National Institutes of Health (NIH) have devised and demonstrated a new, shape-shifting probe, about one-hundredth as wide as a human hair, which is capable of sensitive, high-resolution remote biological sensing that is not possible with current technology. If eventually put into widespread use, the design could have a major impact on research in medicine, chemistry, biology and engineering. Ultimately, it might be used in clinical diagnostics.

To date, most efforts to image highly localized biochemical conditions such as abnormal pH* and ion concentration—critical markers for many disorders—rely on various nanosensors that are probed using light at optical frequencies. But the sensitivity and resolution of the resulting optical signals decrease rapidly with increasing depth into the body. That has limited most applications to less obscured, more optically accessible regions.

The new shape-shifting probe devices, described online in the journal Nature,** are not subject to those limitations. They make it possible to detect and measure localized conditions on the molecular scale deep within tissues, and to observe how they change in real time.

NIST: Shape-Shifting Sensor Can Report Conditions from Deep in the Body, Michael Baum

Nous Sommes Humains...

Posted by Reginald L. Goodwin on March 31, 2015 at 6:30am

Topics: Diversity, Diversity in Science, Economy, Jobs, STEM, Women in Science

A re-post that, after consideration, I decided not to edit [much] in content, with exception of the post title ("we are humans"), since much of its form and content is still quite relevant. As Dean Kamen has been known to say: "you get what you celebrate." In a society centered on celebrity without talent where we celebrate the vile and absurd; confused between controversy, journalism and governance, we all appear to be celebrating all the wrong things. Hopefully, this month has inspired especially young women to focus on the rational, factual and actual; the scientific, technological, engineering and mathematical; and hopefully for you all: empowering and rewarding things.

From the image source at Nature:

"Science remains institutionally sexist. Despite some progress, women scientists are still paid less, promoted less frequently, win fewer grants and are more likely to leave research than similarly qualified men. This special issue of Nature takes a hard look at the gender gap — from bench to boardroom — and at what is being done to close it."

Unfortunately, the world is not like Star Trek, populated with fictional Captains like Kathryn Janeway of this inspiring description:

"This subject's penchant for the scientific method and clear-cut choices has given her a healthy dose of skepticism, which usually provides a command asset in dealing with new situations. Her preference for difficult studies is self-traced back to childhood, when she would prefer that to outdoor play. Since then, she has indicated no pleasure in outdoor camping, hiking, or cooking." StarTrek.com

I follow a blog: Female Science Professor. The author describes herself as a full professor, and other than staying anonymous (probably important around review time) she's very frank about the biases encountered both from colleagues and students: her most resent post, a student in class evaluation said "You should improve your teaching methods." The prof made lemons into lemonade and blogged about it. The genders of her students - like her own identity - were left nebulous.

Diversity: an ideal we all agree sounds good on paper, but are reluctant to do the heavy lift to achieve it (see Nature excerpt). Even in politics: our current president as probability represents 2.3% of the general population of Chief Executives from George Washington to himself. However, disrespect of the presidential office and obstruction of his agenda approaches Guinness World Record levels as he's being sued for using Executive Orders - the least of any president according to official archives and math - "abuse" being any Executive Order above zero. My concern is beyond executive or party: it is nation viability in a global economy that is growing exponentially and unrelenting in its competitiveness. We need everyone on deck; everyone respected and valued. To survive, the old paradigms need to be buried where they belong: in the past.

Women and minorities are not only underrepresented in the sciences, they are openly discouraged from pursuing STEM careers at the university level and at early life stages. I was personally insulted by my middle school science teacher - "No, you big dummy!" - after asking a question about calculating the coefficient of linear expansion on a metal wire. I had stifled the immediate urgent need at that moment to deck him, confident of the outcome with the authorities if I had. My parents were not amused, and scheduled a visit with the principal. That was followed by a sweaty, self-preserving "apology" from the science teacher. I passed his class with a descent grade, and moved on from the twerp. The fact both groups are so low means discouragement is remarkably efficient to maintain the status quo of the "usual suspects" in the sciences, and a concentration of wealth and opportunities along gender and cultural lines. Suffice to say, to resist the "haters": you have to want it!

Albert Einstein was so fond of answering the fan mail of children interested in science, author Alice Calaprice wrote a book on it. In an exchange with a young science fan from South Africa named Tiffany:

September 19, 1946: "I forgot to tell you, in my last letter, that I was a girl. I mean I am a girl. I have always regretted this a great deal, but by now I have become more or less resigned to the fact. Anyway, I hate dresses and dances and all the kind of rot girls usually like. I much prefer horses and riding. Long ago, before I wanted to become a scientist, I wanted to b e a jockey and ride horses in races. But that was ages ago, now. I hope you will not think any the less of me for being a girl!"

To which, Einstein's reply was classic, and classy (circa October 1946):

"I do not mind that you are a girl, but the main thing is that you yourself do not mind. There is no reason for it."

Carl Sagan pointed out there is an excellent correlation between poverty for women and high birthrates, whether the country is defined by religion - Christian, Hindu, Irreligious, Muslim, etc. That would suggest access to birth control increases the wealth of women and nations, WHO would have issue with that is beyond me. Sadly, some obviously would, and attempt to litigate or legitimate their regressive tendencies. Slippery slopes forge unintended pathways, and thereby negative consequences unforeseen.

Minorities (an ironic label for the majority of the Earth's population) at least numerically in this country are hampered by generations of specifically-designed social engineering; castigated for not competing in rigged "rights" of citizenship (like voting); when the value of property plummets at their presence; the neurological harmful effects of leaded plumbing in East Austin and other areas not addressed until gentrification (and now I see climate effects); globalization and technology eliminating previous decent-paying jobs, doubled unemployment rates and the obvious differences dependent on which side of the tracks you were born (still) in education since Brown vs. Board. It's also interesting to see screeds on the Internet against the LGBT community, unbeknownst to the screed producer of the Turing Test for artificial intelligence, or that he's the reason we have in the lexicon "algorithm"; "computation"; "cryptography" (the essence of McAfee, Norton or any antivirus software), or as the father of Computer Science that we're typing on laptops at all. Not to mention the ugly, breathtaking displays of xenophobia at the border of California to children by the great-great-grandchildren of immigrants that have yet to recompense the Native Americans for the sins of Columbus.

We can have myriad months of celebrations that target specific groups and their contributions. It all disappears into the social, attention-deficit ether, eventually. Our discourse, our academia, our music, our self-governance; our sense of right-and-wrong (who goes to prison and who goes to rehab) will not change nor will we survive as a species until we see one another: women, migrants, minorities; LGBT and the current majority...as humans.

Countering Stereotype Threat...

Posted by Reginald L. Goodwin on March 30, 2015 at 8:24am

Scientific American, see [2] below

Topics: Diversity, Diversity in Science, Education, Jobs, STEM, Women in Science

Stereotype threat refers to being at risk of confirming, as self-characteristic, a negative stereotype about one's group (Steele & Aronson, 1995). This term was first used by Steele and Aronson (1995) who showed in several experiments that Black college freshmen and sophomores performed more poorly on standardized tests than White students when their race was emphasized. When race was not emphasized, however, Black students performed better and equivalently with White students. The results showed that performance in academic contexts can be harmed by the awareness that one's behavior might be viewed through the lens of racial stereotypes. [1]

Scott Barry Kaufman seems to refer to this in his Scientific American article "The Need for Belonging in Math and Science" [2]:

From her earliest memories, Catherine Good was good at math. By second grade she was performing at the fourth grade level, sometimes even helping the teacher grade other students’ work. She was praised constantly for her “gift”, often overhearing her mother tell anyone who would listen that she was a “sponge” for anything mathematical.

As time went on:

Achieve she did. Good did so well as an undergraduate, that she decided to pursue a Ph.D. in mathematics. Again, she wasn't driven by the sheer joy, but by other forces:

“My counter-stereotypical achievement, coupled with my belief that those successes were rooted in an innate gift, not only fueled my academic pursuits, but also formed the basis for my academic identity.”

For awhile, Good performed as usual in her graduate program. But then something happened that would change the course of her career: her identity became threatened. As Good puts it, “the identity as a mathematician that I thought was so well-entrenched and established came crashing down, leaving me in a professional crisis.”

Despite her good grades, a flood of self-doubt crept in. She suddenly wondered: Was I simply no longer inspired by the level of rigor and originality necessary for graduate level mathematics? Was it the fact that for the first time in my academic life, I had to work, really work, at my studies?

And, finally...

Whatever the cause(s), one thing was certain: she no longer felt a sense of belonging in mathematics. As a result, she left mathematics.

I have had to come to grips with this in myself, in the US Air Force as a Communications Officer, within the Semiconductor Industry itself and Graduate School: certain things stick out to you.

1. You're the only "one," at the classified briefing to plan the satellite and wireless communications network for an exercise; at the yield engineering meeting (see #2 below). The cartoon above pertaining to the difference for women in STEM could also be of the one African American, Hispanic/Latino/Native American; the Asian that HAS to be good at math as a matter of genetics, so any questions for clarification and understanding means you're a defect somehow.

2. Some indication of that in my offspring. He's performing quite well in Civil Engineering, yet he often feels like "the one." I'm sure if he asked around campus, or joined his campus NSBE chapter (a pet peeve we're working through), he'd find his predicament not so unique.

Ironically, the strength of my taking a Masters in Microelectronics and Photonics online is I am "one" of many "ones". We don't see each other; we only interact/question via email. I send homework in PDF. If I experience some form of stereotype threat, it is in my own self-doubt, which are many: am I too old to do this; will I be the only "one" in the room? There is a freedom and a loneliness in online anonymity, the only brief camaraderie I experienced when I inquired last year how they weathered Hurricane Sandy: Stevens University is in Hoboken, NJ.

I recall once that observation being made by someone I worked with at Motorola: "we're the 'only black engineers' in the room," my fellow alumni said. "And, we're the best damn engineers IN the room" I shot back. He gave me a grin and an "Aggie Pride" verbal acknowledgement. Despite that bravado, I wish I had Dr. JC Holbrook's paper on survival strategies [3] in many instances I have also felt the pressure of stereotype threat. Religion and spirituality - as she mentions - are forms of mental survival strategies (go watch 12 Years a Slave, if you haven't already). Cultural expression - that if not abused by charlatans, pundits, lying politicians and political machinations spewing manipulative talking points, inevitably propels individuals and groups forward despite near insurmountable obstacles. Think of the Civil Rights movement. Unless society were to make a massive, herculean change towards eliminating inequality, this mental skill will remain necessary.

To go further beyond a masters, I'll have to emerge from online anonymity, even with my company behind me (as they enthusiastically are), I'll have to use survival strategies and fight within myself this "stereotype threat" that morphs into self-fulfilling prophecy for many of us. One is a promise I made to my parents. My journey in science started with a chemistry set and my first almost fatal experiment. Instead of discouraging me, they just barred me from repeating THAT particular one. As science lifts countries out of poverty, it has lifted me twice: once post the US Air Force; second eight years after a lay off from that same company where we were the "best damn engineers in the room." And I have obligated myself to finish what they planted in me and seed it forward to their grandchildren, and any other youth I can influence.

There are of course, regressive forces that want nothing more than to maintain the status quo as in atomizing us into separate "teams/factions" within national borders. If we're a part of a team in a particular race: it will ever be the human race and species, irregardless of culture or gender.

It is an important, internal and external struggle we ultimately must win. This country in particular will be bereft of a prosperous future without our triumph and our inputs.

1. Reducing Stereotype Threat: What is 'Stereotype Threat'?
2. SciAm Beautiful Minds: The Need for Belonging in Math and Science
3. #P4TC: Survival Strategies
4. #P4TC: An earlier article on Stereotype Threat

IR and G-HAT...

Posted by Reginald L. Goodwin on March 30, 2015 at 8:20am

Image: NGC 2403 in Camelopardalis. Dysonian SETI, not limited to relatively nearby stars, looks for signs of astroengineering not just in our own but in distant galaxies like this one, some ten million light years away.. Credit & Copyright: Martin Pugh.

Topics: Drake Equation, SETI, Space, Space Exploration

This has been a week devoted to extraterrestrial technologies and the hope that, if they exist, we can find them. Large constructions like Dyson spheres, and associated activities like asteroid mining on the scale an advanced civilization might use to make them, all factor into the mix, and as we’ve seen, so do starships imagined in a wide variety of propulsion systems and designs. Dysonian SETI, as it is called, takes us into the realm of the hugely speculative, but hopes through sifting our abundant astronomical data to find evidence of distant engineering.

This effort is visible in projects like the Glimpsing Heat from Alien Technologies (G-HAT) SETI program, which proceeds in the capable hands of Jason Wright and colleagues Steinn Sigurðsson and Matthew Povich at Penn State (see Wright’s Glimpsing Heat from Alien Technologies essay in these pages as well as his AstroWright blog). For those wanting to follow up these ideas, an excellent introduction is the paper “Dysonian Approach to SETI: A Fruitful Middle Ground?”, which ran in JBIS in 2011 (Vol. 64, pp. 156-165). It’s not, unfortunately, available online, though the British Interplanetary Society offers a print copy of the entire back issue here.

Centauri Dreams: SETI Explores the Near-Infrared, Paul Gilster

Spheres and Dwarfs...

Posted by Reginald L. Goodwin on March 29, 2015 at 2:07pm

Image Source: Earth-Sky - What is a Dyson Sphere?

Topics: Astrophysics, Dyson Sphere, White Dwarfs, SETI

TECHNOLOGY REVIEW: Back in 1960, the physicist Freeman Dyson publish an unusual paper in the journal Science entitled “Search for Artificial Stellar Sources of Infra-red Radiation.” In it, he outlined a hypothetical structure that entirely encapsulates a star to capture its energy, which has since become known as a Dyson sphere.

The basic idea is that all technological civilizations require ever greater sources of energy. Once the energy of their home planet has been entirely exhausted, the next obvious source is the mother star. So such a civilization is likely to build a shell around its star that captures the energy it produces.

Of course, such a sphere must also radiate the energy it absorbs and this would produce a special signature in the infrared part of the spectrum. Such a source of infrared radiation would be entirely unlike any naturally occurring one and so provide a unique way of spotting such as advanced civilization.

Because Sun-like stars seem the most obvious homes for advanced civilizations, most studies of Dyson spheres have focused on the properties these kinds of systems would have when built within the habitable zone at a distance of about 1 astronomical unit.

These studies have revealed well-known limitations, however. Such spheres tend to be unstable and require huge volumes of material to build. But most problematic of all, anything or anyone on the surface of these spheres would experience low levels of gravity, a problem that could not easily be solved with known physics.

Today, Ibrahim Semiz and Salim Ogur at Bogazici University in Turkey, define an entirely new class of Dyson sphere. Instead of thinking about a sphere around a Sun-like star, Semiz and Ogur consider a sphere built around a white dwarf.

They say that such a sphere would avoid some of the most severe problems and that there are good arguments to think that they might be more common than the ones Dyson originally imagined.

Physics arXiv: Dyson Spheres around White Dwarfs,
İbrahim Semiz, Salim Oğur

Women's History Month...

Posted by Reginald L. Goodwin on March 29, 2015 at 2:00pm

Source: National Academy of Sciences [1]

Topics: Diversity, Diversity in Science, STEM, Women in Science

American Association for the Advancement of Science

This Women's History Month, celebrate women in science through reading! Science Books & Films has even compiled a reading list for the occasion. Below, take a look at science books written by or about women with the accompanying Science NetLinks teaching resources.

AAAS: Books for Women's History Month

American Institute of Physics: Scitation

Their Day in the Sun: Women of the Manhattan Project, Ruth H. Howes, Caroline L. Herzenberg and Benjamin C. Zulueta, Reviewer

Amazon.com: The public perception of the making of the atomic bomb is yet an image of the dramatic efforts of a few brilliant male scientists. However, the Manhattan Project was not just the work of a few and it was not just in Los Alamos. It was, in fact, a sprawling research and industrial enterprise that spanned the country from Hanford in Washington State to Oak Ridge in Tennessee, and the Met labs in Illinois. The Manhattan Project also included women in every capacity. During World War II the manpower shortages opened the laboratory doors to women and they embraced the opportunity to demonstrate that they, too, could do 'creative science'.

National Academy of Sciences

Published since 1877, Biographical Memoirs provide the life histories and selected bibliographies of deceased National Academy of Sciences members. Colleagues familiar with the subject's work write these memoirs and as such, the series provides a biographical history of science in America. This special collection features memoirs of women who shaped American science. We hope you will enjoy – and be inspired by – the biographies of these groundbreaking researchers.

1. Biographical Memoirs: Women's History Month

Dr. Gerty Theresa Cori, née Radnitz...

Posted by Reginald L. Goodwin on March 28, 2015 at 8:43am

Image Source: NobelPrize.org

Topics: Biochemistry, Diversity, Diversity in Science, Metabolism, Nobel Prize, Physiology, STEM, Women in Science

The Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine 1947

Born: 15 August 1896, Prague, Austria-Hungary (now Czech Republic)

Died: 26 October 1957, St. Louis, MO, USA

Affiliation at the time of the award: Washington University, St. Louis, MO, USA

Prize motivation: "for their discovery of the course of the catalytic conversion of glycogen"

Field: biochemistry, metabolism, physiology

Prize share: jointly to Carl Ferdinand Cori and Gerty Theresa Cori, née Radnitz "for their discovery of the course of the catalytic conversion of glycogen" and the other half to Bernardo Alberto Houssay "for his discovery of the part played by the hormone of the anterior pituitary lobe in the metabolism of sugar".

Note: Dr. Cori's biography was an interesting read. Considering it was penned by the Nobel committee at the end of the 1940's; women were just a few years beyond the Suffrage Movement, and society was still - in general - not nearly as advanced socially or sociologically on cultural or gender issues. I found and give reference to a biography more about her than... well, you'll see what I mean in a moment.

Carl Ferdinand Cori was born in Prague on the Marine Biological Station in Trieste, and it was here that the young Carl spend his childhood. He received an early introduction to science from his father and this was stimulated on summer visits to the Tyrol, to the home of his grandfather, Ferdinand Lippich, Professor of Theoretical Physics at Prague. He studied at the German University of Prague to study medicine. During World War I, he served as a lieutenant in the Sanitary Corps of the Austrian Army on the Italian front; he returned to University, where he studied with his future wife, Gerty, to graduate Doctor Vienna and a year as assistant in pharmacology at the position as biochemist at the State Institute for the Study of appointed Professor of Pharmacology at the Washington University Medical School in St. Louis, where he later became Professor in Biochemistry.

The Cori's have collaborated in most of their research work, commencing in their student days and stemming from their mutual interest in the preclinical sciences. Their first joint paper resulted from an immunological study of the complement of human serum.

"Gerty Cori - Facts". Nobelprize.org. Nobel Media AB 2014. Web. 28 Mar 2015. http://www.nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/medicine/laureates/1947/cori-gt-facts.html

Changing The Face of Medicine: Dr. Gerty Theresa Radnitz Cori, first woman in America to receive a Nobel Prize in Science

Graphene Ice Sandwich...

Posted by Reginald L. Goodwin on March 28, 2015 at 8:30am

Square ice between two graphene sheets as seen in a transmission electron microscope. High-contrast dark spots are oxygen atoms that indicate positions of water molecules. Hydrogen atoms yield too little contrast to be resolved even by the state-of-the-art TEM. The top right inset shows a magnified image of a small area in the centre of the ice crystal. Credit: University of Ulm, Germany

Topics: Carbon Nanotubes, Graphene, Nanotechnology, Nanostructures

Researchers in the UK, Germany and China say they have observed a new type of frozen water in the form of square ice sandwiched between sheets of graphene. The ice films, which are less than 1 nm thick, have a completely different symmetry to that of normal ice – which has a hexagonal structure. This ice should also exist inside certain other types of nanostructures, such as carbon nanotubes, and could help explain why water moves unusually in these materials – a result that could have implications for developing more efficient filtration, desalination and distillation technologies.

"The new phase of ice forms at room temperature, well above the 'normal' freezing temperature of water," explain team leaders Irina Grigorieva and Andre Geim of the University of Manchester in the UK. "Apart from finding this new phase – not something that happens every day – our result will allow us to better understand the counterintuitive behaviour of water inside nanochannels, such as ultrafast permeation though graphene oxide membranes."

Nanotech Web: Square ice forms in graphene sandwich, Belle Dumé, contributing editor at nanotechweb.org

High Flight...

Posted by Reginald L. Goodwin on March 27, 2015 at 6:33am

Bessie Coleman: Image Source at [2] below, slide 5 of 7

Topics: Education, Diversity in Science, NASA, Spaceflight, Star Trek, STEM, Women in Science

"Oh, I have slipped the surly bonds of earth,

And danced the skies on laughter-silvered wings;

Sunward I've climbed and joined the tumbling mirth of sun-split clouds -

and done a hundred things You have not dreamed of -

wheeled and soared and swung high in the sunlit silence.

Hovering there I've chased the shouting wind along

and flung my eager craft through footless halls of air.

"High Flight," John Gillespie Magee, Jr., Arlington National Cemetary

The recent death of Sally Ride (2012), the first American female astronaut, has brought to light her contributions to the space program and science. Dr Ride has influenced many females to get into the fields of science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM).

Today, there is an increased push for the American education system to improve their STEM programs as well as to get students to show interest in the fields. It is important to bring attention to some of the African-American females that have, and are still, paving the road for future scientists, astronauts or any STEM degree holders.

Nichelle Nichols is not an astronaut, but her role in Star Trek as Lieutenant Uhura inspired many African-American women to become astronauts and astrophysicists including Mae Jemison. One of the first African-American female roles that was not a servant, Nichols used her position of popularity to work with NASA to recruit minorities and female personnel for the space agency. Those recruited include Dr. Sally Ride, the first female American Astronaut, Colonel Guion Bluford, the first African-American in space and many more. A genuine interest in space and the advancement of space Nichols flew aboard NASA’s C-141 Astronomy Observatory, which analyzed the atmospheres of Mars and Saturn on an eight-hour, high-altitude mission. [1]

1. TheGrio.com: Black women making their mark in space and science,
Similoluwa Ojurongbe
2. Madame Noire:
Taking Flight: 7 Black Female Astronauts and Aviators Who Changed History, Terry Williams

The Moon's Moon...

Posted by Reginald L. Goodwin on March 27, 2015 at 6:28am

This artist's rendition shows part of the plan for NASA's Asteroid Redirect Mission to robotically pluck a boulder off an asteroid and ferry it to high lunar orbit. Astronauts would then visit the boulder as early as 2025. Image Credit: NASA

Topics: Asteroids, Mars, Moon, NASA, Robotics, Space Exploration, STEM

In the 2020s, NASA’s human spaceflight program will revolve around sending astronauts to high lunar orbit to study a small boulder robotically plucked from the surface of a large asteroid, agency officials announced yesterday. The announcement is a crucial milestone for the agency’s nascent Asteroid Redirect Mission (ARM), which is intended to set the stage for future missions sending humans to Mars and other deep-space destinations.

NASA’s decision comes after months of delays as two separate teams investigated how to best achieve ARM’s objectives. The original ARM proposal, dubbed Option A, called for a “grab and bag” approach, in which a robotic space tug captures a small asteroid whole and wraps it in a protective sheath before guiding it into a stable lunar orbit. Though the boulder-snatching concept, Option B, is projected to cost $100 million more than Option A, it won out because it offers more operational flexibility, said NASA associate administrator Robert Lightfoot.

Then again, science is secondary for ARM. Its stated purpose is to test and develop new technologies for spaceflight, such as NASA’s Space Launch System heavy-lift rocket, its Orion deep-space crew capsule and an advanced solar-electric propulsion engine suitable for long-haul cargo trips. NASA is also pitching the missions as a step forward in demonstrating how a spacecraft can alter the orbits of potentially Earth-threatening asteroids—that’s the “Redirect” part of the ARM moniker.

Scientific American:

NASA Chooses a Boulder as the Next Destination for Its Astronauts
Lee Billings

Dr. Rosalyn Yalow...

Posted by Reginald L. Goodwin on March 26, 2015 at 7:22am

Image Source: NobelPrize.org

Topics: Diagnostic Techniques, Diversity, Diversity in Science, Endocrinology, Metabolism, Nobel Prize, STEM, Women in Science

The Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine 1977

Born: 19 July 1921, New York, NY, USA

Died: 30 May 2011, New York, NY, USA

Affiliation at the time of the award: Veterans Administration Hospital, Bronx, NY, USA

Prize motivation: "for the development of radioimmunoassays of peptide hormones"

Field: diagnostic techniques, endocrinology, metabolism

jointly to Roger Guillemin and Andrew V. Schally "for their discoveries concerning the peptide hormone production of the brain" and the other half to Rosalyn Yalow "for the development of radioimmunoassays of peptide hormones".

Perhaps the earliest memories I have of being a stubborn, determined child. Through the years my mother had told me that it was unfortunate that I chose to do acceptable things, for if I had chosen otherwise no one would have deflected me from my path.

My mother, nee Clara Zipper, came to America from Germany at the age of four. My father, Simon Sussman, was born on the Lower East Side of New York, the Melting Pot for Eastern European immigrants. Neither had the advantage of a high school education but there was never a doubt that their two children would make it through college. I was an early reader, reading even before kindergarten, and since we did not have books in my home, my older brother, Alexander, was responsible for our trip every week to the Public Library to exchange books already read for new ones to be read.

By seventh grade I was committed to mathematics. A great chemistry teacher at Walton High School, Mr. Mondzak, excited my interest in chemistry, but when I went to Hunter, the college for women in New York City's college system (now the City University of New York), my interest was diverted to physics especially by Professors Herbert N. Otis and Duane Roller. In the spring when I was in college, physics, and in particular nuclear physics, was the most exciting field in the world. It seemed as if every major experiment brought a Nobel Prize. Eve Curie had just published the biography of her mother, Madame Marie Curie, which should be a must on the reading list of every young aspiring female scientist. As a junior at college, I was hanging on nuclear fission - which has resulted not only in the terror and threat of nuclear warfare but also in the ready availability of radioisotopes for medical investigation and in hosts of other peaceful applications.

"Rosalyn Yalow - Facts". Nobelprize.org. Nobel Media AB 2014. Web. 25 Mar 2015. http://www.nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/medicine/laureates/1977/yalow-facts.html

See-Through Solar...

Posted by Reginald L. Goodwin on March 26, 2015 at 7:15am

New York City Skyscrapers as Seen Through High-Performance SolarWindow™ Module

Topics: Alternative Energy, Green Energy, STEM, Solar Power, Materials Science

Science TIME: It’s called SolarWindow, and it involves spraying clear windows with transparent, electricity-generating coatings. The breakthrough, according to developers New Energy Technologies Inc., comes because previously “the collection of electricity was possible only through use of a metal contact, which blocked visibility and limited transparency.” The coatings use the world’s smallest functional solar cells, which measure less than a quarter the size of a grain of rice.

W-I-I-T-F-M -- What this means for you:

Your smart phone charging from its face in a matter of minutes in the sunlight.
Office buildings generating and storing their own power, greatly reducing the cost of operation.
Ditto for your homes and thus, your heating and cooling expenses.
Your electric car, bus, train or plane could be self-sustaining.
It would make camping out in the woods rather interesting indeed.

What's exciting is reducing what has become a ubiquitous term: carbon footprint. Even if you're not a tree-hugging member of Greenpeace, I've never seen an instance where anyone went to war over sunlight.

Company Site: SolarWindow
Bloomberg: See-Through Solar Is Tomorrow’s Threat to Oil
JD Markman:
Why solar eclipsing oil may first cause a year-long crash, then a 17-year bull market

A Future We Cannot Avoid...

Posted by Reginald L. Goodwin on March 25, 2015 at 7:13am

At City College of San Francisco, student Daniela Cardenas prepares DNA for analysis during the biotechnology module of Bio 11: Introduction to the Science of Living Organisms. This course was developed with funding from the NSF-ATE grant titled, "Incorporating Molecular Biology into the Undergraduate Curriculum."

Credit: City College of San Francisco, Biology Department

Topics: African Americans, Diversity, Hispanic Americans, Jobs, STEM, Women in Science

In the U.S., almost half of all undergraduate students are educated at community colleges. The most recent data show that about 40 percent of community-college students represent the first generation in their family to attend college. Eighteen percent are Hispanic, 15 percent are Black, and 12 percent are students with disabilities.

The community college environment reflects not only demographic changes in the population, but also changes in the economy. As less-skilled jobs are less available, there is a need for more education and training in specialized fields to build or rebuild a career path toward a secure future.

This microcosm of students is key to the National Science Foundation's (NSF) commitment to support high-quality educational experiences in science, technology, engineering and mathematics (the STEM fields) while recruiting underrepresented groups into STEM and building the STEM workforce.

In 1992, Congress presented NSF with its first-ever mandate for program creation, known as the Scientific and Advanced Technology Act. In response to this legislation, the NSF established the Advanced Technological Education (ATE) program, with the overall goal of increasing the knowledge and skills of technicians who are educated at associate-degree-granting colleges.

In funding community colleges, the program gives them a leadership role in strengthening the skills of STEM technicians. The community colleges work in partnership with universities, secondary schools, business and industry and government agencies to design and carry out model workforce development initiatives in fields as diverse as biotechnology, cyber security and advanced manufacturing.

"Those in America with the most favorable view of science tend to be young, well-to-do, college-educated white males. But three-quarters of new American workers in the next decade will be women, non-whites, and immigrants. Failing to rouse their enthusiasm - to say nothing of discriminating against them - isn't only unjust, it's also stupid and self-defeating. It deprives the economy of desperately needed skilled workers."

National Science Foundation:
Preparing high-tech workers, meeting needs of employers
US Courts: Brown vs. Board of Education re-argued today, 1953
Amazon:
First Class: The Legacy of Dunbar, America's First Black Public High School, Alison Stewart
The Demon-Haunted World: Science as a Candle in the Dark, Carl Sagan, Chapter 19: "No Such Thing as a Dumb Question"

Seeing Enterprise...

Posted by Reginald L. Goodwin on March 25, 2015 at 7:09am

Relativistic spacecraft must interact with the cosmic microwave background in a way that produces a unique light signature.

Topics: CMB, Einstein, NASA, Relativity, SETI, Quantum Cosmology, Spaceflight, Spacetime

TECHNOLOGY REVIEW: Interstellar travel may be the stuff of science fiction but it’s straightforward to calculate that it should be possible given the ability to travel at a significant fraction of the speed of light. These kinds of speeds may even be achievable with near future technologies and the tax dollars to make them work.

There are significant challenges, of course. And today, Ulvi Yurtsever and Steven Wilkinson at the defense contractor Raytheon in El Segundo, California, outline another that seems to have been overlooked until now.

These guys point out that any object traveling at relativistic speeds will interact with photons in the cosmic microwave background. This interaction should create a drag that imposes specific limits on how fast spacecraft can travel, they say.

The movement of a relativistic spacecraft will have another effect. It should scatter the cosmic microwave background in a way that produces a unique signature. “As a baryonic spacecraft travels at relativistic speeds it will interact with the CMB through scattering to cause a frequency shift that could be detectable on Earth with current technology,” say Yurtsever and Wilkinson.

They go on to calculate the properties of this signature. They say the scattering should generate radiation in the terahertz to infrared regions of the spectrum and that this signal should move relative to the background. “The salient features of the signal are a rapid drop in temperature accompanied by a rapid rise in intensity, along with the motion of the source with respect to a reference frame fixed to distant quasars, which should be observable,” say Yurtsever and Wilkinson.

In other words, if relativistic spacecraft are zipping across interstellar space, this kind of signature should be visible using the current generation of astrophysical observatories.

That’s an interesting piece of work that takes the analysis of relativistic space travel to a new level. Other researchers have explored the possibility of observing relativistic spacecraft using the optical emissions that their engines must generate. But Yurtsever and Wilkinson go further.

Physics arXiv: Limits and Signatures of Relativistic Spaceflight
Ulvi Yurtsever, Steven Wilkinson

Dr. Barbara McClintock...

Posted by Reginald L. Goodwin on March 24, 2015 at 9:49pm

Image Source: NobelPrize.org

Topics: Biology, Genetics, Diversity, Diversity in Science, Nobel Prize, STEM, Women in Science

The Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine 1983

Born: 16 June 1902, Hartford, CT, USA

Died: 2 September 1992, Huntington, NY, USA

Affiliation at the time of the award: Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory, Cold Spring Harbor, NY, USA

Prize motivation: "for her discovery of mobile genetic elements"

Field: genetics

Relatively few students took this course and most of them were interested in pursuing agriculture as a profession. Only twenty-one years had passed since the rediscovery of Mendel's principles of heredity. ... The results of these studies provided a solid conceptual framework into which subsequent results could be fitted. Nevertheless, there was a reluctance on the part of some professional biologists to accept the revolutionary concepts that were surfacing. This reluctance was soon dispelled as the logic underlying genetic investigations became increasingly evident.

When the undergraduate genetics course was completed in January, a telephone call came from Dr. Hutchinson. He must have sensed my intense interest in the content of his course because the purpose of his call was to invite me to participate in the other genetics course given at Cornell. It was scheduled for graduate students. His invitation was accepted with great pleasure and great anticipations. Obviously, this telephone call cast the die for my future. I remained with genetics thereafter. [1]

*****

To paraphrase George Orwell, every person is unique, but some are more unique than others. There has never been anyone like Barbara McClintock in this world, nor ever will be. She was not simply a representative of a type. Some have considered her as an eccentric, others as a heroine of Science, and still others as a model to be imitated. I would like to tell you how I think of her.

Barbara McClintock was a woman who rejected a woman's life for herself. She began to do it as a small child and never deviated. Her childhood was not a happy one, and perhaps this provided the force, the moral tension that was so strong in her and so necessary for the life she lived. And we must not forget that at the foundation of every creative life there lies a sense of personal inadequacy that energizes the struggle. This sense was strong in Barbara.

Barbara deliberately chose a solitary life without encumbrances, but she did not reject womanhood. In a feminine way, she once said to me "I cannot fight for myself, but I can fight for others." In a time of confusion about such matters, it is important to note that Barbara did not fight against herself by choosing a path that was inconsistent with her nature or her capacity. This is why she could, at the end, say "I have lived a wonderful life and I have no regrets about it." This does not mean that Barbara's life of isolation protected her from inner storms and passions. On the contrary, she was familiar with periods of depression, sense of futility and, yes, tears of frustration and rage. Yet her final judgment on her life was strongly affirmative. [2]

1. "Barbara McClintock - Facts". Nobelprize.org. Nobel Media AB 2014. Web. 23 Mar 2015. http://www.nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/medicine/laureates/1983/mcclintock-facts.html
2. In Memoriam - Barbara McClintock

Yotta-eV and ET...

Posted by Reginald L. Goodwin on March 24, 2015 at 9:46pm

Artist's impression of a black hole. Could an advanced alien civilization create a cosmic collider using such an object? (Courtesy: NASA/JPL-Caltech)

Topics: Black Holes, Neutrinos, Particle Physics, Space, SETI

Has an advanced alien civilization built a black-hole-powered particle accelerator to study physics at "Planck-scale" energies? And if such a cosmic collider is lurking in a corner of the universe, could we detect it here on Earth?

Brian Lacki of the Institute for Advanced Studies in Princeton, New Jersey, has done calculations that suggest that if such an accelerator exists, it would produce yotta electron-volt (YeV or 10²⁴ eV) neutrinos that could be detected here on Earth. As a result, Lacki is calling on astronomers involved in the search for extraterrestrial intelligence (SETI) to look for these ultra-high-energy particles. This is supported by SETI expert Paul Davies of Arizona State University, who believes that the search should be expanded beyond the traditional telescope searches.

Like humanity, it seems reasonable to assume that an advanced alien civilization would have a keen interest in physics, and would build particle accelerators that reach increasingly higher energies. This energy escalation could be the result of the "nightmare scenario" of particle physics in which there is no new physics at energies between the TeV energies of the Standard Model and the 10²⁸ eV Planck energy (10 XeV) – where the quantum effects of gravity become strong. "The nightmare of particle physics is the dream of astronomers searching for extraterrestrials," says Lacki.

An important problem facing alien physicists would be that the density of electromagnetic energy needed to reach the Planck scale is so great that the device would be in danger of collapsing into a black hole of its own making. However, Lacki points out that a clever designer could, in principle, get round this problem and "reaching [the] Planck energy is technically allowed, if extremely difficult".

Physics World: Have alien civilizations built cosmic accelerators from black holes?
Hamish Johnston is editor of physicsworld.com

Cyber-Bullying...

Posted by Reginald L. Goodwin on March 23, 2015 at 11:52am

ERA: History

Topics: Bullying, Diversity in Science, Equal Rights, Internet, Trolls, Women in Science

Section 1. Equality of rights under the law shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any state on account of sex.

Section 2. The Congress shall have the power to enforce, by appropriate legislation, the provisions of this article.

Section 3. This amendment shall take effect two years after the date of ratification.

A moment to discuss this related topic: Yesterday, the Equal Rights Amendment was passed by congress in 1972 (a rare time congress actually worked in our behalf). It would ultimately be defeated from becoming law by Phyllis Schlafly, using fear tactics and some homophobia.

Even the actress Ashley Judd is not immune to cyber-bullying, subjected to the vilest and violent responses to a somewhat off-color remark at a sporting event, that most are thinking anyway as their team is losing, but didn't openly share on social media as we do now (as it didn't exist before). The double-standard is quite apparent as no male sharing such disappointment is assaulted in such a manner. What used to be done in-person by the muscular bully on the playground is done by the cowardly troll on the Internet, usually before there moms call them down for dinner.

As a survivor of trolls: you have the ability to respond in protecting yourselves from bullying, cyber or otherwise. Most social media has a method of blocking them from commenting on your stream. The FBI has a podcast on cyber-bullying as well as an official PSA. My bullying usually has been the response to something said innocuously in a science post that offended a particular troll's view of the universe. After a spirited back-and-forth that eventually went nowhere, I either used the aforementioned blocking settings, or in one severe case, I went here where I found this:

The IC3 (Internet Criminal Complaint Center) was established as a partnership between the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) and the National White Collar Crime Center (NW3C) to receive Internet related criminal complaints and to further research, develop, and refer the criminal complaints to federal, state, local, or international law enforcement and/or regulatory agencies for any investigation they deem to be appropriate. The IC3 was intended, and continues to emphasize, serving the broader law enforcement community to include federal, as well as state, local, and international agencies, which are combating Internet crime and, in many cases, participating in Cyber Crime Task Forces. You can file a complaint here.

Like Ms. Judd, it stops when you stand up and say "no more!" Social media has done wonderful things, but has revealed homophobes, misogynists, racists, sectarians and sociopaths. NONE of you with the ambition, drive and intelligence can be good scientists or engineers if you don't feel safe, on or offline. Sadly, by accident or incident, these Neanderthals will one day be someone's father, dealing with the seeds they have sown to the wind they will inherit. Let their mothers deal with them now when the authorities come to their doors. They deserve neither your power, your protection nor your respect.

Dawn...

Posted by Reginald L. Goodwin on March 23, 2015 at 11:47am

Image Source: Link below

Topics: Ceres, Ion Propulsion, NASA, Space Exploration

The NASA spacecraft Dawn has spent more than seven years traveling across the solar system to intercept the asteroid Vesta and the dwarf planet Ceres. Now in orbit around Ceres, the probe has returned the first images and data from these distant objects.

But inside Dawn itself is another first – the spacecraft is the first exploratory space mission to use an electrically-powered ion engine rather than conventional rockets.

Such ion engines will propel the next generation of spacecraft.

Ion engines use electric power to create charged particles of the fuel, usually the gas xenon, and accelerate them to extremely high velocities. The exhaust velocity of conventional rockets is limited by the chemical energy stored in the fuel’s molecular bonds, which limits the thrust to about 5km/s. Ion engines are in principle limited only by the electrical power available on the spacecraft, but typically the exhaust speed of the charged particles range from 15km/s to 35km/s.

What this means in practice is that electrically powered thrusters are much more fuel efficient than chemical ones, so an enormous amount of mass can be saved through the need for less fuel on board. With the cost to launch a single kilogram of mass into Earth orbit of around $20,000, fuel savings can make spacecraft significantly cheaper.

This can be of great benefit to commercial manufacturers of geostationary satellites, where electric propulsion can allow them to maneuver adding new capabilities to the satellite during its mission. And for scientific missions such as interplanetary travel to the outer regions of the solar system, electric propulsion is the only means to carry useful scientific payload quickly across the enormous distances involved.

Discovery: Step Aside, Rockets – Ion Engines Are the Future of Space Travel
By Steve Gabriel, University of Southampton
#P4TC: NEXT...