(a) Schematic depicting the experimental setup and different stages of the electrodeposition process. SEM images of (b) Ni nanoparticles (left image is a zoomed in image of the wire), (c) a Ni layer in tilt-view from the middle of the array. (d) Top-view SEM images show progressive Ni deposition over time with reductive deposition. Courtesy: Nano Letters DOI: 10.1021/acs.nanolett.7b01950
Electrodeposition can be used to construct novel functional nanowire structures hitherto impossible. This is the new finding from researchers at Harvard University in the US who have deposited conformal layers of various materials onto high-aspect-ratio silicon and micro- and nanowire arrays of different diameters, pitch, aspect ratios, shapes, resistivity and orientation. The structures produced could find use in a wide range of technology applications in chemistry, physics and medicine as well as in energy conversion and storage, sensing and bioelectronics.
Being able to construct ever more complex nanostructures has allowed researchers to study many fundamental physics and chemistry phenomena, and to develop applications for use in a variety of different fields. For example, some 1D nanostructures can be used to manipulate light–matter interactions in novel sensing and light harvesting devices. Nanoelectronics devices based on 1D silicon nanowires can also be employed in bioelectronics and drug-delivery devices.
Further developing the architecture and compositions of such structures with metal-based and polymeric materials could lead to even more sophisticated applications. Electrodeposition could come into its own here since it has proved itself to be an efficient way to deposit films of different materials on flat materials. To date, however, it had never been used to modify nanowire structures with uniform shells or to prepare multiple coaxial shell layers.
The second book in the Elemental series, Return of A.G., will hit shelves and stores on July 26, 2017! It's been two years since the Elementals and Don defeated the evil android A.G. and put a stop to the Pru Empire's return. Now, De, M, Rod, Mo, and the new Elementals Jas, Lucas, Kiara, Jay, and Alex are all working together to keep their world safe. Their first order of business? Finding Samantha and Kevon Prudence, the two who made A.G. into a literal killing machine in the first place. The nine Elementals will have to travel to new locations and meet new people in order to outsmart the Prudence siblings and keep them from enacting their worst plan yet: bringing back A.G.
The book may not be coming out until 7/26, but you can reserve your copy TODAY by preordering the print or digital book here! Don't miss out on your chance to dig into the Elemental series!
Hey BSFS....got a great deal going on here!!! Two books (pdf) for only ONE DOLLAR PER BOOK!!! Have a personal goal to meet by this Friday....so whether or not you decide to get a copy yourself......or just share this blog, I would be grateful. And for an extra bonus, if you purchase both books and share this post, I will draw a black and white headshot of your OC!!!
Read more…
I shifted my posting schedule as I am currently inundated with tape, packing material and moving boxes: LOTS of moving boxes. I have 50 free boxes from the moving company my wife and I have contracted. I filled seven of my own. Several more to go...
I'm taking a blog break as we make this transition out of New York and back to North Carolina. I am both thrilled and a little nervous, looking at the impressive curriculum vitae's of the graduate faculty.
I am walking forward into the future, a desire that I could not subsume with substitute goals - either by myself or others. I am moving back to a city and a school I know only nostalgically as an alumni, now as a graduate student. I will now know in the stresses of graduate research, publication; eventually a position in academia the desired outcome. It is a fulfilling of this description:
I will complete my graduate studies in physics concentration: microelectronics/nanoengineering - now back in the semiconductor industry - and teach at the post secondary level at the end of my career in science.
My graduate orientation will be on my 55th birthday, reminding me why I fell into cynically not celebrating my birthday so much, starting at the ripe old age of seven. I realized then as now, school started two days later. I will be excited as well as thankful. I will be home.
This time though I will be excited, and remember the words I gave my adult sons as to why their mother and I are pursuing this goal:
Plan to live your lives. Pursue your visions with vigor. Dream your dreams with boldness. We will all come to an end eventually. Try to live this one life with as few regrets as possible.
Moving. Will resume posting 3 July 2017. Posting in the fall and presumably the next four years or so will be understandably impacted by graduate work.Read more…
Using laboratory experiments, first place awardee, Del Mar College, Texas, demonstrated that their product, EnteroSword, could offer another solution to the spread of antibiotic-resistant bacteria. Here, team member Daniel Nasr Azadani, demonstrates how EnteroSword fights antibiotic resistant bacteria. Credit: NSF/Bill Petros Photography
The American Association of Community Colleges (AACC) co-sponsors the annual event, which fosters students' interest in science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) careers by asking them to offer creative solutions to real-world problems.
This year, CCIC had students propose solutions to issues focusing on three themes: Maker to Manufacturer, Energy and Environment and Security Technologies.
"Our role as an agency is to fund trailblazers with curiosity-driven ideas," said NSF acting Chief Operating Officer Joan Ferrini-Mundy at a Wednesday Capitol Hill reception, where students showcased their projects. "We know that community colleges are rich resources for the skilled technical workforce and provide an environment where bright new ideas can thrive."
A four-judge panel selected first place awardee Del Mar College for their proposed solution to a problem that affects about 2 million people each year in the United States: the spread of antibiotic-resistant bacteria. Their project, called "Slowing Antibiotic Resistance with EnteroSword," promotes the use of tailor-made viruses that only infect and kill bacteria resistant to conventional antibiotic treatments.
Red Rocks Community College received second place for their project, "Cyber Lab Learning Environment," which demonstrates how students can learn without fear in the safety of student-created cyber labs and develop real-world skills in response to real-world challenges. With print and digital materials, the cyber lab provides a real-world environment for advanced learning.
Six different images from the Hubble Space Telescope have been magnified by a cosmic effect called gravitational lensing. The images were taken in infrared light by Hubble's Wide Field Camera 3. Color has been added to highlight details in the galaxies. Credit: NASA/ESA/J. Lowenthal (Smith College)
Topics: Astronomy, Astrophysics, Cosmology, Gravitational Lensing, NASA, Space
A glittering jackpot of ultrabright galaxies bursting with star formation has been revealed in a series of stunning images taken by the Hubble Space Telescope.
The galaxies captured in these images sparkle like jewels of cosmic light. These massive collections of stars are each as much as 10,000 times more luminous than the Milky Way in the infrared range, or 10 trillion to 100 trillion times the brightness of the sun. They are also forming about 10,000 new stars each year, according to a statement from NASA. (By comparison, it is estimated that fewer than 10 stars form in the Milky Way each year.)
Viewers may also notice strange shapes, including rings and arcs of light. Those are mostly the result of a cosmic phenomenon known as gravitational lensing, in which a foreground galaxy acts as a lens, warping and magnifying the light from a more distant galaxy.
This lensing has magnified the light from these very distant galaxies, giving scientists the opportunity to study in them in much finer detail than would be otherwise possible.
Topics: Consumer Electronics, Economy, Electric Vehicles, Electrical Engineering, Jobs, Nicola Tesla
The Old
University of Illinois student Steve Ward and Fermilab senior technician Jeff Larson developed twin Tesla coils capable of emitting 12 feet (4 meters) of sparks. Credit: Fermilab
Among his numerous innovations, Nikola Tesla dreamed of creating a way to supply power to the world without stringing wires across the globe. The inventor came close to accomplishing this when his "mad scientist" experiments with electricity led to his creation of the Tesla coil.
The first system that could wirelessly transmit electricity, the Tesla coil was a truly revolutionary invention. Early radio antennas and telegraphy used the invention, but variations of the coil can also do things that are just plain cool — like shoot lightning bolts, send electric currents through the body and create electron winds. [1]
The New
Stanford scientists have created a device that wirelessly transmits electricity to a movable disc. The technology could some day be used to charge moving electric vehicles and personal devices. Credit: Sid Assawaworrarit/Stanford University
If electric cars could recharge while driving down a highway, it would virtually eliminate concerns about their range and lower their cost, perhaps making electricity the standard fuel for vehicles.
Now Stanford University scientists have overcome a major hurdle to such a future by wirelessly transmitting electricity to a nearby moving object. Their results are published in the June 15 edition of Nature.
"In addition to advancing the wireless charging of vehicles and personal devices like cellphones, our new technology may untether robotics in manufacturing, which also are on the move," said Shanhui Fan, a professor of electrical engineering and senior author of the study. "We still need to significantly increase the amount of electricity being transferred to charge electric cars, but we may not need to push the distance too much more."
The group built on existing technology developed in 2007 at MIT for transmitting electricity wirelessly over a distance of a few feet to a stationary object. In the new work, the team transmitted electricity wirelessly to a moving LED lightbulb. That demonstration only involved a 1-milliwatt charge, whereas electric cars often require tens of kilowatts to operate. The team is now working on greatly increasing the amount of electricity that can be transferred, and tweaking the system to extend the transfer distance and improve efficiency. [2]
Topics: Commentary, Diversity, Diversity in Science, Science Fiction
Marvel has only had a trailer out for its Black Panther film for one weekend and already the backlash has been severe.
The poster features Chadwick Boseman posing in costume as the titular Black Panther, the king of a fictional African nation, seated on his throne and looking powerful.
However, several critics compared it to a famous picture of Huey P. Newton, who was the co-founder of the Panther Party, a figure who in the 1960s was seen as extreme and “militant.” In the picture, Newton was holding a gun and spear, and while Boseman is not posing with any weapons, many are saying that the pose and even the chair are similar. [1]
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Will #LukeCageTooBlack be the next hashtag? Probably not. But following the release of Netflix’s latest Marvel series, Luke Cage, many viewers are complaining about the show being “racist.”
Many fans jumped on Twitter to protest Marvel’s audacity to represent minorities throughout the 13-episode series. “Lack of white people in Luke Cage makes me uncomfortable. This show is racist, how is this on Netflix,” one person tweeted. Another questioned why the black people on the show were speaking about being an African-American. “Im not racist but :/ why is luke cage so political :/ why do they talk about being black all the time :/ where are the white characters.” [2]
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Last week, the World Science Fiction society named N.K. Jemisin the first black writer to win the Hugo Award for Best Novel, perhaps the highest honor for science-fiction and fantasy novels. Her winning work, The Fifth Season, has also been nominated for the Nebula Award and World Fantasy Award, and it joins Jemisin’s collection of feted novels in the speculative fiction super-genre. Even among the titans of black science-fiction and fantasy writers, including the greats Octavia Butler and Samuel Delany, Jemisin’s achievement is singular in the 60-plus years of the Hugos.
The Fifth Season is a stunning piece of speculative-fiction work, and it accomplishes the one thing that is so difficult in a field dominated by tropes: innovation, in spades. A rich tale of earth-moving superhumans set in a dystopian world of regular disasters, The Fifth Season manages to incorporate the deep internal cosmologies, mythologies, and complex magic systems that genre readers have come to expect, in a framework that also asks thoroughly modern questions about oppression, race, gender, class, and sexuality. Its characters are a slate of people of different colors and motivations who don’t often appear in a field still dominated by white men and their protagonist avatars. The Fifth Season’s sequel, 2016’s The Obelisk Gate, continues its dive into magic, science, and the depths of humanity.
Just a year ago, the idea of a novel as deliberately outside the science-fiction norm as The Fifth Season winning the Hugo Award seemed unlikely. In 2013, a small group of science-fiction writers and commentators launched the “Sad Puppies” and “Rabid Puppies” campaigns to exploit the Hugo nomination system and place dozens of books and stories of their own choosing up for awards. Those campaigns arose as a reaction to perceived “politicization” of the genre—often code for it becoming more diverse and exploring more themes of social justice, race, and gender—and became a space for some science-fiction and fantasy communities to rail against “heavy handed message fic.” Led by people like the “alt-right” commentator Vox Day, the movements reached fever pitch in the 2015 Hugo Award cycle, and Jemisin herself was often caught up in the intense arguments about the future of the genre. [3]
I have been literally waiting for this movie my entire life. I have been reading it, fantasizing about T'Challa and the fantastic technologies he commanded - no more fanciful than warp drive, but the character development from Jack Kirby to Ta-Nehisi Coates (ironically the comic he was authoring has been canceled and the Dora Milaje spin off has been also) drove the stories forward, so as in any fiction, I suspended belief and read on. I find it amazing you can say it's the #1 comic in sales and then cancel the series after two issues for...sales. I posted about it in 2015 [4], and to quote from it something I saw about the comic fiction that wraps everything said above neatly:
“Wakanda is a small country in Africa notable for never having been conquered in its entire history. When you consider the history of the region, the fact that the French, the English, the Belgians or any number of Christian or Islamic invaders were never able to defeat them in battle…well it’s unprecedented.”
Too black...too militant...not enough "diversity," and like Kamala Harris asking ANYTHING as part of her job in the Senate: too "uppity."
The stress that African Americans go through literally shortens our lifespans at the genetic level. That "mask" is a hard taskmaster that exacts a price. Living in a system and society so exquisitely designed for you to frankly...fail, you create stories about yourself. John Henry was a steal-driving man. Automation and mechanization caused John to have a massive coronary in the myth, itself a metaphor in modern times for the replacement of mining jobs by robots.
The "Mask" makes shucking-and-jiving a necessary skill; step-in-fetch a disguise that roils beneath the surface of phony smiles. We anesthetize ourselves with religion, fraternities and sororities, drugs and alcohol; sometimes all of the above.
We are always celebrating "firsts": first black astronaut, first black astronaut from a historically black college and university; first black president.
Do I ask for your forgiveness when the trailer was met with exclamations like "dope"; "I'm hyped"; "tears of joy." Do I NEED your forgiveness?
True story: I never followed "Friends" or "Seinfeld." I've seen it in syndication...at the gym when someone else had it on. I heard a lot of water cooler conversations and saw the lament when the series were canceled. I didn't watch them because the cultural references were as relevant to me as "Leave It To Beaver." Did it halt the shows from having fans? Did I not watch "white shows?" Hell, I watched "Cheers" and even visited the bar back in '85. I also watched "A Family Affair"; "That Girl"; "My Three Sons"; "Rat Patrol"; "The Six Million Dollar Man" occasionally the cavalcade of non-cultural-themed shows was interrupted by "Julia"; "The Jefferson's" "Good Times" and the hope we'd all survive our own hubris "Star Trek." My watching, or lack of watching meant nothing to either shows' popularity or length of their runs.
After a while, you get tired of masks and grinning and shucking and jiving and making everyone from sad to mad puppies "comfortable" as your own telomeres shorten.
“Whenever men and women straighten their backs up, they are going somewhere, because a man can't ride your back unless it is bent,” Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. It's obvious from Luke Cage to Black Panther to NK Jemisin to Kamala Harris, straightened backs are a perceived threat to the social order. A social order inherently dependent on the debasement of others should be challenged artistically, politically and professionally (Guion S. Bluford and Ronald E McNair earned PhDs in the STEM fields of Aerospace Engineering and Laser Physics respectively). For that I offer no apology.
I joked with a college friend in a call to California that the rabid pound-puppy-trolls would come out in full-force by the time the movie premiered February 16, 2018. He laughed when I said "I'm wearing a dashiki and war paint." Who knew the venomous snowflakes would pounce 24 hours after our conversation?
"The Three Brothers" is inspired by a folktale from a small African village. Help us bring that story to a screen near you.
The adventures of "The Three Brothers" entertain and educate. Our characters are 18, 15 and 12 and a half. They come from a culture where magic is an everyday reality and technology is an increasing part of life.
Since elementary school, I've wanted to see more animated African stories on TV and in theaters. And I don't mean talking animals. You may think this is obvious, but civilized people populate Africa. They are flesh and blood, serious and funny, laborer and professional just like you and me. So why does the dark and primitive stereotype persist in America? Because too few people have invested the time, energy and money needed to produce films and TV shows that reflect the many African cultures.
Folklore is vital and varied. Parables, riddles, legends, and folktales define cultures and help young people learn right from wrong, their place in the environment and how to solve problems.
Sincerely,
Robert Penn, Creator of "The Three Brothers" and the development team at 3 Degrees Films
P.S.
I've been a member of Black Science Fiction Society for several years. This is my first blog post. It announces a project that I've been working on since 2007 when I made my first of two trips to a remote section of Sierra Leone, West Africa. A traditional storyteller told me a riddle, which he left unanswered. He requested that I write it down and make it my own. I did that, initially in prose and later as a screenplay. Around 2011, I met Lightning Yumeku, an animation producer, for unrelated reasons. Subsequent to the completion of the other project, Lightning, who is also American but legally changed his name, asked if he could read some of my work. I shared “The Three Brothers” screenplay with him. After reading it, he suggested that I develop it as a family-oriented 30-minute animated series. I developed the primary characters - including the titular brothers Bala, Mamoun and Saiya Mansaray, and the villain Sumaro, who lives in two worlds, as well as secondary characters such as Mr. and Mrs. Mansaray, the chief and elders of their village, and the classmates of Mamoun and Saiya who are still in school. I also prepared a springboard for 72-episodes. In 2015, I entered into a development deal with 3 Degrees Films, the animation company Lightning founded. Last year, Lightning brought on a character designer and a background designer. They've done amazing work! As a result of our development meetings, I've added 4 episodes to the front end of the springboard. That is the four-part miniseries that will introduce the characters, their world, their main challenges and set the young men on the paths they’ll follow throughout the series.
About thirty years ago I started my journey into creating a fantasy world, one that was culturally inclusive, for a global audience. Now, I have the honor of seeing it come to life at Stranger Comics, working with incredible artists, and telling stories that hopefully reflect not only our reader, but also our stories. One such tale is NIOBE: She is Life. I wrote with Amandla Stenberg (Hunger Games, Everything Everything) and Ashley A. Woods did the beautiful art. Darrell May on layouts. With covers by Hyoung (The Last of Us) to Jae Lee (The Dark Tower) on the sequel She is Death. Sheldon Mitchell (The Darkness) does the interiors on the sequel and they are all incredible.
She is Life is a beauty and the beast love story threaded with murder and mystery that leads to all out war, about a young girl who has returned to her ancestors to find her faith. But she finds more than what she bargained for in the coming of age tale.
"With a world divided, who do you turn to?"
This first volume became the first ever nationally distributed comic with a black female author, artist, and hero in the history of comics and I am so happy to share the story and world with you. In the sequel, She is Death, Niobe becomes a badass bounty hunter, tracking down human traffickers and traders. If you get a chance, please check Niobe out as we are 2 weeks away from finishing a kickstarter campaign. We have already smashed through our target, so now it is just free goodies with stretch goals.
Also as ADD ONS, you can grab the DUSU Path of the Ancient hardcover (a tale of Niobe's tribe) and the Niobe Pathfinder module, among other things.
George Washington only served one term. In his farewell address, he warned the new country of breaking up into "factions."
We obviously didn't listen.
We've been factions since the founding of the republic. "All men are created equal" is quite poetic sophistry, since that did not extend to my ancestors of African descent, nor women until the 19th Amendment. Homosexuals were acknowledged only in the early Uniform Code of Military Justice as "bungholery." The only persons that could vote at the founding were property (typically slave) owners.
Now we are here: post the first African American to hold the position in 232 years of the republic, post poll taxes, lynching, KKK terrorism and Jim Crow - apparently, the "good old days." He was followed by a candidate now president that put dog whistle politics through a meat grinder of 140 characters and turned it into a Foghorn; lying brazenly has become performance art; "truthiness" is quaint and nostalgic in comparison to the breathtaking obfuscations we're exposed to on a regular basis from corners we need to trust for the republic to properly function. "Breaking news" is almost oxymoron now.
Now, we're supposed to be calm that the man with the nuclear codes is "new" to the job. At last, my insomnia has a cause to its effect.
The Administrative State
Then we had a long talk about his approach to politics. He never called himself a “populist” or an “American nationalist,” as so many think of him today. “I’m a Leninist,” Bannon proudly proclaimed.
Shocked, I asked him what he meant.
“Lenin,” he answered, “wanted to destroy the state, and that’s my goal too. I want to bring everything crashing down, and destroy all of today’s establishment.” Bannon was employing Lenin’s strategy for Tea Party populist goals. He included in that group the Republican and Democratic Parties, as well as the traditional conservative press.
I emailed Bannon last week recalling our conversation, telling him that I planned to write about it and asking him if he wanted to comment on or correct my account of it. He responded:
“I don’t remember meeting you and don’t remember the conversation. And as u can tell from the past few days I am not doing media.” [1]
Of course that's a convenient dodge and Snopes says it's unproven. Yet we currently have a few dozen candidates announced for a total of 554 positions. [2] What happens if we have a terrorist attack, or a hurricane, flooding, tornado, earthquake here or abroad? Who indeed is running the joint? [3]
Whether myth or mission: Mission accomplished!
The Administrative State are the norms we've established for ourselves, covered by laws, customs and expectations of common sense. Social media has entered the political arena where every representative from senators, house members and the president are expected to send out something into the Zeitgeist. We are in new territory with this ongoing, morose experiment of government-by-tweet of 140 characters or less.
The sad part is our civics knowledge and civility are both at all-time lows, lost in a translation of atomizing electronics that parrots back to us our tastes in music, customized news feeds; decimating what used to be the "The Common Good." The Republican Party removed any mention of their traditional opposition to Russia in the Ukraine at the designing of their platform before the GOP convention, influenced by the candidate that had been a registered democrat for 65 of his 70 years on the planet, he and his surrogates with more ties to the Kremlin than Boris Badenov and Natasha Fatale. The "party of patriotism" post the apotheosis of Joe McCarthy is now soft on Commies. Who knew? We live in interesting times.
Missing in the conversation: the Orwellian-named "Crosscheck," AKA Kris Kobach that was designed not to fight the statistically non-existent incidence of voter fraud, but to eliminate voters - especially African and Hispanic/Latino Americans - from the rolls. This was an inside and an outside job.
While we investigate for collusion, we're allowing both games to go on unchecked before the 2018 and 2020 elections. The choice of our own representation is the feature of our imperfect republic. A foreign nation picking our leaders pushes our national self-definition from a federal republic to banana. Nothing about Director Comey's testimony changed any minds, depending what tribe/faction you find yourself in.
"The Russians are [not] coming," Director Comey: they are already, and still here.
"There are but two parties now: traitors and patriots. And I want hereafter to be ranked with the latter and, I trust, the stronger party." Ulysses S. Grant, Commanding Union General in the Civil War, 18th president of the United States of America.
Loyalty is something we all strive for and want from others. Its a big word that carries a lot of weight with it. This place this website this society is where it will begin. Jarvis challenged me so i am answering that call and let see what happens when you are all challenged as well. You see we need each others help not later now! Lets put something to the test lets see what would happen if we all supported each other in our endeavors. Share the knowledge we have with each other to make the whole successful I dare you. We have to build trust in each other and not burn each other that would be too easy. Everyone brings something different to the table that's for sure. I see many groups and forums on here let it be the base to helping each other with coming up together. Just imagine the great writers on here teaming up with the great artists on here to make an awesome book come to life. Now go a step further and team up with the awesome animators and make a great new show together? Share the recognition share the fame You know who you are in each place lets help each out now, not halfway but give it your all alliances could bring out great things in each of us.....I DARE YOU TO SEE WHAT HAPPENS!
FILE PHOTO: This NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope image shows the bright star-forming ring that surrounds the heart of the barred spiral galaxy NGC 1097, a Seyfert galaxy. NASA/ESA/Hubble/Handout via REUTERS/File Photo
Topics: Astrophysics, Einstein, General Relativity, Gravitational Lensing
The first observation of gravitational microlensing by a star other than the Sun has been reported by astronomers using the Hubble Space Telescope. Predicted by Albert Einstein as a consequence of his general theory of relativity, gravitational microlensing involves the gravitational field of a star bending light coming from a more distant star. It was first observed during a total eclipse in 1919 by looking for deflections in the positions of stars in parts of the sky next to the Sun. Now, Kailash Sahu of the Space Telescope Science Institute in the US and an international team have measured the gravitational lensing of a background star by a white dwarf star called Stein 2051 B. Because the background star is not lined-up perfectly with Earth and Stein 2051 B, a combination of gravitational lensing and Earth's motion around the Sun causes the background star to appear to trace out a loop around Stein 2051 B. Sahu and colleagues mapped its position at five different times in 2013-14 and used this information to calculate the mass of Stein 2051 B. It turns out that astronomers have puzzled over the mass of the white dwarf for over 100 years. It is part of a binary system and the motion of its distant companion suggests that Stein 2051 B has a smaller mass than most white dwarfs, implying that it might have an exotic composition. This recent work, however, suggests that the star has a mass expected for a white dwarf of its radius. The observations will be described in and upcoming paper in Science. [1]
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CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. - Astronomers have found a new application for Albert Einstein's century-old theory of relativity - using it to directly measure the size of a star beyond the sun.
In research published on Wednesday, scientists said they used the Hubble Space Telescope to plot minute changes in the path of light coming from a distant background star as it passed by a relatively close target star, known as Stein 2051B.
Researchers applied Einstein's findings to measure how Stein 2051B's gravity warped the background star's light, a phenomenon the physicist predicted more than 100 years ago and a direct means to assess its mass. The technique could be applied to other stars.
"It was like measuring the motion of a little firefly in front of a light bulb from 1,500 miles away," astronomer Kailash Sahu of the Space Telescope Science Institute in Baltimore said at a news conference.
The research was presented at a meeting of the American Astronomical Society in Austin, Texas, on Wednesday and also published in this week's issue of the journal Science. [2]
BOSTON—At last weekend’s annual meeting of the Association for Psychological Science (APS) in Boston, Cornell University psychologist Robert Sternberg sounded an alarm about the influence of standardized tests on American society. Sternberg, who has studied intelligence and intelligence testing for decades, is well known for his “triarchic theory of intelligence,” which identifies three kinds of smarts: the analytic type reflected in IQ scores; practical intelligence, which is more relevant for real-life problem solving; and creativity. Sternberg offered his views in a lecture associated with receiving a William James Fellow Award from the APS for his lifetime contributions to psychology. He explained his concerns to Scientific American.
[An edited transcript of the interview follows.]
In your talk, you said that IQ tests and college entrance exams like the SAT and ACT are essentially selecting and rewarding “smart fools”—people who have a certain kind of intelligence but not the kind that can help our society make progress against our biggest challenges. What are these tests getting wrong?
Tests like the SAT, ACT, the GRE—what I call the alphabet tests—are reasonably good measures of academic kinds of knowledge, plus general intelligence and related skills. They are highly correlated with IQ tests and they predict a lot of things in life: academic performance to some extent, salary, level of job you will reach to a minor extent—but they are very limited. What I suggested in my talk today is that they may actually be hurting us. Our overemphasis on narrow academic skills—the kinds that get you high grades in school—can be a bad thing for several reasons. You end up with people who are good at taking tests and fiddling with phones and computers, and those are good skills but they are not tantamount to the skills we need to make the world a better place.
What evidence do you see of this harm?
IQ rose 30 points in the 20th century around the world, and in the U.S. that increase is continuing. That’s huge; that’s two standard deviations, which is like the difference between an average IQ of 100 and a gifted IQ of 130. We should be happy about this but the question I ask is: If you look at the problems we have in the world today—climate change, income disparities in this country that probably rival or exceed those of the gilded age, pollution, violence, a political situation that many of us never could have imaged—one wonders, what about all those IQ points? Why aren't they helping?
What I argue is that intelligence that’s not modulated and moderated by creativity, common sense and wisdom is not such a positive thing to have. What it leads to is people who are very good at advancing themselves, often at other people’s expense. We may not just be selecting the wrong people, we may be developing an incomplete set of skills—and we need to look at things that will make the world a better place.
Do we know how to cultivate wisdom?
Yes we do. A whole bunch of my colleagues and I study wisdom. Wisdom is about using your abilities and knowledge not just for your own selfish ends and for people like you. It’s about using them to help achieve a common good by balancing your own interests with other people’s and with high-order interests through the infusion of positive ethical values.
You know, it’s easy to think of smart people but it’s really hard to think of wise people. I think a reason is that we don’t try to develop wisdom in our schools. And we don’t test for it, so there’s no incentive for schools to pay attention.
A zoom in on the Josephson junctions. Two layers of niobium are visible in the image, with the upper film colored blue and the lower film colored red. Josephson junctions are formed in the circular pits (they look a bit like an element of a muffin tin) where the two layers overlap (green). Credit: K. Lehnert/NIST/JILA
Topics: Black Holes, Dark Matter, General Relativity
Here’s a surprising fact: We don’t know what makes up 80 percent of the matter in the universe. I don’t mean that the matter is made of atoms, and we just don’t know which kind of atoms. What I mean is that four-fifths of the universe appears to be made of something that isn’t atoms at all, or more to the point, it’s not made from any of the fundamental particles that we know of.
Why do we think that this mystery matter exists? The short answer is that Albert Einstein’s theory of gravity, general relativity, has painted us into a corner. When we look through telescopes at stars and galaxies moving through the universe, something we can’t see is causing their motion to bend in a particular way. Einstein’s theory of gravity tells how much of this invisible mass—physicists call it “dark matter”—there must be to bend the trajectory of things we can see.
Faced with a situation like this, we make guesses (hypotheses) that we hope explain our strange observations. A good hypothesis should both be consistent with every known fact and have other detectable consequences. If we look for these other consequences and don’t find them, we discard or revise our hypothesis.
Somewhat to my surprise, I find myself working on an experiment designed to look for the consequences of a hypothetical dark matter particle known as the axion. This was surprising because physicists, like those in all professions, divide themselves up into distinct sub-fields. Predictably there are rivalries between, and stereotypes associated with, different cultures that build up around the subfields—the rough equivalent of engineering versus sales in the corporate world.
An artist's rendering of the newly named Parker Solar Probe spacecraft approaching the sun. Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory
Topics: Astrophysics, Heliophysics, NASA, Research, Solar Flares
It's a mission that's been in the works for nearly 60 years. NASA says it will launch a spacecraft in 2018 to "touch the sun," sending it closer to the star's surface than ever before.
The spacecraft is small – its instruments would fit into a refrigerator — but it's built to withstand temperatures of more than 2,000 degrees Fahrenheit, all the while maintaining room temperature inside the probe.
"Even though the sun is so close to us, there's actually a lot about it we don't understand," says heat shield lead engineer Betsy Congdon from the Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory.
Scientists are hoping the data gathered might solve some of the big mysteries about the sun.
Facebook, Google, Microsoft, The Gap, Exxon Mobil, ConocoPhillips, National, Grid, Apple, Adobe, Danfoss, Levi Strauss & Co., Mars Incorporated, Hewlett Packard, Enterprise, Blue Cross Blue Shield of Massachusetts, Morgan Stanley, Unilever, Tiffany & Co Dignity, Health Ingersoll, Rand, Intel Corporation, PG&E Corporation, Johnson Controls, Royal DSM, The Hartford, Salesforce, Schneider Electric, VF Corporation
“A lot of US businesses are concerned about the potential trade ramifications of a US withdrawal,” Elliot Diringer, executive vice president of the Center for Climate and Energy Solutions, the organization that sponsored the full-page ads, told Business Insider. “They think it’s important that the US remain in Paris to ensure them access to the growing clean energy markets around the world, and they see that a US withdrawal could hurt their access to those markets.”
During his time as CEO of Exxon Mobil, Trump’s now Secretary of State Rex Tillerson said the company supported the agreement.
“At Exxon Mobil, we share the view that the risks of climate change are serious and warrant thoughtful action,” Tillerson said at a speech in 2016. “Addressing these risks requires broad-based, practical solutions around the world.” [1]
We have joined Nicaragua - a country we decimated in the "war on drugs" to arm the Contras and Syria - currently in a meltdown of civil war and refugees - and Russia as now one of four nations opting out of the Paris Climate Accords, hat tip to Pittsburgh.
I have an appreciation that when you talk about the age of the universe and the younger in comparison age of the Earth, humans have a perspective of "I'm from Missouri: I'll believe it when I see it." So, sense we've never SEEN a billion years its hard even with radiometric dating to prove to fellow humans that such an age is...provable.
2050 is 33 years, or a little over a traditional generation away. Non-scientists question actual scientists' stochastic models. President Bannon has reasserted himself by damning generations yet born. [2] Thirty-three years is enough time for incremental changes in the climate to take place and be seen by human eyes either living or born in 2017.
The non-sensational name of the phenomenon is "anthropogenic climate disruption." Despite the list of companies covering two fossil fuel companies and many that use them in either manufacture, power generation or transportation of goods and services, our chief "executive" wants to renegotiate ala his ghostwriter's inaugural tome, obviously to put his stamp on it as his ego won't allow him to follow the policies of his predecessor.
The irony is it will be China that will lead the way in green tech and alternative energy generation because they HAVE to: the very air is the number 1 way of dying in their vast country. [3] They will employ their billions of citizens and leave us in the global dust. [4] This will diversify their economy from electronics to that market, making solar and wind cheaper in comparison. In response to rising seas, they will likely move their populations over that landscape inland as other parts of the planet ponder other options. Lobbyists for the fossil industry (my guess) will make laws to combat the "free market" in this regard, similar to solar being so prohibitive to own in Koch-ruled Oklahoma. [5] Germany, China et al will step forward as well, time's arrow in Entropy points always inexorably to the future...it is only the Neanderthals denying science howling at the moonthat revel in the nation's dark past as "ideal."
Topics: Astrophysics, Black Holes, Cosmology, Einstein, General Relativity
General relativity has stood the test of time. But researchers are still exploring alternatives to the theory, attempting to unify gravity with other forces or to explain observations attributed to dark matter and dark energy. Many of these theories involve an additional force beyond the four known fundamental forces. Now, Andrea Ghez and Aurélien Hees at the University of California, Los Angeles, and co-workers, have analyzed the orbits of stars around the Milky Way’s center to derive limits on such a fifth force. While similar constraints had been obtained in weak gravitational fields, this is the first time fifth-force scenarios have been tested in a strong field, such as that created by the supermassive black hole at the center of our Galaxy. [1]
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Our current understanding of the Universe states that it's governed by four fundamental forces: gravity, electromagnetic, and the strong and weak nuclear forces.
But there are hints of a fifth force of nature, and if it exists, we'd not only be able to fill the remaining holes in Einstein's general relativity - we'd have to rethink our understanding of how the Universe actually works. And now physicists have figured out how to put this mysterious force to the ultimate test.
Gravity and the electromagnetic force are on the larger end of the scale - electromagnetic force is needed to keep our molecules together, while gravity is responsible for ensuring that entire galaxies and planets aren't ripped apart.
It's all very neat and sensible, but there's a problem - in a lot of ways, gravity is the 'odd one out' in this very important group.
For one thing, gravity is the last of the four fundamental forces that humans haven't figured out how to produce and control.
It also doesn't appear to explain everything that it should - studies have shown that there's more gravity in our Universe than can be produced by all the visible matter out there. [2]
