As I ride home from work at night or cruise along the highway on a weekend, I generally like to turn the radio to my local smooth jazz radio station (WVSU-FM, Birmingham, AL). It's broadcast both through traditional FM radio and is streamed globally online from the campus of Samford University located in the Birmingham area. It's the nerve center of everything jazz related in Birmingham and other parts of Alabama. Every year there are jazz concerts in various parks all across Metro Birmingham.
I considered myself fortunate to be able to listen to jazz regularly in my region. However, I started to realize that I was one of the few people my age that seemed to appreciate jazz. I'm 29. I've been attending as many jazz concerts as possible in my area, but when I look around I'm one of the few people of my generation who seems to be there. And this has been at jazz events that were free as well as jazz events that I had to pay to get into. So I started doing some research as to what was going on.
One thing I realized is that most people were not exposed to jazz. How could they be exposed, if jazz was something that is not regularly heard on the airwaves these days? In the United States, there are currently 18 stations that play jazz cuts consistently. That's counting AM and FM stations together. If you're in a region that has one of these jazz radio stations and avid fans of jazz who support, great! If you're not in a region that has a jazz scene then you have one of two choices:
1. Spend money for Sirius XM satellite radio to gain access to their jazz stations or;
2. Find streaming radio stations on the Internet.
As a young jazz lover you're kind of in the musical wilderness when a lot of your associates are excitedly discussing the latest album by Drake while you're more hyped up about Bob Baldwin's new album. Now this is not an argument about whether Drake or Bob Baldwin is better. They are two artists in two different genres. Drake raps and Bob Baldwin does jazz. It's just saying that Drake's media exposure is more broad than Bob Baldwin's. Drake gets sponsored by Sprite while Bob Baldwin gets sponsored by whoever he can get.
The corporate entities tend to push radio music that is going to easily sell to teenagers and young adults. You hear the Top 40 songs (pop/hip hop/country/R&B), they are generally about 3 to 4 minutes long with simple catchy beats and lyrics that stick in your head for days on end. You can sell a ton of advertisement in between Top 40 songs. A typical Top 40 song can be generally written and recorded in a few hours. Jazz on the other hand is not something you can easily chop down into a 3 minute song.
That's even with the smooth jazz format, which was originally designed for making jazz more accessible to people. Jazz takes time to record, and requires musicians who have practiced years on instruments. Many public schools no longer have music programs so it is harder to train students (especially those in the middle and lower income levels) in various forms of instruments and vocals.
Those who are able to get music lessons are generally in more affluent families who can afford the instruments and music lessons. So that kind of makes the scene of jazz look like something that only old rich people can afford to perform and participate in.
Is there hope for jazz? Will it be relegated to the storage closets of history as a quaint American musical form created by black people that was once loved by many? Can there be a resurrection of jazz? Can jazz coexist on a large scale with other musical genres? Only time will tell. But I can tell you this. I'll keep listening one way or the other.
I'll turn on my radio in my car after work and pretend that I'm some handsome private eye on the way to solve a case. I'll keep getting exited when I hear jazz notes in a movie or being sampled in a song. And I'll keep sharing when I can with others about the joys of jazz. Hopefully in the future somebody flying through space will throw on a Grover Washington Jr. album as they fly fearlessly throughout the galaxy.
In the immortal words of Spike Spiegel, one of the main characters in the classic anime sci fi series Cowboy Bebop (which has a ton of jazz in it's soundtrack), "See you later Space Cowboy."
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| We're wearing them! |
Topics: Blerd, Circle, Circumference, Geek, Geometry, Math, Nerd, Pi Day
...and yes as you can see, we have our official T-shirts!
Pi Day is celebrated on March 14th (3/14) around the world. Pi (Greek letter “π”) is the symbol used in mathematics to represent a constant — the ratio of the circumference of a circle to its diameter — which is approximately 3.14159.
Pi has been calculated to over one trillion digits beyond its decimal point. As an irrational and transcendental number, it will continue infinitely without repetition or pattern. While only a handful of digits are needed for typical calculations, Pi’s infinite nature makes it a fun challenge to memorize, and to computationally calculate more and more digits.
Ultimate nerd out: It's Albert Einstein's birthday! It's also the 100th anniversary of the General Theory of Relativity, that led to the discovery of Black Holes. Trivia: Black Holes was a subject - like quantum mechanics he couldn't bring himself to believe in, though his work contributed to both.
Info from Celebration Site: PiDay.org
Biography.com: Fascinating Facts About Pi Day & Birthday Boy Albert Einstein
NBC News Weird Science: Pi Day Hits a Milestone, Alan Boyle
My works at Gallery 737 for Black History Month celebration. My idea was to spark imagination by any means at hand, on paper plates, using cardboard, digital tablet and printer, ideas fanciful and practical.
Local and established artist, Margaret Christian, who took part in the Harlem Renaissance, gave me much encouragement. I fret because my stuff does not follow what I see other Black artist doing. If you have already taken the red pill, the blue pill will not bring you back, it will make you purple, but that's another color. It's a big universe and purple has it's moments.
Anyway, Gallery 737 is the display space of Lorain Arts Council Gallery and Arts Center in Lorain Ohio. We are open to all the arts to give our town opportunities to let the arts become a cultural and economic uplift. Reaching out to young folk release their art has been fun. I am hoping to meet other artist (especially Black artist) to are exploring, experimenting and exhibiting this summer. Any Afro-futurist in Lorain?
Topics: Cosmos, Diversity in Science, History, Hypatia, Women in Science
This is Women's History Month and a re-post year-to-day with some edits and updated commentary. Hypatia also appears on the link 17 Game Changers (you'd have to click the link at the bottom, and scroll down).
I dedicate this to all the young women, in math, martial arts and physics I've had the honor of teaching...hold fast to your dreams!
Hypatia (pronounced "hi-pay-see-a"): I read her name in the book Cosmos that I downloaded to my Kindle. I looked at the "old school" Cosmos show where Carl Sagan mentions her (starts at 3:25), and her sad fate. She's described as mathematician, astronomer, physicist, philosopher, quite lovely apparently and driver of her own chariot! She was a beloved teacher and by social practice a celibate, no doubt frustrating potential suitors of her day.
Interestingly as I had predicted to some casually offline at the time, Cosmos: A SpaceTime Odyssey had its detractors of the "young Earth" - humans with dinosaurs (think "The Flintstones") - faux debate between Evolution and so-called Intelligent Design variety. The odd and breathtaking display of hypocrisy in most of the trolls taking to the Internet - notably in 140 misspelled characters or less - created by the very science and modern physics they rail against; supporting pseudoscience in their destructive wake. As constituents, they are played by opportunistic politicians preying on their fears (science, climate change) for votes; the same who apparently have no inkling of how diplomacy is accomplished in the modern era. The backlash to their latest stunt comes from a usually friendly source. Through now quite obvious, overt bigotry, we are a living cartoon; a byword, a caricature of a former democratic republic: a reliable punchline on The Daily Show.
A certain part of the regressive reptilian portion of our minds attacks instinctively that which we think challenges our belief systems - and thus "us". Time and again, we've seen the razing of cities, the flaying of martyrs, the murder of not only the person, but new ideas that would take the species forward. This of course, all for adherence to a dogma. Supposedly through evangelism, it is meant as a "sell," and thus adherence is voluntary - zealotry and fanaticism turns it involuntary; totalitarian. Authoritarianism becomes our governance and its dogmatic ruling class the thought police. Sadly, I can't help but think if part of the mob that set upon Hypatia and ended her life so tragically were peopled by members of her own gender, suffering from what would in the 20th century gain the name "Stockholm Syndrome."
I often fear intolerance will rear its ugly head again and plunge us all over the abyss with it, as it did Alexandria, Egypt (this time, we won't just lose a library). They executed Hypatia...for the "crime" of thinking critically and independently of the lordship of patriarchal society. The saying goes "teach a woman and you teach a generation." The library, like Hypatia, soon expired after her forced passing. As Dr. Sagan states above, we "must not let it happen again."
For the sake of civilization's continuance, and the so-called "weaker sex" that nature favors to outlive men in a pompous, male-centered society: can we?
"Those who do not learn from history are doomed to repeat it."
Jorge Agustín Nicolás Ruiz de Santayana y Borrás, also known as George Santayana
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| Physicists in Finland and Russia have shown how graphene quantum dots can be used to split Cooper pairs. (Courtesy: Shutterstock/Mopic) |
Topics: Cooper Pairs, Graphene, Modern Physics, Superconductivity, Quantum Computers, Quantum Mechanics
Superconducting "Cooper pairs" of electrons have been split to create entangled pairs of electrons in a new device built by physicists in Finland and Russia. The device employs two quantum dots made of graphene. Although other types of quantum dots have been used for this purpose, the latest research suggests that graphene quantum dots should deliver long-lived entangled electron pairs that could be used in quantum computers.
Entanglement is a quantum-mechanical phenomenon in which properties of fundamental particles are correlated so that making a measurement on one particle can instantaneously affect another particle – even across very large distances. In principle, a quantum computer can use this connectedness to perform certain calculations much faster than a conventional computer. Although practical quantum computers do not exist today, some potential designs involve using the intrinsic angular momenta, or "spin", of electrons as quantum bits (qubits) of information that can be entangled.
Superconductors provide a ready source of entangled electrons because the Cooper pairs that allow these materials to conduct electricity with little or no resistance are in fact entangled pairs of electrons with opposite spin. Splitting the pairs while preserving the electrons' entanglement can be done simply by connecting ordinary metal wires to either end of the superconductor. If the set-up is just right, each wire will carry away one electron from a pair. However, it is more often the case that both electrons will end up going down the same wire.
Physics World: Graphene quantum dots split Cooper pairs, Edwin Cartlidge
Hit the links below for more info about the Pencil Gladiators Contest for those beginner comic artists. The First Prize is N30,000 (bragging rights of THE GLADIATOR and some other deals from our sponsors) converts to a little more than $150.00 USD and check the links for sponsor deals...
One of the Judges is MSHINDO KUUMBA so spread the word!
http://comicpanel.org/index.php/content-blog/333-comicpanel-set-to-host-drawing-competition-4
http://comicpanel.org/index.php/content-blog/306-comicpanel-set-to-host-drawing-competition-2
Enjoy.
COMICPANEL THE ACADEMY TRAINING WORKSHOP
This is usually a one day training workshop held on a Saturday and on any aspect of creativity at all, be it digital painting, animation, graphics, cinematography, editing etc which we aim at introducing young individuals and giving them the basics of these skills.
This year, one of Nigerias Top Digital painters GODWIN AKPAN will be anchoring the class and its going to be a workshop that will teach you everything you need to know about digital coloring and using the Wacom tablets to achieve this. You can check his work out HERE
WHAT YOU WILL LEARN
Basics of Digital Colouring.
Understanding Photoshop CS6
Creating Realistic portraits
Creating Matte Painting for film
How to use a Wacom Tablet.
ENJOY!
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| This photograph of the quantum-computing device shows the nine superconducting qubits arranged in a row. The qubits interact with their nearest neighbours to detect and correct errors. (Courtesy: Julian Kelly) |
Topics: Modern Physics, Nanotechnology, Quantum Computer, Quantum Mechanics
A system of nine quantum bits (qubits) that is robust to errors that would normally destroy a quantum computation has been created by researchers at the University of California, Santa Barbara (UCSB) and Google. The device relies on a quantum error-correction protocol, which the team says could be deployed in practical quantum computers of the future.
In principle, powerful quantum computers can be built from a collection of qubits. For a qubit based on an electron, for example, these states would be "spin up" and "spin down", with one state representing a logical "1" and the other "0". Each qubit can be in a superposition of two quantum states at the same time and N qubits could be quantum-mechanically entangled to represent 2N values simultaneously. This would lead to the parallel processing of information on a massive scale not possible with conventional computers.
However, quantum computers are extremely fragile, and a computation can be easily destroyed by "bit errors" that occur when external noise in the environment affects the values of the qubits. While it is proving very difficult to create practical qubits that are robust enough to eliminate such errors, an alternative approach is to accept that errors will occur and to try to correct for them as the quantum calculation progresses.
Now, UCSB's John Martinis and colleagues have taken an important step forward by demonstrating repetitive error correction in an integrated quantum device that consists of nine superconducting qubits. Each qubit is a small circuit consisting of a capacitor and a Josephson junction, and is made from an aluminium film evaporated onto a sapphire substrate. The qubit can be thought of as an artificial atom with information stored in its quantum states.
Physics World: How to make a tougher quantum computer, Belle Dumé, nanotechweb.org
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| Source: NobelPrize.org |
Topics: Biology, Chemistry, Nobel Prize, Research, STEM, Women in Science
The Nobel Prize in Chemistry 2009
Venkatraman Ramakrishnan, Thomas A. Steitz and Ada E. Yonath "for studies of the structure and function of the ribosome".
Born: 22 June 1939, Jerusalem, British Mandate of Palestine (now Israel)
Affiliation at the time of the award: Weizmann Institute of Science, Rehovot, Israel
Field: biochemistry, structural chemistry
I shared a rented, four-room apartment with two additional families and their children. My memories from my childhood are centered on my father's medical conditions alongside my constant desire to understand the principles of the nature around me. The hard conditions didn't dampen my curiosity. Already at five, I was already investigating the world. In one of my experiments, I tried to measure the height of our tiny balcony using the furniture from inside the apartment. I put a table on another table, and then a chair and a stool on top, but I did not reach the ceiling. Hence, I climbed up on my construct, fell down to the back yard on the ground floor and broke my arm ... Incidentally, the results of this experiment are still unknown, since the current tenants in the apartment have remodeled the ceiling.
Dr. Ada E. Yonath - Interview
"Ada E. Yonath - Facts". Nobelprize.org. Nobel Media AB 2014. Web. 12 Mar 2015. http://www.nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/chemistry/laureates/2009/yonath-facts.html
Topics: Aeronautical Engineering, Flight, Green Energy, Green Tech, Solar Power
A pioneering flight around the world will use nothing but sunshine for fuel. In the dusty peach dawn of a desert day, the Solar Impulse 2 airplane took flight at 11:12 PM Eastern time on March 8 from Abu Dhabi on the first leg of a bid to fly around the world exclusively powered by electricity generated from sunlight.
The primary structural component is carbon-fiber sheets that weigh just 25 grams per square meter, or roughly three times lighter than a similar sized piece of paper. That carbon fiber is used sparingly in structural spots where forces push on the airplane. But the interior of the wings, the fuselage and other areas are empty to save even that tiny bit of weight, co-pilot Bertrand Piccard explained to Scientific American.
Atop those wings, as well as the body and even the tail of the plane, are 17,248 solar cells as thin as a human hair that generate electricity as the plane flies, some of which is stored in four lithium polymer batteries. Those batteries take over powering the plane’s four electric motors at night, which spin the two propellers under each wing. All told the plane weighs 2,300 kilograms and the four batteries are the heaviest passengers, weighing in at 633 kilograms. Making the plane required 12 years of calculations, computer simulations, building and testing, according to Piccard, and some $140 million.
Scientific American:
Solar Plane Takes Flight to Circle Globe in 180 Days [in Photos], David Biello
Site: Solar Impulse
You Tube: Solar Impulse Channel
Topics: Astrophysics, Dark Matter, Diversity in Science, Nobel Prize, Women in Science
Two who advanced what we know about astrophysics:
And, one so familiar and deep cover, she was literally "hidden in plain sight":
From discovering pulsars to correcting the optics of the fuzzy Hubble Space Telescope, here are 17 stories of women who made undeniably vital contributions to astronomy and physics.
Popist: These 17 Women Changed The Face Of Physics, Mika McKinnon
When a group of Sikh children were asked who their favourite superheroes are, the answers were barely surprising: Iron Man, Batman, Superman and the usual list of DC and Marvel old-hands.
But when they were asked if they knew of a Sikh comic book superhero, their response was unanimous: an emphatic no.
“And then we asked them, ‘Would you like to see one?’ The looks on their faces was just priceless,” says Supreet Singh Manchanda, a technology executive and comic creator based in San Francisco.
“They just beamed.”
My website, "The Ratchedemic" discusses issues and occurrences in the world around us, highlights Black excellence, and promotes me on my journey to my life goals. In the three months since I first started this website and blog I have done great things with discussing and highlighting, but not so much on the promotion aspect. Now with today's newest post all that changes, check it out at the link below and learn about how my love of the fantastic has made me who I am today; a "Super Black"!
http://theratchedemic.squarespace.com/blog/2015/3/9/super-black
My friend, fellow comic creator and artist Samax Amen wrote about one OUR most favorite Milestone Media Group book "Shadow Cabinet." Check it out.
http://ghettomanga.blogspot.com/2015/03/my-few-words-about-my-favorite.html?m=1
Topics: Bias, Diversity in Science, Education, STEM, Women in Science
This is a re-post from 2012 whose title I didn't quite explain: "the limit as it approaches" is a term in Calculus - helped to co-develop by Sir Isaac Newton and Gottfried Leibniz to define The Derivative; Leibniz's impact was Integration. The point of the article in Physics Today I think is still three years hence quite relevant, as well as PT's own Calculus social reference.
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| South African Agency for Science and Technology Advancement |
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| Harvard Theoretical Physicist Dr. Lisa Randall |
PHYSICS TODAY: Of all the sciences in the US, physics continues to have the lowest representation of women. Currently, women earn just 21% of bachelor’s degrees and 17% of PhDs in the field. Discourse about women in physics often centers on representation, and the unspoken assumption seems to be that if the representation of women were to increase to some higher level, all would be well. However, the focus on representation obscures important issues and ignores the day-to-day experiences of women physicists.
In fact, women physicists could be the majority in some hypothetical future yet still in their careers experience problems that stem from often unconscious bias. After all, science, and especially physical science, is seen by many cultures as a primarily male domain. But do women actually experience problems in their day-to-day work as physicists? Do they have equal access to opportunities and resources? If not, how does that inequity affect their careers? If harmful, sex-based differences of access exist, then those of us who care about the situation of women in physics need to come up with a solution that encompasses more than just increasing female representation.
I had the pleasure of being educated by Dr. Elvira Williams at North Carolina A and T State University. She was the fourth African American female awarded a PhD in physics in the United States, specifically Condensed Matter-Diffusion Physics, from Howard University (she's third from the bottom of this list). She last taught at Shaw University.
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| Dr. Elvira Williams: Cambridge Who's Who |
I'm proud and honored to have studied General Physics II and Electromagnetic Field Theory from her.
Physics Today: Women in Physics: A Tale of Limits
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| Image Source: NobelPrize.org |
Topics: Biology, Genetics, Nobel Prize, Research, STEM, Women in Science
The Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine 2009
Elizabeth H. Blackburn, Carol W. Greider and Jack W. Szostak "for the discovery of how chromosomes are protected by telomeres and the enzyme telomerase".
This year's Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine is awarded to three scientists who have solved a major problem in biology: how the chromosomes can be copied in a complete way during cell divisions and how they are protected against degradation. The Nobel Laureates have shown that the solution is to be found in the ends of the chromosomes – the telomeres – and in an enzyme that forms them – telomerase.
The long, thread-like DNA molecules that carry our genes are packed into chromosomes, the telomeres being the caps on their ends. Elizabeth Blackburn and Jack Szostak discovered that a unique DNA sequence in the telomeres protects the chromosomes from degradation. Carol Greider and Elizabeth Blackburn identified telomerase, the enzyme that makes telomere DNA. These discoveries explained how the ends of the chromosomes are protected by the telomeres and that they are built by telomerase.
If the telomeres are shortened, cells age. Conversely, if telomerase activity is high, telomere length is maintained, and cellular senescence is delayed. This is the case in cancer cells, which can be considered to have eternal life. Certain inherited diseases, in contrast, are characterized by a defective telomerase, resulting in damaged cells. The award of the Nobel Prize recognizes the discovery of a fundamental mechanism in the cell, a discovery that has stimulated the development of new therapeutic strategies.
"The Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine 2009". Nobelprize.org. Nobel Media AB 2014. Web. 7 Mar 2015. http://www.nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/medicine/laureates/2009/
National Institute of Health:
Discrimination, racial bias, and telomere length in African-American men.
Chae DH1, Nuru-Jeter AM2, Adler NE3, Brody GH4, Lin J5, Blackburn EH5, Epel ES3.
In the near future, troublesome women are marked “noncompliant” and trucked off to a space age Auxiliary Compliance Outpost – aka Bitch Planet – which is also the name of a new comic series by Kelly Sue DeConnick and Valentine De Landro.
