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Finn! I AM YOUR FATHER!!!!

Posted by Diane on November 25, 2015 at 8:19pm

There's scuttlebutt going around that the character Finn in The Force Awakens, may be Lando Calrissian's son. Check this from ScreenRant:

SuperBroMovies was the first to spot an Amazon listing for a Star Wars: The Force Awakens 1000 piece jigsaw puzzle in a collectible tin. That in itself isn’t the exciting part (unless you really like jigsaw puzzles), but the image on the puzzle is of Finn (John Boyega) and the listing explicitly describes him as Lando Calrissian’s son. Lando, of course, was the former owner of the Millennium Falcon: a suave gambler and smuggler who eventually joined the Rebel Alliance. Calrissian was played by Billy Dee Williams, who has hinted that he may make an appearance in the new slate of Star Wars movies.

I guess we will know for sure in a short while. 

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Finding Field Equations...

Posted by Reginald L. Goodwin on November 25, 2015 at 7:21am
Figure 1. Albert Einstein (1879–1955), in this 1916 photograph, poses in his study at Wittelsbacherstraße 13 in Berlin-Wilmersdorf. (Courtesy of the Leo Baeck Institute, New York.)
Citation: Phys. Today 68, 11, 30 (2015); http://dx.doi.org/10.1063/PT.3.2979


Topics: Einstein, History, General Relativity, Research


In his later years, Einstein often claimed that he had obtained the field equations of general relativity by choosing the mathematically most natural candidate. His writings during the period in which he developed general relativity tell a different story.

This month marks the centenary of the Einstein field equations, the capstone on the general theory of relativity and the highlight of Albert Einstein’s scientific career.1 The equations, which relate spacetime curvature to the energy and momentum of matter, made their first appearance in a four-page paper submitted on 25 November 1915 to the Prussian Academy of Sciences in Berlin and reprinted in TheCollected Papers of Albert Einstein (CPAE),2 volume 6, document 21. How did Einstein, shown in figure 1, arrive at those equations? He later insisted that the gravitational equations “could only be found by a purely formal principle (general covariance).”3 Such statements mainly served to justify his strategy in the search for a unified field theory during the second half of his career. As a description of how he found the field equations of general relativity, they are highly misleading.

The 25 November paper was the last in a series of short communications submitted to the Berlin Academy on four consecutive Thursdays that month (CPAE 6; 21, 22, 24, 25). In the first paper, Einstein replaced the field equations that he had published in 1913 with equations that retain their form under a much broader class of coordinate transformations (see figure 2). In the second, a highly speculative hypothesis he adopted about the nature of matter allowed him to change those equations to equations that are generally covariant—that is, retain their form under arbitrary coordinate transformations. In the fourth, he achieved the same end by changing the field equations of the first paper in a different and more convincing way, as shown in figure 3. In the third, based on the field equations of the second paper but unaffected by the modification of the fourth, he accounted for the 43 seconds of arc per century missing in the Newtonian account of the perihelion motion of Mercury.

Physics Today: Arch and scaffold: How Einstein found his field equations
Michel Janssen and Jürgen Renn

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Alpha Centauri Dreams...

Posted by Reginald L. Goodwin on November 24, 2015 at 6:16pm
Image Source: NASA - Imagine The Universe!


Topics: Exoplanets, NASA, Planets, Planetary Science, Space Exploration, Research


Physics Database: The famous alpha Centauri system — one of our nearest neighbors in space — happens to be one of the best targets for exoplanet search. In this talk Michael Endl, a research scientist at the University of Texas, will review past and current planet search efforts that targeted the alpha Centauri system. In addition, he will focus on his team’s program, an intensive multi-year observing campaign carried out at Mt John University Observatory in New Zealand. As always, for more high quality videos check out the links below.

Post title derived from the excellent site Centauri-Dreams.org

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Short Story Vending Machine Solves All Fiction-On-The-Go Problems

Posted by William Hayashi on November 24, 2015 at 11:57am

It's a familiar scene: You're waiting for a train, or for a chronically late friend. Bored, you reach for your phone to pull up Twitter -- but you left your phone at home, or the battery's dead. You stare about, panicked, desperate for something stimulating to occupy the next few seemingly endless minutes. Billboards to read? A couple making out to ogle? Anything!

Click here for the full story

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My new book, "Ruins of the Fall: Tree of Might" is out!!!

Posted by Russell A. Mebane on November 24, 2015 at 11:19am

I would like to thank everyone here at Black Science Fiction Society for all the help they've offered and given me.  A couple ideas for this book came from science articles I found on this site.  It's been a great two-year journey!  This book is the first part of a trilogy, and it should be highly controversial.  It's out on Kindle only, and is available for lending. 

Thanks again, everybody!

God bless...

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Neighbors...

Posted by Reginald L. Goodwin on November 23, 2015 at 7:30am
Image source: MIT News


Topics: Exoplanets, NASA, Planets, Planetary Science, Space Exploration


It's a scant 39 light years away, but even if we developed a propulsion system to get us there in a human lifetime, the inhospitable weather would make me select another destination. Good candidate for LONG distance study...

Scientists have discovered a new exoplanet that, in the language of “Star Wars,” would be the polar opposite of frigid Hoth, and even more inhospitable than the deserts of Tatooine. But instead of residing in a galaxy far, far away, this new world is, galactically speaking, practically next door.

The new planet, named GJ 1132b, is Earth-sized and rocky, orbiting a small star located a mere 39 light-years from Earth, making it the closest Earth-sized exoplanet yet discovered. Astrophysicists from MIT and elsewhere have published these findings today in the journal Nature.

Based on their measurements, the scientists have determined that the planet is a roasting 500 degrees Fahrenheit, and is likely tidally locked, meaning that it has a permanent day and night side, presenting the same face to its star, much like our moon is locked to the Earth.

MIT News: New exoplanet in our neighborhood, Jennifer Chu

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Sole Power...

Posted by Reginald L. Goodwin on November 20, 2015 at 7:54am
Image GIF source: MIT Technology Review


Topics: Economy, Jobs, Materials Science, Metamaterials, STEM


Considering the obesity rate in the country and the FitBit craze, this could be a win-win for all of us.

Children have been harnessing energy from their steps ever since 1992, when L.A. Gear introduced sneakers that light up. For most adults, however, the ambient energy created by the simple act of walking is forever lost. Considering that the average person takes around 216 million steps in a lifetime, it’s a significant waste.

Inventor Laurence Kemball-Cook hopes to harness the lost energy at two points of contact: the shoe and the floor. In 2009, Kemball-Cook founded Pavegen, a company whose floor tiles can capture the power of footsteps. The technology uses compression to skim a tiny fraction of the energy created when a human steps on the tile. It’s been installed in more than 100 projects around the world, including a football stadium in Rio de Janeiro and a terminal in Heathrow Airport. The energy is stored in batteries inside the tiles, where it can then be used to power lighting, advertisements, and way-finding solutions, which guide people through an environment via directional arrows.

Now Kemball-Cook and his R&D team have turned their attention to the shoe itself, hoping to apply the same principles used in the tiles as a way to harness personal energy. “The idea is that the energy source would be readily available to the shoe wearer,” explains Kemball-Cook, who has been in discussions with major footwear manufacturers such as Nike and Reebok about ways the technology could be incorporated into consumer products. “You could walk from work and charge your phone en route instead of waiting to use a charger at home. Runners could charge their music players during a jog.”

MIT Technology Review: The Quest to Make Your Shoe a Power Source, Simon Parkin
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Suicide Squad Trailer

Posted by Carles CJ Juzang on November 19, 2015 at 8:00am

We will see if DC has what it takes with characters outside of the Bat and Soops. Suicide Squad looks dark and procative but I am not sure the addition of Will Smith, Viola Davis Adewale Akinnuoye-Agbaje or Jared Leto's version of the Joker will make this a success. YOUR Thoughts and Feedback BSFS?

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THE GODS OF EGYPT- A fantasy at best

Posted by Carles CJ Juzang on November 19, 2015 at 7:30am

Ok peeps just making you aware of THIS movie that hired a lot of special effects peeps of African decent. The FANTASY of this movie to me is why are the lead characters of this movie are not or at least look AFRICAN (hell I'll even go as far as to ask why don't they look Egyptian). GREAT to see Hollyhood exploring myths outside the European standard but again...sigh!  Asking for YOUR FEEDBACK BSFS PEOPLE! I am a fan of both Gerard Butler and Nikolaj Coster-Waldau but with the plethora of actors and actresses of African decent  as well as other parts of the known entertainment planet, all I can do is SMH.  I will probably wait until the digital version is available to purchase cause from the looks of the trailer it is mos def "Eye Candy". Your thoughts please?

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MAGLEV @ Home...

Posted by Reginald L. Goodwin on November 19, 2015 at 7:19am
Image Source: BBC - Leeds - K-T Picture Galleries

Topics: Materials Science, Quantum Mechanics, Semiconductor Technology, Superconductivity

I might do this at home, but I think this is already a neat demo done for many a high school or even college introductory physics class.

I disagree on one point in the video: we do use superconducting magnets specifically for levitation in the semiconductor industry in a few of our processes that require it. There are also several bullet trains that use this feature of super-cooled metal, thereby inducing superconductivity. You are welcome to invent other uses. Source: Scientific American, How to Do Quantum Magnetic Levitation at Home, November 17, 2015
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Musing Crichton...

Posted by Reginald L. Goodwin on November 18, 2015 at 10:51am
Star Trek Wiki Memory Alpha: Nanite

Topics: Diversity in Science, Nanotechnology, Philosophy, Science Fiction, Star Trek, Women in Science

From Physics Database:

Dr. Amanda Barnard is an Office of the Chief Executive (OCE) Science leader, and head of the Virtual Nanoscience Laboratory at CSIRO. She received her PhD in 2003, followed by a Distinguished Postdoctoral Fellow in the Center for Nanoscale Materials at Argonne National Laboratory (USA), and the prestigious senior research position as Violette & Samuel Glasstone Fellow at the University of Oxford (UK) with an Extraordinary Research Fellowship at The Queen’s College.

In this talk Dr Amanda Barnard will take us through the latest advances in nanotechnology and answer the fantastic question: ‘Are nanoparticles alive?’ In the world of science fiction, nanotechnology is often shown as swarms of micro-machines that act without the need for human supervision. Much like their biological counterparts, these imagined devices even sometimes possess their own intelligence. The imagination of science fiction writers has taken this high tech fantasy beyond the reality. But scientists have imagination too, and increasingly they are taking nanomaterials to remarkable places with properties that sound stranger than fiction.
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Wearable Biosensors...

Posted by Reginald L. Goodwin on November 17, 2015 at 7:31pm
A conformally contacted device on an artificial eye for glucose sensing in tears. Courtesy: YS Rim


Topics: Materials Science, Optical Physics, Semiconductor Technology, Nanotechnology, Thin Films

Okay, I have to admit: the bionic eye freaked me out. I'm trying to get used to it...


Researchers at the California NanoSystems Institute and the University of California, Los Angeles, have developed ultrathin, flexible, metal oxide semiconducting thin films for use in wearable or implantable biosensors. The devices, which are made using a straightforward printing technique, could be used as sensors in non-invasive health monitoring applications like smart contact lenses that monitor a person’s glucose levels, for example.

Nanotechweb: Metal oxide thin films make wearable biosensors

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Power To Pluto...

Posted by Reginald L. Goodwin on November 16, 2015 at 10:31am
Image Source: Wired


Topics: Electrical Engineering, Humor, Planetary Science, Space Exploration


This was a rather tongue-in-cheek article, I say that because all solutions point to the company web site and the products it produces or allegedly can produce. It does raise the issue of interplanetary and interstellar travel: charging your cell phone for selfies is kinda low on the scale of concerns once you fly beyond the "Goldilocks Zone" we currently inhabit. Like "The Martian," you're probably going to have to subsist on a lot of veggies even if you didn't like them as a kid since a burger and fries would be well...several billion miles away!

Imagine this. You have just parked your private space ship on Pluto, intrigued by all the recent NASA photos of the not-a-planet small wannabe-could-be-planet, and you realize your cell phone is on its last legs. Power-wise, that is. Not because you skipped the last two upgrades.

What to do? For sure, here on Pluto, a zillion miles away from the sun, rigging up some sort of solar screen recharger thing is out of the question. Not that you can't do that and not because it wouldn't work (eventually) but because you need power fast. There are Pluto selfies to take and tweets to be tweeted.

Mouser Electronics: Portable Power: Especially Useful on Pluto, Arden Henderson

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