LISA Pathfinder launch timeline

On Wednesday, a Vega rocket will boost LISA Pathfinder into space to pave the way to a future mission for detecting gravitational waves. Once aloft, ESA’s mission control teams will pace the ultra high-tech spacecraft through the critical first days of the journey to its final destination.

At 04:15 GMT (05:15 CET) on Wednesday, 2 December, ESA’s LISA Pathfinder is set to lift off on a 30 m-tall Vega rocket from Europe’s Spaceport in Kourou, French Guiana, for a 105-minute ride into orbit.

LISA Pathfinder is a demonstrator to help open up a completely new window into the Universe: it will test new technologies needed to measure gravitational waves in space. Predicted by Albert Einstein, these waves are ripples in the curvature of spacetime produced by massive celestial events, such as the merging of black holes.

Detecting gravitational waves would be an additional confirmation of General Relativity, and greatly improve our knowledge of the most powerful phenomena in the Universe.
Ariane 5 flight V188 rises above ESA's Estrack station in Kourou, French Guyana
Kourou tracking station

Separation from Vega is expected at 06:00 GMT (07:00 CET), marking the moment when controllers at ESA’s ESOC operations centre in Darmstadt, Germany, take over the satellite.

First contact is expected two minutes later, around 06:02 GMT (07:02 CET) via the ground station at Kourou.

After confirming LISA Pathfinder’s status and overall health, ground teams will start an intensive cycle of crucial and complex orbit-raising manoeuvres.

These will include firing the mission’s propulsion module six times during 6–11 December to raise its initial orbit, before beginning a six-week cruise phase to its operational orbit some 1.5 million km from Earth in a sunward direction.

After arriving at the final working orbit, the propulsion module will be discarded in later January, and, after about three months of setting-up and calibration, the science mission will begin in March.

The liftoff will be streamed live via two separate programmes on Wednesday: launch webcast live from Kourou, 03:55 GMT (04:55 CET) start; and a media briefing live from ESOC, 05:45 GMT (06:45 CET) start (links to each via http://www.esa.int).

The timeline below is subject to change. An expanded version is available on ESA’s Rocket Science blog.

1-2 December 2015

 

MET	GMT	CET	Vega VV06	LISA Pathfinder/ESOC	Tracking stations
L-09:10:00	19:05:00	20:05:00		Flight Control Team ‘on console’ in ESOC Main Control Room; start of prelaunch activities (B-section)
L-09:00:00	19:15:00	20:15:00		ESOC teams begin monitoring spacecraft and ground systems, receiving live telemetry from LISA Pathfinder on top of Vega via umbilical
L-08:00:00	20:15:00	21:15:00	Start of Vega countdown
L-06:00:00	22:15:00	23:15:00		Start of ESOC network countdown; mission controllers continue monitoring LISA Pathfinder	Ground tracking stations: Start of dedicated LPF launch support. Begin station check outs at ESA 15m stations at Perth (Aus), Maspalomas (Spain), Kourou (F. Guiana) plus ASI station Malindi (Kenya)
L-05:45:00	22:30:00	23:30:00		ESOC starts a series of data flow tests to confirm primary & backup data links between ESOC and tracking stations	Data flow tests KRU, MAS, PER, MAL-X
L-05:30:00	22:45:00	23:45:00	Activation of Vega Multi Function Unit - MFU controls the launcher's critical systems (incl power distribution & pyrotechnics)
L-05:10:00	23:05:00	00:05:00	"Vega Inertial Reference System on; Vega telemetry starts flowing"
L-05:05:00	23:10:00	00:10:00		ESOC Flight Director conducts first formal check of ground segment launch readiness: confirms that teams, systems and stations are ready	Data flow tests contiune: test back-up links to stations
L-04:55:00	23:20:00	00:20:00		ESOC Flight Director reports ground segment status to Kourou launch control centre
L-04:50:00	23:25:00	00:25:00	Activation of Vega Safeguard Master Unit - SMU controls safety self-destruct, which can be commanded by ground or autonomously in case of degraded flight behaviour
L-04:20:00	23:55:00	00:55:00	Activation of Vega onboard computer and loading of flight program
L-03:45:00	00:30:00	01:30:00			End of data flow tests via back-up station links. Links now configured for actual LPF TM. Begin data flow tests on primary links.
L-02:40:00	01:35:00	02:35:00	Mobile gantry withdrawal (45 mins)
L-02:30:00	01:45:00	02:45:00			End of data flow tests via primary station links. Links now configured for actual LPF TM. All data flow tests complete; ground segment configured for actual LPF TM
L-02:00:00	02:15:00	03:15:00		Mission Control Team handover in ESOC MCR. A-Section engineers briefed by B-Section counterparts.
L-01:45:00	02:30:00	03:30:00		A-Section of Mission Control Team now on console in MCR	Station engineer team at Kourou depart for safe area. From now until launch, KRU station operated remotely from ESOC.
L-01:55:00	02:20:00	03:20:00	Alignment and checks of Inertial Reference System (after withdrawal of gantry)
L-01:15:00	03:00:00	04:00:00	Vega telemetry transmitter on (after withdrawal of gantry) Vega transponders on
L-00:55:00	03:20:00	04:20:00		ESA Flight Director conducts Go/NoGo roll call in Main Control Room
L-00:35:00	03:40:00	04:40:00		ESOC Spacecraft Operations Manager conducts final briefing with ground tracking stations	All stations in conference with ESOC
L-00:34:00	03:41:00	04:41:00	Launcher system ready
L-00:25:00	03:50:00	04:50:00		ESOC Flight Director conducts final formal check of ground segment launch readiness: confirms that teams, systems and stations are ready
L-00:15:00	04:00:00	05:00:00	LISA Pathfinder on internal power	ESOC Flight Director confirms ground segment ready for launch to Kourou launch control centre
L-00:10:00	04:05:00	05:05:00	Last Kourou weather report before launch
L-00:04:00	04:11:00	05:11:00	Start of Vega synchronized sequence
L-00:00:08	04:14:52	05:14:52	Last possible launch abort
00:00:00	04:15:00	05:15:00	Vega first stage ignition
00:00:01	04:15:01	05:15:01	LIFT OFF
L+00:01:53	04:16:53	05:16:53	Separation of first stage
L+00:01:54	04:16:54	05:16:54	Second stage ignition
L+00:02:30	04:17:30	05:17:30			All tracking stations configured for AOS - first acquisition of signal
L+00:03:37	04:18:37	05:18:37	Separation of second stage
L+00:03:49	04:18:49	05:18:49	Third stage ignition
L+00:04:03	04:19:03	05:19:03	Fairing jettisoned
L+00:06:30	04:21:30	05:21:30	Separation of third stage
L+00:07:29	04:22:29	05:22:29	Fourth stage first burn
L+00:16:23	04:31:23	05:31:23	Fourth stage shutdown
L+01:41:19	05:56:19	06:56:19	Fourth stage second burn
L+01:42:53	05:57:53	06:57:53	Fourth stage second shutdown
L+01:45:33	06:00:33	07:00:33	LISA Pathfinder release command
L+01:45:33	06:00:33	07:00:33	SEPARATION	LISA Pathfinder separates from fourth stage; begins automatic sequence
L+01:47:03	06:02:03	07:02:03	Acquisition of signal (earliest) from satellite via Kourou station	KRU AOS LPF
L+01:48:00	06:03:00	07:03:00		ESOC issues test command	"KRU transmits test command KRU starts ranging & Doppler for orbit determination"
L+01:55:10	06:10:10	07:10:10	Fourth stage third burn, for deorbiting
L+01:55:17	06:10:17	07:10:17	Fourth stage shutdown
L+02:10:00	06:25:00	07:25:00		LISA Pathfinder end of automatic sequence. In stable, Sun-pointing mode. ESOC teams continue checkout

Notes:

CET offset = 01:00:00
Vega launcher is also tracked by separate dedicated stations. These are not indicated in this timeline.

Abbreviations:

LCC: Launcher Control Centre, Jupiter Control Room, Kourou, French Guyana
ESOC: European Space Operations Centre, Darmstadt, Germany
OD: ESA Flight Operations Director in Main Control Room
VV06: Arianespace Vega launcher flight VV06
MET: Mission Elapsed Time - before/after liftoff times are -/+
LPF: LISA Pathfinder spacecraft
AOS: Acquisition of signal
LOS: Loss of signal
MCR: Main Control Room at ESOC
OM: ESA Ground Operations Manager in Main Control Room
SOM: ESA Spacecraft Operations Manager in Main Control Room

 

from Rocket Science » Rocket Science http://ift.tt/1OqEKxI
v

On Wednesday, a Vega rocket will boost LISA Pathfinder into space to pave the way to a future mission for detecting gravitational waves. Once aloft, ESA’s mission control teams will pace the ultra high-tech spacecraft through the critical first days of the journey to its final destination.

At 04:15 GMT (05:15 CET) on Wednesday, 2 December, ESA’s LISA Pathfinder is set to lift off on a 30 m-tall Vega rocket from Europe’s Spaceport in Kourou, French Guiana, for a 105-minute ride into orbit.

LISA Pathfinder is a demonstrator to help open up a completely new window into the Universe: it will test new technologies needed to measure gravitational waves in space. Predicted by Albert Einstein, these waves are ripples in the curvature of spacetime produced by massive celestial events, such as the merging of black holes.

Detecting gravitational waves would be an additional confirmation of General Relativity, and greatly improve our knowledge of the most powerful phenomena in the Universe.
Ariane 5 flight V188 rises above ESA's Estrack station in Kourou, French Guyana
Kourou tracking station

Separation from Vega is expected at 06:00 GMT (07:00 CET), marking the moment when controllers at ESA’s ESOC operations centre in Darmstadt, Germany, take over the satellite.

First contact is expected two minutes later, around 06:02 GMT (07:02 CET) via the ground station at Kourou.

After confirming LISA Pathfinder’s status and overall health, ground teams will start an intensive cycle of crucial and complex orbit-raising manoeuvres.

These will include firing the mission’s propulsion module six times during 6–11 December to raise its initial orbit, before beginning a six-week cruise phase to its operational orbit some 1.5 million km from Earth in a sunward direction.

After arriving at the final working orbit, the propulsion module will be discarded in later January, and, after about three months of setting-up and calibration, the science mission will begin in March.

The liftoff will be streamed live via two separate programmes on Wednesday: launch webcast live from Kourou, 03:55 GMT (04:55 CET) start; and a media briefing live from ESOC, 05:45 GMT (06:45 CET) start (links to each via http://www.esa.int).

The timeline below is subject to change. An expanded version is available on ESA’s Rocket Science blog.

1-2 December 2015

 

MET	GMT	CET	Vega VV06	LISA Pathfinder/ESOC	Tracking stations
L-09:10:00	19:05:00	20:05:00		Flight Control Team ‘on console’ in ESOC Main Control Room; start of prelaunch activities (B-section)
L-09:00:00	19:15:00	20:15:00		ESOC teams begin monitoring spacecraft and ground systems, receiving live telemetry from LISA Pathfinder on top of Vega via umbilical
L-08:00:00	20:15:00	21:15:00	Start of Vega countdown
L-06:00:00	22:15:00	23:15:00		Start of ESOC network countdown; mission controllers continue monitoring LISA Pathfinder	Ground tracking stations: Start of dedicated LPF launch support. Begin station check outs at ESA 15m stations at Perth (Aus), Maspalomas (Spain), Kourou (F. Guiana) plus ASI station Malindi (Kenya)
L-05:45:00	22:30:00	23:30:00		ESOC starts a series of data flow tests to confirm primary & backup data links between ESOC and tracking stations	Data flow tests KRU, MAS, PER, MAL-X
L-05:30:00	22:45:00	23:45:00	Activation of Vega Multi Function Unit - MFU controls the launcher's critical systems (incl power distribution & pyrotechnics)
L-05:10:00	23:05:00	00:05:00	"Vega Inertial Reference System on; Vega telemetry starts flowing"
L-05:05:00	23:10:00	00:10:00		ESOC Flight Director conducts first formal check of ground segment launch readiness: confirms that teams, systems and stations are ready	Data flow tests contiune: test back-up links to stations
L-04:55:00	23:20:00	00:20:00		ESOC Flight Director reports ground segment status to Kourou launch control centre
L-04:50:00	23:25:00	00:25:00	Activation of Vega Safeguard Master Unit - SMU controls safety self-destruct, which can be commanded by ground or autonomously in case of degraded flight behaviour
L-04:20:00	23:55:00	00:55:00	Activation of Vega onboard computer and loading of flight program
L-03:45:00	00:30:00	01:30:00			End of data flow tests via back-up station links. Links now configured for actual LPF TM. Begin data flow tests on primary links.
L-02:40:00	01:35:00	02:35:00	Mobile gantry withdrawal (45 mins)
L-02:30:00	01:45:00	02:45:00			End of data flow tests via primary station links. Links now configured for actual LPF TM. All data flow tests complete; ground segment configured for actual LPF TM
L-02:00:00	02:15:00	03:15:00		Mission Control Team handover in ESOC MCR. A-Section engineers briefed by B-Section counterparts.
L-01:45:00	02:30:00	03:30:00		A-Section of Mission Control Team now on console in MCR	Station engineer team at Kourou depart for safe area. From now until launch, KRU station operated remotely from ESOC.
L-01:55:00	02:20:00	03:20:00	Alignment and checks of Inertial Reference System (after withdrawal of gantry)
L-01:15:00	03:00:00	04:00:00	Vega telemetry transmitter on (after withdrawal of gantry) Vega transponders on
L-00:55:00	03:20:00	04:20:00		ESA Flight Director conducts Go/NoGo roll call in Main Control Room
L-00:35:00	03:40:00	04:40:00		ESOC Spacecraft Operations Manager conducts final briefing with ground tracking stations	All stations in conference with ESOC
L-00:34:00	03:41:00	04:41:00	Launcher system ready
L-00:25:00	03:50:00	04:50:00		ESOC Flight Director conducts final formal check of ground segment launch readiness: confirms that teams, systems and stations are ready
L-00:15:00	04:00:00	05:00:00	LISA Pathfinder on internal power	ESOC Flight Director confirms ground segment ready for launch to Kourou launch control centre
L-00:10:00	04:05:00	05:05:00	Last Kourou weather report before launch
L-00:04:00	04:11:00	05:11:00	Start of Vega synchronized sequence
L-00:00:08	04:14:52	05:14:52	Last possible launch abort
00:00:00	04:15:00	05:15:00	Vega first stage ignition
00:00:01	04:15:01	05:15:01	LIFT OFF
L+00:01:53	04:16:53	05:16:53	Separation of first stage
L+00:01:54	04:16:54	05:16:54	Second stage ignition
L+00:02:30	04:17:30	05:17:30			All tracking stations configured for AOS - first acquisition of signal
L+00:03:37	04:18:37	05:18:37	Separation of second stage
L+00:03:49	04:18:49	05:18:49	Third stage ignition
L+00:04:03	04:19:03	05:19:03	Fairing jettisoned
L+00:06:30	04:21:30	05:21:30	Separation of third stage
L+00:07:29	04:22:29	05:22:29	Fourth stage first burn
L+00:16:23	04:31:23	05:31:23	Fourth stage shutdown
L+01:41:19	05:56:19	06:56:19	Fourth stage second burn
L+01:42:53	05:57:53	06:57:53	Fourth stage second shutdown
L+01:45:33	06:00:33	07:00:33	LISA Pathfinder release command
L+01:45:33	06:00:33	07:00:33	SEPARATION	LISA Pathfinder separates from fourth stage; begins automatic sequence
L+01:47:03	06:02:03	07:02:03	Acquisition of signal (earliest) from satellite via Kourou station	KRU AOS LPF
L+01:48:00	06:03:00	07:03:00		ESOC issues test command	"KRU transmits test command KRU starts ranging & Doppler for orbit determination"
L+01:55:10	06:10:10	07:10:10	Fourth stage third burn, for deorbiting
L+01:55:17	06:10:17	07:10:17	Fourth stage shutdown
L+02:10:00	06:25:00	07:25:00		LISA Pathfinder end of automatic sequence. In stable, Sun-pointing mode. ESOC teams continue checkout

Notes:

CET offset = 01:00:00
Vega launcher is also tracked by separate dedicated stations. These are not indicated in this timeline.

Abbreviations:

LCC: Launcher Control Centre, Jupiter Control Room, Kourou, French Guyana
ESOC: European Space Operations Centre, Darmstadt, Germany
OD: ESA Flight Operations Director in Main Control Room
VV06: Arianespace Vega launcher flight VV06
MET: Mission Elapsed Time - before/after liftoff times are -/+
LPF: LISA Pathfinder spacecraft
AOS: Acquisition of signal
LOS: Loss of signal
MCR: Main Control Room at ESOC
OM: ESA Ground Operations Manager in Main Control Room
SOM: ESA Spacecraft Operations Manager in Main Control Room

 

from Rocket Science » Rocket Science http://ift.tt/1OqEKxI
v

Matt Ridley and Benny Peiser’s Misleading Guide to the Climate Debate [Greg Laden's Blog]

This post was written by Peter Sinclair and Greg Laden in response to a recent Wall Street Journal Op Ed piece by Matt Ridley and Benny Peiser.

In a recent Wall Street Journal commentary, “Your Complete Guide to the Climate Debate,”
Matt Ridley and Benny Peiser ask what might make world leaders concerned about the security impacts of climate change. One answer might be the US Department of Defense.

In its 2010 Quadrennial Defense review, Pentagon experts wrote:

“…climate change could have significant geopolitical impacts around the world, contributing to poverty, environmental degradation, and the further weakening of fragile governments. Climate change will contribute to food and water scarcity, will increase the spread of disease, and may spur or exacerbate mass migration.”

If that sounds familiar, it’s because it’s today’s front page news. A 2014 Defense Department document underlined the message, calling climate warming “a threat multiplier.”

Ridley and Peiser ridicule President Obama over his “careless” statement that climate change is a greater threat than terrorism. Indeed, recent research indicates that the current Syrian refugee crisis is at least partly a result of climate change enhanced drought in the region.

Ridley and Peiser claim that global temperatures have risen only slowly. This is simply untrue. The upward march of global surface temperatures varies, as expected for any natural system such as this, but continues on an upward trend. Contrarian claims of an extended pause in global warming have been debunked over recent months by at least a half dozen studies. (See: this, this, this, this, and this.)

Ridley and Peiser also suggest that surface temperatures have risen less than earlier climate modeling had projected. This is simply untrue. Global surface temperatures have risen at a pace of about 0.15 degrees C per decade since 1990, which is within the range of earlier IPCC projections.

Ridley/Peiser suggest that current record smashing weather events are due to El Nino, not climate change.

Wrong for two reasons.

First, many of the record breaking events we have experienced over recent years happened when there was no El Nino.

Second, records that are set during an El Nino period are, obviously, compared to all other prior El Nino periods as well. This year’s El Nino is exceeding earlier El Nino years in heat and tropical storm activities precisely because of a continued rise in planetary heat.

Ridley and Peiser claim that it has been warmer at times during the last 10,000 years. This statement is not supportable. While scientists know that orbitally caused warming occurred some 8000 years ago, the most current research suggests that today’s surface temperature exceed those values, or will shortly under current trends.

It is incorrect to assert that there have been no changes in extreme storms, or flooding. In the past week we have seen a new annual northern hemisphere record in major hurricanes, with 30 storms category 3 and above this year, literally blowing away the old record of 23, with the season not yet over.

Every year for the last three years, careful and conservative researchers at the US Bureau of Meteorology have studied the contribution of global warming to major weather events around the world. Every year the number of events attributed to global warming goes up. (See these three reports.)

The US Global Change Research Program has documented the increase in extreme precipitation events across the country, and in recent weeks, the east and gulf coast of the US have been inundated by a “1000 year rain event”, as well as a new phenomenon, coastal flooding not associated with any storm, merely the regular pull of the tides, on an ocean that has risen several inches since 1950.

Miami taxpayers are currently spending 500 million dollars on pumps and other infrastructure to remedy the flooding Peiser and Ridley say does not exist.

Ridley and Peiser make the claim that tropical storms can’t be as much of a problem now as they were in the past because the number of deaths attributed to natural disasters is reduced. The irony of this statement is stunning. The reason there are fewer deaths due to weather related natural disasters is precisely because climate science and meteorology have developed methods and models to predict and warn. That very same science is telling us about the recent, ongoing, and future changes in climate due to the burning of coal, oil, and natural gas.

Ridley and Peiser seek to confuse by conflating Arctic and Antarctic sea ice, without mentioning that the small increase in Antarctic sea ice, along with the large loss of Arctic ice, is predicted from our understanding of the global warming process, and that, globally, sea ice area is clearly in a multi-decadal decline, the very reason that our giant oil companies are lobbying so intensely for access to polar regions they know are thawing.

Similarly deceptive is the claim that “Antarctica is gaining land based ice”. Here they cite a one-off outlier study, not the other dozen studies completed since 2012 by groups from NASA, the European Space Agency and others, most using more recent data than the cited piece, and all of which show overall Antarctic land ice loss. Moreover, the author of the study cited has said that
if the sea level rise does not come from Antarctica, it obviously must be undercounted elsewhere, such as Alpine glaciers, Greenland, or thermal expansion of the oceans – since observed sea level rise is unequivocal.

That sea level rise is also the most unambiguous indicator of a warming planet. The relentless and accelerating observed rise of the seas supports the half dozen recent studies showing that global warming has not halted or paused, and continues apace.

Ridley and Peiser claim that research is increasingly showing climate sensitivity to be low. This is entirely the opposite of what has been happening. The most likely range of values of climate sensitivity (the amount of increase in surface temperature that eventually occurs as a result of the doubling of CO2 in the atmosphere) was established over a century ago. Recently revealed documents show that Exxon Mobil Corporation itself studied climate science as early as the late 70’s, and its findings were in clear agreement with the National Academy of Science 1979 report, which estimated a climate sensitivity of 3°C, plus or minus 1.5° C. Tables in Exxon’s 1982 Climate Change “Primer” for executives show predictions for 2015 markedly similar to contemporary estimates by NASA, and NOAA.

Meanwhile, the solutions for climate change are at hand.

Solar and wind energy have grown faster, and costs have plummeted further, than even most fervent supporters would have predicted a few years ago. Wind and solar are now out-competing coal and nuclear everywhere, and even gas in many markets. Recent volatility in oil and gas prices make the predictable zero cost of renewables all the more attractive, as more and more major corporations are signing power purchase agreements for renewable energy, based on markets, not political correctness.

In a recent article in Scientific American, Engineers Mark Jacobsen and Mark Deluchi have shown how 139 countries can generate their total energy needs by 2050 from wind, solar, and water technologies.

Today’s average cost of large-scale solar in the U.S. is 5 cents/kWh. The installed cost of solar is down by half since 2009. The cost of wind in the U.S. is 2.5 cents per kWh, and efficiency is about the same, and sometimes below 1 cent/kWh. (See this.)

Denmark, Scotland, Spain, and Portugal are now producing more than half their electricity from renewable sources, Germany is close to a third – and the German grid is 10 times more reliable than the US grid.(See this)

In 20 US states, contractors will put solar panels on your roof for free – and in San Antonio Texas, the utility will pay you for the privilege of putting those panels on, and lowering your utility bill. (See this and this)

It’s a business model that will spread, sooner than coal barons like Matt Ridley would like you to believe.

Polling shows again and again that large majorities of Americans across all demographics favor rapid development of renewable energy, and tough regulations for greenhouse gases.

In addition, most importantly, a large majority of Americans now believe that climate change is a moral issue that obligates government officials, and private citizens, to take action.

The tactics of confusion and distortion are losing their effectiveness, as more and more Americans experience the effects of a climate altered world first hand. It’s time to stop denying the science, and begin discussing the solutions.

from ScienceBlogs http://ift.tt/1IvOoJc

This post was written by Peter Sinclair and Greg Laden in response to a recent Wall Street Journal Op Ed piece by Matt Ridley and Benny Peiser.

In a recent Wall Street Journal commentary, “Your Complete Guide to the Climate Debate,”
Matt Ridley and Benny Peiser ask what might make world leaders concerned about the security impacts of climate change. One answer might be the US Department of Defense.

In its 2010 Quadrennial Defense review, Pentagon experts wrote:

“…climate change could have significant geopolitical impacts around the world, contributing to poverty, environmental degradation, and the further weakening of fragile governments. Climate change will contribute to food and water scarcity, will increase the spread of disease, and may spur or exacerbate mass migration.”

If that sounds familiar, it’s because it’s today’s front page news. A 2014 Defense Department document underlined the message, calling climate warming “a threat multiplier.”

Ridley and Peiser ridicule President Obama over his “careless” statement that climate change is a greater threat than terrorism. Indeed, recent research indicates that the current Syrian refugee crisis is at least partly a result of climate change enhanced drought in the region.

Ridley and Peiser claim that global temperatures have risen only slowly. This is simply untrue. The upward march of global surface temperatures varies, as expected for any natural system such as this, but continues on an upward trend. Contrarian claims of an extended pause in global warming have been debunked over recent months by at least a half dozen studies. (See: this, this, this, this, and this.)

Ridley and Peiser also suggest that surface temperatures have risen less than earlier climate modeling had projected. This is simply untrue. Global surface temperatures have risen at a pace of about 0.15 degrees C per decade since 1990, which is within the range of earlier IPCC projections.

Ridley/Peiser suggest that current record smashing weather events are due to El Nino, not climate change.

Wrong for two reasons.

First, many of the record breaking events we have experienced over recent years happened when there was no El Nino.

Second, records that are set during an El Nino period are, obviously, compared to all other prior El Nino periods as well. This year’s El Nino is exceeding earlier El Nino years in heat and tropical storm activities precisely because of a continued rise in planetary heat.

Ridley and Peiser claim that it has been warmer at times during the last 10,000 years. This statement is not supportable. While scientists know that orbitally caused warming occurred some 8000 years ago, the most current research suggests that today’s surface temperature exceed those values, or will shortly under current trends.

It is incorrect to assert that there have been no changes in extreme storms, or flooding. In the past week we have seen a new annual northern hemisphere record in major hurricanes, with 30 storms category 3 and above this year, literally blowing away the old record of 23, with the season not yet over.

Every year for the last three years, careful and conservative researchers at the US Bureau of Meteorology have studied the contribution of global warming to major weather events around the world. Every year the number of events attributed to global warming goes up. (See these three reports.)

The US Global Change Research Program has documented the increase in extreme precipitation events across the country, and in recent weeks, the east and gulf coast of the US have been inundated by a “1000 year rain event”, as well as a new phenomenon, coastal flooding not associated with any storm, merely the regular pull of the tides, on an ocean that has risen several inches since 1950.

Miami taxpayers are currently spending 500 million dollars on pumps and other infrastructure to remedy the flooding Peiser and Ridley say does not exist.

Ridley and Peiser make the claim that tropical storms can’t be as much of a problem now as they were in the past because the number of deaths attributed to natural disasters is reduced. The irony of this statement is stunning. The reason there are fewer deaths due to weather related natural disasters is precisely because climate science and meteorology have developed methods and models to predict and warn. That very same science is telling us about the recent, ongoing, and future changes in climate due to the burning of coal, oil, and natural gas.

Ridley and Peiser seek to confuse by conflating Arctic and Antarctic sea ice, without mentioning that the small increase in Antarctic sea ice, along with the large loss of Arctic ice, is predicted from our understanding of the global warming process, and that, globally, sea ice area is clearly in a multi-decadal decline, the very reason that our giant oil companies are lobbying so intensely for access to polar regions they know are thawing.

Similarly deceptive is the claim that “Antarctica is gaining land based ice”. Here they cite a one-off outlier study, not the other dozen studies completed since 2012 by groups from NASA, the European Space Agency and others, most using more recent data than the cited piece, and all of which show overall Antarctic land ice loss. Moreover, the author of the study cited has said that
if the sea level rise does not come from Antarctica, it obviously must be undercounted elsewhere, such as Alpine glaciers, Greenland, or thermal expansion of the oceans – since observed sea level rise is unequivocal.

That sea level rise is also the most unambiguous indicator of a warming planet. The relentless and accelerating observed rise of the seas supports the half dozen recent studies showing that global warming has not halted or paused, and continues apace.

Ridley and Peiser claim that research is increasingly showing climate sensitivity to be low. This is entirely the opposite of what has been happening. The most likely range of values of climate sensitivity (the amount of increase in surface temperature that eventually occurs as a result of the doubling of CO2 in the atmosphere) was established over a century ago. Recently revealed documents show that Exxon Mobil Corporation itself studied climate science as early as the late 70’s, and its findings were in clear agreement with the National Academy of Science 1979 report, which estimated a climate sensitivity of 3°C, plus or minus 1.5° C. Tables in Exxon’s 1982 Climate Change “Primer” for executives show predictions for 2015 markedly similar to contemporary estimates by NASA, and NOAA.

Meanwhile, the solutions for climate change are at hand.

Solar and wind energy have grown faster, and costs have plummeted further, than even most fervent supporters would have predicted a few years ago. Wind and solar are now out-competing coal and nuclear everywhere, and even gas in many markets. Recent volatility in oil and gas prices make the predictable zero cost of renewables all the more attractive, as more and more major corporations are signing power purchase agreements for renewable energy, based on markets, not political correctness.

In a recent article in Scientific American, Engineers Mark Jacobsen and Mark Deluchi have shown how 139 countries can generate their total energy needs by 2050 from wind, solar, and water technologies.

Today’s average cost of large-scale solar in the U.S. is 5 cents/kWh. The installed cost of solar is down by half since 2009. The cost of wind in the U.S. is 2.5 cents per kWh, and efficiency is about the same, and sometimes below 1 cent/kWh. (See this.)

Denmark, Scotland, Spain, and Portugal are now producing more than half their electricity from renewable sources, Germany is close to a third – and the German grid is 10 times more reliable than the US grid.(See this)

In 20 US states, contractors will put solar panels on your roof for free – and in San Antonio Texas, the utility will pay you for the privilege of putting those panels on, and lowering your utility bill. (See this and this)

It’s a business model that will spread, sooner than coal barons like Matt Ridley would like you to believe.

Polling shows again and again that large majorities of Americans across all demographics favor rapid development of renewable energy, and tough regulations for greenhouse gases.

In addition, most importantly, a large majority of Americans now believe that climate change is a moral issue that obligates government officials, and private citizens, to take action.

The tactics of confusion and distortion are losing their effectiveness, as more and more Americans experience the effects of a climate altered world first hand. It’s time to stop denying the science, and begin discussing the solutions.

from ScienceBlogs http://ift.tt/1IvOoJc

Ceres’ Permanent Shadows May House Relics From The Infant Solar System (Synopsis) [Starts With A Bang]

“Lots of science fiction deals with distant times and places. Intrepid prospectors in the Asteroid Belt. Interstellar epics. Galactic empires. Trips to the remote past or future.” -Edward M. Lerner

Of all the asteroids we’ve ever discovered, it’s arguably the very first one, Ceres, that’s got the most to teach us. Currently being mapped at higher and higher resolution by NASA’s Dawn Spacecraft, Ceres isn’t just the largest asteroid we’ve got, it’s also one of the least inclined, orbiting the Sun with a tilt of just 3 degrees.

Image credit: NASA / JPL-Caltech / UCLA / MPS / DLR / IDA, from the DAWN mission.

This means, much like the Moon, that there’s a chance it has permanently shadowed craters at its poles, possibly containing volatile materials that have boiled off everywhere else on the world. Yet within these permanent shadows, relics from billions of years ago may still persist.

Image credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/UCLA/MPS/DLR/IDA, via http://ift.tt/1T6owcW.

Come find out what might be in there on today’s Mostly Mute Monday!

from ScienceBlogs http://ift.tt/1TnNKnu

“Lots of science fiction deals with distant times and places. Intrepid prospectors in the Asteroid Belt. Interstellar epics. Galactic empires. Trips to the remote past or future.” -Edward M. Lerner

Of all the asteroids we’ve ever discovered, it’s arguably the very first one, Ceres, that’s got the most to teach us. Currently being mapped at higher and higher resolution by NASA’s Dawn Spacecraft, Ceres isn’t just the largest asteroid we’ve got, it’s also one of the least inclined, orbiting the Sun with a tilt of just 3 degrees.

Image credit: NASA / JPL-Caltech / UCLA / MPS / DLR / IDA, from the DAWN mission.

This means, much like the Moon, that there’s a chance it has permanently shadowed craters at its poles, possibly containing volatile materials that have boiled off everywhere else on the world. Yet within these permanent shadows, relics from billions of years ago may still persist.

Image credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/UCLA/MPS/DLR/IDA, via http://ift.tt/1T6owcW.

Come find out what might be in there on today’s Mostly Mute Monday!

from ScienceBlogs http://ift.tt/1TnNKnu

New Facility Shows Path to Future Army Training

Maj. Mike Stinchfield, left, and Maj. Greg. Pavlichko demonstrate the virtual capabilities of the Stryker Virtual Collective Trainer concept at the Combined Arms Center – Training Innovation Facility on Fort Leavenworth, Kan. Photo by Mike Casey.

By Mike Casey – Combined Arms Center – Training 

A team of soldiers and civilians is hammering plywood together and adding off-the-shelf electronics to demonstrate ideas for a new generation of Army training capabilities.

The Combined Arms Center – Training Innovation Facility, or CAC-TIF, last year began its mission of assisting the Army in generating ideas for enhanced training with low-cost solutions.

“The CAC-TIF is a living laboratory for the field and tactical formations,” said Brig. Gen. Mark J. O’Neil, deputy commanding general of the Combined Arms Center – Training. “We want to work with the force to find ways to fill training gaps. Through collaborative efforts, we will save time and money in developing the new training capabilities.”

Besides working with the force, the CAC-TIF team will collaborate with the Program Executive Office for Simulation, Training and Instrumentation, which develops, acquires and sustains simulators for training.

The CAC-TIF’s work on the Stryker Virtual Collective Trainer concept exemplifies how the facility is taking requests from the field.

In 2013, Lt. Gen. Robert B. Brown, then commanding general of I Corps, wanted a Stryker training simulator, but not at the cost of simulators that replicate the Abrams, Bradley and other vehicles. CAC-TIF developers used commercially available virtual reality headsets to create a 360-degree immersive environment and opted for touch screens instead of a number of buttons. Rather than creating an expensive metal platform, developers chose plywood.

“We built one vehicle interface for less than $7,000,” said Maj. Mike Stinchfield, who manages the CAC-TIF. He emphasized that the current model is for demonstration and testing – not for use by the force now.

In December, the CAC-TIF team will showcase the Stryker Virtual Collective Trainer concept at the Interservice/Industry Training, Simulation and Education Conference, and later take the demonstration to Maneuver Center of Excellence and home stations to receive Soldier feedback.

“We want to hear from soldiers to find out what works and what doesn’t work,” Stinchfield said.

The CAC-TIF is part of the U.S. Army Training and Doctrine Command, or TRADOC, Capability Manager – Virtual and Gaming, which writes requirements for training simulators and approves simulators for the field.

Getting early feedback from the force will help the Army get training products to soldiers quicker and at lower costs, Stinchfield said.

One of the cost savers is the virtual reality headset versus the more expensive simulator’s computer screens.

“Virtual reality provides immersion and a sense of presence that is as good, if not better than the current simulators, at a fraction of the cost. The technology needs improvements, but several major companies will release retail versions in 2016 that we anticipate will be fully capable for the Stryker trainer,” he said.

The CAC-TIF, however, did not scrimp on some items. “The joystick that controls the remote weapon system in the Stryker is exactly the same as the real one,” Stinchfield said. “That form, fit and function needed to be there.”

Stinchfield’s team used the Army’s flagship gaming program, Virtual Battlespace 3, to create the simulation environment for the Stryker.

Brown, now the commanding general of the Combined Arms Center on Fort Leavenworth, recently visited the CAC-TIF. “The CAC-TIF has the potential to significantly improve readiness through home station training,” he said.

“This needs to get out and demonstrated to home stations for feedback from Stryker leaders and soldiers,” said Brown regarding the Stryker vehicle.

The CAC-TIF team is planning several visits to Stryker locations with the demonstration.

from Armed with Science http://ift.tt/1PnSACE

Maj. Mike Stinchfield, left, and Maj. Greg. Pavlichko demonstrate the virtual capabilities of the Stryker Virtual Collective Trainer concept at the Combined Arms Center – Training Innovation Facility on Fort Leavenworth, Kan. Photo by Mike Casey.

By Mike Casey – Combined Arms Center – Training 

A team of soldiers and civilians is hammering plywood together and adding off-the-shelf electronics to demonstrate ideas for a new generation of Army training capabilities.

The Combined Arms Center – Training Innovation Facility, or CAC-TIF, last year began its mission of assisting the Army in generating ideas for enhanced training with low-cost solutions.

“The CAC-TIF is a living laboratory for the field and tactical formations,” said Brig. Gen. Mark J. O’Neil, deputy commanding general of the Combined Arms Center – Training. “We want to work with the force to find ways to fill training gaps. Through collaborative efforts, we will save time and money in developing the new training capabilities.”

Besides working with the force, the CAC-TIF team will collaborate with the Program Executive Office for Simulation, Training and Instrumentation, which develops, acquires and sustains simulators for training.

The CAC-TIF’s work on the Stryker Virtual Collective Trainer concept exemplifies how the facility is taking requests from the field.

In 2013, Lt. Gen. Robert B. Brown, then commanding general of I Corps, wanted a Stryker training simulator, but not at the cost of simulators that replicate the Abrams, Bradley and other vehicles. CAC-TIF developers used commercially available virtual reality headsets to create a 360-degree immersive environment and opted for touch screens instead of a number of buttons. Rather than creating an expensive metal platform, developers chose plywood.

“We built one vehicle interface for less than $7,000,” said Maj. Mike Stinchfield, who manages the CAC-TIF. He emphasized that the current model is for demonstration and testing – not for use by the force now.

In December, the CAC-TIF team will showcase the Stryker Virtual Collective Trainer concept at the Interservice/Industry Training, Simulation and Education Conference, and later take the demonstration to Maneuver Center of Excellence and home stations to receive Soldier feedback.

“We want to hear from soldiers to find out what works and what doesn’t work,” Stinchfield said.

The CAC-TIF is part of the U.S. Army Training and Doctrine Command, or TRADOC, Capability Manager – Virtual and Gaming, which writes requirements for training simulators and approves simulators for the field.

Getting early feedback from the force will help the Army get training products to soldiers quicker and at lower costs, Stinchfield said.

One of the cost savers is the virtual reality headset versus the more expensive simulator’s computer screens.

“Virtual reality provides immersion and a sense of presence that is as good, if not better than the current simulators, at a fraction of the cost. The technology needs improvements, but several major companies will release retail versions in 2016 that we anticipate will be fully capable for the Stryker trainer,” he said.

The CAC-TIF, however, did not scrimp on some items. “The joystick that controls the remote weapon system in the Stryker is exactly the same as the real one,” Stinchfield said. “That form, fit and function needed to be there.”

Stinchfield’s team used the Army’s flagship gaming program, Virtual Battlespace 3, to create the simulation environment for the Stryker.

Brown, now the commanding general of the Combined Arms Center on Fort Leavenworth, recently visited the CAC-TIF. “The CAC-TIF has the potential to significantly improve readiness through home station training,” he said.

“This needs to get out and demonstrated to home stations for feedback from Stryker leaders and soldiers,” said Brown regarding the Stryker vehicle.

The CAC-TIF team is planning several visits to Stryker locations with the demonstration.

from Armed with Science http://ift.tt/1PnSACE

Highly efficient Buckycatchers

Capturing buckyballs involves molecular design based on non-covalent interactions. This poses interesting challenges for both the designer and the computational chemist. The curved surface of the buckyball demands a sequestering agent with a complementary curved surface, likely an aromatic curved surface to facilitate π-π stacking interactions. For the computational chemist, weak interactions, like dispersion and π-π stacking demand special attention, particularly density functionals designed to account for these interactions.

Two very intriguing new buckycatchers were recently prepared in the Sygula lab, and also examined by DFT.¹ Compounds 1 and 2 make use of the scaffold developed by Klärner.² In these two buckycatchers, the tongs are corranulenes, providing a curved aromatic surface to match the C₆₀ and C₇₀ surface. They differ in the length of the connector unit.

B97-D/TZVP computations of the complex of 1 and 2 with C₆₀ were carried out. The optimized structures are shown in Figure 1. The binding energies (computed at B97-D/QZVP*//B97-D/TZVP) of these two complexes are really quite large. The binding energy for 1:C₆₀ is 33.6 kcal mol^-1, comparable to some previous Buckycatchers, but the binding energy of 2:C₆₀ is 50.0 kcal mol^-1, larger than any predicted before.

1

2

Figure 1. B97-D/TZVP optimized geometries of 1:C₆₀and 2:C₆₀.

Measurement of the binding energy using NMR was complicated by a competition for one or two molecules of 2 binding to buckyballs. Nonetheless, the experimental data show 2 binds to C₆₀ and C₇₀ more effectively than any previous host. They were also able to obtain a crystal structure of 2:C₆₀.

References

(1) Abeyratne Kuragama, P. L.; Fronczek, F. R.; Sygula, A. "Bis-corannulene Receptors for Fullerenes Based on Klärner’s Tethers: Reaching the Affinity Limits," Org. Lett. 2015, ASAP, DOI: 10.1021/acs.orglett.5b02666.

(2) Klärner, F.-G.; Schrader, T. "Aromatic Interactions by Molecular Tweezers and Clips in Chemical and Biological Systems," Acc. Chem. Res. 2013, 46, 967-978, DOI: 10.1021/ar300061c.

InChIs

1: InChI=1S/C62H34O2/c1-63-61-57-43-23-45(41-21-37-33-17-13-29-9-5-25-3-7-27-11-15-31(35(37)19-39(41)43)53-49(27)47(25)51(29)55(33)53)59(57)62(64-2)60-46-24-44(58(60)61)40-20-36-32-16-12-28-8-4-26-6-10-30-14-18-34(38(36)22-42(40)46)56-52(30)48(26)50(28)54(32)56/h3-22,43-46H,23-24H2,1-2H3/t43-,44+,45+,46-
InChIKey=RLOJCVYXCBOUQB-RYSLUOGPSA-N

2: InChI=1S/C66H36O2/c1-67-65-51-24-45-43-23-44(42-20-38-34-16-12-30-8-4-27-3-7-29-11-15-33(37(38)19-41(42)43)59-55(29)53(27)56(30)60(34)59)46(45)25-52(51)66(68-2)64-50-26-49(63(64)65)47-21-39-35-17-13-31-9-5-28-6-10-32-14-18-36(40(39)22-48(47)50)62-58(32)54(28)57(31)61(35)62/h3-22,24-25,43-44,49-50H,23,26H2,1-2H3/t43-,44+,49+,50-
InChIKey=JAUUHTKCNSNBMD-NETXOKAWSA-N

from Computational Organic Chemistry http://ift.tt/1Nljp84

Capturing buckyballs involves molecular design based on non-covalent interactions. This poses interesting challenges for both the designer and the computational chemist. The curved surface of the buckyball demands a sequestering agent with a complementary curved surface, likely an aromatic curved surface to facilitate π-π stacking interactions. For the computational chemist, weak interactions, like dispersion and π-π stacking demand special attention, particularly density functionals designed to account for these interactions.

Two very intriguing new buckycatchers were recently prepared in the Sygula lab, and also examined by DFT.¹ Compounds 1 and 2 make use of the scaffold developed by Klärner.² In these two buckycatchers, the tongs are corranulenes, providing a curved aromatic surface to match the C₆₀ and C₇₀ surface. They differ in the length of the connector unit.

B97-D/TZVP computations of the complex of 1 and 2 with C₆₀ were carried out. The optimized structures are shown in Figure 1. The binding energies (computed at B97-D/QZVP*//B97-D/TZVP) of these two complexes are really quite large. The binding energy for 1:C₆₀ is 33.6 kcal mol^-1, comparable to some previous Buckycatchers, but the binding energy of 2:C₆₀ is 50.0 kcal mol^-1, larger than any predicted before.

1

2

Figure 1. B97-D/TZVP optimized geometries of 1:C₆₀and 2:C₆₀.

Measurement of the binding energy using NMR was complicated by a competition for one or two molecules of 2 binding to buckyballs. Nonetheless, the experimental data show 2 binds to C₆₀ and C₇₀ more effectively than any previous host. They were also able to obtain a crystal structure of 2:C₆₀.

References

(1) Abeyratne Kuragama, P. L.; Fronczek, F. R.; Sygula, A. "Bis-corannulene Receptors for Fullerenes Based on Klärner’s Tethers: Reaching the Affinity Limits," Org. Lett. 2015, ASAP, DOI: 10.1021/acs.orglett.5b02666.

(2) Klärner, F.-G.; Schrader, T. "Aromatic Interactions by Molecular Tweezers and Clips in Chemical and Biological Systems," Acc. Chem. Res. 2013, 46, 967-978, DOI: 10.1021/ar300061c.

InChIs

1: InChI=1S/C62H34O2/c1-63-61-57-43-23-45(41-21-37-33-17-13-29-9-5-25-3-7-27-11-15-31(35(37)19-39(41)43)53-49(27)47(25)51(29)55(33)53)59(57)62(64-2)60-46-24-44(58(60)61)40-20-36-32-16-12-28-8-4-26-6-10-30-14-18-34(38(36)22-42(40)46)56-52(30)48(26)50(28)54(32)56/h3-22,43-46H,23-24H2,1-2H3/t43-,44+,45+,46-
InChIKey=RLOJCVYXCBOUQB-RYSLUOGPSA-N

2: InChI=1S/C66H36O2/c1-67-65-51-24-45-43-23-44(42-20-38-34-16-12-30-8-4-27-3-7-29-11-15-33(37(38)19-41(42)43)59-55(29)53(27)56(30)60(34)59)46(45)25-52(51)66(68-2)64-50-26-49(63(64)65)47-21-39-35-17-13-31-9-5-28-6-10-32-14-18-36(40(39)22-48(47)50)62-58(32)54(28)57(31)61(35)62/h3-22,24-25,43-44,49-50H,23,26H2,1-2H3/t43-,44+,49+,50-
InChIKey=JAUUHTKCNSNBMD-NETXOKAWSA-N

from Computational Organic Chemistry http://ift.tt/1Nljp84

November Pieces Of My Mind #3 [Aardvarchaeology]

Irish trad session at Wirström’s pub in Stockholm’s Old Town

• One of the most annoying and amateurish things a graphic designer can do, in my experience, is to insert hard hyphens.
• I make a policy of keeping conservative and libertarian people in my Facebook feed and not muting them even though I don’t agree with them. But lately I’ve had to add a subclause: I’m only keeping the smarter, better-reasoning ones. Because really, it’s just unproductive for everyone if I allow my image of my political opponents to get skewed by the stupidest and angriest members of their camp.
• A lot of people let Muslim refugees stay in their spare rooms right now. We can’t do that because we’ve got a Muslim bartender staying in ours while he has his Östermalm bachelor pad refurbished. He’s always here a lot for game night anyway.
• Wife frying dried cuttlefish strips. A heavy cloud of unwashed crotch permeates our house.
• The timer on the tree lights covering our little lilac tree sounds just like a defragging hard disk.
• Woah. I just checked the competition for this job in a neighbouring country. The competitor with the largest number of publications in their national library has 7 titles there. I have 18. In their national library.
• Can we just agree that “materiality” is a useless buzzword in archaeology and move on?
• I want to make sacrifice to Odinn. Or pray to Saint Lawrence. But since I was born in Sweden after the Reformation, I can’t really. It would be diachronic cultural appropriation.
• Author submits image with too few pixels. Argues that since it was clipped from a 300 dpi photo it should work just fine.
• Hehe. Sinéad O’Connor’s cover of “Song To The Siren” copies the melodic ornaments of the TMC/Cocteau cover, with lyrics clearly mistranscribed from that version.
• Jrette grumbling about Adele Adkins’s vocal range, which makes her songs difficult.
• The latest episode of Radiolab is amazing. Deals with international surrogate parenthood, ”baby outsourcing”. It’s got terrified Israeli gay men running around Katmandu during the earthquake clutching their infant sons and daughters. It’s got interviews with housemaids from Darjeeling conducted in the house where they stay with their kids during their surrogate pregnancies. It’s a jaw-dropper!
• Yesterday the Swedish government came out and said “We can’t receive more asylum seekers to a standard that we can accept”. I’m more interested in whether we can receive more asylum seekers to a standard that they can accept, that is, one that is preferable to getting tortured and killed by the Daesh.
• This scholar publishes papers in Swedish, then tries to list them in later bibliographies with titles in English “because they have English summaries”.
• “Candle” is bougie in French. This goes back to the town of Béjaïa in Algeria which was a centre of wax production and candle making in the Middle Ages.
• In Medieval Stockholm, butchers lived on the west side of the town island towards Lake Mälaren with its rich farming districts. Fishermen lived on the seaward east side.
• Driving four refugees last night to accommodation provided by a temperance lodge in Häggvik, I got directions from one of the guys who had satnav in his phone. It gave directions in Arabic and he gesticulated.
• Went out scouting the forgotten strips of municipal property in the area my dad lives in. Discovered two types: disused unpaved streets (now largely paths) and post-borne power lines. The latter are used as free parking spaces for cars and boat trailers.
• If you donate at least SEK 300 to the World Wildlife Fund right now, they’ll send you a cuddly turtle. I’m donating SEK 299 to avoid this. I wish they’d stop sending me a bloody book every year too.
• A music journalist on Little Atoms last week exemplified those who don’t care much about music with “people who will just buy Adele CDs”. I was a little hurt. I’m a big music nerd and care lots, and I think Adele is really impressive.
• I’m walking in this pro-refugee protest behind the banner of Revolutionary Communist Youth, despite being neither.
• Jrette exclaimed “PNYEAH”. I decided that it was a freedom of speech issue and did not investigate. Or it may have been a sneeze.

from ScienceBlogs http://ift.tt/1NDywfl

Irish trad session at Wirström’s pub in Stockholm’s Old Town

• One of the most annoying and amateurish things a graphic designer can do, in my experience, is to insert hard hyphens.
• I make a policy of keeping conservative and libertarian people in my Facebook feed and not muting them even though I don’t agree with them. But lately I’ve had to add a subclause: I’m only keeping the smarter, better-reasoning ones. Because really, it’s just unproductive for everyone if I allow my image of my political opponents to get skewed by the stupidest and angriest members of their camp.
• A lot of people let Muslim refugees stay in their spare rooms right now. We can’t do that because we’ve got a Muslim bartender staying in ours while he has his Östermalm bachelor pad refurbished. He’s always here a lot for game night anyway.
• Wife frying dried cuttlefish strips. A heavy cloud of unwashed crotch permeates our house.
• The timer on the tree lights covering our little lilac tree sounds just like a defragging hard disk.
• Woah. I just checked the competition for this job in a neighbouring country. The competitor with the largest number of publications in their national library has 7 titles there. I have 18. In their national library.
• Can we just agree that “materiality” is a useless buzzword in archaeology and move on?
• I want to make sacrifice to Odinn. Or pray to Saint Lawrence. But since I was born in Sweden after the Reformation, I can’t really. It would be diachronic cultural appropriation.
• Author submits image with too few pixels. Argues that since it was clipped from a 300 dpi photo it should work just fine.
• Hehe. Sinéad O’Connor’s cover of “Song To The Siren” copies the melodic ornaments of the TMC/Cocteau cover, with lyrics clearly mistranscribed from that version.
• Jrette grumbling about Adele Adkins’s vocal range, which makes her songs difficult.
• The latest episode of Radiolab is amazing. Deals with international surrogate parenthood, ”baby outsourcing”. It’s got terrified Israeli gay men running around Katmandu during the earthquake clutching their infant sons and daughters. It’s got interviews with housemaids from Darjeeling conducted in the house where they stay with their kids during their surrogate pregnancies. It’s a jaw-dropper!
• Yesterday the Swedish government came out and said “We can’t receive more asylum seekers to a standard that we can accept”. I’m more interested in whether we can receive more asylum seekers to a standard that they can accept, that is, one that is preferable to getting tortured and killed by the Daesh.
• This scholar publishes papers in Swedish, then tries to list them in later bibliographies with titles in English “because they have English summaries”.
• “Candle” is bougie in French. This goes back to the town of Béjaïa in Algeria which was a centre of wax production and candle making in the Middle Ages.
• In Medieval Stockholm, butchers lived on the west side of the town island towards Lake Mälaren with its rich farming districts. Fishermen lived on the seaward east side.
• Driving four refugees last night to accommodation provided by a temperance lodge in Häggvik, I got directions from one of the guys who had satnav in his phone. It gave directions in Arabic and he gesticulated.
• Went out scouting the forgotten strips of municipal property in the area my dad lives in. Discovered two types: disused unpaved streets (now largely paths) and post-borne power lines. The latter are used as free parking spaces for cars and boat trailers.
• If you donate at least SEK 300 to the World Wildlife Fund right now, they’ll send you a cuddly turtle. I’m donating SEK 299 to avoid this. I wish they’d stop sending me a bloody book every year too.
• A music journalist on Little Atoms last week exemplified those who don’t care much about music with “people who will just buy Adele CDs”. I was a little hurt. I’m a big music nerd and care lots, and I think Adele is really impressive.
• I’m walking in this pro-refugee protest behind the banner of Revolutionary Communist Youth, despite being neither.
• Jrette exclaimed “PNYEAH”. I decided that it was a freedom of speech issue and did not investigate. Or it may have been a sneeze.

from ScienceBlogs http://ift.tt/1NDywfl

Bumping up against a parallel universe

Ranga-Ram Chary. Visit his bio page.

A scientist has evidence of our universe and a parallel universe bumping into one another, in the distant past. An analysis by Ranga-Ram Chary of a map of the cosmic microwave background revealed eerie glowing patches that he thinks might be imprints left in the encounter. The map comes from data gathered by a space observatory called Planck, operated by the European Space Agency (ESA) from 2009 to 2013, and Chary is a researcher at the at the U.S. Planck Data Center at CalTech. Follow the links below to learn more:

Many universes?

What Ranga-Ram Chary found

Many universes? Until recent decades, most astronomers would have told you that, by definition, the word universe means all there is. That word was used to describe all space, time, matter, physical laws and constants. But now a new word – multiverse – has entered the language of scientists.

Not all scientists agree, but some – including Stephen Hawking, for example, and Alan Guth of MIT – believe there’s scientific justification for a multiverse, many universes springing into being, possibly existing simultaneously, each possibly with its own physics. If true, then our universe of stars and galaxies is just a small part of this vast assemblage of many universes.

The New York Times was describing a brief history of the multiverse when it explained that the argument for it comes from Big Bang theory:

… according to the standard model, shortly after the universe exploded into existence about 14 billion years ago, it suddenly jumped in size by an enormous factor. This ‘inflation’ can best be understood by imagining that the observable universe is, relatively speaking, a tiny blob of space buried deep within a vast labyrinth of interconnected cosmic regions.

Under this theory, if you took a God’s-eye view of the multiverse, you would see big bangs aplenty generating a tangled melee of universes enveloped in a superstructure of frenetically inflating space.

Though individual universes may live and die, the multiverse is forever.

How can we envision the multiverse? There are different ways of describing the possibilties, and scientists nowadays may speak of bubble universes, or a quantum multiverse. You can read a relatively easy compilation of scientists’ ideas about the multiverse on Wikipedia.

The cosmic microwave background – first theorized in the 1940s and first observed in 1965 by Arno Penzias and Robert Wilson at the Bell Telephone Laboratories in New Jersey – is a tool for studying the possibility of alternate universes.

Theorists determined several years ago that, if two universes started out close enough that they touched before expanding space pushed them apart, they could leave an imprint – a bruise – on each other that might show up on the cosmic microwave background.

View larger. | ESA’s Planck space observatory released the highest resolution map yet of the cosmic microwave background – CMB – in 2013. It shows tiny temperature fluctuations that correspond to regions of slightly different densities in the early days of our universe: the seeds of future galaxies and stars. Map via ESA.

What Ranga-Ram Chary found. The cosmic microwave background is often described as relic radiation leftover from the Big Bang. ESA’s Planck space observatory has been the third space observatory specifically designed to study it. It mapped the cosmic microwave background with greater precision than its two predecessor satellites, COBE and WMAP.

Analyzing those maps is part of Chary’s job at the U.S. Planck Data Center.

NewScientist.com broke the story about his recent analysis of the cosmic microwave background about a month ago. It described what he did this way:

Instead of looking at the [cosmic microwave background, or CMB] itself, Chary subtracted a model of the CMB from Planck’s picture of the entire sky. Then he took away everything else, too: the stars, gas and dust.

With our universe scrubbed away, nothing should be left except noise.

But in a certain frequency range, scattered patches on the sky look far brighter than they should.

This residual signal was about 4,500 times brighter than it should be and may represent an imprint from a parallel universe, which bumped into ours long ago. Chary himself feels tentative about this conclusion. In his paper, published at arXiv.org in October, he wrote:

…it could also possibly be due to the collision of our universe with an alternate universe.

But he also says that there’s a 30% probability the signal is just noise. And, in an email, he told EarthSky:

One has to trust the data since Nature has a way of surprising us with the unexpected. But for something as unusual as alternate universes, one needs at least two independent lines of evidence. Right now, we have only one, and it is currently right at the limit of the current data from Planck.

This isn’t the first time that a scientists has found possible evidence that other universes have bumped up against our own. In 2010, Stephen M. Feeney et al also described four statistically unlikely circular patterns in the cosmic microwave background (CMB). They also mentioned the possibility of bruises to our universe, caused by being bumped four times by other universes. Their evidence came from Planck’s predecessor, the Wilkinson Microwave Anisotropy Probe, or WMAP, and it was later disproven. But Planck sees the cosmic microwave background about three times more clearly than WMAP.

This greater detail might mean that an observation of an imprint from another universe is now possible.

If alternate universes do exist, we cannot contact them. But Chary expressed his personal belief that their existence has profound implications for our universe, when he told EarthSky:

… unless we have a physically motivated way to explain the value of key physical parameters of our universe – such as the baryon to photon ratio, the fine structure constant and the total energy density – one has to conclude that Nature may be playing dice after all, and we are just a random Universe among a multitude of others.

Is our universe one among many in a multiverse?

Bottom line: A researcher at the U.S. Planck Data Center, Ranga-Ram Chary, conducted an analysis of the cosmic microwave background that revealed eerie glowing patches – 4,500 brighter than they should have been. There’s a 30% probability the signal is just noise, but it might also be a cosmic fist-bump: evidence of our universe colliding with another universe.

Read more about Planck and the cosmic microwave background

from EarthSky http://ift.tt/1Oq1q1j

Ranga-Ram Chary. Visit his bio page.

A scientist has evidence of our universe and a parallel universe bumping into one another, in the distant past. An analysis by Ranga-Ram Chary of a map of the cosmic microwave background revealed eerie glowing patches that he thinks might be imprints left in the encounter. The map comes from data gathered by a space observatory called Planck, operated by the European Space Agency (ESA) from 2009 to 2013, and Chary is a researcher at the at the U.S. Planck Data Center at CalTech. Follow the links below to learn more:

Many universes?

What Ranga-Ram Chary found

Many universes? Until recent decades, most astronomers would have told you that, by definition, the word universe means all there is. That word was used to describe all space, time, matter, physical laws and constants. But now a new word – multiverse – has entered the language of scientists.

Not all scientists agree, but some – including Stephen Hawking, for example, and Alan Guth of MIT – believe there’s scientific justification for a multiverse, many universes springing into being, possibly existing simultaneously, each possibly with its own physics. If true, then our universe of stars and galaxies is just a small part of this vast assemblage of many universes.

The New York Times was describing a brief history of the multiverse when it explained that the argument for it comes from Big Bang theory:

… according to the standard model, shortly after the universe exploded into existence about 14 billion years ago, it suddenly jumped in size by an enormous factor. This ‘inflation’ can best be understood by imagining that the observable universe is, relatively speaking, a tiny blob of space buried deep within a vast labyrinth of interconnected cosmic regions.

Under this theory, if you took a God’s-eye view of the multiverse, you would see big bangs aplenty generating a tangled melee of universes enveloped in a superstructure of frenetically inflating space.

Though individual universes may live and die, the multiverse is forever.

How can we envision the multiverse? There are different ways of describing the possibilties, and scientists nowadays may speak of bubble universes, or a quantum multiverse. You can read a relatively easy compilation of scientists’ ideas about the multiverse on Wikipedia.

The cosmic microwave background – first theorized in the 1940s and first observed in 1965 by Arno Penzias and Robert Wilson at the Bell Telephone Laboratories in New Jersey – is a tool for studying the possibility of alternate universes.

Theorists determined several years ago that, if two universes started out close enough that they touched before expanding space pushed them apart, they could leave an imprint – a bruise – on each other that might show up on the cosmic microwave background.

View larger. | ESA’s Planck space observatory released the highest resolution map yet of the cosmic microwave background – CMB – in 2013. It shows tiny temperature fluctuations that correspond to regions of slightly different densities in the early days of our universe: the seeds of future galaxies and stars. Map via ESA.

What Ranga-Ram Chary found. The cosmic microwave background is often described as relic radiation leftover from the Big Bang. ESA’s Planck space observatory has been the third space observatory specifically designed to study it. It mapped the cosmic microwave background with greater precision than its two predecessor satellites, COBE and WMAP.

Analyzing those maps is part of Chary’s job at the U.S. Planck Data Center.

NewScientist.com broke the story about his recent analysis of the cosmic microwave background about a month ago. It described what he did this way:

Instead of looking at the [cosmic microwave background, or CMB] itself, Chary subtracted a model of the CMB from Planck’s picture of the entire sky. Then he took away everything else, too: the stars, gas and dust.

With our universe scrubbed away, nothing should be left except noise.

But in a certain frequency range, scattered patches on the sky look far brighter than they should.

This residual signal was about 4,500 times brighter than it should be and may represent an imprint from a parallel universe, which bumped into ours long ago. Chary himself feels tentative about this conclusion. In his paper, published at arXiv.org in October, he wrote:

…it could also possibly be due to the collision of our universe with an alternate universe.

But he also says that there’s a 30% probability the signal is just noise. And, in an email, he told EarthSky:

One has to trust the data since Nature has a way of surprising us with the unexpected. But for something as unusual as alternate universes, one needs at least two independent lines of evidence. Right now, we have only one, and it is currently right at the limit of the current data from Planck.

This isn’t the first time that a scientists has found possible evidence that other universes have bumped up against our own. In 2010, Stephen M. Feeney et al also described four statistically unlikely circular patterns in the cosmic microwave background (CMB). They also mentioned the possibility of bruises to our universe, caused by being bumped four times by other universes. Their evidence came from Planck’s predecessor, the Wilkinson Microwave Anisotropy Probe, or WMAP, and it was later disproven. But Planck sees the cosmic microwave background about three times more clearly than WMAP.

This greater detail might mean that an observation of an imprint from another universe is now possible.

If alternate universes do exist, we cannot contact them. But Chary expressed his personal belief that their existence has profound implications for our universe, when he told EarthSky:

… unless we have a physically motivated way to explain the value of key physical parameters of our universe – such as the baryon to photon ratio, the fine structure constant and the total energy density – one has to conclude that Nature may be playing dice after all, and we are just a random Universe among a multitude of others.

Is our universe one among many in a multiverse?

Bottom line: A researcher at the U.S. Planck Data Center, Ranga-Ram Chary, conducted an analysis of the cosmic microwave background that revealed eerie glowing patches – 4,500 brighter than they should have been. There’s a 30% probability the signal is just noise, but it might also be a cosmic fist-bump: evidence of our universe colliding with another universe.

Read more about Planck and the cosmic microwave background

from EarthSky http://ift.tt/1Oq1q1j