science

Monster Prominence

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Yesterday (Feb. 24, 2011), a rather large flare (M 3.6 class coronal mass ejection) occurred near the edge of the Sun. It blew out a gorgeous, waving mass of erupting plasma that swirled and twisted over a 90-minute period . In the words of to the Solar Dynamics Observatory:

This event was captured in extreme ultraviolet light by NASA’s Solar Dynamics Observatory spacecraft . Some of the material blew out into space and other portions fell back to the surface. Using a cadence of a frame taken every 24 seconds, the sense of motion is, by all appearances, seamless. Sit back and enjoy the jaw-dropping solar show.



Per usual, this video is also best enjoyed full screen.

…At The Speed Of Lightning

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Lightning Strike
(Image courtesy of University Of Florida Lightning Research Group)

How lightning works is still pretty much a mystery. But this summer, some large steps to understanding it’s movement were made. Until recently, there wasn’t fast enough camera technology to capture an x-ray image of lightning.

A new camera has a resolution sharp enough to reveal a bright ball of x-rays at the head of the bolt, with almost no lingering radiation along the bolt’s trail. The X-ray glow follows a so-called lightning leader – a channel in the air that forms a path for the lightning. The leader’s charged tip creates an electric field that accelerates electrons almost to the speed of light and causes the X-ray emissions.

The lightning leader is also known as a step leader, because it seems to travel by leaps and bounds rather than in a continuous line. The trail left by the step leader allows negative charge to travel down, even as positively charged leaders travel upward from the ground to meet in the middle. That triggers a so-called return stroke moving upward from the ground toward the cloud – the flash of what human eyes see as lightning.

You can find a lot more lightning stuff on Artifacting.

Your Face In Space

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I’m not exactly sure why, but NASA has launched a program to get your face into orbit. They want to put a picture of you on one of the two remaining space shuttle missions. You can choose between mission STS-133 with an expected launch date of 11/01/2010 and mission STS-134 with an expected launch date of 02/26/2011.

Simply visit NASA’s Face In Space website, choose your mission, upload your photo, and get into orbit. Return to the site after mission launch to print your Flight Certificate – a commemorative certificate signed by the Mission Commander. You can also check on mission status, view mission photographs, and follow the commander and crew on Twitter or Facebook.

Beginners Guide To Viewing The Persied Meteor Shower

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The annual summer Perseid meteor shower is set to display its glory in our skies over the next couple of days. The show comes as Earth passes through the dust trail of the Swift-Tuttle Comet. The meteors that scorch through the atmosphere appear to come from the constellation Perseus. The peak of the show is expected to be this evening, Thursday the 12th of August. The show should be particularly easy to view this year since there will be little light interference from the moon.

If you go outside a little early on Thursday evening, around sunset, you’ll see a beautiful gathering of planets in the sunset sky–Venus, Mars, Saturn and the crescent Moon. It’s a nice way to start a meteor watch. Here are a few tips to help you have the best viewing experience.

  • Check the weather. If it’s cloudy in your area there’s no point to the rest of it. Checking the weather will also let you know if you should bring a coat or warm clothes.
  • Clear Sky Charts are a good way to determine how dark and cloudy your night sky will be. For example, here is the chart for Denver:

  • Try to get out of the city. Your viewing experience is greatly diminished by light pollution: the leftover glow leaked from densely populated cities’ artificial light. Use this website to help you determine the darkest place for viewing in your area.
  • Use this website to help you determine the peak time for viewing in your timezone. The best Perseid activity, no matter the date or location, is usually seen during the last hour before the start of morning twilight, when Perseus lies highest above the horizon in a dark sky. This is usually between the hours of 4:00 AM and 5:00 AM for most of us. If you can’t time it exactly don’t worry, anytime after midnight you should see a healthy number of “shooting stars” throughout the night.
  • The meteors will appear to be coming from the near the Persius constellation. So try to find a location with a low horizon to the north-northeast (if you are in Northern hemisphere). It’s not important that you look precisely at the Persius constellation but a goodstar chart will help you orientate yourself to the heavens and give you an idea of what you are looking at. Sky maps can also be found online and for the iPhone.
  • Relax your eyes and let you gaze wander this will allow you to pick up on the quick flashes that are produced by the shower.

    • Things to bring:

    • A coat or blanket
    • Bugspray
    • A flashlight
    • A compass (or a good sense of direction)
    • A folding lounge chair
    • Drinks & snacks
    • A sense of wonder

Most of all it’s important to have fun and enjoy the splendors of nature. If you’re interested in learning more about meteor showers this amateur astronomy website is a good place to start.

The Booty-Call And The Acts Involved Therein

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A study recently published online in the Journal of Sex Research titled “Positioning the Booty-Call Relationship on the Spectrum of Relationships: Sexual but More Emotional Than One-Night Stands” investigates the nature of the acts engaged in during a booty-call. The study aimed to (a) examine the types of emotional and sexual acts involved in booty-call relationships and (b) compare the frequency of those acts to one-night stands and serious long-term relationships

Acts that are more characteristic of some degree of emotional intimacy (e.g., kissing on the lips) were most common in serious relationships but were also committed frequently in the context of booty-call relationships. This also suggests that part of the nature of booty-call relationships contains some degree of emotional intimacy.

The table below shows the frequency each individual sexual/emotional act within in each particular relationship type

[table id=3 /]

Not surprisingly, the researchers found that the booty-call relationship is more closely aligned with casual-sex relationships than serious long-term relationships. For instance, there was a positively correlation with the tendency to leave immediately after sex for booty-call relationships and one-night stands, but not for serious romantic relationships. However, the booty-call isn’t strictly sexual.

Booty-call relationships appear to be characterized by a combination of emotional (e.g., kissing on the lips) and sexual (e.g., penile-vaginal sex) acts. Emotional acts are of particular importance to demonstrate that booty-call relationships are distinct from one-night stands. One-night stands occur a single time, where sexual gratification is paramount and emotional feelings or acts are rather absent (Fisher & Byrne, 1978). In contrast, booty-call relationships have the longevity to explore other aspects and interests of the individuals’ sexuality.

In addition, the stunted emotional aspect combined with the longer time-horizons associated with the booty-call can be correlated to greater sexual exploration (teh butt seks!) than is allowed for in one-night stands.

we found that booty-call relationships were characterized by higher levels of kissing, in general, as well as manual and anal sex than in one-night stands. It may be that the limited time that characterizes one-night stands forces individuals to prioritize a small number of sex acts, or it may be that they do not feel comfortable making sexual requests for less common acts because they might lead to a global rejection and, therefore, to no sex at all. In the relatively less temporary and more acquainted context of booty-call relationships, individuals may have the freedom to explore their sexuality more because they have more time and less fear of being entirely rejected.

Also of interest, the researchers also made an attempt to determine why leaving immediately afters sex was so much common among booty-calls than one-night stands or long-term relationships.

By minimizing acts that are emotionally intimate and leaving after sex, partners may effectively prevent booty-call relationships from turning into committed, long-term relationships.

Similarly, individuals were more likely to leave after sex in the context of booty-call relationships than one-night stands. This may be because there is an implicit under standing between one-night stand partners that the nature of the relationship is casual and temporary, whereas the repeated encounters for booty-call relationship partners requires such a strategy to maintain the quasi-sexual nature of booty-call relationships.

If your interested in reading the entire study, you can download it here.

1.21 Gigawatts!

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Less than two seconds in real-time, this video of a lightning strike in Rapid City, South Dakota is spectacular. The video is slowed down to 9,000 frames per second. ZT Research describes the video as a preceding downward positive ground flash that triggers upward leaders from seven towers, three of which are visible in the video. I love how hundreds of “mini strikes” flicker around the central strikes. ZT Research has more cool lightning strike videos on their site.

No Beginning, No End, No Big Bang

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Wun-Yi Shu (associate professor at National Tsing Hua University in Taiwan) has proposed a new universal model in which mass is converted into length and time is converted into space as the universe expands. As the universe contracts, the opposite occurs. The conversion factor depends varying gravitational “constant” and a varying speed of light (G/c2). Yeah, he also proposes that the speed of light is not constant.

However, his model explains “how the magnitudes of the three basic physical dimensions, mass, time, and length, are converted into each other, or equivalently, a novel theory about how the geometry of spacetime and the distribution of mass-energy interact. The theory resolves problems in cosmology, such as those of the big bang, dark energy, and flatness, in one fell stroke.”

Big Bang-less models are gaining popularity among cosmologists.

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