Friday, February 27, 2015

Good article by Steve Cole


February 26, 2015
RELEASE 15-025
New NASA Earth Science Missions Expand View of Our Home Planet
The Global Precipitation Measurement mission produced its first global map of rainfall and snowfall, from April to September 2014. The data map combines measurements from 12 satellites and the GPM Core Observatory, launched Feb 27, 2014, covers 87 percent of the globe and is updated every half hour.
Image Credit: 
NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center
Download this video in HD formats from NASA Goddard's Scientific Visualization Studio
Four new NASA Earth-observing missions are collecting data from space – with a fifth newly in orbit – after the busiest year of NASA Earth science launches in more than a decade.
On Feb. 27, 2014, NASA and the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) launched the Global Precipitation Measurement (GPM) Core Observatory into space from Japan. Data from GPM and the other new missions are making observations and providing scientists with new insights into global rain and snowfall, atmospheric carbon dioxide, ocean winds, clouds, and tiny airborne particles called aerosols.
NASA's five Earth-observing missions of 2014-2015
Over the past 12 months NASA has added five missions to its orbiting Earth-observing fleet – the biggest one-year increase in more than a decade.
Image Credit: 
NASA
“This has been a phenomenally productive year for NASA in our mission to explore our complex planet from the unique vantage point of space,” said John Grunsfeld, associate administrator of NASA’s Science Mission Directorate in Washington. “Combined with data from our other Earth-observing spacecraft, these new missions will give us new insights into how Earth works as a system.”
With these missions, including two instruments mounted on the exterior of the International Space Station, NASA now has 20 Earth-observing space missions in operation. Observations from these missions, like all NASA data, will be freely available to the international scientific community and decision makers in the United States and abroad.
“The highly accurate measurements from these new missions will help scientists around the world tackle some of the biggest questions about how our planet is changing,” said Peg Luce, deputy director of the Earth Science Division at NASA Headquarters in Washington. “These new capabilities will also be put to work to help improve lives here on Earth and support informed decision-making by citizens and communities.”
Last month, NASA released the agency’s most comprehensive global rain and snowfall product to date from the GPM mission made with data from a network of 12 international satellites and the Core Observatory. The Core Observatory acts as a tuner to bring together measurements of other satellites, providing a nearly global picture of rain and snow called the Integrated Multi-satellite Retrievals for GPM, or IMERG. The first global visualization of the initial IMERG data was released Thursday.
“The IMERG data gives us an unprecedented view of global precipitation every 30 minutes,” said Gail Skofronick-Jackson, GPM project scientist at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland. “Knowing where, when and how much it rains and snows is vital to understanding Earth’s water cycle.”
The Orbiting Carbon Observatory-2, launched on July 2, 2014, is providing preliminary global maps of carbon dioxide concentrations and a related phenomenon known as solar-induced chlorophyll fluorescence. OCO-2 data will let scientists better understand how carbon dioxide is distributed around the globe and changes with the seasons. The data will be used to identify the sources and storage places, or sinks, of carbon dioxide, the most significant human-produced greenhouse gas driving global climate change.
A preliminary global map based on observations from November and December 2014 shows carbon dioxide concentrations largely driven by the seasons, with higher levels in the northern hemisphere winter and lower in the southern hemisphere summer. The data show levels unprecedented in recorded history, according to Ralph Basilio, OCO-2 project manager at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California.
“The ultimate goal is to collect data to advance carbon cycle science, improve understanding of the global climate change process, and make better-informed decisions,” Basilio said.
In addition to these two free-flying satellite missions, NASA deployed two Earth-observing instruments to the International Space Station: ISS-RapidScat, a scatterometer that measures wind speeds and direction over the ocean, and the Cloud-Aerosol Transport System (CATS), a lidar that measures the altitude of clouds and airborne particles.
Launched Sept. 21, 2014, ISS-RapidScat’s ocean wind measurements continue observations made by the agency’s QuikScat satellite, according to Bryan Stiles, the mission’s science processing lead at JPL. These measurements already are being used in weather forecast models used by the United States Navy, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, and by European and Indian scientists.
The ISS-RapidScat team also is using the wind measurements to better understand how ocean winds differ, on average, during the day and night.
CATS, which was launched to the space station on Jan. 10, has released its first data image: a slice of the atmosphere over Africa showing clouds and dust particles on Feb. 11. Clouds and aerosols remain two of the biggest question marks in terms of impact on future potential climate change.
CATS was built by a team at Goddard as a way to demonstrate new lidar technology capable of accurate cloud and aerosol measurements, according to Matt McGill, CATS principal investigator at Goddard.
NASA's newest Earth-observing satellite, the Soil Moisture Active Passive (SMAP), was launched Jan. 31 to begin its mission to map global soil moisture and detect whether soils are frozen or thawed. Currently in its checkout phase, the observatory completed a key milestone Tuesday with the deployment of its 20-foot-wide (6-meter) reflector antenna, which in about a month will begin rotating at approximately 15 revolutions per minute. The antenna will produce a 620-mile-wide (1,000-kilometers) measurement swath, mapping the entire globe every two to three days.
NASA monitors Earth's vital signs from land, air and space with a fleet of satellites and ambitious airborne and ground-based observation campaigns. NASA develops new ways to observe and study Earth's interconnected natural systems with long-term data records and computer analysis tools to better see how our planet is changing. The agency shares this unique knowledge with the global community and works with institutions in the United States and around the world that contribute to understanding and protecting our home planet.
Video and images of these new NASA data products are available online at:
For more information about NASA's Earth science activities, visit:
-end-
Steve Cole
Headquarters, Washington
202-358-0918
stephen.e.cole@nasa.gov
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Thursday, February 26, 2015

Making Society Home Page...very cool

COMMUNITY February 3, 2015
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Morocco Maker Scene

I lived in Morocco for 6 weeks as part of my location independent journey. I went from the financial capital of the country Casablanca, to the administrative one Rabat to a…
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Morocco Maker Scene
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This looks interesting: Enchanted Objects Design Challenge - Detailed Information


created by Pat Kelly on Jan 28, 2015 6:39 AM, last modified by Pat Kelly on Feb 3, 2015 3:15 AM
Version 4
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Background

The world is becoming fully of amazing technology the downside being that devices are starting to look the same, “black-glass slabs” of all sizes.  The near future involves the embedding of technology into re-imagined everyday objects, and rendering what was once ordinary into the “enchanted”. 

The Challenge

We would like to extend this concept into the revitalisation of old objects, appliances or furniture and turn them into “enchanted” ones, rendered so by the addition of the latest Internet of Things technology.

Examples of this include:
  1. A grandfather clock that responds to voice commands: e.g., one could approach it, say “Tell me the time in Sydney, Australia” and the hands would move to the appropriate setting.
  2. A barometer that taps into WiFi and changes its setting based upon the latest, most accurate weather forecast.
  3. An old fashioned desk lamp that will automatically switch itself on based upon information it receives via the internet such as the time when sunset is due to occur and adjusts its brightness as twilight approaches.
  4. A bookcase you can speak to and which will reply – so you can find the position of a book, and order a book you don’t have from an online retailer.  It also makes its catalogue available to the user via a mobile app.
  5. A mirror that looks back and responds to "Mirror, Mirror" commands – also, the glass could potentially be replaced with a screen that shows the individual in various outfits.
  6. A mixing bowl or pot which can assist you in preparing food – which uses a combination of sensors and internet connectivity which determines what steps to take and where you are in the preparation stages could make cooking an "enchanted" experience.

Role of Security

element14 believes that the Internet of Things may hit a roadblock: namely, the lack of secure communications between objects and individuals could lead to a situation in which data is being shared without explicit consent and exploited for malicious purposes.  Therefore any Internet of Things challenge we will undertake in the future will have a security aspect: we will want to see that appropriate security measures have been built into the solutions.  Bonus points will be given for clear demonstrations of this in the finished project.

Kit Provided


SAMA5D4 Xplained Ultra

60d37bec6b8da5029546c79a70c60635.png

Assessment

The following criteria will be used in their analysis:
  • Accuracy: how well does the proposed solution register the information it is intended to assess?
  • Convenience: how easy it will be for non-technical personnel to use ? 
  • Cost: how much will it cost?  Is it cost effective?
  • Durability: for example, can it withstand everyday life and yet continue to function normally?

The solution which meets these four criteria the best will be the winner; in the case that if further improvements are yet required for it to be used in real life scenarios, we will may work with the winning engineer to develop it to fruition.

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Pluto a Planet Again? It May Happen This Year

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Pluto a Planet Again? It May Happen This Year

By David A. Weintraub, Vanderbilt University | February 25, 2015 12:22 pm
planets_iau_2
Ceres is the largest object in the asteroid belt, and NASA’s Dawn spacecraft will arrive there on March 6.
Pluto is the largest object in the Kuiper belt, and NASA’s New Horizons spacecraft will arrive there on July 15.
These two events will make 2015 an exciting year for solar system exploration and discovery. But there is much more to this story than mere science. I expect 2015 will be the year when general consensus, built upon our new knowledge of these two objects, will return Pluto and add Ceres to our family of solar system planets.
The efforts of a very small clique of Pluto-haters within the International Astronomical Union (IAU) plutoed Pluto in 2006. Of the approximately 10,000 internationally registered members of the IAU in 2006, only 237 voted in favor of the resolution redefining Pluto as a “dwarf planet” while 157 voted against; the other 9,500 members were not present at the closing session of the IAU General Assembly in Prague at which the vote to demote Pluto was taken. Yet Pluto’s official planetary status was snatched away.
Ceres and Pluto are both spheroidal objects, like Mercury, Earth, Jupiter and Saturn. That’s part of the agreed upon definition of a planet. They both orbit a star, the Sun, like Venus, Mars, Uranus and Neptune. That’s also part of the widely accepted definition of a planet.

Planet Problems

Unlike the larger planets, however, Ceres, like Pluto, according to the IAU definition, “has not cleared the neighborhood around its orbit.” The asteroid belt is, apparently, Ceres’ neighborhood while the Kuiper Belt is Pluto’s neighborhood – though no definition of a planet’s neighborhood exists, and no agreed upon understanding of what “clearing the neighborhood” yet exists. Furthermore, no broad-based agreement exists as to why “clearing the neighborhood” need be a requirement in order for an object to be considered a planet.
Some planetary astronomers would argue that were the Earth placed in the Kuiper Belt, it would not be able to clear its neighborhood and thus would not be considered, by the IAU definition, a planet; apparently location matters. Here a planet, there not a planet. I’d argue that location shouldn’t matter; instead, the intrinsic properties of the objects themselves should matter more. And so we are led back to Ceres and Pluto.
Never before visited by human spacecraft, Ceres and Pluto, as we will soon bear witness, are both evolving, changing worlds. Yesterday, Ceres and Pluto were strangers, distant, barely known runt members of our solar system. By the end of this calendar year, however, we will have showered both objects with our passion and our attention, we will have welcomed them both into our embrace. And we almost certainly will once again call both of them planets.
Two views of Ceres acquired by NASA’s Dawn spacecraft on Feb. 12, 2015. Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/UCLA/MPS/DLR/IDA
Two views of Ceres acquired by NASA’s Dawn spacecraft on Feb. 12, 2015. Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/UCLA/MPS/DLR/IDA

Ceres, Temporarily a Planet

Ceres was discovered on New Year’s Day in 1801, by Italian astronomer Giuseppe Piazzi, a member of an international team of astronomers dubbed the Celestial Police, who were searching for a supposedly missing planet in between the orbits of Mars and Jupiter. When discovered, Ceres was immediately recognized as a planet, the eighth one known at the time (neither Neptune nor Pluto had been discovered yet).
But within a few years, other objects in the asteroid belt were discovered and Ceres no longer seemed to stand out as far from the crowd. In 1802, the great astronomer William Herschel suggested that Ceres and Pallas and any other smaller solar system objects should be called asteroids – meaning star-like. In telescope images, they were so tiny that they looked point-like, like stars, rather than disk-like, like planets. And so, more than a century before Pluto was discovered, Ceres was plutoed.

What is Ceres?

But Ceres does still stand out. It’s the largest asteroid, by far, nearly 1,000 kilometers across (twice as large in diameter as Vesta, the second largest asteroid), though not perfectly spherical in shape.
As happened inside Earth and other planets, planetary scientists think that long ago, the denser material in Ceres separated from the lighter material and sank to form a core.
Astronomers think Ceres is rich in water – as much as one-third of Ceres might be water – and may have a thin atmosphere. Bright, white spots on its surface might even be large frozen lakes. Ceres may, in fact, have as much fresh water as Earth, have Earth-like polar caps, and might even have a sub-surface liquid ocean layer, like Jupiter’s moon Europa and Saturn’s moon Enceladus.
Beginning this month, we’ll start to learn more about these tantalizing possibilities. With our increasing knowledge of and familiarity with Ceres, we will no longer be able to identify meaningful criteria that will allow us to continue to classify Ceres as not-a-planet. Ceres will continue to be a small planet, but in 2015 we will come to understand that dwarf planets are planets, too.
Hubble images of Pluto taken in 2010. NASA, ESA, and Marc W. Buie (Southwest Research Institute)
Hubble images of Pluto taken in 2010. Credit: NASA, ESA, and Marc W. Buie (Southwest Research Institute)

Pluto’s Short Planetary Reign

When Pluto was discovered by Clyde Tombaugh in 1930, many astronomers were certain that a large planet orbited the Sun beyond Neptune. Instead they found Pluto, which turned out to be small compared to Earth and Neptune, though more than double the size of Ceres, with a diameter of 2,300 kilometers.
Pluto also has an unusual orbit, as it crosses Neptune’s orbit, though it does so in such a way that it can never collide with Neptune.
Pluto’s modern-day troubles began in 1992, when astronomers David Jewitt and Jane Luu discovered the first objects in the region of the solar system now known as the Kuiper Belt. Whereas the asteroid belt where Ceres resides is made mostly of house- and mountain-sized rocks that orbit the Sun in between the orbits of Mars and Jupiter, the Kuiper Belt is made mostly of house- and mountain-sized chunks of ice that orbit the Sun beyond the orbit of Neptune. Pluto, as it turns out, is one of the biggest objects in the Kuiper Belt.

What is Pluto?

Pluto is the last unexplored planet in our solar system. And the Kuiper Belt may contain hundreds of other planetary worlds like Pluto. These may be the most numerous worlds in the solar system; they may contain, together, the most total surface area of all the solid-surfaced planets.
Pluto has one large moon, Charon, and at least four small moons: Nix, Hydra, Kerberos and Styx. It has an atmosphere that expands and contracts as Pluto warms and cools during its 248 year orbit around the Sun. The surface is likely rich in water ice, enriched with methane and nitrogen and carbon monoxide frosts; these ices might contain complex organic molecules.
The New Horizons mission is poised to answer some of our myriad questions about Pluto. How did it form? What is the atmosphere made of? What is the surface like? Does Pluto have a magnetic field? What are the moons like? Does Pluto have a subsurface ocean? Is the surface of Pluto’s moon Charon pure water ice?
Pluto has guarded its secrets for four and half billion years. But in a few months, a few intrepid humans will pull back the curtain on Pluto and say “Hello, Pluto, we’re here.” And Pluto will begin to share her secrets with us. When she does, as with Ceres, our familiarity with Pluto will help us recognize that Pluto is, was, and has always been a planet, albeit a small one.
We only get to visit Ceres and Pluto for the very first time, once. This year. March 6 and July 15. In your lifetime. In this incredible year of the dwarf planet. Get ready to party. Ceres and Pluto are coming home.
The Conversation
Top image by International Astronomical Union
This article was originally published on The Conversation.
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