Darren Straight’s Blog

Anyone catch last night’s Total Lunar Eclipse?

I went into the countryside late last night/early morning to see if I could catch a glimpse of the eclipse, but unfortunately due too heavy cloud cover and heavy fog I didn’t get to see much.

Not to worry though, I had a nice drive in the foggy countryside and found some great places which were away from the lights of the surrounding towns which gave great views of the night sky, great for the next UK Total Lunar Eclipse on the 28th of September 2015, if I’m still in the area!

Also had some fun testing out the new O2 XDA Orbit 2 I’m testing out (thanks to Steve Cater from VCCP a marketing agency for O2), but more on that later in a full review, which will surely be giving it the thumbs up, so far it’s been coming in very handy.

The Large Hadron Collider - the most powerful atom-smasher ever built - will be switched on in May 2008, and particle physics will hit pay-dirt. However a pair of Russian mathematicians (Irina Aref’eva and Igor Volovich) have are stating that the LHC might just turn out to be the world’s first time machine.

It is a highly speculative claim, that’s for sure. But if Aref’eva and Volovich are correct, the LHC’s debut at CERN, the European particle physics centre near Geneva in Switzerland, could provide a landmark in history. That’s because travelling into the past is only possible - if it is possible at all - as far back as the creation of the first time machine, and that means 2008 could become Year Zero for future time travellers, since it would only be possible to travel back as far as the first doorway in time.

Just a heads up that a total eclipse of the Moon will be occuring during the night of Wednesday/Thrusday the 20th/21st February 2008. The entire event will be visible from South America and most of North America (on February 20th) as well as Western Europe, Africa, and western Asia (on February 21st). During a total lunar eclipse, the Moon’s disk can take on a dramatically colorful appearance from bright orange to blood red to dark brown and (rarely) very dark gray.

An eclipse of the Moon can only take place at Full Moon, and only if the Moon passes through some portion of Earth’s shadow. The shadow is actually composed of two cone-shaped parts, one nested inside the other. The outer shadow or penumbra is a zone where Earth blocks some (but not all) of the Sun’s rays. In contrast, the inner shadow or umbra is a region where Earth blocks all direct sunlight from reaching the Moon.

If only part of the Moon passes through the umbra, a partial eclipse is seen. However, if the entire Moon passes through the umbral shadow, then a total eclipse of the Moon occurs. For more information on how, what, why, where and when of lunar eclipses, see the special web page lunar eclipses for beginners.

The following diagrams show the Moon’s path through Earth’s shadows (higher resolution versions of the above figure). The times of major stages of the eclipse are given for a number of time zones in North America. Please choose the diagram for your own time zone. Each diagram is a GIF file with a size of about 100k.

Some people may be puzzled that the Moon’s motion is from west to east (right to left) in these diagrams, instead of its daily east to west (left to right) motion in the sky. However, the Moon actually moves WEST to EAST (right to left in the Northern Hemisphere) with respect to the Earth’s shadow and the stars.

For full details of this Total Lunar Eclipse check out this NASA Page.

The structure covers 538 square feet and travels 26 feet into the earth. In it’s construction, the colony moved 40 tons of soil. Billions of ant loads of soil were brought to the surface. Each load weighed four times as much as the worker ant, and in human terms, was carried over 1/2 mile to the surface. It is the equivalent of building the great wall of china. It is truly a wonder of the world…

You can watch the full documentary “Ants - Natures Secret Power” over at openflv.com, it’s worth downloading to watch!

Labour-saving machines save us labour, that’s the point. They transport us from the ground floor to the fifth floor. They take us from A to B. They wash and dry and cook and clean for us.

But these machines use energy which produces CO2. It would help if we could use them less or use them more efficiently.

Take lifts. Or rather don’t. If you work on the 25th floor of a skyscraper, fair enough. But lifts are like vertical taxis - you wouldn’t hail a cab to go 100 feet down the road so why summon one to take you a few floors up?

So use less machine power and more of your own steam power. And if you take the stairs or find a way to resist other labour-saving machines, please come back and click DONE IT so we can count how much CO2 we’ve all saved.

Touching the stairs
Stair-climbers James, Jo and Pete risk their lives by trying to reach the third floor. It’s a story of guts and sacrifice; a story of genuine heroes who don’t know the meaning of the word ‘lift’ - or do they?

Lifts Are Not F.A.B
By Michael Wright To illustrate the considerable dangers of lifts, Michael Wright not only reused some old bits of polyboard and silver spray to make a skyscraper, lift shaft and lift, he reused some old bits of airfix for the props, two old marionettes to be the lift victims and one of those victims to be the evil lift-cord cutter. The result: a tremendous piece of psychological insight about lifts and why you should doubt them big time. Music by the very talented Aaron Paul Low of Sacred noise, produced by the very kind London Partizan.

December’s green thing is all about buying an old thing, not a new
thing.  New things are the fanciest and most specced-up things and
have the almost irresistible appeal of being the latest things. But
manufacturing a new thing uses resources and energy, all of which
creates CO2.  So instead of buying a new thing, buy an old thing. Old
things save us CO2 and come with less megapixels, for sure, but do
come with character, romance, mystery and history all included as
standard.

Exciting Simulations have today uploaded a new in-game video showing off the
new Space Shuttle Mission 2007 Virtual Flight Deck.

The video was originally captured at a resolution of 1280×1024 but had to be
resized to standard DVD resolution. So although the video quality does not do it
justice, the Virtual Flight Deck is modeled in high resolution, sharp graphics
allowing the Astronauts to zoom in and read all the labels and gauges at any
time without the need of going into the equally exquisitely detailed 2D panels.

It’s also worth noting that this is still “work in progress” and the cockpit will from what I hear look even better when the game is released this December.

Direct link to the downloads page: http://www.space-shuttle-mission.com/downloads.html

The Green Thing is a new, not for profit community site that’s just launched. The idea is to unite people against climate change by making it easy and enjoyable to be a bit greener, with the help of London’s creative industries. Every month you get a different Green Thing to do – October’s is ‘walk once’ – and all you have to do is do it.

The aim of Green Thing is to create people-powered sustainability – to help as many people as possible in as many countries as possible to do the green thing; then to use this people power to get governments and business to take fast actions to reduce carbon emissions and do the green thing too – thereby helping prevent climate change.

Because entertainment is very inspiring and lectures a bit less so, these monthly Green Things are suggested with great content from a growing community of brilliant writers, musicians, designers, directors and artists; as well as some of London’s best agencies.

So if you feel like doing The Right Green Thing for the enviroment why not check it out at:

http://www.thegreenthingwalk.com and http://www.dothegreenthing.com/

A striking image of seaweed shows the complexity of even the simplest organisms.

Seen here is Irish moss—Chondrus crispus—a common Atlantic red alga that is routinely harvested for its carrageenan. The chemical is used as a thickener in many processed foods.

Andrea Ottesen of the University of Maryland’s Department of Plant Science and Landscape Architecture shared a first place prize in the photography category of the 2007 International Science and Engineering Visualization Challenge for the natural light photo.

The awards are given out each year by the National Science Foundation and the journal Science for the imagery that best conveys complex scientific information and concepts.

Read more about National Geographics Best Science Images of 2007 here.

What’s Unique:
450+ students, 18 countries, 1 satellite – and 121,866 pieces of prime real estate. We are the largest American student-led spacecraft design program, and this is the first time that individuals and organizations around the world have the opportunity to personalize their very own portion of a satellite, and by doing so, support cutting-edge student research.

Their Mission:
To raise money to support student research in space life sciences and engineering, to advance space exploration and share the excitement of space exploration with the rest of the world, to inspire future scientists and explorers, and to launch our satellite into orbit!

How It Works:
In return for a donation to support development of our spacecraft, individuals and companies can put pictures, logos, slogans, signatures, and other messages on our website and on our spacecraft. With a launch expected in 2010, the satellite will orbit the Earth for five weeks – after which a part of the satellite will return to the Earth to be recovered.

Images and messages on the outside of the spacecraft will be photographed in orbit, and donors who reserved a spot in the Gold Zone of the reentry capsule will receive the space hardware bearing their image or message. All donors will also be recognized on the website and in other venues. In total, 121,866 square centimeters are available, for as little as $35. The larger the donation, the more of this “real estate†a donor receives.

A Bit of History:
Development of the YourNameIntoSpace (Y*N*I*S) spacecraft and its science payload began in 2001, with the creation of the Mars Gravity Biosatellite program. The program goal is to design, develop, launch and operate a satellite that will orbit the Earth for five weeks to study how Martian gravity — about one-third that of Earth’s gravity — will affect the body. To date the project has actively engaged over 450 students from around the world, from engineers to English majors. Students have been involved with every aspect of the mission, from designing the satellite to developing launch operations and running educational outreach activities.

Setting Precedents:

Check out http://www.yournameintospace.org/