I cannot begin tell you how excited my children will be to learn that scientists think* giant pterosaurs may have breathed in a similar way to crocodilians when they get home from school today. Read Brian Switek’s explanation of the newest research at National Geographic Phenomena.
Category: Curiosities of Nature
Science for the People: Cosmology is Hard
This week, Science for the People is talking about the mindbending science trying to understand the inner workings of the Universe. Astrophysicist Ethan Siegel returns to discuss the BICEP2 experiment, and its search for the fingerprints of cosmic inflation. And they’ll talk to theoretical cosmologist Roberto Trotta about his book The Edge of the Sky: All You Need to Know about the All-There-Is, which explains the history and concepts of cosmology using the 1,000 most common words in the English language.
*Josh provides research help to Science for the People and is, therefore, completely biased.
The Palette of Dunloe
In 2011, we took the family to County Kerry in Ireland for Easter (I was working at the MRC Laboratory of Molecular Biology in Cambridge, UK at the time). One of the highlights of the trip was walking at the Gap of Dunloe. The gorse was in full bloom, providing a bright contrast to the greens, greys, browns, and blues of the landscape.
We didn’t really do much. Just walked. And looked. Among all the wonderful mornings we have had as a family, that morning at the Gap of Dunloe is a stand out. Afterward, the kids fell asleep in the car and we took a leisurely drive around the Ring of Kerry.
Since Mike and I founded The Finch & Pea, we’ve slowly and steadily made superficial changes to the site’s style, without getting away from our original “online science pub” idea. We still love the concept; but we (by which I mean me) like to fiddle with things. So, over a series of incremental changes, we’ve changed quite a bit – as you can see from looking at our various site headers.
Maybe it is the approaching winter and shortening days. Maybe it is the pessimistic feeling that our Internet home is a bleak Mad Max wasteland roamed by gangs of sociopaths, pock-marked by outposts of civilization. Maybe I was procrastinating. Whatever the reason, we decided to brighten up some of the colors around the joint, while still being recognizable and feeling like home. We wanted to keep the same general theme to our site colors, but draw the updated versions from nature.
What the Philae are you doing here?
UPDATE 12 NOV 2014 11:10AM (ET): Apollo 11 shit went down today. No matter what else we might be, we are a species that landed a robot on a comet about 500 million kilometers away for the purpose of scientific exploration. Not too shabby.
UPDATE 12 NOV 2014 11:54AM (ET): There is concern that Philae has not anchored to the comet properly. They are working on it.
Look, we appreciate you stopping by; but humanity is trying to land a robot on a comet for the first time ever. There is Apollo 11 level shit going down today. You can watch the ESA’s webcast live with us. The Philae lander is scheduled to touch down at about 11:00 AM (US Eastern).
Over at xkcd, Randall Munroe is doing live updates of the Philae lander’s progress (and its internal monologue).
HT: Emily Lakdawalla (whom you should be reading today)
Philae: The Power of Positive Thinking?
UPDATE 12 NOV 2014 11:12AM (EST): THEY DID IT!
Tomorrow, the Philae lander detaches from the ESA Rosetta spacecraft and attempts to touch down on Comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko at Site J. A successful landing will be one of the great feats of human scientific exploration.
A webcast of the landing attempt will begin at 2PM (ET) today (ie, now).
Instead of waiting to post pictures, we are going to be optimistic and start with this LEGO build from Stefan Schindler showing the Philae lander resting comfortably on the comet’s surface. More to come…
The Finch and Pea 