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Space

TRENDS: Skyscrapers Suspended From Space

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Analemma Tower

Skyscrapers are ambitious projects by nature, but one architecture studio is taking them to new heights. Clouds Architecture Office is a New York City architecture firm founded by Masayuki Sono and Ostap Rudakevych. They designed the Analemma Tower, which inverts the classical skyscraper by being suspended it from space, rather than standing on firm ground. Yes, you read that right. They essentially want to build a very tall tower dangling from space. Of course there’s more to it than that. The Analemma Tower would be suspended on a high-strength cable from an asteroid. It is also a proposal to build … Read more

SPACE: That’s One Dusty Galaxy You Have There

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space dust

Astronomers hate dust as much as the rest of us ― even more, perhaps. It’s one thing to get a little dust in your eye that takes your vision out of focus. Now imagine this kind of dust problem on a galactic scale where it hinders scientists trying to focus their telescopes into space. That’s part of the challenge faced by researchers at the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory in California, reports Space.com. They’re creating an instrument that will offer specific information on how fast the universe is growing. This device ― the Dark Energy Spectroscopic Instrument ― will create a … Read more

SPACE: Virtual Flight Over Mars

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Mars

Although Donald Trump has signed a bill authorizing money to fund future exploration of Mars,tourism to the Red Planet is still a long way away. Still, a person can dream, and one Finnish filmmaker is making that dream look like reality. Jan Fröjdman spent three years turning photos taken by NASA’s Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter into a four and a half minute travelogue of the planet’s surface. By David Moye – Full Story at The Huffington Post

GEEK OUT: Aliens Traveling on Radio Beams

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Aliens Radio Beams

Two Harvard University scientists are suggesting that mysterious fast radio bursts, detected in faraway galaxies, may be evidence of aliens traveling through the cosmos. FRBs are extremely bright flashes of radio waves that last for only a thousandth of a second and are detected by earthbound telescopes. Since the first one was observed 10 years ago, 17 have actually been reported, although scientists think there are thousands of them a day. At first, Abraham “Avi” Loeb said, he took a conservative approach to explaining them. “It looked like the simplest explanation would be flares from stars in the Milky Way … Read more

Colonizing Space

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Beyond Earth

In Beyond Earth: Our Path to a New Home in the Planets, Charles Wohlforth and Amanda R. Hendrix propose colonizing Titan, the largest moon of Saturn, and the second largest moon in the solar system. They reject constructing colonies on Mars and the Moon, claiming Titan offers the most resources for creating a permanent human settlement. Even though I don’t buy their premise, Wohlforth and Hendrix have written a book that nicely sums up the current knowledge on human space travel. What’s damning and depressing is their long litany of obstacles we face living in space. Over the years I’ve … Read more

Where No Gay Has Gone Before: Back to the Moon?

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How many of you have wanted to go to the moon?  Everybody?  Well, we’re all nerds here so I’m not surprised. What is a surprise is NASA’s announcement that there is the possibility of astronauts returning to the moon as early as next year.  2018 is the fiftieth anniversary year of Apollo 8, which was the first spacecraft to reach and orbit our natural satellite.  Commander Frank Borman, James Lovell and William Anders left Earth’s orbit, circled the moon a few times and returned home safely. Acting NASA administrator Robert Lightfoot said last month he wants to fast-track the heavy-lift … Read more

SCIENCE: If An Asteroid Target’s Earth, We’re…

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asteroid - pixabay

It’s the stuff of science fiction: Scientists discover that an asteroid is heading for Earth, and we don’t have any measures in place to prevent the space rock from hitting us. But this scenario is actually more plausible than many people realize.= There are about 15,000 asteroids in our immediate galactic neighborhood. On March 2, astronomers at the Catalina Sky Survey in Arizona spotted a 10-foot-wide space rock that passed Earth, “diving in closer than many communications and weather satellites,” Space.com reports. The asteroid came within 9,000 miles of Earth, according to NASA’s Center for Near Earth Object Studies. The moon, by comparison, is about 239,000 miles … Read more

POP CULTURE: Sally Ride Becomes a Lego Figurine

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Sally Ride Lego

Move aside Batman, for the first gay woman and American woman in space Sally Ride is to be immortalized with a Lego figure. A set of five new figurines, based on real female scientists, engineers and astronauts, will be out in late 2017. Honoring five pioneers of the American space program, the design was created by science writer Maia Weinstock who won the Lego Ideas competition. Full Story at Gay Star News

SPACE: Fly Me to the Moon

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Moon - pixabay

Well, here’s a bit of space news we weren’t expecting: Today, future Martian overlord and SpaceX founder Elon Musk announced that in 2018, the company will fly two private citizens around the Moon in its Dragon 2 spacecraft, carried by its extremely powerful Falcon Heavy rocket. While the voyagers’ names have not been disclosed, according to SpaceX, a “significant deposit” has already been made. “This is a really thing that’s happened,” Elon Musk told reporters at a press conference. “We’ve been approached to do a crewed mission beyond the Moon…[and these passengers] are very serious about it. We plan to … Read more

1 In 3 Americans Would Move To An Alien Planet To Escape U.S. Politics

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7 Planets

If it meant escaping the current political atmosphere, nearly 1 in 3 Americans say they’d be willing to leave Earth altogether. That’s according to a SurveyMonkey poll conducted Thursday, which found that 29 percent of U.S. adults would consider temporarily moving to one of the newly discovered Earth-like planets to avoid the next four years under President Donald Trump. The journey wouldn’t be easy. Those seven planets are orbiting a dwarf star some 39 light-years — or 230 trillion miles — away. But whatever it takes, right? By Chris D’Angelo – Full Story at The Huffington Post