Ted Talks: The Age of the Industrial Internet

Tedtalks_marco_internetofthingsI came across another interesting and fascinating TED Talk recently. In this lecture, famed economist Marco Annunziata spoke about a rather popular subject – “The Internet of Things”, and how it is shaping our society. This term is thrown around a lot lately, and it refers to a growing phenomenon in our world where uniquely identifiable objects are connected to virtual representations in an Internet-like structure.

Basically, the concept postulates that if all objects and people in daily life were equipped with identifiers, they could be managed and inventoried by computers. By equipping all objects in the world with minuscule machine-readable identifiers, daily life could be transformed. How this is likely to look is the subject of Annunziata’s talk, beginning with the past two hundred years and the two major waves of innovation humanity went through.

Internet_of_ThingsThe first came with the Industrial Revolution (ca. 1760-1903), which permanently altered our lives with factories, machinery, railways, electricity, air travel, etc. The second wave came with the Internet Revolution (ca. 1980 – 2000), which has once again changed our lives permanently with computing power, data networks, and unprecedented access to information and communication.

Now, in the modern era, we are entering into a new phase of innovation, one which he refers to as the “Industrial Internet”. Judging by current research and marketing trends, this wave is characterized by intelligent machines, advanced analytics, and the creativity of people at work. It is a marriage of minds and machines, and once again, our lives will be permanently altered by it.

internet_of_things_beechamIn the course of the twelve minute lecture, Annunziata explains how the emergence of machines that can see, feel, sense and react will lead to an age where the technology we depend upon will operate with far greater efficiently. Naturally, there are many who would suspect that this all boils down to AIs doing the thinking for us, but in fact, it’s much more complicated than that.

Think of a world where we would be able to network and communicate with all of our devices – not just our smartphones or computers, but everything from our car keys to our cars and home appliances. By all things being marked and represented in a virtual internet-like environment, we could communicate with or remotely check on things that are halfway across the world.

Think of the implications! As someone who is currently very fascinated with how the world will look in the not-too-distant future, and how people will interact with it, I can tell you this stuff is science fiction gold! Check it out and be sure to follow the link at the bottom of the page to comment.


Source: ted.com

News From Space: Birth of Black Hole Witnessed

big bang_blackholeWhen it comes to observational astronomy, scientists and cosmologists have been facing a sort of crisis of late. With so many instruments aimed at the heavens, recording what little information makes it all the way to Earth, simply observing distant stars has been providing diminishing returns. In order to keep moving forward, we must observe the most unusual and, in many cases, violent cosmic events so we can see some truly novel data.

This presents a bit of a challenge, since the the space industry can’t possibly set up enough telescopes to look at every part of the night sky all at once. With so much depth through which to zoom, it would seem a lost cause to try to capture unexpected, short-lived events. And yet, one such event, one that is truly cosmic in nature (no pun!), was captured just recently.

NASA's_Fermi,_Swift_See_'Shockingly_Bright'_Burst_(before_and_after_labels)It took place back in late November, when an “armada of instruments” from all over the world saw a massive gamma-ray burst originating from a point in space known as GRB 130427A. This burst was more powerful than what many researchers believed was theoretically possible, and is now thought to be the collapse of a giant star and the birth of a black hole.

The event has been described as a “Rosetta stone moment” by astronomers for a number of reasons. In addition to being a truly rare and awesome sight, this burst has also sent out information that astronomers will be studying for many years to come. And while it’s too soon to draw any real conclusions, there is already widespread excitement about the sheer newness of it.

blackhole_birthAnd yet, GRB 130427A only lasted about 80 seconds at observable intensities, so the fact that it was observed, letalone documented so thoroughly was truly surprising! This was all thanks to the Los Alamos National Laboratories in New Mexico, where six robotic cameras – collectively referred to as RAPTOR, or RAPid Telescopes for Optical Response – were able to respond in time to catch the event unfold.

The RAPTOR telescopes are networked together and all obey a central computer “brain”. Between their dedicated computing hardware and robotic swivel-mounts, they can turn to view any point in the sky in less than three seconds. As the world’s fastest “optical response” devices, RAPTOR’s telescopes are designed to make sure we don’t miss astronomical events when they happens, because in astronomy there are no second chances.

gamma-ray-burst The RAPTOR telescopes to ensure things aren’t missed by performing extremely diffuse, wide-angle sweeps of the sky to pick up hints at about where and when a major event is taking place. When one of the telescopes sees a hint of something good, it and the others quickly reorient and zoom to capture it in full detail. And with all six telescopes capturing the same event, the wealth of information gleamed is quite impressive.

The telescopes have different specializations as well. For example, the RAPTOR-T views all events through four aligned lenses with four different color filters. By looking at the differences in color distribution in the sample, RAPTOR-T can provide info about the distance to an event (by measuring Red Shift and Blue Shift) or about some elements of its environment.

grb130427aThis gamma ray burst is thought to be the brightest in decades, perhaps in a century. And if astronomers had missed it, it’s likely that nobody would have gotten the chance to capture one again. Luckily, the event was also seen by a number of other gamma ray detectors and x-ray telescopes. These included NASA’s Fermi, NuSTAR, and Swift satellites, all of which managed to see some portion of the event as it unfolded.

However, most telescopes joined in to view the event’s so-called afterglow, an incredibly violent occurrence where the newly-born black hole threw out debris and damage over a wide radius. For several hours, this radius glowed and astronomers watched as it faded. The intensity of high-energy gamma rays in that afterglow faded in tandem with its conventional light emissions.

This is one of the first useful bits of information provided by this event – the link between gamma rays and optical phenomena. But this is just one way that it could be astronomy’s latest Rosetta Stone observation. In the next few months, we can all look forward to a slew of exciting updates as astronomers sort through the implications of having witnessed the birth of an unprecedented singularity.

And in the meantime, check out this video of the gamma-ray burst, as observed by the RAPTOR All-Sky Monitor:


Source: extremetech.com

Judgement Day Update: Google Robot Army Expanding

Atlas-x3c.lrLast week, Google announced that it will be expanding its menagerie of robots, thanks to a recent acquisition. The announcement came on Dec. 13th, when the tech giant confirmed that it had bought out the engineering company known as Boston Dynamics. This company, which has had several lucrative contracts with DARPA and the Pentagon, has been making the headlines in the past few years, thanks to its advanced robot designs.

Based in Waltham, Massachusetts, Boston Dynamics has gained an international reputation for machines that walk with an uncanny sense of balance, can navigate tough terrain on four feet, and even run faster than the fastest humans. The names BigDog, Cheetah, WildCat, Atlas and the Legged Squad Support System (LS3), have all become synonymous with the next generation of robotics, an era when machines can handle tasks too dangerous or too dirty for most humans to do.

Andy-Rubin-and-Android-logoMore impressive is the fact that this is the eight robot company that Google has acquired in the past six months. Thus far, the company has been tight-lipped about what it intends to do with this expanding robot-making arsenal. But Boston Dynamics and its machines bring significant cachet to Google’s robotic efforts, which are being led by Andy Rubin, the Google executive who spearheaded the development of Android.

The deal is also the clearest indication yet that Google is intent on building a new class of autonomous systems that might do anything from warehouse work to package delivery and even elder care. And considering the many areas of scientific and technological advancement Google is involved in – everything from AI and IT to smartphones and space travel – it is not surprising to see them branching out in this way.

wildcat1Boston Dynamics was founded in 1992 by Marc Raibert, a former professor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. And while it has not sold robots commercially, it has pushed the limits of mobile and off-road robotics technology thanks to its ongoing relationship and funding from DARPA. Early on, the company also did consulting work for Sony on consumer robots like the Aibo robotic dog.

Speaking on the subject of the recent acquisition, Raibert had nothing but nice things to say about Google and the man leading the charge:

I am excited by Andy and Google’s ability to think very, very big, with the resources to make it happen.

Videos uploaded to Youtube featuring the robots of Boston Dynamics have been extremely popular in recent years. For example, the video of their four-legged, gas powered, Big Dog walker has been viewed 15 million times since it was posted on YouTube in 2008. In terms of comments, many people expressed dismay over how such robots could eventually become autonomous killing machines with the potential to murder us.

petman-clothesIn response, Dr. Raibert has emphasized repeatedly that he does not consider his company to be a military contractor – it is merely trying to advance robotics technology. Google executives said the company would honor existing military contracts, but that it did not plan to move toward becoming a military contractor on its own. In many respects, this acquisition is likely just an attempt to acquire more talent and resources as part of a larger push.

Google’s other robotics acquisitions include companies in the United States and Japan that have pioneered a range of technologies including software for advanced robot arms, grasping technology and computer vision. Mr. Rubin has also said that he is interested in advancing sensor technology. Mr. Rubin has called his robotics effort a “moonshot,” but has declined to describe specific products that might come from the project.

Cheetah-robotHe has, however, also said that he does not expect initial product development to go on for some time, indicating that Google commercial robots of some nature would not be available for several more years. Google declined to say how much it paid for its newest robotics acquisition and said that it did not plan to release financial information on any of the other companies it has recently bought.

Considering the growing power and influence Google is having over technological research – be it in computing, robotics, neural nets or space exploration – it might not be too soon to assume that they are destined to one day create the supercomputer that will try to kill us all. In short, Google will play Cyberdyne to Skynet and unleash the Terminators. Consider yourself warned, people! 😉

Source: nytimes.com

Birth of an Idea: Seedlings

alien-worldHey all! Hope this holidays season finds you warm, cozy, and surrounded by loved ones. And I thought I might take this opportunity to talk about an idea I’ve been working on. While I’m still searching for a proper title, the one I’ve got right now is Seedlings. This represents an idea which has been germinated in my mind for some time, ever since I saw a comprehensive map of the Solar System and learned just how many potentially habitable worlds there are out there.

Whenever we talk of colonization, planting the seed (you see where the title comes from now, yes?) of humanity on distant worlds, we tend to think of exoplanets. In other words, we generally predict that humanity will live on worlds beyond our Solar System, if and when such things ever become reality. Sure, allowances are made for Mars, and maybe Ganymede, in these scenarios, but we don’t seem to think of all the other moons we have in our Solar System.

solar_systemFor instance, did you know that in addition to our system’s 11 planets and planetoids, there are 166 moons in our Solar System, the majority of which (66) orbit Jupiter? And granted, while many are tiny little balls of rock that few people would ever want to live on, by my count, that still leaves 12 candidates for living. Especially when you consider that most have their own sources of water, even if it is in solid form.

And that’s where I began with the premise for Seedlings. The way I see it, in the distant future, humanity would expand to fill every corner of the Solar System before moving on to other stars. And in true human fashion, we would become divided along various geographic and ideological lines. In my story, its people’s attitudes towards technology that are central to this divide, with people falling into either the Seedling or Chartrist category.

nanomachineryThe Seedlings inhabit the Inner Solar System and are dedicated to embracing the accelerating nature of technology. As experts in nanotech and biotech, they establish new colonies by planting Seeds, tiny cultures of microscopic, programmed bacteria that convert the landscape into whatever they wish. Having converted Venus, Mars, and the Jovian satellites into livable worlds, they now enjoy an extremely advanced and high standard of living.

The Chartrists, on the other hand, are people committed to limiting the invasive and prescriptive nature technology has over our lives. They were formed at some point in the 21st century, when the Technological Singularity loomed, and signed a Charter whereby they swore not to embrace augmentation and nanotechnology beyond a certain point. While still technically advanced, they are limited compared to their Seedling cousins.

terraforming-mars2With life on Earth, Mars and Venus (colonized at this time) becoming increasingly complicated, the Chartrists began colonizing in the outer Solar System. Though they colonized around Jupiter, the Jovians eventualy became Seedling territory, leaving just the Saturnalian and Uranian moons for the Chartrists to colonize, with a small string of neutral planets lying in between.

While no open conflicts have ever taken place between the two sides, a sort of detente has settled in after many generations. The Solar System is now glutted by humans, and new frontiers are needed for expansion. Whereas the Seedlings have been sending missions to all suns within 20 light-years from Sol, many are looking to the Outer Solar System as a possible venue for expansion.

exoplanets1At the same time, the Chartrists see the Seedling expansion as a terrible threat to their ongoing way of life, and some are planning for an eventual conflict. How will this all play out? Well, I can tell you it will involve a lot of action and some serious social commentary! Anyway, here is the breakdown of the Solar Colonies, who owns them, and what they are dedicated to:

Inner Solar Colonies:
The home of the Seedlings, the most advanced and heavily populated worlds in the Solar System. Life here is characterized by rapid progress and augmentation through nanotechnology and biotechnology. Socially, they are ruled by a system of distributed power, or democratic anarchy, where all citizens are merged into the decision making process through neural networking.

Mercury: source of energy for the entire inner solar system
Venus: major agricultural center, leader in biomaterial construction
Earth: birthplace of humanity, administrative center
Mars: major population center, transit hub between inner colonies and Middle worlds

Middle Worlds:
A loose organization of worlds beyond Mars, including the Jovian and Saturnalian satellites. Those closest to the Sun are affiliated with the Seedlings, the outer ones the Chartrists, and with some undeclared in the middle. Life on these worlds is mixed, with the Jovian satellites boasting advanced technology, augmentation, and major industries supplying the Inner Colonies. The Saturnalian worlds are divided, with the neutral planets boasting a high level of technical advancement and servicing people on all sides. The two Chartrist moons are characterized by more traditional settlements, with thriving industry and a commitment to simpler living.

Ceres: commercial nexus of the Asteroid Belt, source of materials for solar system (S)
Europa: oceanic planet, major resort and luxury living locale (S)
Ganymede: terraforming operation, agricultural world (S)
Io: major source of energy for the Middle World (N)
Calisto: mining operations, ice, water, minerals (N)
Titan: major population center, transit point to inner colonies (N)
Tethys: oceanic world, shallow seas, major tourist destination (N)
Dione: major mining colony to outer colonies (C)
Rhea: agricultural center for outer colonies (C)

Outer Solar Colonies:
The Neptunian moons of the outer Solar System are exclusively populated by Chartrist populations, people committed to a simpler way of life and dedicated to ensuring that augmentation and rapid progress are limited. Settlements on these worlds boast a fair degree of technical advancement, but are significantly outmatched by the Seedlings. They also boast a fair degree of industry and remain tied to the Inner and Middle Worlds through the export of raw materials and the import of technical devices.

Miranda: small ice planet, source of water (C)
Ariel: agricultural world, small biomaterial industry and carbon manufacturing (C)
Umbriel: agricultural world, small biomaterial industry and carbon manufacturing (C)
Titania: agricultural world, small biomaterial industry and carbon manufacturing (C)
Oberon: agricultural world, small biomaterial industry and carbon manufacturing (C)
Triton: source of elemental nitrogen, water, chaotic landscape (C)

News From Space: Gaia Lifts Off!

gaia_liftoffThis morning, the European Space Agency’s Gaia mission blasted off from Europe’s Spaceport in Kourou, French Guiana, on the head of a Soyuz rocket. This space observatory aims to study approximately 1 billion stars, roughly 1% of the Milky Way Galaxy, and create the most accurate map yet of the Milky Way. In so doing, it will also answer questions about the origin and evolution of our home Galaxy.

As the successor to the Hipparcos mission – an ESA astrometry satellite that was launched in 1989 and operated until 1993 – it is part of ESA’s Horizon 2000 Plus long-term scientific program. Repeatedly scanning the sky, Gaia will observe each of the billion stars an average of 70 times each over the five years and measure the position and key physical properties of each star, including its brightness, temperature and chemical composition.

The Milky Way Shines on ParanalThe Soyuz VS06 launcher, operated by Arianespace, lifted off at 09:12 GMT (10:12 CET). About ten minutes later, after separation of the first three stages, the Fregat upper stage ignited, delivering Gaia into a temporary parking orbit at an altitude of 175 km. A second firing of the Fregat 11 minutes later took Gaia into its transfer orbit, followed by separation from the upper stage 42 minutes after liftoff.

Gaia is now en route towards an orbit around a gravitationally-stable virtual point in space called L2 Lagrange Point, some 1.5 million kilometres beyond Earth.  Tomorrow, engineers will command Gaia to perform the first of two critical thruster firings to ensure it is on the right trajectory towards its L2 home orbit. About 20 days after launch, the second critical burn will take place, inserting it into its operational orbit around L2.

Gaia_spacecraftJean-Jacques Dordain, ESA’s Director General, had this to say about the launch:

Gaia promises to build on the legacy of ESA’s first star-mapping mission, Hipparcos, launched in 1989, to reveal the history of the galaxy in which we live.

ESA’s Gaia project scientist Timo Prusti expressed similar sentiments, highlighting how the Gaia mission’s ultimate purpose is to advance our understanding of the cosmos:

Along with tens of thousands of other celestial and planetary objects, this vast treasure trove will give us a new view of our cosmic neighbourhood and its history, allowing us to explore the fundamental properties of our Solar System and the Milky Way, and our place in the wider Universe.

By taking advantage of the slight change in perspective that occurs as Gaia orbits the Sun during a year, it will measure the stars’ distances and their motions across the sky. This motions will later be put into “rewind” to learn more about where they came from and how the Milky Way was assembled over billions of years from the merging of smaller galaxies, and into “fast forward” to learn more about its ultimate fate.

Gaia_galaxyThis is an especially ambitious mission when you consider that of the one billion stars Gaia will observe, 99% have never had their distances measured accurately. The mission will also study 500,000 distant quasars and will conduct tests of Einstein’s General Theory of Relativity. So as the mission continues and more data comes in, scientists and astronomers will be able to construct more detailed models of how the universe was created, and perhaps how it will end…

The current consensus is that the universe began with a creation event known as The Big Bang. However, the question of how it will end, either through a “Big Crunch” event – where the expansion of the universe will eventually cease and all matter will collapse back in on itself – or simply continue to expand until all stars and galaxies consume their fuel and burn out, remains something of a mystery.

Gaia_spacecraft2Personally, I call Big Crunch, mainly because I like to the think that our universe is one of many. Not just in the parallel dimension sense, but in the temporal sense as well. Like the city of Ilium (aka. Troy), existence as we know it is built upon the foundations of countless others, stretching backwards and forwards into infinity…

Deep stuff, man! In the meantime, enjoy this video of the Gaia’s mission’s liftoff, courtesy of the ESA:


Sources: universetoday.com, esa.int

Paleonews: Reconstructing what Dinosaurs Looked Like

dinosaur_bonesSince the first discovery of their remains was made, modern humans have struggled to reconstruct how dinosaurs lived, behaved, and even appeared. As simple as it may seem to the rest of us, paleontologists understand that bones alone do not an accurate representation make. And over the years, many theories have been advanced as to what the full, fleshy forms of dinosaurs truly looked like.

And thanks to a find made in Grand Prairie, Alberta last year, one of the richest source of dinosaur bones in the world, scientists are that much closer to getting an accurate picture as to what one candidate – Edmontosaurus regalis – looked like. In short, the find revealed a body part never seen before on any dinosaur –  a soft, fleshy comb on its head, similar to those found on roosters.

edmontosaurus-regalisAccording to Victoria Arbour, a University of Alberta paleontologist who co-authored the scientific paper published Thursday in the journal Current Biology, the comb constituted a “structure that was completely unexpected.” And that it “kind of makes us wonder what other dinosaurs might have had.” The find is also interesting because of the connection it draws to the biology of today’s animals, something which is still considered distinct from prehistoric creatures.

Edmontosaurus are a duck-billed, plant-eating dinosaur that grew to be 12 metres long and was thought to have roamed North America in herds during the late Cretaceous, about 75 and 65 million years ago. It also belonged to a group of dinosaurs known as hadrosaurs, a family of duck-billed herbivores which were the most common dinosaurs on the continent at the time.

edmontosaurusPhil Bell, a paleontologist at the University of New England in Armidale, Australia, was with the Philip J. Currie Dinosaur Museum currently under construction in Grand Prairie, Alta., when he uncovered the fossil last summer with geologist Federico Fanti of the University of Bologna. As the lead author of the paper, Bell claims that the new findings are a major breakthrough in determining the dinosaur’s behavior.

In particular, the existence of the comb adds to evidence that Edmontosaurus was a social animal, as ornaments like combs and crests are typically used for communication among animals such as roosters, especially in relation to competition for females:

[E]quivalent to discovering for the first time that elephants had trunks. These findings dramatically alter our perception of the appearance and behaviour of this well-known dinosaur. We might imagine a pair of  male Edmontosaurus sizing each other up, bellowing, and showing off their head gear to see who was the dominant male and who is in charge of the herd.

dinosaur_fossilsAnd of course, this find demonstrates many of the limitations imposed on paleontologist, as fossils typically only preserve the bones of an animal and not fleshy structures. But in rare cases, fossils are found that are described as “mummified”, where bones are in the same positions relative to each other that they would have been in life, with impressions of the skin preserved on top.

According to Arbour, it’s not clear what conditions lead the preservation of skin impressions, but it likely involves the animals dying in a flood and being quickly buried by sand or mud. She added that even when skin impressions are preserved, they are often only visible in certain lighting or when the rock breaks a certain way, which may be why combs hadn’t been noticed on earlier “mummified” Edmontosaurus fossils.

dinosaur_skinimpressionsWhile earlier hadrosaurs had bony crests, researchers thought the crest had been completely lost in Edmontosaurus. The new discovery suggests that, in fact, the dinosaurs’ crests had changed, but remained an important feature. Bell said it also suggests that similar structures may have been missed in other dinosaurs:

There’s no reason that other strange fleshy structures couldn’t have been present on a whole range of other dinosaurs, including T. rex or Triceratops.

So really, this single find could have far-reaching implications for the field of paleontology. And with time, more discoveries, and additional refinements to the excavation process, we might just get a full and complete picture of what life really and truly looked like on Earth millions of years ago.

Source: cbc.ca

3-D Printed Guns: Congress Ready to Extend the Ban

3D_printed_weaponsEarlier this month, mere days before the anniversary of the Sandy Hook Elementary School mass shooting, Congress began proposing to extend a ban placed plastic firearms capable of evading metal detectors and X-ray machines. Narrowly beating a midnight deadline on Monday, Dec. 9th, the ban was extended for a period of ten years, though efforts to strengthen the restrictions were narrowly blocked by Congressional Republicans.

This was a bittersweet moment for advocates of gun control, but the implications of this decision go beyond the desire to not see another school shooting take place. With the growth of 3-D printing technology and fears that guns could be created using open-source software and store bought printers, preemptive measures were seen as necessary. Simply shutting down Distributed Defense’s website seemed insufficient given the interest and ease of access.

Cody-Wilson-Defense-Distributed-Wiki-Weapon-3-d-printed-gunBans on plastic and undetectable firearms were first passed during the administration of Ronald Reagan, and have been renewed twice – first in 1998 and again in 2003. But such weapons have become a growing threat and due to 3-D printing, which are becoming better and more affordable. And though public access is still limited to weapons made from ABS plastic, it may be only a matter of time before something more sophisticated becomes available.

However, advocates of gun control emphasize that this extension contains two key defeats. For starters, Democratic Senator Chuck Schumer’s desire to strengthen the ban by requiring that such weapons contain undetachable metal parts was blocked. In addition, the fact that the ban was extended for a ten-year period as is means it cannot be revisited and strengthened again in the near future.

3dmetalgun-640x353In this respect, the ban highlights a year of failure of the Obama administration and Congressional Democrats to toughen gun laws in the wake of the Sandy Hook shooting. Despite this tragedy and other mass shootings – such as the one that took place at the Washington Naval Yard – and the fact that some 90% support tougher gun laws, it seems that pro-gun lobbyists and the NRA are destined to have their way for the time being.

In the meantime, we can only hope that industrial 3-D printing, which allows for objects to be created out of metal parts, does not become readily available to average citizens. The one saving grace of the 3-D printed gun is the fact that it is entirely composed of plastic, making it an ineffective (if undetectable) weapon. And here’s hoping 2014 sees a lot less violence and a lot more humanity!

Source: cbc.ca, huffingtonpost.com

The Walking Dead Season 4B Trailer

TWD_S4-B_FEB2014Earlier this month, AMC released a teaser trailer for the second half of season four of The Walking Dead. And as you can see, they kept it simple, focusing on action, crisis, and all the other stuff that the show is famous for. And despite the brevity of it, a few things were made clear from this half-minute clip. For instance, we see who survives the prison debacle to fight another day and what they will be up to.

This includes Rick, Carl, Daryl, Michonne, Tyreese, Sasha, Glenn, Maggie, Beth, and Bob, all of whom find themselves in the wilderness and looking for a place to hunker down. I know, no big revelations there, they did all make it out of the prison last time I checked. But they are also traveling separately at this point, with some fighting Walkers while Rick is forced to fight with his injuries and his demons.

This last aspect is something very much on point with the plot of the original comic. You see, in that version, Rick not only lost his baby Judith during the Governor’s assault on the prison, but Lori as well. With his wife and daughter dead, but son still alive, he had to cling to what little sanity he had for both their sakes. And having been seriously injured, Carl was also terrified he would die and come back…

Lot’s of potential there! First episode of the latter half of the season airs on February 9th. Enjoy the clip!

News From Space: 200 km Water Jets on Europa

europa-landerAs the prime candidate for extra-terrestrial life, the Jovian moon of Europa has been the subject of much speculation and interest over years. And while our understanding of the surface has improved – thanks to observations made by several space probes and the Hubble space telescope – what lies beneath remains a mystery. Luckily, Europa may yet provide Earth scientists with a chance to look at its interior.

Earlier this month, data collected from the Hubble space telescope suggested that enormous jets of water more than 200 kilometers tall may be spurting intermittently from the moon’s surface. The findings, presented last week to the American Geophysical Union, await independent confirmation. But if the jets are real, the frozen world would join the tiny number of others known to have active jets, including Saturn’s moon Enceladus and Neptune’s moon Triton.

europa-lander-2What’s more, should these newly observed water plumes be tapping into some Europan sea, they could be bringing material to the surface that would otherwise stay hidden. Follow-up observations from Earth or with probes around Europa could sample the fountains, hunting for organic material and perhaps finding the evidence need to prove that living organisms exist beyond Earth.

Scientists spotted the plumes thanks to ultraviolet images taken by Hubble in December 2012. The research team, which hails from the Southwest Research Institute in Texas, then published their research in Science magazine. In the paper, astronomer and co-author Lorenz Roth explained their findings:

We found that there’s one blob of emission at Europa’s south pole. It was always there over the 7 hours we observed and always at the same location.

Previous observations from NASA’s Galileo mission, which visited the Jupiter system in the 1990s and early 2000s, suggest that Europa’s south pole is full of ridges and cracks quite similar to features called tiger stripes on Enceladus that spew water.

europa_chaosterrainLorenz and his team looked back through previous Hubble data to see if the plumes could have been spotted earlier but saw nothing, suggesting that they are likely transient. At the time, Europa was at its farthest from Jupiter, which could explain why the jets appeared only then. Researchers recently determined that Enceladus’ plumes are weakest when the moon is closest to Saturn, likely because the ringed planet’s gravity squeezes the tiger stripes shut.

Astronomer Kurt Retherford, also of SwRI and another co-author, claimed that the case of Enceladus helped them to make a connection with what they were observing:

We actually saw this press release on Enceladus. And we thought, ‘Oh my god! This is the explanation’” for why Europa’s plumes might only appear when it’s far from Jupiter.

In the past, scientists have looked for evidence of jets coming from Europa’s surface. When the Voyager probes flew by in the 70s, one image showed a fuzzy spot that some thought to be a plume, though most considered it an artifact of imaging. Galileo also saw a row of dark spots on a ridge of Europa which looked similar to spots seen on planet Earth before an eruption begins.

europaBecause of these previous false positives though, scientists are likely to be cautious when interpreting these newest results. But even with these reservations, Robert Pappalardo – who leads the planning team for the Europa Clipper Pre-Project (a proposed mission to Europa) – said that he’s already discussing with other scientists how these new results should affect their study priorities.

For instance, some future orbiter headed to Europa could carry detectors specifically designed to search for heavy organic molecules that could be indicative of life in the subsurface. When it passed over the geyser’s spray, it would be bathed in material from the moon’s interior, giving scientists a window into Europa’s ocean. Pappalardo also hopes that the finding will help push Europa to a place of high priority in NASA’s exploration agenda.

Due to budget constraints, a manned mission is not yet feasible, but NASA has indicated that it would be willing to send a robot lander there in the near future. In addition, recent computer models provided from the University of Texas showed that the ice is likely to be thinnest at the equator. Between the possibility that the oceans might be most accessible in this region, and the likelihood that some of that water escapes into space, unlocking the mysteries of the Jovian satellite might be easier than previously thought.

europa_gieserSources: wired.com, science.jpl.nasa.gov