Posts Tagged: "Galileo"

In Support of Inaugurating February 7 as ‘World e Day’

Mathematics is a fascinating subject to some people, but a horror to most. Formulas and rules abound to govern purely abstract relationships that appear alien to ordinary life. Yet, mathematical laws govern our entire world, and the Universe. Physicist Max Tegmark believes that the Universe is itself entirely mathematics, i.e., we are all elaborate formulas in some metaverse. Embedded within the mathematical laws are inscrutable constants, such as pi and e, where e is the so-called base of the natural logarithm. e is roughly 2.718281828…. Although Pi (3.14159…) has an official day, 3-14, or March 14, e has yet to acquire this honor. Last year, I wrote in honor of World Pi Day. This year, I propose making 2-7, or February 7, National or World e Day.

Raymond Van Dyke

February 7, 2019

NASA’s Juno craft to reach Jupiter on July 4th to find what’s hidden beneath the clouds

Since 1972, NASA has sent a series of eight spacecraft to this fifth planet in our solar system, including Cassini and Galileo. This 4th of July, NASA engineers and scientists are hoping for the successful arrival of Juno, the latest spacecraft to visit this massive planetary body. When it arrives at Jupiter, Juno will fire up its main engine for 35 minutes to enter an elliptical orbit around the planet. Juno’s mission will see it orbit Jupiter at least 37 times at a distance of 5,000 km (3,100 mi) from the top of Jupiter’s cloud atmosphere, the closest any craft has come to this planet.

Steve Brachmann

July 2, 2016

For 25 years the Hubble Space Telescope unlocks secrets of the universe

Images captured by the Hubble Space Telescope also helped the global science community learn more about the formation of planets and galaxies. In 1995, Hubble captured images in the Orion Nebula of intense radiation jets reaching trillions of miles long as well as the gaseous protoplanetary disks which serve as raw material for the stars and planets of a forming solar system. Other planetary discoveries pioneered by Hubble researchers include the first visible-light image ever captured of a planet outside of our solar system, Fomalhaut b, located 25 light years from earth in the Piscis Australis constellation.

Steve Brachmann

May 19, 2015

25 Years Since Galileo: A Recent Look at NASA Technologies

October 18 marks the 25th anniversary of the 1989 launching of the Galileo spacecraft by the National Aeronautics and Space Administration, a mission which focused on the study of the planet Jupiter and its moons. For decades, the operations of NASA have been incredibly innovative and inspirational to inventors of all kinds. The agency is still involved in various programs for scientific research, especially involving Mars… Although a patent has not yet been issued, metamaterials, or artificial materials engineered to have properties that aren’t found in nature, are the focus of U.S. Patent Application No. 20140287904, which is titled Negative Dielectric Constant Material Based on Ion Conducting Materials. The metamaterials involved in the invention are specifically negative index materials which have the unique ability to achieve a negative refractive index, enabling the creation of superlenses with greatly increased optical resolutions. The invention has multiple applications in both the commercial aerospace and military industries, such as cloaking or high-frequency communication systems.

Steve Brachmann

October 17, 2014