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Unfortunatly we are also home to some invasive alien species that threaten to kill and choke our natural life. One excellant example is the recent appearance of Coqui Frogs (read more) which came in on plants being imported for sales (go figure).

These little frogs (about the size of a nickel) are the loudest thing you have ever heard. At over 110 decibles per chirp there are no predators in Hawai'i for this creature and communities can grow as high as 20,000 to 40,000 per acre. You can imagine the din.

Furthermore, the coqui are eating insects that are normally eaten by our native creatures - which can upset the balance.

Hence my neighbor... coqui are moving into our neighborhood and the neighborhood association asked $44 from each person from which they would hire specialists to come and destroy the coqui (there are two effective methods, one a caffeine spray and the other a citric acid sollution spray - we have used the citric acid spray with great success).

My neighbor, a devout vegean is steadfast against it. Will not treat her coqui... "they have a right to live". Whereas, my response is... hey, man brought them in, man can bring them back out - to which she is very upset. (in the same token, she won't treat for termites, cockroaches, or rats either). Completely misses the point, as far as I can tell, that they are damaging OTHER species - nopers, THEY HAVE A RIGHT TO LIVE.

Ah well... I always maintained that eating vegetables was worse because they can't run and hide - and killing an entire field is akin to localized genocide.

Aloha nui loa

I heard a bunch of stuff about XTP a while ago, but not much recently.

Here's what Google finds:

http://www2.ics.hawaii.edu/~blanca/nets/xtp.html
http://www.cs.columbia.edu/~hgs/internet/xtp.html

What's really annoying about this guy is that he seems to think that un-manned spaceflight will somehow benefit if manned spaceflight is scaled back. Of course, that's nonsense. Cut manned spaceflight and I will bet you a donut to a Delta VH that within a decade NASA will cease to exist. This guy, who benefitted professionally to a huge extent from the existence of manned spaceflight programs, now has the nerve to turn around and bite the hand that (probably quite literally) fed him. That's annoying. And it hurts all of space science in the long run.

On a dollar-for-dollar basis space research of any kind (manned or unmanned) is pretty much a total waste of money. Some examples will help: the Hubble Space Telescope cost something like 2 billion. That's about 20 times the cost of the Keck Telescope, and it is about neck-and-neck when it comes to scientific output between the two. When it comes to planetary exploration - can you honestly say that there have been spin-offs that are useful here on Earth? I mean, let's be honest here: the science return from space research is all pretty trivial. Between us, who really gives a sh*t about some radiation belts around the Earth? A few power-line operators maybe, but it's not like they need a detailed understanding of the Earths bow-shock to operate, now is it? As for the rest of it - well, pretty pictures of Saturn are nice and all, but who really cares? They're ice and dirt, and have absolutely no impact on our daily lives. None whatsoever.

Some would argue that certain kinds of science can only be done from space, things like far-infrared, or X-ray observations. But those missions have in effect been subsidized to the tune of billions by other, less worthy missions. If you had to factor in the development cost of heavy-lift boosters into the cost of developing the Chandra X-ray observatory, it would have cost $20 billion or more. I doubt that would have been seen as worthwhile science.

In terms of improving human life, wouldn't the billions spent on un-manned space exploration be better spent curing disease through the NIH? Or a tax-cut. I mean, tax -cuts and de-regulation make more ultra-billionaires; if they want to fund space research privately then they can do that, and the free market will reward it accordingly (if in fact it is worthwhile).

Only a true naif would think that science is funded for scientific reasons alone, and Dr. van Allen has an inflated sense of his own importance when it comes to national funding priorities. Sciences like physics were funded because physiscists know how to make very, very large bombs. Bio-medical science is funded because people don't want to die. Everything else is pretty much not funded, or lives off of the table-droppings from the big sciences. And the big sciences are not funded because Congress has a love for deep knowledge.

By somehow pretending like his particular kind of science is more worthy than other science, he's starting a discussion that by all rights should hurt all of space science. In other words: Jim, SHUT UP. We've got a good gig going here, and you're messing it up.

The GMT Home Page is #1.

World Time = Greenwich Mean Time (GMT) - Current Time in every ... is # 2.

I think you will find, however, that in common technical usage, at least in the states, "Universial Time" is prefered to "Greenwich Mean Time" anyway. Less anglo centric.

GMT means Generic Mapping Tools.

Its nice to see that the ACLU has decided to protect my 5 year olds right to surf the net and enjoy the pron pop ups the these unethical perverts want to send.

It's nice to see that you prefer to let Witch-finder General Ashcroft into my computer and my bedroom rather than take responsibility to raise your own child.

Are you such a bad parent that you think a nanny-State can do a better job?

Your five year-old daughter might well be shocked by seeing porn on your computer; but I wager she'd be wakened by screaming nightmares for a month if she saw these pictures of the results of the Nazi Holocaust. (Note that two of the pictures, including the one of the emaciated children your daughter's age who were subjected to medical "experiments", are served up by a Florida public school system.)

Should we remove those pictures from the Internet to protect your daughter? Turn the Holocaust survivors' "never again" into "never again seen"?

What about pictures of Pol Pot's Killing Fields?

Will throwing those pictures down the memory hole make your job as parent any easier?

What about sanitizing inconvenient pictures of America's Iraq War?

Is you daughter too young for those pictures of her country's "accomplishments"? Shall we censor them too?

Or maybe it's a better idea you sit with your five-year old while she browses the internet?

To learn how to write your chosen language, check out the University web sites for your language. For example USC has an excellent Mandarin links area USC Chinese Language program , mostly pointing to free stuff. Fortunately, many Chinese teachers in the US have started using the Integrated Chineses Program ICP , an amazingly easy way to learn Chinese, if you do the homework. As the man in the parent post says, "dedication and commitment" are required.

I am having such fun that I have enrolled in evening Mandarin classes at GMU which does use ICP. It's my new way of gaming, learning how to read, write and speak Chinese.

Have fun, Lao Xuesheng (Old Student)

ps. I am not sure but there may be a Integrated Japanese Program, USC Japanese Language Center. I found it at the " USC Japanese Dept. page . Have fun.

It may take some time to learn to use it properly though...

Yes, channel 6 is 83.25 Mhz, channel 7 is 175.25 MHz...channels 2-6 are 'VHF-LO' and 7-13 is 'VHF-HI'

UHF starts at channel 14 @ 471.25 MHz...

See this page for more info.

Programming today is a race between software engineers striving to build bigger and better idiot-proof programs, and the Universe trying to produce bigger and better idiots. So far, the Universe is winning. -- Rich Cook.

All I really know, is that the people who show up with a degree in English, and want to code, rarely work out.

If you don't mind the advice, I think the problem may lie in how you interview. It's hard to do a good interview for a programing job, especially for those of us who still consider ourselves coders, but the preperations will pay off.

I ask the usual character questions -- do you like Star Trek? Could Superman beat up Darth Vader? Do you think it's ok to put mustard on a Roast Beef sandwich? And so on. (kidding of course).

I also do a whiteboard test of language neutral tasks. Using an OO language the interviewee and I make up on the spot (syntax only of course) we build a program that can, given a list of all the flights in the US, tell you the fastest way to get from point A to point B, at any given time. If they actualy understand the math, that's even better, but I'll settle for us making progress towards a solution, and seeing their designs. I also do a Meta-language example, where we, on the whiteboard , build a Turing machine (though I don't call it that during the interview, we just talk about rules for our machine) that will be able to recognize certain things. I also will frequently run Robocode and then looking at the API with the interviewee, ask about the robot they would make.

I agree that this sort of stuff does give the CS grad an advantage -- they've probably had discrete math, and ougta understand nodes, edges and the pumping lemma. But I think that these concepts are generic enough that a person with no "formal" training can still arrive at good answers. I also think though that this reveals the CS students who can parrot what they heard but didn't "understand." I find these sort of thngs very valuable in revealing CS majors who can talk the talk, but can't code their way out of a wet paper bag. I'm not saying I've never hired a dud, but I can say (knok on wood) so far I've avoided the "negative work" employee, who is so bad it takes another developer to fix everything this 1st guy broke. As for the entry level positions, and salary, I wrote some thoughts about essential skills. If you have the skills I describe, you should take the job, and start working -- you'll get promoted quickly. And none of that has to do with a degree -- it's attitude.

in fact, like backov, I'm wary of too much education --if you have a BS and an MS in CS I'm wary of you. I'll want to know why you didn't go work right away with a BS. If you have a BS in CS, I'm gonna want to know what programs you made for yourself, for pleasure, and not for school. You should have a simple website somewhere too. PLEASE have a web site somewhere. If you don't have your resume available from your home page, along with a few other docs, you won't do well in this field. And if you're just out of college, you should have a student web page right? Finally, you probably know if you're a star or not. If you are indeed a star, take the job if it's cool, and don't worry about the money. Learn from the greybeards around, and realize that you're gonna fly the coop soon enough anyway. Most developers get their best raises by constantly switching jobs. If you're not a star, friggin RECOGNIZE that, and embrace your roll as a "behind th

The "recipe" for meteorite identification usually includes the ratio of oxygen isotopes. This ratio varies as you head away from the Sun. So, if you can identify the ratio, you can match pebble A to pebble B (or planet B) fairly well.

It's the primitive part I like about gnuplot. It's great for quick and dirty data verification plots. When I want really pretty plots for publications, I use GMT. It take forever to fine tune a GMT plot, but you can make them exactly how you want. It's also very scriptable(TM) which one of my requirements.

Actually, Caulerpa taxifolia is a natural variety which has spread out of its normal environment.

I was reading lots of stuff about the Iran/Iraq war over the weekend.

After the initial year or two where Iran managed to push the Iraqi's out of Iran, they kept fighting for another 6-7 with the WHOLE ENTIRE INTENT to spread their "Islamic State" across all of the middle east, and to eventually annihilate Israel.

If we hadn't supported Saddam then, Iran would have attempted to conquer most of the middle east.

150,000 Iraqi's died to prevent that, and the Iranian Islamic government sent 350,000 Iranians to their death in their attempts to carry out their aims (most died *AFTER* Saddam was willing to sue for peace, when the Iranian goverment kept the war going in hopes of spreading "their Islamic state" by force).

Almost everyone playing back-seat driver can't possibly imagine all the equally or even more horrible repercussions of changing any one set of things in the past.

The world is a very complicated place. If you could go back in time and undo a few things, I can just as easily expect that *even worse* things would have happened.

Just look at North Korea. The entire world has been "shunning" them for how many years now? Exactly as most peaceniks would have us do with any "rogue" state. How many North Koreans have starved to death or been put to death in camps? Look at the following, the "mid" estimate for "Domestic Democide" by the North Koreans, it stands at two million and is estimated to increase by 100,000 per year. http://www.hawaii.edu/powerkills/SOD.TAB10.1.GIF

ANYONE could make a fairly solid argument that we should have bitten the bullet and conquered all three countries (Iran, Iraq, and North Korea) 20 years ago, and the net loss of life and "overall injustice" would be an order of magnitude smaller.

I give good odds that no matter what happens or how you slice it, Iraq will fall into Islamic Hard Line hands, and we'll get at least one more BIG war between various mid-east states, killing hundreds of thousands. And there's not much we can do about it, short of undermining their very *culture*.

Here are some good things to read:

Traffic Patterns and How To Erase Traffic Jams

Traffic Psychology

According to this page on Sedna, it's got a perihelion (closest approach) of 76 AU, outside of the scattering influence of Neptune. 2000 OO67 has an aphelion like Sedna, but a much closer perihelion at 21 AU.

There's mention of the big buck$ LSST telescope, and a proposal to pop for six dedicated scopes, but nothing about the US$8mil or so that has already been allocated to the PanSTARRS project in Hawaii. UH is developing a telescope array and automated asteroid detection system to scan almost the entire sky every few days. Once deployed on either Mauna Kea or Haleakala, a five year campaign is planned to catalog at least 90% of the estimated number of 0.3km or bigger NEOs out there.

If an orbit is found that seems to intersect with us, then it becomes someone else's problem.

I'm not sure how bright the glow would be, of course...

Yeah, you're wrong ;)

The net reaction is this:

6CO2 + 6H2O (+ light energy) -> C6H12O6 + 6O2

It would be the reverse reaction of burning C6H12O6 (glucose), not carbon.

For a more detailed stepwise reaction: here

Compared to new ground-based telescopes, the Hubble is a technically inferior telescope. But it still gets much better images because it doesn't have the atmosphere. It's not just because it "must be cooler" because it's space-based. No amount of telescope can make up for the atmosphere.

Peter Henderson. Purely functional operating systems. In J. Darlington, P. Henderson, and D. A. Turner, editors, Functional programming and its applications, pages 177--192. Cambridge University Press, 1982.

It would be difficult. I think you're talking about interferometry. This was originally developed for radio telescopes, and is harder to do at shorter wavelengths. The Submillimeter Array, working at the shorter submm wavelengths, has just opened on Mauna Kea, although some work has already been done with linking the James Clerk Maxwell Telescope and the Caltech Submillimeter Observatory. At optical wavelengths it gets harder still. An example is the Cambridge Optical Aperture Synthesis Telescope (COAST). There's also the proposed `Ohana project.

A major problem is that you have to preserve the phase information of the light when you combine the signals from the telescopes, so you can't just record images with a CCD (which only gets you the intensity) and then try to handle the rest of it in software.

Essentially this means that you'd have to combine light from the telescopes in real time and keep the path lengths between them accurate to a small fraction of the wavelength you're measuring. You can do this "off-line" at radio frequencies, for example with the Very Long Baseline Array (VLBA) but not at optical frequencies.

So, in summary, the Internet lets amateur observers collaborate in various ways. However, combining their optical telescopes to get the resolving power of a larger telescope (the size of the distributed collection of individual telescopes) through optical interferometry is not one of them.

It would be difficult. I think you're talking about interferometry. This was originally developed for radio telescopes, and is harder to do at shorter wavelengths. The Submillimeter Array, working at the shorter submm wavelengths, has just opened on Mauna Kea, although some work has already been done with linking the James Clerk Maxwell Telescope and the Caltech Submillimeter Observatory. At optical wavelengths it gets harder still. An example is the Cambridge Optical Aperture Synthesis Telescope (COAST). There's also the proposed `Ohana project.

A major problem is that you have to preserve the phase information of the light when you combine the signals from the telescopes, so you can't just record images with a CCD (which only gets you the intensity) and then try to handle the rest of it in software.

Essentially this means that you'd have to combine light from the telescopes in real time and keep the path lengths between them accurate to a small fraction of the wavelength you're measuring. You can do this "off-line" at radio frequencies, for example with the Very Long Baseline Array (VLBA) but not at optical frequencies.

So, in summary, the Internet lets amateur observers collaborate in various ways. However, combining their optical telescopes to get the resolving power of a larger telescope (the size of the distributed collection of individual telescopes) through optical interferometry is not one of them.

Olivine forms volcanically, and will alter quickly (on a geological scale) into another mineral called Serpentine, which is why finding it here is very suggestive that both during its formation and subsequence existance on Mars, the rock has remained dry. It's not such a surprise that olivine has been found, is it?

I read at one of the links that "Olivine is also found in many iron-nickel meteorites. Not just as small grains but as significantly sized crystals sometimes occupying over 50% of the meteorites volume."
I do not know anything about minerals really, but if the lander is exploring a crater, couldn't this come from the meteorite that created the crater in the first place?

Replacement - The replacement for the HST is due to go up in 2012, so there's a relatively small window with no orbital telescope (at least, if all goes well)

Exactly. As an astronomer let me assure you that all of these are absolutely worthless, and all scientific progress will cease once this horribly-redesigned-to-justify-a-manned-shuttle, wasn't-even-built-right-by-political-contractees turkey that's reached the end of its operative lifetime.

Actually, it is a shame in a purely emotional way. Just like when MIR was deorbited. But it's still the right call.

And I don't mean to demean the astronauts who at risk to their own lives got that POS in something like working order, and finally gave everyone some pretty pictures.

I do... but I'm afraid its not much help for the question you ask. Here is all the Science article says on the subject:

"The Hawaiian bobtail squid Euprymna scolopes (Cephalopoda: Sepiolidae) (Fig. 1A) is similar to other cephalopod species that have been studied (6-9) in having both variably reflective tissues, such as the skin of the mantle, and statically reflective tissues, such as those associated with the eye, digestive gland, and light organ. The reflector of the bilobed light organ is a particularly well-developed tissue (Fig. 1, A to D) that modulates the luminescence produced by a population of the symbiotic bacterium Vibrio fischeri (10, 11). On each side of the adult light organ, symbiont-containing epithelial tissue comprises a core that is surrounded by the thick silvery reflector. Together with a muscle-derived lens, these dioptrics function to direct the bacterial luminescence ventrally (11). "

However, a quick Internet search turned up this old article, which seems to support the camouflage use of the organ. But it also sounds like we don't really know how the squid uses its light organ. Its not like we can just ask it! Like many things, it may have more than one use.

And here is Dr. McFall-Ngai's webpage, which summarizes her research and lists her other publications.

• Obviously you have never lived in a country that kills its OWN citizens. For something closer to your home (assuming USA), check out the Waco atrocities committed by the government, as well as Ruby Ridge. Here is some If you are into films, you can also check out the controversial documentary on it.
• Obviously you haven't heard of the totalitarian regimes in Germany, USSR, and USA's close friends Saudi Arabia and Egypt. A couple of stories on the state of Egypt (USA's 2nd large recipient of military aid)
• Obviously you haven't heard of the damage done to civil rights activists in the 60's by the FBI and the CIA. Laws were actually changed to prevent this sort of thing.
• Obviously you have never been targetted by the police. (I have no proof of this but if you let me track you, I can find out :) )
• Obviously you are not a minority man (particularly black) living in some parts of USA. (Don't know this either. But I can easily verify this if you send your driver's license to me)
• Obviously you haven't heard of the infiltration of the FBI by organized criminals (particularly the Italian mafia in the 60's and 70's).
• Obviously you haven't heard of police fabricating information and jailing people.
• Obviously you haven't heard of the government cooking up bogus charges and jailing people. (Refer to the previous link and do your research)
• Obviously McCarthyism is not part of your collective mind.
• Obviously you haven't heard of John Ashcroft's recent decree to spy on antiwar activists.
• Obviously you believe the legal system represent justice. (I can't prove this to anyone. It is something that you will realize as you grow up and leave the cave that you have been living in--if you actually manage to do that!)
• Obviously you underestimate the power of the goverment.

• Obviously you have never lived in a country that kills its OWN citizens. For something closer to your home (assuming USA), check out the Waco atrocities committed by the government, as well as Ruby Ridge. Here is some If you are into films, you can also check out the controversial documentary on it.
• Obviously you haven't heard of the totalitarian regimes in Germany, USSR, and USA's close friends Saudi Arabia and Egypt. A couple of stories on the state of Egypt (USA's 2nd large recipient of military aid)
• Obviously you haven't heard of the damage done to civil rights activists in the 60's by the FBI and the CIA. Laws were actually changed to prevent this sort of thing.
• Obviously you have never been targetted by the police. (I have no proof of this but if you let me track you, I can find out :) )
• Obviously you are not a minority man (particularly black) living in some parts of USA. (Don't know this either. But I can easily verify this if you send your driver's license to me)
• Obviously you haven't heard of the infiltration of the FBI by organized criminals (particularly the Italian mafia in the 60's and 70's).
• Obviously you haven't heard of police fabricating information and jailing people.
• Obviously you haven't heard of the government cooking up bogus charges and jailing people. (Refer to the previous link and do your research)
• Obviously McCarthyism is not part of your collective mind.
• Obviously you haven't heard of John Ashcroft's recent decree to spy on antiwar activists.
• Obviously you believe the legal system represent justice. (I can't prove this to anyone. It is something that you will realize as you grow up and leave the cave that you have been living in--if you actually manage to do that!)
• Obviously you underestimate the power of the goverment.

In particular, there seems to have been an agreement made some years ago between whatever entity handles the summit for astronomy (probably the University of Hawaii Institute for Astronomy) and some native groups (mountaintops are sacred places) under which the astronomy folks got permission to build a certain number (int) of telescopes.

That many have now been built. The astronomy folks would like to build more. And... various folks (natives and others) are noting that um, no, that's not what they agreed to. So there's been a lot of paperwork, environmental impact statements, and so on.

In some cases, things are a little grey-area-ish. They want to build "outriggers" on the sides of the Keck scopes, for example. And the Smithsonian-Sinica.tw-Harvard submillimetre array - does that count as 8 scopes, since there are 8 dishes, or 1, since it's an interferometer?

As it now stands, though, Mauna Kea wins lots of astronomy pissing matches. :) It has the 2 largest optical scopes in the world (Keck and Keck II), plus the 4th largest (Subaru) and another in the top 10 (Gemini North), the largest single submillimeter telescope (James Clerk Maxwell) and I think the largest dedicated infrared telescope (UKIRT).

If someone wanted to build a truly monster scope on Mauna Kea, they could simply remove one of the small ones, it would seem. University of Hawaii has an 0.6-metre one and a 2.2-metre one. (Yes, those are "small," all you backyard astronomers who are now drooling. ;) Take out the 0.6 and replace it with a 30-metre one, and you haven't changed the number of telescopes, right?

In particular, there seems to have been an agreement made some years ago between whatever entity handles the summit for astronomy (probably the University of Hawaii Institute for Astronomy) and some native groups (mountaintops are sacred places) under which the astronomy folks got permission to build a certain number (int) of telescopes.

That many have now been built. The astronomy folks would like to build more. And... various folks (natives and others) are noting that um, no, that's not what they agreed to. So there's been a lot of paperwork, environmental impact statements, and so on.

In some cases, things are a little grey-area-ish. They want to build "outriggers" on the sides of the Keck scopes, for example. And the Smithsonian-Sinica.tw-Harvard submillimetre array - does that count as 8 scopes, since there are 8 dishes, or 1, since it's an interferometer?

As it now stands, though, Mauna Kea wins lots of astronomy pissing matches. :) It has the 2 largest optical scopes in the world (Keck and Keck II), plus the 4th largest (Subaru) and another in the top 10 (Gemini North), the largest single submillimeter telescope (James Clerk Maxwell) and I think the largest dedicated infrared telescope (UKIRT).

If someone wanted to build a truly monster scope on Mauna Kea, they could simply remove one of the small ones, it would seem. University of Hawaii has an 0.6-metre one and a 2.2-metre one. (Yes, those are "small," all you backyard astronomers who are now drooling. ;) Take out the 0.6 and replace it with a 30-metre one, and you haven't changed the number of telescopes, right?

In particular, there seems to have been an agreement made some years ago between whatever entity handles the summit for astronomy (probably the University of Hawaii Institute for Astronomy) and some native groups (mountaintops are sacred places) under which the astronomy folks got permission to build a certain number (int) of telescopes.

That many have now been built. The astronomy folks would like to build more. And... various folks (natives and others) are noting that um, no, that's not what they agreed to. So there's been a lot of paperwork, environmental impact statements, and so on.

In some cases, things are a little grey-area-ish. They want to build "outriggers" on the sides of the Keck scopes, for example. And the Smithsonian-Sinica.tw-Harvard submillimetre array - does that count as 8 scopes, since there are 8 dishes, or 1, since it's an interferometer?

As it now stands, though, Mauna Kea wins lots of astronomy pissing matches. :) It has the 2 largest optical scopes in the world (Keck and Keck II), plus the 4th largest (Subaru) and another in the top 10 (Gemini North), the largest single submillimeter telescope (James Clerk Maxwell) and I think the largest dedicated infrared telescope (UKIRT).

If someone wanted to build a truly monster scope on Mauna Kea, they could simply remove one of the small ones, it would seem. University of Hawaii has an 0.6-metre one and a 2.2-metre one. (Yes, those are "small," all you backyard astronomers who are now drooling. ;) Take out the 0.6 and replace it with a 30-metre one, and you haven't changed the number of telescopes, right?

In particular, there seems to have been an agreement made some years ago between whatever entity handles the summit for astronomy (probably the University of Hawaii Institute for Astronomy) and some native groups (mountaintops are sacred places) under which the astronomy folks got permission to build a certain number (int) of telescopes.

That many have now been built. The astronomy folks would like to build more. And... various folks (natives and others) are noting that um, no, that's not what they agreed to. So there's been a lot of paperwork, environmental impact statements, and so on.

In some cases, things are a little grey-area-ish. They want to build "outriggers" on the sides of the Keck scopes, for example. And the Smithsonian-Sinica.tw-Harvard submillimetre array - does that count as 8 scopes, since there are 8 dishes, or 1, since it's an interferometer?

As it now stands, though, Mauna Kea wins lots of astronomy pissing matches. :) It has the 2 largest optical scopes in the world (Keck and Keck II), plus the 4th largest (Subaru) and another in the top 10 (Gemini North), the largest single submillimeter telescope (James Clerk Maxwell) and I think the largest dedicated infrared telescope (UKIRT).

If someone wanted to build a truly monster scope on Mauna Kea, they could simply remove one of the small ones, it would seem. University of Hawaii has an 0.6-metre one and a 2.2-metre one. (Yes, those are "small," all you backyard astronomers who are now drooling. ;) Take out the 0.6 and replace it with a 30-metre one, and you haven't changed the number of telescopes, right?

I'm talking about the fact that there are several ground-based observatories that consist of multiple telescopes (Keck, Magellan, VLT, LBT), and that one of the goals of this design is interferometry. None of these telescopes is currently planning on doing optical interferometry, because it's just too hard. They're all working on infrared interferometry, and even that is very difficult to accomplish. Especially with mirrors mounted independently, as all except the LBT are.

When scientists look for life out side the solar system, why don't they focus on moons of Jupiter like planets instead of finding Earth like planets.

Actually, they have looked for moons around extrasolar planets that eclipse their star. The main example (so far) of the "transiting technique" is HD 209458b, a hot Jupiter in a 3-day period. This transit has been observed using Hubble, with a sensitivity that would allow one to detect Saturn-like rings or moons as small as twice the size of Earth. None were found. More information here.

Of course, a 3-day period planet's moon would still be unable to harbor life as we know it (too hot). But these are the first steps being taken to look for such objects. As more transiting planets are detected, this technique will tell us a lot about moon systems around these planets.

Moons of giant planets in temperate zones may indeed be the key to finding life-sustaining bodies. Our own Moon stabilizes the rotational axis of the Earth, which prevents many extreme climatic changes. Compare this to Mars, which has no large moons (only two small ones) that lead to the same stability. A giant planet would have a similar affect on the dynamics. This is just one example of how a second body (in our case, the Moon) aids the development of life. One can ponder how much the probability of life drops off if such a body does not exist, though I'm not sure anyone has a convincing answer, yet.

We can barely image planets that are twice the size of Jupiter and you are suggesting we should image MOONS!?

So far, scientists have been unable to image any extra-solar planets at all. The planets have been detected indirectly--by looking at the effects of the planet on the star. An overview of these techniques. Astronomers have directly imaged brown dwarfs, which are somewhat like both planets and stars. We can't yet image exoplanets, but we can still learn a lot about them.

Direct imaging of planets may be made with the Keck Interferometer in Nulling Mode (a similar setup is being designed for the LBTI in Arizona, and the European VLTI), or with "Extreme Adaptive Optics", or finally with the Terrestrial Planet Finder.

If the people on the inside surface were much more evolved than us, then surely they would know calculus. Therefore, they would figure out that anywhere inside the sphere, they would actually be weightless.

Is that from all instruments or just a subset? If all that's pretty impressive.

Whew. That's a lot.

I support the UKIRT instruments, and wrote a lot of the code for IRIS2 and the heterodyne instruments on JCMT. The joy of it lies in the fact that data reduction for the vast majority of instruments is similar. For the most part, an infrared camera is an infrared camera is an infrared camera. New instruments only require a few tweaks. IRIS2 support only took a couple of weeks to get going, and now they have a fully functional data reduction pipeline for their imaging data that performs in realtime.

Another joy lies in the infrastructure. Once you've written all kinds of file handling, calibration, and configuration code there's no need to write it all again from scratch just because you get a new instrument.

Oh, and it's GPL.

The "it's in Hawai'i" info was for the benefit of other readers. Readers less delightedly in the know than the parent poster can find out more about UKIRT at the homepage. Also check out the other stuff going on at the (Anglo-Canadian-Dutch) Joint Astronomy Centre.

The "it's in Hawai'i" info was for the benefit of other readers. Readers less delightedly in the know than the parent poster can find out more about UKIRT at the homepage. Also check out the other stuff going on at the (Anglo-Canadian-Dutch) Joint Astronomy Centre.

TO: Free Software Communistic-unity

FROM: Fearless Leader Penguini, Central Committee, USSR Government in Exile

SUBJECT: "the movement's usual public image of happy software proles linking arms and singing the "Internationale" while freely sharing the fruits of their code-writing labor"

It has come to our attention that most of you have not learned our theme song. Please go immediately here and memorize it in your native language. Regard this as a top priority directive. Also memorize it in the secondary language of your choice and be ready for foreign travel.

The source is with us!

Since I live in Hilo Hawaii, I was very excited to hear several years ago about the different uses of Macadamia nut husks. As it is right now, outside of most of the Macadamia processing plants (Mauna Loa), there are huge piles of husks just rotting. One of the coolest uses to be announced is the ability to use the husks as charcoal. I am just waiting for the day I can go down to the local Wiki-Wiki and pick up a bag of Macadamia nut charcoal to cook my Huli-Huli chicken :)

Barring any glitches, it should be churning out production data in three years. The observation program will then proceed over three to five years, depending on funding. Given the short cycle time between individual observations, PanSTARRS should usually be able to accurately calculate an object's orbit by the time a science editor gets wind of it. It beats a sharp stick in the eye.

Other projects intended to detect objects down to several hundred meters are still in the planning stage.

Barring any glitches, it should be churning out production data in three years. The observation program will then proceed over three to five years, depending on funding. Given the short cycle time between individual observations, PanSTARRS should usually be able to accurately calculate an object's orbit by the time a science editor gets wind of it. It beats a sharp stick in the eye.

Other projects intended to detect objects down to several hundred meters are still in the planning stage.

Soon they'll try the ultimate, using the recent MIT laser cooling technique to bring down the temperature to below 1 kelvins. Now thats when the ambient cosmic background radiation will become a pain.

SCUBA (Submillimeter Common-User Bolometer Array) on JCMT maintains a temperature of about 60mK using a liquid helium dilution refrigerator. It is probably the continuously coldest place that we know of in the universe, since it maintains 60mK for weeks on end.

So no, you don't need laser cooling techniques to get down to these low temperatures for astronomical detectors.

(a) Except as provided in paragraph (b) of this section, no person may operate a moored balloon or kite- (1) Less than 500 feet from the base of any cloud; (2) More than 500 feet above the surface of the earth; (3) From an area where the ground visibility is less than three miles; or (4) Within five miles of the boundary of any airport. (b) Paragraph (a) of this section does not apply to the operation of a balloon or kite below the top of any structure and within 250 feet of it, if that shielded operation does not obscure any lighting on the structure.

No person may operate an unmanned free balloon- (a) Unless otherwise authorized by ATC, in a control zone below 2,000 feet above the surface, or in an airport traffic area; (b) At any altitude where there are clouds or obscuring phenomena of more than five-tenths coverage; (c) At any altitude below 60,000 feet standard pressure altitude where the horizontal visibility is less than five miles; (d) During the first 1,000 feet of ascent, over a congested area of a city, town, or settlement or an open-air assembly of persons not associated with the operation; or (e) In such a manner that impact of the balloon, or part thereof including its payload, with the surface creates a hazard to persons or property not associated with the operation.

Hopefully this will make companies realize that the Internet isn't comprised of just IE users.

Well, not quite, but the last time I looked, (which was about 9 days ago) about 95% of internet users used Internet Explorer for their web browser. While that doesn't comprise all internet users, it's close enough to make no odds.

True, those objects block our view at optical wavelengths, but they can be transparent (well, optically thin) at submillimetre wavelengths. I work for the James Clerk Maxwell Telescope, which is the world's largest single-dish submillimetre-wave telescope. The JCMT has, for example, seen into the cores of the famous pillars in the Eagle Nebula.

ftp://videl.ics.hawaii.edu/temp/usenix-slashdot/us enix.mp3
Mirror of MP3 just in case of Slashdotting.