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Actually you could. Using numbers from NASA on the amount of energy received by earth each day from the sun is about 10,000 times as much as we consume. So to put that number in perspective we could cover 1% of the earth's surface in 1% efficient panels and be able to meet our current energy needs. Now given that even the really cheap thin film ones are like 4% efficient (going from memory here so I may be off but it is reasonable number) we would only need to cover 0.25% of earth's surface to meet our needs or we could still cover 1% of it and have a surplus of energy. Now the question becomes does it currently make economic sense to build out that much generation capacity and the needed storage capacity?

This sounds like the frivolous science from the past decades. Before this meteorite from 'Mercury' there was a meteorite allegedly from 'Mars'. They even fooled poor president Clinton to utter upon it. http://www2.jpl.nasa.gov/snc/clinton.html

It is April 1st today, but these mercurian reports from a dude called Irving came yesterday.

Don't the scientists at NASA and elsewhere have anything better to do than identify earthlings rocks as extraterrestrial. Self-deception is indeed a strong force, but this is getting out of hands.

I have just finished doing a music video for a song I have about the Mars rovers. I was very impressed with the image data that NASA makes available on the Mars Science Laboratory - RAW images from cameras as well as annotated images with explanations.

It's not the same panorama, but this one of Mt. Sharpe is pretty awesome (14576x2018 pixels).

Not the exact same picture, but here one with a 88mb TIFF. Here's another with an 88mb TIFF, and here is a whole lot more for your desktop pleasure.

Not the exact same picture, but here one with a 88mb TIFF. Here's another with an 88mb TIFF, and here is a whole lot more for your desktop pleasure.

Not the exact same picture, but here one with a 88mb TIFF. Here's another with an 88mb TIFF, and here is a whole lot more for your desktop pleasure.

Here's one I found within 1 minute of searching on Google.

Climate Change was the original name of the phenomena. "Global Warming" is only one aspect of the problem, it's use as the prominent name is because of idiots who don't actually understand the problem (i.e. political slogan bullshit).

Efforts to restore the original name to prominence is just trying to counteract the idiots who thought emphasising one aspect of the problem for FUD purposes was a good idea to get political action.

You are missing that this march is marked by a particular weather pattern which is just as much out of whack as, say, this february's pattern. Look at february - Gistemp data here. Looking ahead for complete March, we will probably see significant arctic warming with a temporary cold snap in the lower latitudes.

No, he meant the link to jizmag instead of NASA. The third link, the one that promises photos.

http://landsat.gsfc.nasa.gov/news/news-archive/news_0591.html

http://landsat.gsfc.nasa.gov/news/news-archive/news_0591.html

http://landsat.gsfc.nasa.gov/news/news-archive/news_0591.html

http://landsat.gsfc.nasa.gov/news/news-archive/news_0591.html

No, he meant the link to jizmag instead of NASA. The third link, the one that promises photos.

http://landsat.gsfc.nasa.gov/news/news-archive/news_0591.html

http://landsat.gsfc.nasa.gov/news/news-archive/news_0591.html

http://landsat.gsfc.nasa.gov/news/news-archive/news_0591.html

http://landsat.gsfc.nasa.gov/news/news-archive/news_0591.html

No, he meant the link to jizmag instead of NASA. The third link, the one that promises photos.

http://landsat.gsfc.nasa.gov/news/news-archive/news_0591.html

http://landsat.gsfc.nasa.gov/news/news-archive/news_0591.html

http://landsat.gsfc.nasa.gov/news/news-archive/news_0591.html

http://landsat.gsfc.nasa.gov/news/news-archive/news_0591.html

No, he meant the link to jizmag instead of NASA. The third link, the one that promises photos.

http://landsat.gsfc.nasa.gov/news/news-archive/news_0591.html

http://landsat.gsfc.nasa.gov/news/news-archive/news_0591.html

http://landsat.gsfc.nasa.gov/news/news-archive/news_0591.html

http://landsat.gsfc.nasa.gov/news/news-archive/news_0591.html

I'm not sure how much I buy that... even partial serial numbers should be enough to determine that they pieces are likely to be from mission 'x' and not from mission 'y'. Enough partials and the level of confidence as to which mission they came from can get pretty high.

You can also compare the recovery location to the impact point for each mission - Apollo By The Numbers has a table giving the impact locations for the S-IC and S-II stages. I'd have to plot it out to see how far apart they are, but at first glance they're modestly well scattered. (Anyone know how to convert those lat/long coordinates into WGS-84 or Google Earth coordinates?) Again, not a smoking gun but definitely a way to increase the confidence level.

I'm not sure how much I buy that... even partial serial numbers should be enough to determine that they pieces are likely to be from mission 'x' and not from mission 'y'. Enough partials and the level of confidence as to which mission they came from can get pretty high.

You can also compare the recovery location to the impact point for each mission - Apollo By The Numbers has a table giving the impact locations for the S-IC and S-II stages. I'd have to plot it out to see how far apart they are, but at first glance they're modestly well scattered. (Anyone know how to convert those lat/long coordinates into WGS-84 or Google Earth coordinates?) Again, not a smoking gun but definitely a way to increase the confidence level.

Very well: http://quest.arc.nasa.gov/mars/ask/atmosphere/Martian_atmosphere.txt

They do so via radio waves utilizing the "Deep Space Network" (no, really!). You can find a NASA PDF as well as Wiki page, etc.

http://voyager.jpl.nasa.gov/where/index.html http://voyager.jpl.nasa.gov/mission/interstellar.html http://abyss.uoregon.edu/~js/images/voy_traj.jpg And you can simulate the entire flight and its current position in 3D at http://eyes.nasa.gov/

http://voyager.jpl.nasa.gov/where/index.html http://voyager.jpl.nasa.gov/mission/interstellar.html http://abyss.uoregon.edu/~js/images/voy_traj.jpg And you can simulate the entire flight and its current position in 3D at http://eyes.nasa.gov/

http://voyager.jpl.nasa.gov/where/index.html http://voyager.jpl.nasa.gov/mission/interstellar.html http://abyss.uoregon.edu/~js/images/voy_traj.jpg And you can simulate the entire flight and its current position in 3D at http://eyes.nasa.gov/

No, it wasn't the Eniac.

"There are three different computer types on the Voyager spacecraft and there are two of each kind. Total number of words among the six computers is about 32K."*

[*] - http://voyager.jpl.nasa.gov/faq.html

What is this the third time we had a story about it leaving the solar system? Some include the Oort Cloud in the solar system so are we facing hundreds of years of these announcements?

No. We'd be facing thousands of years of these announcements. From NASA:

Sometime before the year 2020, Voyager 1 will become the first spacecraft to cross the heliopause-the outer boundary of the vast region of space dominated by the solar wind and the sun's magnetic field-and reach interstellar space. In that sense, it can be said that the spacecraft will be able to sample what space is like beyond our solar system. (If we define the solar system as the sun and everything that primarily orbits the sun, however, Voyager 1 will remain within the confines of the solar system until it emerges from the Oort cloud in another 14,000 to 28,000 years).

Fortunately, in 28,000 years, its plutonium power supply will only be producing somewhere around 4 * 10^-94 watts, so I'm pretty sure we won't be talking to it by then. :-)

Its already pasted the ort cloud

No, according to NASA's Voyager project page, Voyager 1 won't escape the Oort cloud (really the outer Oort cloud) for another 14,000 - 28,000 years. (Probably due to running out of power in the next 10 to 15 years.)

"We are in a magnetic region unlike any we've been in before -- about 10 times more intense than before the termination shock -- but the magnetic field data show no indication we're in interstellar space," said Leonard Burlaga, a Voyager magnetometer team member based at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Md. "The magnetic field data turned out to be the key to pinpointing when we crossed the termination shock. And we expect these data will tell us when we first reach interstellar space."

http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/news/news.php?release=2012-381

If we define the solar system as the sun and everything that primarily orbits the sun, however, Voyager 1 will remain within the confines of the solar system until it emerges from the Oort cloud in another 14,000 to 28,000 years

http://solarsystem.nasa.gov/missions/profile.cfm?MCode=Voyager_1&Target=Beyond

He said "not even remotely close" not which side of it it was not close to.

Though:
Voyager 1 is in the process of escaping the solar system at a speed of about 523.6 million km per year, or about 1.4 million km per day. Even at this tremendous speed, Voyager 1 will take at least 14,000 years (and maybe twice that or even longer) to emerge from the Oort cloud. http://solarsystem.nasa.gov/missions/profile.cfm?MCode=Voyager_1&Target=Beyond

The Voyager project's chief scientist says not just yet: http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/news/news.php?release=2013-107 Also, here's a fairly recent video lecture he gave on the topic that gives some good details: http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/events/lectures_archive.cfm?year=2012&month=9

What is this the third time we had a story about it leaving the solar system? Some include the Oort Cloud in the solar system so are we facing hundreds of years of these announcements?

The Voyager project's chief scientist says not just yet: http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/news/news.php?release=2013-107 Also, here's a fairly recent video lecture he gave on the topic that gives some good details: http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/events/lectures_archive.cfm?year=2012&month=9

What is this the third time we had a story about it leaving the solar system? Some include the Oort Cloud in the solar system so are we facing hundreds of years of these announcements?

Too bad NASA has a better definition of "true interstellar space."

The Voyager project's chief scientist says not just yet: http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/news/news.php?release=2013-107 Also, here's a fairly recent video lecture he gave on the topic that gives some good details: http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/events/lectures_archive.cfm?year=2012&month=9

The Voyager project's chief scientist says not just yet: http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/news/news.php?release=2013-107 Also, here's a fairly recent video lecture he gave on the topic that gives some good details: http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/events/lectures_archive.cfm?year=2012&month=9

Take your politically colored blinders off, Rose produced nothing but propaganda for the anti-science movement. His "official" graph is a fabrication, (see http://www.windows2universe.org/earth/climate/climate_today.html and http://data.giss.nasa.gov/gistemp/graphs_v3/ and Rose cites no authorities. Referring back to the main thread - the hour of 'lights out' would be much better spent if everyone sought out ways and actually acted on them consistently to reduce their energy demand. Like cleaning out and turning off that 2nd refrigerator - turning the heat down, unplugging your device charges when you aren't using them, just use less energy, or we're all screwed. Especially future generations.

Yes. Except for all the actual research that goes on. It's actually been quite a while since I've seen a webpage quite as long as the list of experiments they've carried out: http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/station/research/experiments/experiments_by_expedition.html#1

That's really irrelevant to the question of the ISS's purpose, which was never research. And if you think the ROI on it, even with all that research, is within many orders of magnitude of any other research investment, you're high as a kite. The thing cost $150 *billion* US dollars -- so far! That's about 1/3 of the total amount of money NASA has spent in its history, across every program. That's over 300,000 per man hour spent in it so far. If you assume that research is only done half of that time (which is nuts, but we'll assume they sleep 8 hours a day, research 12 hours a day and do everything else in four hours), that's $600,000 per man-hour spent on research.

And given that basically zero research was done in the first half of the ISS being up there, because it wasn't staffed sufficiently, and they don't do 12 hours of research a day, I suspect the "real" number is closer to two million dollars per man-hour spent on research up there.

But when was the last time you saw a story even on this site about a new discovery from ISS?

It's been about as long as it's been since I've seen Slashdot have decent editing. Slashdot's a digest site, though, so it only reports what people submit, so it only reflects what's famous now.

For example, after all these years we still don't have any experiments to see whether centrifugal "simulated gravity" would be helpful in mitigating the health effects of long-duration flights. Not even with mice! That would seem like a no-brainer.

Close. Running an experiment like that would indeed require several people to have no brains. Sure, we can put people (or mice) in a centrifuge and spin them, but that doesn't really teach us much that's useful. How much force is actually needed to mitigate what effects? How much of the energy budget should be allotted to spinning, rather than propulsion? Does the spinning need to be constant (mandating a ring-shaped spaceship), or is a spinning sleep chamber sufficient? How does diet affect the effects?

Hollywood's depiction of science as a series of groundbreaking epiphanies doesn't actually work. Sure, once in a while we stumble on amazing things, but more often it's just a long slow process of observations. That's what they're doing now on the ISS. There's a lot of experiments regarding cellular growth and function, and several for figuring out exactly how to counter those adverse health effects. The experiments aren't as headline-inducing as sticking mice in a centrifuge, but they're more helpful in the long run.

No, the ISS is, was, and was always intended to be a corporate welfare platform to keep defense contractors in business during the waning period of the cold war.

Yes. Except for all the actual research that goes on. It's actually been quite a while since I've seen a webpage quite as long as the list of experiments they've carried out: http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/station/research/experiments/experiments_by_expedition.html#1

Really? What kind of a question is that?

http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/station/research/index.html

Actually, extremely-high bandwidth laser comms for communication at further-than-the-moon distances is a hot research topic, precisely because optical telescopes can do things that radio telescopes can't. Specifically, optical telescopes can offer 150dB of gain even from a modest-sized 'scope. For more, see the tech report series at JPL's TMO Tech Report Series.

Of course, lasers require precision aiming, but that's just an engineering problem. :-)

If you've ever recorded static, you've recorded someone's wireless transmission.

No. That is not true. Static is the Cosmic Microwave Background and is present everywhere on this planet (and theoretically the entire universe). The CMB is the leftover from the Big Bang.

http://skeptics.stackexchange.com/questions/5264/is-x-noise-on-tv-due-to-big-bangs-background-radiation

I wanted to link to NASA but for some reason, it is not resolving for me currently. Very weird. http://www.nasa.gov/vision/universe/starsgalaxies/cobe_background.html

Plutonium dioxide is already oxidized. It's chemically impossible for it to catch fire, and again, dense and heavy with a high melting point.

Never underestimate the power of chemistry to make unintentionally broad statements concerning lack of ability to catch fire look silly. You assume burning in air. Chemists merely look for a stronger oxidizer. Muahahaha....

Are rockets launched with thousands of kilos of fluorine-based oxidizer?

I'm assuming we're talking about a rocket launch failure of a plutonium-dioxide based RTG. These devices have a long history of safe operation by now, with the most extreme test being the lunar lander splashdown after Apollo 13 where the RTG survived the crash intact. Prior to that there have been several instances of rupture, but provided they remain rare, the risks posed these uncommon events are still low.

Wow. Rather than acknowledge that your statement, which I took pains to highlight was unintentionally overbroad, was contradicted by a rather cool video of some more common oxides catching fire, you felt the need to be an ass by dragging in a number of points which neither the post that you responded to, your original post, or the specifically quoted statement actually reference.

1. Are rockets launched with thousands of kilos of fluorine-based oxidizer? Possibly What ISP do you want? Nevermind that plutonium dioxide is "burned" with fluorine in some plutonium enrichment processes. Thank you, Wikipedia.

2. We're talking about a rocket launch failure involving an RTG? The parent wasn't, and you weren't in your response, both of which were referring to a nuclear pile fire. I sure as hell wasn't. However, I'm happy to assume that we're talking about a fluorine-oxidized rocket fuel so long as one person can unilaterally assume things for the other.

3. RTGs have a long history of safe operation. Irrelevant. You mentioned an oxidation state, then said that it is "chemically impossible for plutonium dioxide to catch fire." Not a word about an RTG, a rocket explosion, limits on the chemicals involved... nada. Well, there are more oxidizers in heaven and earth than are dreamt of in your meager visions of chemistry.

I suggest that you learn to deal with minor mistakes in more self-deprecating manner. Ass.

The lead-free solder has cost billions in failures.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Whisker_(metallurgy) http://nepp.nasa.gov/WHISKER/

NASA lost satellites because of lead-free solder (despite them requesting leaded solder). The funny thing is, leaded solder completely prevents whisker formation.

Now, you may not care about whiskers if you just throw away your electronics every year or two, but if you want longevity, these things will kill you. So for lead-free solder preventing pollution? We are producing much more garbage now thanks to whisker-caused short circuit failures.

I agree with everything except the part where that has something to do with gold contamination in solder joints.

The lead-free solder has cost billions in failures.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Whisker_(metallurgy)
http://nepp.nasa.gov/WHISKER/

NASA lost satellites because of lead-free solder (despite them requesting leaded solder). The funny thing is, leaded solder completely prevents whisker formation.

Now, you may not care about whiskers if you just throw away your electronics every year or two, but if you want longevity, these things will kill you. So for lead-free solder preventing pollution? We are producing much more garbage now thanks to whisker-caused short circuit failures.

Given NASA's constant funding problems for the last few decades, by this point all the talented engineers and researchers would of left.

Yet, we have two rovers on Mars and two orbiters at Mars, an orbiter at Saturn, an orbiter at Mercury, a fly-by probe on the way to Pluto, multiple astronomical observatories, lunar orbiters, and more earth sciences orbiters than you can shake a stick at... In fact, NASA has more going on currently than at almost any other time in it's history. I'd suggest you calibrate your biases against reality, because the former is way out of touch with the latter.
 

At this rate, is there any meaningful hope left for NASA, JPL or indeed any government-funded space-related agencies?

I've been hearing that question since the mid-70's - NASA watchers seem to be mostly nothing but a bunch of Chicken Little's for whom the sky is perpetually falling.
 
From years of watching NASA, their problems aren't so much budgetary and managerial... and not just at HQ, but all the way out to the line troops at the Centers. NASA has a long standing problem with properly estimating and managing their budgets. To be fair, some of that isn't their fault - Congress is rarely inclined to fund the engineering development missions that would give them the experience to do so... as a result, practically every program and mission is a one-off that absolutely must succeed because failure isn't an option. And because Congress and the general public treat every failure as an earth shattering disaster, something of a positive feedback loop has been established which just makes the problem worse.

That seems likely- data from other instruments on Cassini has suggested that aromatic hydrocarbons such as benzene and anthracene form high in Titan's atmosphere. The altitude (~1000km) is consistent with the location of the glow, and the emission line fits- a mix of polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons has long been thought to be the source of a 3.3 micron emission line seen in interstellar dust.

If you just look at the photo of the powdered rock sample, you can see it doesn't look dusty red, like soil samples and rocks from elsewhere on Mars. The red is hematite, a sign of high-oxidation. The grey of Gale Crater says right away that this environment is different, less-oxidized, and probably also a good deal less acidic.

If you just look at the photo of the powdered rock sample, you can see it doesn't look dusty red, like soil samples and rocks from elsewhere on Mars. The red is hematite, a sign of high-oxidation. The grey of Gale Crater says right away that this environment is different, less-oxidized, and probably also a good deal less acidic.

1. Spirit and Opportunity rovers - huge success

2. Cassini-Huygens: Despite some issues, still managed to collect an enormous amount of data on probably the most (or perhaps second most) interesting place in the solar system - including a landing on Titan. Arguably the high point of space exploration so far.

3. Curiousity Rover - again, hugely successful

4. MESSENGER probe - has has it's mission extended, having achieved every mission objective

5. And of course New Horizons my current favourite

Their launch capacity has been diminishing steadily for the past 40 years.

Appearances can be deceptive. It's certainly true that by distance Voyager I/II (I assume this is what you are alluding to) has travelled a greater distance than any other mission - but in a sense that is a matter of coasting along and observing what the data tells you. Not to take anything away from Voyager, let me emphasise, it was, and is, an astounding achievement.

Thank goodness it's not entirely up to them anymore.

I'm not sure there was ever a time when it was entirely up to them but it seems to me that NASA are the ones doing the interesting stuff at the moment. Sending apes/humans into LEO? Kinda been done before. Sending humans into orbit around Mars? Ummm.. Why? That planet, apart from being generally boring (excluding the possibility of some sort of life there) has already been thoroughly mapped from space by the Mars Orbiter. And we learnt years ago that humans aren't required on locale to make missions work. Hardly groundbreaking stuff.

http://prod.nais.nasa.gov/cgi-bin/eps/bizops.cgi?gr=D&pin=51#154104

This is NASA's business oportunities page. Very cool...

Methinks there is now a confusion of flaps and slats and ailerons in this conversation.

Since pilots generally do not want to bank their aircraft on takeoffs and landings, being as how most planes these days do not have wing skids, ailerons are generally in the neutral position at these times. (Or they are being used as auxiliary flaps and not as coordinated roll controllers).

NASA is going back to wing warping: an 'aeroelastic" wing fighter plane, the USAF story. Using ailerons is a constant fight against the aerodynamics of flight, and a loss of efficiency. Wing warping works with aerodynamic properties and is much more efficient.

The length of day is not stable

http://www.nasa.gov/topics/earth/features/japanquake/earth20110314.html

Over the long (looooooong) term days are getting longer

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Day_length#Historical_variation_of_day_length_because_of_tidal_acceleration