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CraigD

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Post and discuss interesting articles & videos about science and technology.

You don't need to be an expert - just interested in the wonders of modern science, technology, and the history of these fields.

Please keep it rational, and post articles from reputable sources.
Try not to editorialise headlines and keep the copy to just a paragraph with a link to the original source. When quoting excerpts from articles, I think the best method is to italicise the copy, and include a link to the source.

Have some fun with your comments and discussions... just keep the sources legitimate.

Other threads:
The Break Room has a number of other popular threads, so there is no need to post material here that is better suited to these other threads:

- Covid19-Coronavirus updates and news
- Conspiracy Thread Free For All
- The *religious* discussion thread


Please enjoy!
 
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The views expressed on this page by users and staff are their own, not those of NamePros.
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Packs Of Ravenous Wild Boars Are Ransacking Rome

ROME — Rome has been invaded by Gauls, Visigoths and vandals over the centuries, but the Eternal City is now grappling with a rampaging force of an entirely different sort: rubbish-seeking wild boars.

Entire families of wild boars have become a daily sight in Rome, as groups of 10-30 beasts young and old emerge from the vast parks surrounding the city to trot down traffic-clogged streets in search of food in Rome's notoriously overflowing rubbish bins.

Posting wild boar videos on social media has become something of a sport as exasperated Romans capture the scavengers marching past their stores, strollers or playgrounds.

https://www.npr.org/2021/09/28/1041124299/wild-boars-rome-streets-food
 
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DNA markers reveal if you shared a womb with twin that didn't survive

About one in eight people had a twin embryo that didn’t survive to term, and in future there may be a simple cheek swab test that can reveal if you are in this group.

Jenny van Dongen at VU Amsterdam in the Netherlands and her colleagues have found that identical twins carry a characteristic pattern of alterations to their DNA, known as epigenetic changes, that isn’t seen in people who didn’t have twin embryos. These variations happen in early pregnancy and last into adulthood.

https://www.newscientist.com/articl...u-shared-a-womb-with-twin-that-didnt-survive/
 
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Please post your pics mate :)

Unfortunately, the aurora didn't happen in my location. The only northern lights I saw was my own home-grown, lol. :cigar:

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Western airplane maintenance providers rush to sign Chinese contracts

Western aircraft maintenance, repair and overhaul providers (MROs) signed a flurry of new contracts with Chinese customers and joint-venture partners at the country's biggest air show this week to strengthen their foothold in the lucrative market.

The quick rebound in traffic in China's domestic aviation market to pre-COVID levels, coupled with large declines in other parts of the world, has made China even more important to providers trying to minimise pandemic-driven revenue hits.

"China is key to the future of aerospace because the centre of gravity of passenger traffic is moving east," Kailash Krishnaswamy, general manager at Spirit AeroSystems China, said on the sidelines of Airshow China in Zhuhai after signing a 10-year repair contract with cargo carrier SF Airlines. Spirit was attending the show for the first time.

https://www.reuters.com/business/ae...iders-rush-sign-chinese-contracts-2021-09-30/
 
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Western airplane maintenance providers rush to sign Chinese contracts

While well-maintained aircraft are more efficient, I don't see this curve bending...

Global-CO2-emissions-from-aviation.png


Aviation accounts for around 2.5% of global CO2 emissions, but it’s overall contribution to climate change is higher. This is because air travel does not only emit CO2: it affects the climate in a number of more complex ways.

As well as emitting CO2 from burning fuel, planes affect the concentration of other gases and pollutants in the atmosphere. They result in a short-term increase, but long-term decrease in ozone (O3); a decrease in methane (CH4); emissions of water vapour; soot; sulfur aerosols; and water contrails. While some of these impacts result in warming, others induce a cooling effect. Overall, the warming effect is stronger.

Non-CO2 climate impacts mean aviation accounts for 3.5% of global warming

https://ourworldindata.org/co2-emis...n-aviation-accounts-for-3-5-of-global-warming
 
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Astronomers size up biggest-known comet as it approaches solar system

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The comet is officially known as C/2014 UN271 Bernardinelli-Bernstein – the 2014 indicates the year it was technically first spotted, in data gathered by the Dark Energy Survey. However, it wasn’t identified until June 2021 by astronomers Pedro Bernardinelli and Gary Bernstein, after whom the object is now named.

Now, further observations have narrowed down its size more precisely. A new analysis, led by Bernardinelli and Bernstein themselves, found that the comet nucleus is around 150 km wide, based on its brightness. If so, that makes it the largest comet ever discovered, by quite a margin. Most are only a few kilometers to several dozen kilometers wide, while some particularly big ones, like Hale-Bopp, may be up to 80 km (50 miles) wide. The previous record-holder, Sarabat’s Comet of 1729, has been estimated at about 100 km wide.

Read on...
https://newatlas.com/space/c2014-un271-bernardinelli-bernstein-largest-comet/
 
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Engineers at Google's DeepMind Have Made a Major Advance in Weather 'Nowcasting'

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When it comes to the weather report, it's not just tomorrow's weather that meteorologists try to discern.

As well as long-term forecasts, weather models are often tasked with predicting meteorological conditions over the next hour or so, known as 'nowcasting'. Over at Google-backed artificial intelligence company DeepMind, researchers have now made a major step forward in the accuracy of precipitation nowcasting.

https://www.sciencealert.com/ai-is-getting-much-better-at-predicting-the-next-hour-of-weather
 
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YouTube bans all anti-vaxx content – not just misinformation about COVID-19 shots

  • YouTube said it is banning all content claiming that approved vaccines do not work or are harmful.
  • That includes vaccines for illnesses other than the coronavirus disease for the first time.
  • The ban is a departure from the industry’s historical hands-off approach to content moderation.
https://www.businessinsider.com.au/...ules-bans-prominent-anti-vaxxers-covid-2021-9
 
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Largest Underwater Eruption Ever Recorded Gives Birth to Massive New Volcano

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A huge seismic event that started in May of 2018 and was felt across the entire globe has officially given birth to a new underwater volcano.

Off the eastern coast of the island of Mayotte, a gigantic new feature rises 820 meters (2,690 feet) from the seafloor, a prominence that hadn't been there prior to an earthquake that rocked the island in May 2018.

https://www.sciencealert.com/the-la...ion-ever-recorded-gave-birth-to-a-new-volcano
 
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China power crunch spreads, shutting factories and dimming growth outlook

Widening power shortages in China have halted production at numerous factories including many supplying Apple and Tesla, while some shops in the northeast operated by candlelight and malls shut early as the economic toll of the squeeze mounted.

China is in the grip of a power crunch as a shortage of coal supplies, toughening emissions standards and strong demand from manufacturers and industry have pushed coal prices to record highs and triggered widespread curbs on usage. Read the explainer

https://www.reuters.com/world/china/chinas-power-crunch-begins-weigh-economic-outlook-2021-09-27/
 
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50 years ago, the first CT scan let doctors see inside a living skull – thanks to an eccentric engineer at the Beatles’ record company

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The possibility of precious objects hidden in secret chambers can really ignite the imagination. In the mid-1960s, British engineer Godfrey Hounsfield pondered whether one could detect hidden areas in Egyptian pyramids by capturing cosmic rays that passed through unseen voids.

He held onto this idea over the years, which can be paraphrased as “looking inside a box without opening it.” Ultimately he did figure how to use high-energy rays to reveal what’s invisible to the naked eye. He invented a way to see inside the hard skull and get a picture of the soft brain inside.

The first computed tomography image – a CT scan – of the human brain was made 50 years ago, on Oct. 1, 1971. Hounsfield never made it to Egypt, but his invention did take him to Stockholm and Buckingham Palace.

Read the full article:
https://theconversation.com/50-year...engineer-at-the-beatles-record-company-149907
 
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Startling Discovery Reveals Mysterious Citadel Hidden in Ancient Maya City

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Modern-day imaging technology is able to uncover ancient buildings and structures not visible on the surface, and we just got another excellent example: the discovery of a hidden neighborhood in one of the biggest historical Maya cities.

The city in question is Tikal, now in Guatemala. Thought to have been one of the most dominant settlements in the ancient Maya empire, particularly between 200-900 CE, at its peak it could have had as many as 90,000 people living there.

Using LIDAR scanning equipment, researchers found evidence of development under what was thought to be a natural area. What's more, the hidden ruins look to match the style of buildings in Teotihuacan – a sprawling metropolis established centuries before the rise of the Aztecs, built by a largely unknown culture.

Read the full article:
https://www.sciencealert.com/experts-just-uncovered-a-hidden-neighborhood-in-an-ancient-mayan-city
 
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BepiColombo: Europe's Mercury space mission in final stretch

https://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-58754882

Europe's first mission to Mercury arrives at its destination in the coming hours.

"This first flyby puts Bepi in a two-to-three resonance with Mercury. That's to say, as Mercury goes three times around the Sun, Bepi will go around twice.

The next flyby in June next year, will slow this to a three-to-four resonance: Bepi will circle the Sun three times compared with Mercury's four circuits.

Further passes in June 2023, September 2024, December 2024, and January 2025 should see Bepi in a regular orbit to begin full science operations in 2026.

"When we get into orbit, we'll then start studying the magnetic field at Mercury, and the surface of Mercury, which has huge temperatures of 450C, the temperature of a pizza oven, and yet it has water on the surface in some places," said Prof Mark McCaughrean, Esa's senior advisor for science and exploration.

"Mercury has a huge metal core. It's very much denser than it should be for its size. We just don't understand how Mercury got to be the way it is. So, there are huge mysteries about the origin of Mercury and that's what BepiColombo is designed to study," he told BBC News."
 
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BepiColombo: Europe's Mercury space mission in final stretch

https://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-58754882

Europe's first mission to Mercury arrives at its destination in the coming hours.

"This first flyby puts Bepi in a two-to-three resonance with Mercury. That's to say, as Mercury goes three times around the Sun, Bepi will go around twice.

The next flyby in June next year, will slow this to a three-to-four resonance: Bepi will circle the Sun three times compared with Mercury's four circuits.

Further passes in June 2023, September 2024, December 2024, and January 2025 should see Bepi in a regular orbit to begin full science operations in 2026.

"When we get into orbit, we'll then start studying the magnetic field at Mercury, and the surface of Mercury, which has huge temperatures of 450C, the temperature of a pizza oven, and yet it has water on the surface in some places," said Prof Mark McCaughrean, Esa's senior advisor for science and exploration.

"Mercury has a huge metal core. It's very much denser than it should be for its size. We just don't understand how Mercury got to be the way it is. So, there are huge mysteries about the origin of Mercury and that's what BepiColombo is designed to study," he told BBC News."

Thanks. Great article from the BBC.

Space travel is all about velocity and slowing down without using brakes. A very complex parking maneuver!

Found this animation from Scott Murphy explaining the gravity assists and flybys required to park this little traveller:



"...Mercury has a huge metal core. It's very much denser than it should be for its size. We just don't understand how Mercury got to be the way it is..."

My first guess would be that the lighter elements in the planet's crust simply evaporated away over the eons and were lost into space, leaving the dense core. It was probably quite a bit larger originally.

Anyway, I'm looking forward to learning more over the coming years!
 
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Stinky 'mushball' hailstones on Uranus may explain an atmospheric anomaly there (and on Neptune, too)

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There's no good reason why ammonia shouldn't be present at Uranus and Neptune.

However, a recent discovery of giant ammonia-rich hailstones on Jupiter might shed some light on this mystery. Spoiler alert! The ammonia might not be missing at all; it may just be hidden in deeper layers of the planets' atmospheres, where current scientific instruments cannot reach.

A possible key to solving this mystery was provided by NASA's Juno mission, which is currently orbiting Jupiter.

Read on...
https://www.space.com/uranus-mushballs-hailstones-stinky-gas-neptune-atmosphere-anomaly
 
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A 'Bubble Barrier' is trapping plastic waste before it can get into the sea

What do old televisions, street signs, motorbike helmets, windsurf boards, and Christmas trees have in common? They were all caught floating down Amsterdam's Westerdok canal -- by a curtain of bubbles.

"The Bubble Barrier" was developed as a simple way to stop plastic pollution flowing from waterways into the ocean. An air compressor sends air through a perforated tube running diagonally across the bottom of the canal, creating a stream of bubbles that traps waste and guides it to a catchment system.

Read on...

https://edition.cnn.com/2021/06/08/europe/bubble-barrier-sea-c2e-spc-intl/

https://thegreatbubblebarrier.com/

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCC4s1gywFvp6l0n7utCM-OA

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After a decade of research, scientists have concluded that we are leaving the Holocene Epoch and entering the Anthropocene Epoch - where human impact on earth is greater than all natural systems combined.

 
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Drone Photo Award winners capture a dizzyingly fantastic view of the world

What does our planet look like from the sky?

The winning images of this year's Drone Photo Awards capture a dizzyingly fantastic view of the world. From high above, a field of bright green grass in Vietnam looks like faux fur – and a frozen reservoir in Kazakhstan resembles shards of broken glass.

The awards, in their fourth year, received entries from 105 countries and 2,900 professional and amateur photographers, says Luca Venturi, contest founder and art director of Siena Awards, a group based in Siena, Italy, that organizes international photo competitions.

https://www.npr.org/sections/goatsa...ture-a-dizzyingly-fantastic-view-of-the-world

It's worth scrolling through these ... they are amazing.
 
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Fossil fuel companies paying top law firms millions to ‘dodge responsibility’

The world’s biggest corporate law firms have been making millions of dollars representing fossil fuel companies but, as the climate crisis intensifies, this work is coming under increasing scrutiny.

Over the last five years, the 100 top ranked law firms in the US facilitated $1.36tn of fossil fuel transactions, represented fossil fuel clients in 358 legal cases and received $35m in compensation for their work to assist fossil fuel industry lobbying, according to a “climate scorecard” published in August.

https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2021/oct/09/fossil-fuel-companies-law-firms
 
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NASA Confirms What They Suspected About Jezero Crater on Mars All Along

https://www.sciencealert.com/the-je...-a-huge-lake-images-from-perseverance-confirm

"Images from Mars reveal how water helped shape the Red Planet's landscape billions of years ago, and provide clues that will guide the search for evidence of ancient life, a study said Thursday.

In February, NASA's Perseverance rover landed in Jezero crater, where scientists suspected a long-gone river once fed a lake, depositing sediment in a fan-shaped delta visible from space.

The study in Science analyzed high-resolution images captured by Perseverance of the cliffs that were once the banks of the delta.

Layers within the cliffs reveal how its formation took place.

NASA astrobiologist Amy Williams and her team in Florida found similarities between features of the cliffs seen from the crater floor and patterns in Earth's river deltas.

The shape of the bottom three layers showed a presence and steady flow of water early on, indicating Mars was "warm and humid enough to support a hydrologic cycle" about 3.7 billion years ago, the study says.

The findings will help researchers figure out where to send the rover for soil and rocks that may contain precious "biosignatures" of putative Martian life forms.

"From orbital images, we knew it had to be water that formed the delta," Williams said in a press release.

"But having these images is like reading a book instead of just looking at the cover."

Finding out whether life may have existed on Mars is the main mission of Perseverance, a project that took decades and cost billions of dollars to develop.
 
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