#ScienceLooksGood: The Superhero Shuffle

This is one of my favorite books of all time! The Physics of Superheroes is a fun read that uses known comic examples to explain properties of physics.  For example, Kakalios talks about how force, mass, and acceleration would come into play if Superman is actually able to jump over tall buildings in a single bound!

The author, Jim Kakalios, served as a science consultant for the new Spiderman movie. In the YouTube video below, he talks about the gig and exactly how he created the "decay algorithm" used in the film. Check it out!

As you can see, Jim is also a strong proponent of making science for everyone and avoiding complicated jargon and other mess that makes science hard to understand. I respect the man and I hope that my blog has a similar effect.

#ScienceLooksGood: This July 4th Could Explain Everything

This July 4th can explain everything. And I mean EVERYTHING, as in how the universe works. Scientists have been puzzeld for decades as to why some particles have mass and some don't, and they have hypotehsized the existence of something known as the Higgs Boson particle that would explain why. It's rumored that scientists will announce the discovery of the Higgs Boson, or "God particle", on July 4th.

Ezra Klein made me SO happy by geeking out and going into the importance of the Higgs boson. It's a great primer - check it out!

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There are many other videos on the history of the Higgs boson on a very helpful MSNBC page. 

The Minute Physics YouTube channel that Ezra refers to is also beyond awesome.  Here's a quick one, which covers the equation called the Standard Model that predicts the existence of the Higgs Boson:

Check out Minutephysics on Facebook, Twitter, and Google+!

#ScienceLooksGood: Carl Sagan is the Man

My good friend Monika Brooks alerted me to this wonderful PBS post that challenges scientists to explain concepts to a group of 11 year olds. The topic, as shown in the video below, is "What Is a Flame?"

The contest is appropriately named after one of my heroes - Carl Sagan. He was an astronomer with an uncanny ability to explain complex terms in a normal way. 

Hey Carl!

This was best exemplified in his book and TV series Cosmos, which defined space exploration for many folks in the 80s. I didn't discover Cosmos until 2002, and I immediately fell in love with it.  Check out the Cosmos intro below:

One More Flight for Amelia Earhart

75 years ago (1937) was a sad day in history - Amelia Earhart disappeared on her second attempt to fly around the world. A recent press release from The International Group for Historic Aircraft Recovery (TIGHAR) reveals that new technology will finally attempt to gather evidence on what happened with Earhart after that fateful flight. A specialized FedEx process to deliver the parts to ensure everything goes smoothly. All of the details on the expedition can be found on TIGHAR's project page.

The technology is out of a video game. An Autonomous Underwater Vehicle (AUV) will be sent to map the underwater area and highlight any areas of interest that may be wreckage. A Remote Operated Vehicle (ROV) will then take scans, measurements, and other operations of the target areas. The plan is imagery only - no recovery will be attempted.

Images appear courtesy of TIGHAR.org

Hopefully technology can help us solve what happened to one of our nation's heroes. Let's go!

Mars: Five Minutes of Funk (Almost)

NASA previously launched the Curiosity Rover to help further explore the terrain of Mars. It's scheduled to land on August 5th and will begin "a two-year study of whether the landing vicinity ever offered an environment favorable for microbial life."

One of the most important parts is the actual landing sequence when Curiosity will approach from space, enter the Martian atmosphere, descend toward the desired target, and land successfully. This is known as "Seven Minutes of Terror", and is the most painful time for the engineers involved as well as space geeks such as myself.  There are plenty of redundant systems on any spacecraft in case there is an electronic failure, but just about everything has to go correct. In honor of "Seven Minutes of Terror", I present "Five Minutes of Funk"

This post on Planetary.org gives a nice summary on the different phases of this sequence, known as EDL (Entry, Descent, Landing). Discovery also has a nice profile, and mentions the following:

Now think about this: the rover weighs — get this — 890 kilograms, nearly a ton. The Mars air is thick enough that engineers have to deal with it, but too thin to bring Curiosity all the way to the surface safely. So they need a heat shield to slow it initially, a parachute to brake even more, and then rocket motors to drop it the rest of the way.

 Check out the video below for more details!