Well…around christmas, the James Webb Space Telescope, which I will call the JWST from now on, was launched towards it’s L2 station point and most of us science geeks were elated and concerned at the same time since there were over 300 things that needed to work perfectly for it to be usable…there were a couple of pieces of good news on the scope yesterday that I wanted to talk about here…first, the launch was so accurate that they had to burn very little thruster fuel to make course corrections and that means instead of having enough fuel for 5 years, the operators of the scope think they will have enough for 10-12 years and that is really good news since there is no way to refuel it with it being so far away…and second, the tennis court sized sunscreen successfully deployed yesterday and it is locked in place with no problems so we’re halfway there in getting it ready to start observations in a couple of months…still going to keep my fingers crossed that nothing goes wrong and I just can’t wait for “first light” and the science that can be done with it…
Category Archives: Science
Some good news on energy…
Well…as prices for wind and solar power continue to fall, their use continues to rise to be the second most used source of energy in the US. Last year, renewables including geothermal and biomass made up 22% of the energy used and it is predicted that these sources will grow by another 10% next year…and that is good news for the planet as coal use continues to fall…and for some reason, private equity is even getting involved in new ideas in fusion generation of electricity…and that has been a government investment to this point so why private investment now? In my lifetime, fusion has always been “10 years away” and never closer and I’m not sure why individuals would invest the billions necessary build a fusion plant that is no closer being viable that it was in the 90′s…haven’t read of any breakthroughs lately and if there were, people would be shouting it from the rooftops and all I hear is silence. So, let’s take this one with a huge grain of salt…after all, not one fusion plant has ever produced as much energy as has been put in to get the reaction going….but I would love to be proved wrong…
I’m a little nervous…
Well…any of you who have been here before know me to be a science geek who still watches every rocket launch that is televised and reads a lot about things happening in science…and tomorrow, something really cool is happening at 7:24 in the morning…the James Webb space telescope is going to be launched from French Guyana and I’m a little nervous about that….The Arianne V rocket that is going to launch it has a great reliability record so getting it to space probably won’t be the problem…but there are over 300 discrete actions that have to happen to get it ready for observing and if any one doesn’t go right, we will have a 12 billion dollar lump of coal in our stockings. Since the mirror and sun shield are too big to fit on even the biggest rockets, they had to be folded into a much smaller package…and then it has to unfold itself once in space and on the way to the L2 Lagrange point a million miles away…and they are using that point since it is the point where the Earth and the sun’s gravity balance out and it takes a lot less fuel to keep in place…but that takes it so far away that if it doesn’t go right, there is no way to service it…I do have faith that NASA can make it work…I am a little nervous….
Omicron sucks…
Well…couldn’t find a political topic for today so I thought I’d talk about the latest covid variant, Omicron, and what is known about it now…the latest testing shows that 70-90% of new cases are no longer delta but omicron and shows how fast this new one spreads and that is a little scary….but, it appears that it multiplies in the airways of the nose and doesn’t shred the lungs like delta does…at least that’s what it looks like so far…but, there are almost 140 million cases predicted in the US between Jan 1 and March 1 2022….and that means that 60% of the US will have been infected with some form of covid…and the scary part is that 90% of those with omicron may not even know it and will spread it even farther and faster….one tiny little ray of light is that it appears that the hospitalization rate from omicron is 90 to 96% less than delta and the fatality rate is 97 to 99% lower…but the sheer volume of infections will still overwhelm most hospital systems in the first three months of next year….those of us that have gotten our booster shots have a really good chance of staying out of the hospital and then not having the long covid that is ravaging many in this country…it looks like my choice to stay away from my grandchildren was the right one…even though my kids are still pissed at me and aren’t talking to me anymore because I haven’t visited…oh, well….
Topics are getting harder to find…
Well….I wonder why I am having such problems finding topics these days? I know I’ve done almost 10,000 of these but there are still things happening in the world that interest me….and I still read a lot so that can’t be it….I haven’t done one on science in a long time and I wonder why that is? There are cool things happening with the James Webb space telescope getting ready for launch in December….and that instrument will resolve 10 times fainter objects that even Hubble and it isn’t even going to be in orbit around the Earth…it is going to be set at one of the Lagrange points a million miles from Earth in a stable orbit that will trail the Earth in it’s orbit…it has a mirror that is 6 times larger than Hubble and will see in infrared light that will allow us to see through the dust and gas towards the center of the galaxy and may even be able to see the black hole that is there and that would be pretty cool…and it will happen in my lifetime but it may be the last cool telescope that is launched before I’m gone….hey, I found a topic! Okay, it’s cheating a little bit but I need to get on the windows in here and get these two done…I did get the kitchen one done already and I got two bike rides in so I guess I could put these off…nope, going to do at least one before soccer comes on….
Hubble is back up and running….
Well…if you are a science/astronomy nerd like I am, you must have had concern when the Hubble went down a month ago and everything they tried to get it running failed….but the smart men and women at NASA kept at it and just yesterday they switched the telescope to a backup system and it fired right back up and is running like normal….and these people figured all this out with the telescope out of reach over 500 miles in space…and if they couldn’t get it working, Hubble would have become just another piece of space junk since there is no spacecraft that could get to it and stabilize it so spacewalks could be done to fix it….but I think we who have enjoyed the science and beauty that the telescope has provided over the past almost 30 years have to get ready to let it go…after all, it is 90′s technology that has a fixed life and it will die at some point…but I hope it’s not before the James Webb Space telescope is launched next year…it would be so damn cool to have two great scopes in the sky at one time and have them work together to do things that they can’t alone…fingers crossed…
Another toy for rich people…
Well….with the launch of Richard Branson’s sub orbital space ship today and the breathless coverage of it, I don’t get it….yeah, it is something of a technical accomplishment but damn, sub orbital trips were being done 60 years ago so I guess I don’t see that this is any kind of progress….and the news constantly emphasized that this ship can take 6 passengers into space and that is just so wonderful that ordinary people can now go kinda into space…but what kind of ordinary people? At more than 250,000 bucks a seat, what kind of ordinary person can afford that? I don’t mean to be a crab about this but if we tell the truth, this ship is not going to do any scientific research…it is not stretching the limits of technology…and it’s only use is to be another toy for rich people to uselessly spend money on that will go straight into another billionaire’s pocket….not much of an accomplishment in my eyes….
We flew a helicopter on Mars!
Well….I kind of wanted to get out of my rut of topics lately and NASA helped that out with the first successful flight of a helicopter on Mars early this morning….and I just saw a photo from the lander showing it about a foot off the ground and I can’t wait to see the video of the flight that should be available next week…and it takes that long since the data stream is very small from the copter to keep the weight low and give it a chance to succeed…something like this is just what I needed since the start of the pandemics…yep, I said pandemics…one caused by the virus and the other caused by guns that are used for the daily mass shootings we have seen for the past month…but, that is for another one of these. One of the coolest parts of the Mars helicopter saga is that it has on board a small piece of the fabric from the original Wright flyer onboard that the Wright Brothers flew for the first powered flight of a heavier than air craft in 1903…there are some dreamers at NASA still and that makes me smile…and it looks like the proof of concept that this copter is providing will lead to others on other missions no matter what the results of the next flights are…and I can’t wait til the copter can go higher and get a shot of the lander and it’s surroundings…we humans can still do astounding things when we try….
Perseverance has landed!
Well…yeah, I’m a space geek and had to watch the landing of the new Perseverance lander on Mars just a few minutes ago…and the lander is in good shape and sending photos already….I just love seeing the reactions of the people running the show when they get the announcement and data saying the landing went off without a hitch and they have a healthy rover…man, to have a job you love that much and to be successful looks like a great thing…can’t wait to see photos from the helicopter…
Some good virus news…
Well…yeah, I’m writing a lot today but I’m getting other stuff done too…got the first two totes packed in the kitchen after I ran errands…even got some salt to put on the ice outside the door so keep my old butt from falling…but, that’s not what this one is about…just read an article from an epidemiologist that had a bit of good news on the virus in it…in his calculations using the amount of Americans infected, along with the pace of vaccinations, he estimated that we could reach herd immunity with 75% of the US population with some amount of immunity to the virus by the 4th of July….and that is with the current rate of vaccinations at the already doable 2 million per day…and that rate should go up as competent people take charge of the vaccination efforts. So, this could be the biggest damn 4th of July celebration in the history of the country if we achieve it…but there is still a long way to go…so, keep wearing your masks and social distancing…we can do that for 4 more months if the reward is a maskless summer and getting to see our family and friends again….