The SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY News Thread

[SaintessHeart]

It is around 14-16. Hence why I say lolis are considered to be any girl below 16 - it is a scientifically (or rather historically) proven fact.

[AnimeFan188]

Pentagon Enlists Jeff Bezos and Richard Branson To Design a Space Plane:

"The Pentagon’s premier research division wants to design an advanced spacecraft
that engineers have tried and failed to build for years. So they’ve enlisted the help
of Amazon founder Jeff Bezos and Sir Richard Branson, naturally.

No, the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency has not lost its marbles; it’s
just that Branson’s Virgin Galactic and Bezos’ Blue Origin companies have technology
the Pentagon needs to reduce the exorbitant cost of space flight."


"DARPA wants its new experimental spaceship to fly 10 times within in 10 days
and it wants the contractor to show that the vessel can fly at 10 times the speed
of sound or more. The agency also wants the contractors to show that they can
actually launch a real 3,000-pound to 5,000-pound satellite into orbit during their
demonstration. To top it off, it all has to cost less than $5 million for each flight.

If all goes well, the new XS-1 should be ready for flight by 2018."

See:

http://www.thedailybeast.com/article...ce-plane.html#

[Ithekro]

So they want something that could be an almost practical space plane.

[SaintessHeart]

Originally Posted by Ithekro

So they want something that could be an almost practical space plane.

Trans-orbital reconnaisance/bomber aircraft?

[ganbaru]

Originally Posted by SaintessHeart

Trans-orbital reconnaisance/bomber aircraft?

Would one of such plane, with a non-nuclear payload between 3000 to 5000 pound be able to sink a warship ?

[SaintessHeart]

Originally Posted by ganbaru

Would one of such plane, with a non-nuclear payload between 3000 to 5000 pound be able to sink a warship ?

Both. Remember how those "tungsten rods from space" work? Same concept - just use inertia to hurl a regular 500lbs JDAM and guide it to a warship of your choice.

[JokerD]

Wasn't it proved in WW2 that high altitude of rapidly moving warships were pretty much useless?
Also, at the speeds the bombs are going to move, would guidance be enough, I think you are going to have to use rockets instead of tailfins to change the directions of those things.

[ganbaru]

Originally Posted by JokerD

Wasn't it proved in WW2 that high altitude of rapidly moving warships were pretty much useless?

It might work, especially if the warship can't detect either the plane or the projectile.

[Ithekro]

The US military has no need of an anti-ship weapon of that nature. They have a fleet of ships for that already.

Anti-bunker, or mountain base weapon is a possible idea (to punch into places like the Iranian nuclear enrichment center or something). But also as a quicker way to get up to two tons of material up into orbit daily.

[Nerroth]

While there are other threads discussing the recent MH17 disaster, it may be worth noting here that there are reports claiming as many as 100 HIV/AIDS researchers and campaigners (to include Joep Lange, a former president of the International AIDS Society) were lost in the incident. They were due to attend an international AIDS conference being held next week in Melbourne.

If so, this would mark a significant blow to the international community of scientists and supporters working to combat the human immunodeficiency virus, as well as to the millions of people worldwide whose lives continue to be affected by the HIV/AIDS pandemic.

EDIT: It seems that more recent reports offer a much lower tally of lost delegates (with at least seven names confirmed thus far), though it may be a while before the final number is confirmed.

[AnimeFan188]

The 5 Massive New Telescopes That Will Change Astronomy
Forever:

"The biggest building boom in the history of astronomy is upon us.
In Chile and Hawaii and in space, astronomers are getting powerful
telescopes that dwarf the current state-of-the-art instruments.
When the mountain blasting and the mirror polishing are all done,
we will have the clearest and most detailed views of outer space
ever.

This boom has long been in the works for years, as billion-dollar
telescopes don't just fund and plan themselves. Now, these
telescopes are starting to break ground. "If it all plays out as
expected and budgeted," writes Dennis Overbye in the New York
Times, "astronomers of the 2020s will be swimming in petabytes of
data streaming from space and the ground." Let's take a closer
took at what these billion-dollar telescopes can do for astronomy
in the decades to come."

See:

http://gizmodo.com/the-5-massive-new...omy-1610529758

[Asuras]

Originally Posted by Ithekro

The US military has no need of an anti-ship weapon of that nature. They have a fleet of ships for that already.

Except that entails putting our valuable ships in harms way to achieve the same result.

[AnimeFan188]

Boffins tell of solar storm near-miss;
'We'd still be picking up the pieces now'

"On 23 July 2012, two coronal mass ejections (CME) burst out of
the Sun's surface within 15 minutes of each other and headed out
into space at more than 3,000km per second. If they had erupted
nine days earlier Earth would have been directly in its path.
Instead, NASA's Solar Terrestrial Relations Observatory (STEREO)
satellite was perfectly positioned to record the blast.

For a paper [PDF] in the journal Space Weather, scientists
analyzed the data from STEREO and found that the CMEs were the
largest yet measured – and could even have exceeded the
notorious 1859 Carrington event. Had they hit us, the resulting
electromagnetic disturbance could have taken out most of the
GPS network, communications satellites, electrical grids and
some servers."

See:

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2014/07...just_one_week/

&

http://science.nasa.gov/science-news...ul_superstorm/

[AnimeFan188]

NASA: New "impossible" engine works, could change
space travel forever:

"Until yesterday, everyone in the international community was
laughing at this engine and its inventor, Roger Sawyer. It's
called the EmDrive and everyone said it was impossible
because it went against the laws of physics. But the fact is
that the quantum vacuum plasma thruster works in the lab and
scientists can't explain why.

Sawyer's engine is extremely light and simple. It provides a
thrust by "bouncing microwaves around in a closed container."
The microwaves are generated using electricity that can be
provided by solar energy. No propellant is necessary, which
means that this thrusters can work forever unless a hardware
failure occurs. If real, this would be a major breakthrough
in space propulsion technology."

See:

http://sploid.gizmodo.com/nasa-revea...49987/+barrett

[Ithekro]

How much thrust? It seems like it would be very useful.

[SaintessHeart]

Originally Posted by Ithekro

How much thrust? It seems like it would be very useful.

30 to 50 micronewtons. Why don't they just create a micro nozzle 20mm in diameter and run it over an amplifier, then mount it over an artificial planet?

[JokerD]

My personal belief is that we should invent practical shields before engines...

[Ithekro]

Sometimes you need to motivation to build protective shields first. Like a practical means to have spacecraft move around so that people will want to build them for more than just orbital flights.

[JokerD]

Originally Posted by Ithekro

Sometimes you need to motivation to build protective shields first. Like a practical means to have spacecraft move around so that people will want to build them for more than just orbital flights.

Actually I'm thinking of shielding from solar flares and radiation, which would have practical uses back on earth... This can help protect spacecraft (and astronauts) from cosmic radiation. Practical uses on earth would be to protect nuclear powerplants. If small enough, it can even protect the nuclear reactor/battery of a spacecraft.

[SaintessHeart]

Originally Posted by JokerD

Actually I'm thinking of shielding from solar flares and radiation, which would have practical uses back on earth... This can help protect spacecraft (and astronauts) from cosmic radiation. Practical uses on earth would be to protect nuclear powerplants. If small enough, it can even protect the nuclear reactor/battery of a spacecraft.

http://www.newscientist.com/blog/inv...dy-armour.html

Now all you need is a conductive aerial surface for it to flow over, then boom! Liquid shield. That one is much easier than making a force shield that stops bullets.