Archive for June, 2009

3D Astro Images

Imagine if you had a head as larger than a planet, OK good. Now imagine that you are looking up at the ‘sky’ (with your head being larger than the planet you normally live on some would say that the sky is everywhere but I digress…)  and things that would normally appear flat begin to have depth. You can see that the moon is closer to you than the sun and that planets really do look like they are way out there. Astronomer JP Metsavainio has been taking wonderful photos of the night sky and then enhancing them to give you the illusion of what they would look like it you were of a galactic size. His estimates of depth are a best guess but I’m going to say that for the sake of argument that he is correct. Seeing these nebula and galaxies with stereo depth is just cool. 

Astroanarchy

Popularity: 4% [?]

No Lens Lasers

Impressive, technology like this might lead to all sorts of wonderful things. I’m thinking video projectors that use lasers and that have no moving parts of nasty super hot lamps (just super hot lasers, have to work on that…)

Researchers have now demonstrated a plasmonic collimator that utilizes grooves etched directly into the semiconductor laser facet. If the technique is adopted — Harvard University has applied for a patent on the process — then semiconductor lasers can be downsized to a bare die without a lens.

Lasers need lenses no more

Popularity: 3% [?]

New Element Officially Added

Set another place at the periodic table, we have another confirmed guest!  It’s not every day that science updates the classic chart of  the atoms that make up our universe (well what we know of it so far…)

A team of scientists, lead by Sigurd Hofmann at the GSI Helmholtzzentrum für Schwerionenforschung (Centre for Heavy Ion Research) in Darmstadt, Germany are credited with its discovery.

“The new element is approximately 277 times heavier than hydrogen, making it the heaviest element in the periodic table,” the scientists said in a statement.

Hofmann and his team first synthesized the element in 1996 by firing charged zinc atoms through a 120 meter-long particle accelerator into a lead target. The zinc and lead nuclei were fused to form the new element.

Go science! Too bad you can’t get a sample of it, the lifespan of this element is measured in seconds. Wikipedia has a gob of tech on it if you want to sound all smart like to your friends: Wikipedia – Element 112

[via Periodic table adding new element - The Register UK]
Want your own periodic table of the elements? I bet you do! Amazon has a nice periodic table of the elements for less than $10. Buy it and I get a tiny kick back, we all know how that works.

Popularity: 2% [?]