Hubble Ultra Deep Field : Humbling experience

This image you can see below is that of the Hubble Ultra Deep Field, taken over a period of 11 days in 2003. This image has around 10,000 galaxies in it. All points, smears and dots in this image is a galaxy. A galaxy has an average of a hundred billion stars in it. And it's impossible that not one of these billions of stars has a planet - with some form of life in it, Intelligent or not.

Makes you wonder about the real place of our planet in this vast and gigantic Universe that we live in.

It all started from this image taken 18 years ago. In 1995, the Hubble Deep Field was taken in a span of 10 days, targeting a very small patch of seemingly empty space in the night sky. Only to found out that small patch has 3,000 galaxies in it. Taken from that point when the Universe is still very young.

Here is the video I found on Youtube.

Contemplate that for a few minutes. Stare at this image of Ten thousand Galaxies. One trillion trillion stars. And an unimaginable number of planets. The human mind with all its power, could be humbled by the sheer vastness and endless spectacle.

I would strongly recommend to watch these videos.

Our Atomic Snapshots

It would be I should say, a dream of every Chemist or Science buff in general, maybe humanity's, to live in a world and in a century, where it seems, many unthinkable things in the past are now part of our real physical lives. This century saw the changes the way we communicate with the rise of the Cellular phone and the Internet. The rapid accelerating achievements in the world of Computing that made way for faster and more powerful Computers. Advances in Medicine is seeking to eliminate even the most vilest of all diseases. Engineering feats that helps in human progress. Human societies coming together for the first time, to talk, gather information, to plan for the future. 

But for me, no achievement would equal to that what happened a few days ago. When for the first time, humans were able to take an actual photo of an atom. Yes, you heard me right! The atom now has his own portrait. And what a glorious portrait that would be!

Here is a jpeg you can easily see online. 

From the website:

http://www.newscientist.com/article/mg21829194.900-smile-hydrogen-atom-youre-on-quantum-camera.html?full=true

How cool is that!

I am cosidering myself very lucky to have live in this age of wonder. 

Photo referrence:

http://www.techeblog.com/index.php/tech-gadget/scientists-photograph-the-inside-of-an-atom-for-the-first-time

Here is another interesting article. Molecules too are being photographed for the first time!

http://www.theverge.com/2013/5/31/4382606/berkeley-lab-hi-res-photograph-of-atoms-forming-covalent-bond

Nanotechnology: Industry of the very small

First time I heard of this term, well that was only around a few years ago. Just around during the time I re-ignited my interest in Science and Technology. Sci-fi films also gave me some idea on how this works. It's like building a machine so small that you cannot see it with the naked eye, yet so powerful that it is still able to do its task. For newbies like me, this might seem impossible, but in reality lots of scientists are already engaging in a promising technology, that would shape this century.

Theoretical model of a Nanotech machine

So what excatly is Nanotechnology? *Wikipedia has a simple definition of that " is the manipulation of matter on an atomic and molecular scale. ". The Center for Responsible Nanotechnology (http://www.crnano.org/) defines Nanotechnology as the "engineering of functional systems at a molecular scale". The National Nanotechnology Initiative of the United States, gave a clearer view on what Nanotech should be. For NNI, it is the manipulation of matter with at least one dimension sized from 1 to 100 nanometers.

A nanometer is a unit of length in the metric system, equal to one billionth of a metre. Imagine that! A billionth of a metre. It is like slicing a metre of wood in a billion equal parts. That is tremendously small. 

HISTORY OF NANOTECHNOLOGY


It is not well known but the concept of nanotechnology was first proposed by the Nobel laureate Richard P. Feynman in 1959 at the Annual Meeting of the American Physical Society.

Richard Feynman

 **Richard P. Feynman said that:

“Now, the name of this talk is ``There is Plenty of Room at the Bottom''---not just ``There is Room at the Bottom.'' What I have demonstrated is that there is room---that you can decrease the size of things in a practical way. I, now want to show that there is plenty of room. I will not now discuss how we are going to do it, but only what is possible in principle---in other words, what is possible according to the laws of physics. I am not inventing anti-gravity, which is possible someday only if the laws are not what we think. I am telling you what could be done if the laws are what we think; we are not doing it simply because we haven't yet gotten around to it…..

 I want to build a billion tiny factories, models of each other, which are manufacturing simultaneously. . . The principles of physics, as far as I can see, do not speak against the possibility of manoeuvring things atom by atom. It is not an attempt to violate any laws; it is something, in principle, that can be done; but in practice, it has not been done because we are too big…”

 He talked about the problem of manipulating and controlling things on a small scale. Extrapolating from known physical laws, Feynman envisioned a technology using the ultimate toolbox of nature, building nanoobjects atom by atom or molecule by molecule.

Norio Taniguchi

The term nanotechnology created by Norio Taniguchi in 1974 at the University of Tokyo. His definition was; "Nano-technology" mainly consists of the processing of separation, consolidation, and deformation of materials by one atom or one molecule." After years Eric Drexler published a paper in 1981 about the basic concepts of nanotechnology. By 1992, Drexler was using "molecular nanotechnology" or "molecular manufacturing" to distinguish his manufacturing ideas from the simpler product-focused research that was borrowing the word. This research, producing shorter-term results, came to define the field for many observers, and has continued to claim the term "nanotechnology."

Eric Drexler

Cylindrical nanotubes consisting of carbon atoms which were first suggested by Richard P. Feynman (the possibility of manipulating atoms to create objects new nanomaterials) were developed in 1991 by a researcher, Dr. Sumio Iijima, at the electronics maker NEC Corp and are now in use in applications such as sports stadium flood lights.

By concerning the reality of nanotechnology, the National Science and technology Council (NSTC) of the White House created the Interagency working Group on Nanoscience Engineering and Technology (IWGN) in 1998.

In January 2000 at the same institute President Bill Clinton announced $500 million worth of funding in support of the U.S. government's investment in nanotechnology research and development.

Opinions differ about whether Clinton was influenced by Drexler's descriptions of advanced manufacturing. Instead of focusing on molecular manufacturing, the National Nanotechnology Initiative (NNI) chose to fund nanoscale technology, which it defined as anything with a size between 1 and 100 nanometers with novel properties. This broad definition encompassed cutting-edge semiconductor research, several developing families of chemistry, and advances in materials.

NANOTECH MATERIALS***

Nanotechnology fascinated scientists in the search of materials that we know that shows quite different properties when they are reduced to nano size. Like inert materials such as platinum catalysts become, stable materials such as aluminum becomes combustible, rigid material such as gold at room temperatures in nano size it turns into a liquid state, and insulators becomes conductors as with the case of silicone. These new features allow the discovery of new materials, hence offering humanity overwhelming possibilities in the Advancement of Science. 


NANOTECHNOLOGY IN REAL LIFE APPLIANCE

Techno enthusiasts most often mentioned example of manipulation at the nano level, the manufacturing process means that the processor in nanometers, and indicates the size of the transistor array. Smaller transistors mean more of them on a wafer, which entails a lower cost processors or more processors. Only two years ago the current processors were produced in 90nm process, and today begins production of 45nm processors, enabling a drastic increase in CPU power, but also reduce production costs. World GPU graphics processor chips that are almost always Kaskai for Intel and AMD CPUs in terms of miniaturization technology of production is now also in the 65nm process. We assume that development will continue in that direction because manufacturers still complain that they are not stuck, and somewhat slower progress of the processed volume of information dealt with parallel processing (more than one core per processor).

Visit this site for more real-life applications of Nanotechnology:

http://weburbanist.com/2008/08/17/15-astonishing-real-life-applications-of-nanotechnology/

Nanotechnology initiatives can take more than 20 to maybe 50 years to become commercial, however the development process may cause the next industrial revolution.


Moreover the development of nanotechnology will probably change the manufacturing process of almost every product. Whatever happens nanotechnology is likely to be the human race's greatest scientific achievement to date and will completely change all our lives.



References:

*Wikipedia

www.nano.gov (National Nanotechnology Initiative)

www.nano.org.uk (Institute of Nanotechnology)

**Richard P. Feynman, There's Plenty of Room at the Bottom, Engineering and Science (February 1960), California Institute of Technology.

***http://motionperpetual.info/nanotechnology-real-life/

Exoplanets: Too interesting, though too far away

It's been a while since my last post. Been busy like everybody else. But that does not mean I will stop posting. 

During the past decade we have been hearing news about new planets being discovered. And these are newly discovered planets OUTSIDE of our own Solar System.  

Simply put, an Exoplanet or Extrasolar planet is any planet outside the solar system. Wikipedia states that " A total of 871 such planets (in 682 planetary systems, including 130 multiple planetary systems) have been identified as of April 20, 2013". Since the first discovery of the first exoplanet in 1992 by Radio astronomers Aleksander Wolszczan (Polish) and Dale Frail (Canadian), we as humans, specially the ones aware of this, has been reflecting about the possibility of alien life, our place in the cosmos, and where's God in this picture. It gives us this wonderful insight in the world of Astronomy and would make any amateur science supporter to pursue such a career path. 

The most famous extrasolar planet is probably Gliese 581c, because of its relative proximity (20 light years), Earth-like mass, and its location within the "habitable zone" of its star, a zone which could theoretically sustain life.

Gliese 581 c or Gl 581 c is a planet orbiting the red dwarf star Gliese 581. Second planet discovered in the system and third in order from the star. It has a mass at least 5.6 times that of the Earth. Known as a super-Earth (a planet of 1 to 10 Earth masses). It was the smallest known extrasolar planet around a main-sequence star. On April 21, 2009, another planet orbiting Gliese 581, Gliese 581 e, was announced with an approximate mass of 1.9 Earth masses.

Here are some facts about Exoplanets:



Most Massive: HD 43848

Discovered in 2008, this exoplanet has a mass that is 25 times the mass of Jupiter. Orbiting around a star that is a just a bit smaller than our sun, HD43848 is nearly 8000 times as massive as Earth.



The Smallest: CoRoT-7b

This planet is less than twice the size of Earth, and its density is similar to Earth's. Discovered in February 2009, CoRoT-7b takes 20.4 hours to orbit a star that is slightly smaller, cooler and younger than our sun.



The Most likely to Have Life: Gl 581 e

Of the four planets that orbit the star called Gliese 581, two are near the edges of what astronomers called the habitable zone, where liquid water may exist. One of these planets is near the cool edge of the zone, but Gl 581 e, spotted in April 2009, is in a warmer spot.



The Biggest Radius: CT Cha b

This gas giant has a radius that is more than twice as large as our largest planet, Jupiter, and 17 times as massive.



The Hottest: WASP-18b

Although the data is still preliminary, this 2009 discovery may be the hottest, says University of Central Florida professor Joseph Harrington, stealing the title from another planet that Harrington calculated to be the hottest in 2007. This speedy planet, which is 10 times the size of Jupiter, hauls its mass around its star in less than an Earth day. But title of "hottest" may still be under contention—because it is so close to its star, WASP-18b is likely to spiral into it within the next million years.



The Most Eccentric Orbit: VB 10 b

A planet that orbits its star in a perfect circle would have an eccentricity designated as 0. The eccentricity of Earth's orbit is 0.0167—a very slight oval. The orbit of VB 10 b is the most elliptical orbit known—with an eccentricity of nearly 0.98, it is even more stretched out than the orbit of Haley's comet.



The Baby: Fomalhaut b

Only 25 light-years away, Fomalhaut is a neighbor of our sun. In 2005, astronomers discovered the exoplanet Fomalhaut b hiding amid the interstellar dust surrounding Fomalhaut. The presence of the dust means that the system is still very young and is likely to have more planets form within it—Fomalhaut b may be just the first-born. And just like a baby, this planet is crawling; it takes about 876 years to orbit its star.



The Farthest from its Star: UScoCTIO 108 b

This planet, which has 14 times the mass of Jupiter, spends its days at about 670 astronomical units—about 64 billion miles—away from its star. That's about 17 times farther away than dwarf planet Pluto is from our sun.



The Farthest from Earth: OGLE-05-390L b

At 21,450 light-years away, this is the farthest exoplanet scientists have found. It is five times the mass of the Earth and twice the distance from its star and it trundles slowly around, taking 3500 days to orbit.

Referrences:


http://groovychk.deviantart.com/art/Gliese-581c-133733307

http://www.wisegeek.com/what-was-the-first-extrasolar-planet-discovered.htm

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Extrasolar_planet

http://www.popularmechanics.com/science/space/deep/4335269

26 Awe-Inspiring Reminders Of Just How Insignificant We Are

Prepare to feel tiny:

Source: nasa.gov

Furthest ever image of the universe

Source: Mike Read (WFAU), UKIDSS/GPS and VVV / via: ph.ed.ac.uk

One Billion Stars in just one galaxy

Source: eso.org

The View 50 Million Light Years Away

Source: eos.unh.edu

A rocket launch over an aurora

Source: nasa.gov

A Not so dark Dark core

Source: nasa.gov

Coronal Hole on the Sun

Source: spaceflight.nasa.gov

European Panorama at night from the international space station

Source: nasa.gov

Enterprise flying over NYC

Source: nasa.gov

Groundhog day on Mars

Source: nasa.gov

Janus, one of Saturns creepy moons

Source: eso.org

Moon and the Milky Way

Source: Michael Shainblum

Milky way in all its Splendor

Source: nasa.gov

New view of the blue marble

Source: Stéphane Guisard / via: astrosurf.com

Orion over the Temple of Kukulkan

Source: nasa.gov

Overlapping galaxies

Source: 360cities.net

Panorama of Mars

Source: apod.nasa.gov

Saturn's Storms

Source: eso.org

The Pencil Nebula

Source: Adam Block / via: skycenter.arizona.edu

9 Billion Pixels of the Milky Way Galaxy

Source: sci.esa.int

The remains of supernova W44

Source: eso.org

The slow death of R Sculptoris

Source: eso.org

Thors helmet revisited

Source: Greg Scheiderer / via: seattleastronomy.com

Transit of Venus

Source: nasa.gov

Transit of Venus up close

Source: nasa.gov

UFO Galaxy

Source: nasa.gov

Twister on Mars





Reposted with permission from myscienceacademy.com

The Rockstar Scientist

A Science Lecture - Can you imagine one speaker speaking to thousands of  attendees?

I would like to imagine that we live in a world where:

1. Science documentaries are shown regularly in Movie theatres.
2. Science TV shows have more ratings than reality shows and other shows on national television. 
3. Schools and Universities concentrate in teaching Science and Math than any other school subject. 
4. Where the majority of people appreciate and wonder with awe about the Cosmos. 
5. Where Scientists are regarded as heroes and receives more popularity, wealth and recognition just like Movie persons and athletes. 

The last one is quite interesting. Do you remember any time in history that lectures are sold out and has lots of people attending? To be honest, I don't know one, maybe you know. 

Scientists, most of the time depends on money from the government or from research grants from private individuals or private companies (aside from savings in their salaries from their respective Universities and Research facilities) in providing that boost in their research in terms of equipment, hiring staffs, and building infrastructure. As far as I can tell, most of these intelligent minds are not rich, some are struggling, and some does not even care about the money. Nikola Tesla, one of the geniuses of the 20th century, even died a poor man.

Yuri Milner (right) with Mark Zuckerberg. Yuri is also a stock holder of  Facebook.

But that changed in 2012, when Yuri Milner, a former physicist and Internet enterpreneur, created the Milner Prize, formally known as the Fundamental Physics Prize in which winners gets a lucrative $3 million, more than the Nobel and Templeton Prizes combined. This would be a great boost for physicists in terms of using the money for further scientific research or for projects in popularizing physics, specially science. 

Based on the Michael Brooks article "Can millionaire physicists draw masses to science?" for the website www.newscientist.com:

"As he told New Scientist recently, Milner plans to use his wealth to paint scientists as heroes, turning them into household names and stimulating an increase in research funding and in the number of young people wanting to become scientists. "The more attention you attract to science, the better off everybody will be," he said."

"The three-million-dollar question is: will it work? Probably not. Rewarding scientists financially is easy. Turning them into household names is not so simple. As became clear during the ceremony (latest Fundamental Physics Prize ceremony), theoretical physicists make terrible celebrities."

The article also cited that physicists are "very human". They interact with students, pupils, co-workers, spectators - ordinary people. And for me, that seems to be the most noble of all traits - humility, which fame and fortune couldn't buy. 

So I guess, my perceived world where Science is pouplar and the people pursuing it are also popular might be impossible here or maybe in some other Universe, but we'll never know what's next for our dear intellectuals. 


Referrences:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fundamental_Physics_Prize

http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn23319-can-millionaire-physicists-draw-the-masses-to-science.html

Is there life outside of Earth?

Watching the film "E.T." and "My Stepmother is an Alien" when I was a kid gave me that idea. "War of the Worlds", "Independence Day", "Star Trek", "Aliens", "Paul", "Star Wars" and the various UFO conspiracies gave me a different viewpoint - the normal views on extraterrestrials. My re-ignited interest in Science and Astronomy, changed that view again. Is there really life elsewhere in the cosmos?

That, I think would be the greatest question being asked by millions of people, for thousands of years. Several documentaries has tackled these questions like Carl Sagans' "Cosmos", Morgan Freeman's "Through the Wormhole", and Stephen Hawking's "Into the Universe with Stephen Hawking".  Though sadly, I have not seen any other documentaries maybe some forgotten titles from National Geographic or Discovery channel but the ones mentioned are the one's I clearly remember.

I think, Science fiction and conspiracy theories greatly contributed to the "belief" that aliens exist, PLUS that these aliens are intelligent, has a very high level of technology, and most of all, almost all of them want to conquer the Earth! I trembled before of these ideas, but I suspended ... or ignored these after I became aware of what the real deal with aliens is.

Since our technology brought us to the moon in 1969, we have been gazing to the stars ever since. Some are active in searching for life using radio waves, and some are using high-tech mobile explorers in Mars to find evidence of life, and some are simply trying to observe life here - specially ones that could survive in extreme environments to determine if there is a possibility that complex biological lifeforms might survive elsewhere in the universe. 

Giordano Bruno

Giordano Bruno (1548 - 1600), first gave the idea that there are infinite worlds populated by intelligent beings. His controversial concept (in a time where anybody who gives an idea contrary to the religious teachings of the Catholic church would mean instant jailtime and possible execution) cost him his life. Other revolutionary thinkers tend to be discreet at that time, fearing for their lives in the process.

The invention of the telescope and the acceptance of the Copernican or the Heliocentric system (where the sun is at the center of the solar system and not earth) are the main ingredients that fueled astronomers to think further and try to answer that question. William Herschel, the person who discovered Uranus is even convinced that the Solar System, as well as other systems are well populated with alien life. 

William Herschel

Even this idea has been endeared with the religious establishment also. The Mormons believe that God has created Earth and all Earth-like planets for humans to live in. Though most mainstream religions does not believe that there are other worlds populated with alien-life as it is their belief that only the Earth is the only planet that was created by God for humans and that our species and life itself is unique in the cosmos. 

Basis for possible life in the Cosmos:

1. That the biochemical components of life which is mainly Carbon-based, is abundant in the Universe. All the elements that make up the human body - mainly Carbon, Oxygen, Hydrogen and Nitrogen are abundant in the Universe, based on observations of the chemistry of stars and galaxies. 

2. That every solar system in the universe has a Goldilocks zone or a Habitable zone - named after the famous story where Goldilocks tried the porridge which is "not too hot, and not too cold". It applies to a region in the solar system where a planet is in a zone where the temperatures is not too hot for water to easily evaporate and where it is not too cold to easily turn it into ice. In our solar system Earth and Mars are considered in this zone. 

3. There is this hypothesis called Panspermia, wherein life on Earth was created by the seeds of extraterrestrial material (meteors, comets) coming from outerspace or from other planets, such as Mars. 

4. Water - an essential component in mixing different chemicals to form simple lifeform, could be found in large quantities in the Solar System. 

5. Extremophiles - organisms that can survive extreme habitats (extreme cold or hot environments) has been discovered and found that these are capable of living in these environments which can simulate extreme environments in outer space. 

There are three major ways to detect extraterrestrial life:

Kepler Space Telescope

1. Kepler Spacecraft - already in space scanning the skies for planets, specially those in the Goldilocks zone. 

SETI Farm

2. SETI - Search for Extra-Terrestrial Intelligence. Uses an array of satellite dishes scanning for radio signals from outer space. 

Curiosity Rover in Mars

3. Robotic Exploration of the Solar System - Either in the form of a space probe (voyager 1 and 2 ) and robot explorers in other planets (notably Mars) like Curiosity. 

So it might take more than our lifetime to determine if aliens exist - even in its primitive simple form. But at least, when the time comes we can truly say.... We are not alone!


Referrence:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Extraterrestrial_life