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Apr92021 by adminNo Comments

Tiny Mars helicopter set for first flight Sunday

Science

April 9 (UPI) -- NASA's plan to fly a helicopter on Mars comes to fruition Sunday with an attempted 40-second climb to just 10 feet, but agency officials say they hope to make bolder efforts in the next few weeks. "We'll be going higher and further," MiMi Aung, the space agency's project manager on the helicopter, Ingenuity, said Friday. "By the fifth flight, if we get that far, we are going to take very bold flights and ... it would be unlikely to land safely because we'll start going into unsurveyed areas." Advertisement NASA plans to fly Ingenuity at 10:54 p.m. EDT Sunday, but results won't be available until 4:15 a.m. Monday due to transmission delays between the helicopter, the rover and Earth. A live broadcast of the mission control room at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena,...

Apr22021 by adminNo Comments

Groups urge pressure on Mexico to save tiny vaquita porpoise

Technology

Environmental groups are asking the U.S. government and international organizations to pressure Mexico to do more to save the vaquita marina porpoise, the world's most endangered marine mammalByThe Associated PressApril 1, 2021, 8:31 PM• 3 min readShare to FacebookShare to TwitterEmail this articleMEXICO CITY -- Environmental groups called Thursday for an international ban on trade in a range of Mexican seafood and wildlife, seeking to force Mexico to do more to save the vaquita marina porpoise, the world’s most endangered marine mammal.The United States already has an embargo on imports of shrimp from the upper Gulf of California. Also known as the Sea of Cortez, the body of water is the only place where the vaquita lives, and as few as 10 remain.The Natural Resources Defense Council, the...

Jan232021 by adminNo Comments

Tiny particles formed from trace gases can seed open ocean clouds

Science

Jan. 22 (UPI) -- It doesn't take much to seed a cloud in the atmosphere above the open ocean, according to a new study published Friday in the journal Nature Communications. When sunlight reacts with trace gas molecules in the marine boundary layer, the half-a-mile-thick layer of atmosphere that sits above the open ocean, tiny aerosols are forged -- a process called new particle formation. Advertisement "When we say 'new particle formation,' we're talking about individual gas molecules, sometimes just a few atoms in size, reacting with sunlight," study co-author Chongai Kuang said in a news release. "It's interesting to think about how something of that scale can have such an impact on our climate -- on how much energy gets reflected or trapped in our atmosphere," said Kuang, a climate sc...

Sep272020 by adminNo Comments

Tiny airborne particles may pose a big coronavirus problem

Technology

NEW YORK -- At a University of Maryland lab, people infected with the new coronavirus take turns sitting in a chair and putting their faces into the big end of a large cone. They recite the alphabet and sing or just sit quietly for a half hour. Sometimes they cough.The cone sucks up everything that comes out of their mouths and noses. It's part of a device called “Gesundheit II” that is helping scientists study a big question: Just how does the virus that causes COVID-19 spread from one person to another?It clearly hitchhikes on small liquid particles sprayed out by an infected person. People expel particles while coughing, sneezing, singing, shouting, talking and even breathing. But the drops come in a wide range of sizes, and scientists are trying to pin down how risky the various kinds ...

Sep132020 by adminNo Comments

New quantum thermometer can measure a fever in a tiny worm

Science

Sept. 11 (UPI) -- Scientists have successfully outfitted an optical microscope with quantum sensors, creating a precise microscope-based thermometer, capable of sensing a "fever" in tiny nematode worms. Quantum systems are extremely sensitive to their surrounding environs, making them ideal for measuring in vivo temperature changes. Optical microscopes allow scientists to image microscopic structures in biological samples, and when combined with fluorescent biomarkers, can be used to observe biological processes. Advertisement In a new proof-of-concept study, researchers at Osaka City University combined the two technologies in order to observe biological systems and processes in which heat and temperature play an important role. "Our system effectively integrates fast particle tracking a...