Month: July 2008

Poll: In Your Opinion, What Will be the First LHC Landmark Discovery?

Working on the LHC (CERN)

The first experiments to be carried out by the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) at CERN are on the horizon. Some people are frightened by this historic particle accelerator, but the science community is abuzz with anticipation and excitement. Although some of the conditions of the Big Bang will be recreated, it is important to remember a second “Bigger Bang” will not be generated – although the LHC is powerful, it’s not that powerful!

There is a rich variety of experiments that will be carried out by a variety of LHC detectors in the 27 km circumference ringed accelerator. These experiments include ATLAS, CMS, ALICE, LHCb, TOTEM, and LHCf. All have their own specific goals, but a few possible discoveries stand out as being revolutionary for particle physics and cosmology alike. I’ve written a host of articles about the LHC and I have my own personal hopes for what could be discovered, but I’d be interested to get your views too…
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How Long Would it Take to Travel to Proxima Centauri?

Project Orion - Using nuclear explosions as pulsed propulsion (NASA)

This is one of those articles I’ve been meaning to write for a long time: How long would the interstellar transit be from Earth to the nearest star (and no, I don’t mean the Sun)? It turns out that there is no practical way, using today’s available technology that we can travel to Proxima Centauri (a red dwarf star, 4.33 light years from the Solar System). This is a shame as there are so many stars and so many exoplanets to explore, which space enthusiast wouldn’t want to envisage interstellar space travel? However, there may be help at hand, using modern technology and materials; we might be able to mount a manned expedition to Proxima lasting a little under a century…
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Wolf-Rayet Star: My Favourite Stellar Object

Artist impression of a Wolf-Rayet star (NASA)

Wolf-Rayet (WR) stars are my favourite stellar objects bar none. Due to the excitement factor I find them even more interesting than black holes, pulsars and quasars. Why? Well, they are a significant period of a massive star’s lifetime making its violent, self-destructive death, possibly culminating in a supernova or gamma ray burst (GRB). WR stars blast out dense stellar winds creating a bubble of matter that completely obscures the star’s surface from any attempts at observation. They are also very noisy neighbours, disrupting binary partners and messing up huge volumes of space. If you thought a star might die quietly, the WR phase ensures this isn’t the case and astronomers are paying attention, making some of the most detailed observations of WR stars yet…
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Carnival of Space Week 61 at Mang’s Bat Page

Tesla (deathray) experiment!

For this week’s adventures into all things astro, check out David Gamey’s Mang’s Bat Page. There is a large number of blog posts about the recent Tunguska research plus loads of other space news you’ll enjoy. For my entry, I submitted Watch out Phoenix! Don’t Scratch the CD! – my concerns for the safety of the CD on board the Phoenix Mars Lander that appears to be dropping piles of abrasive Mars regolith over the most expensive data disk ever made, let alone sent to Mars… (I wouldn’t lose any sleep over this though!)

Enjoy! Ian

Poll: Should ESA Science Have a Political Agenda?

French President Nicolas Sarkozy

Recently, French President Nicolas Sarkozy announced his vision for the future of the European Space Agency (ESA). To prevent ESA from becoming “obsolete” and overtaken by nations with fledgling space agencies (such as China, Japan and India), Sarkozy believes ESA should move away from a “science driver” and adopt a “political driver”. He is a huge advocate of NASA’s politically-driven direction and wants to adopt a similar model for Europe.

However, NASA’s political future is looking uncertain (budget cuts and job losses), is this a reliable model for ESA to adopt? Having said that, without a political incentive in the 1960’s NASA may never have landed man on the Moon. Perhaps politics can invigorate investment and space exploration.

I want to hear your view on this tricky subject, so for Astroengine’s first foray into online polls (true democracy over here!), please cast your vote on the question below and we’ll see what everyone thinks. If you want to share your views, please feel free to leave a comment!
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Now we can Call Martian Regolith “Soil” Thanks to Phoenix

Phoenix sprinkles regolith into the oven (NASA/UA)

This is just one of those niggles I’ve felt ever since I started working on Mars projects and articles. How can “Mars soil” be an accurate description of the stuff that sits on the surface of Mars? You see it written everywhere, from NASA to New Scientist, writers have referred to Martian regolith as soil. Why is this? Is regolith and soil that much different? Perhaps I was just getting my knickers in a twist for no reason; perhaps they were the same thing after all. So back to basics, I grabbed for my trusty old dusty dictionary and stopped leafing through the pages at “S”… there, soil. Now for “R”… got R but no regolith (wasn’t that a word in 1980?), just regorge (that isn’t pretty). So I get online and do my research 21st Century style: Google.

I found my answer, but it turns out recent data from the Phoenix Mars lander has complicated matters… apparently the writers at NASA and New Scientist were right all along (even though they didn’t realise it)…
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2012 Doomsday Article Now Available in Portuguese

A Mayan pyramid, but did the Mayans really forecast doomsday?

With a special thanks to Nisia Chaves at Chá de Camomila, my original “No Doomsday in 2012” article published on the Universe Today has been carefully translated into Portuguese. This is great as it extends the readership to countries such as Portugal, Angola, Brazil, Cape Verde, East Timor, Guinea-Bissau, Chinese S.A.R. of Macau, Mozambique and São Tomé and Príncipe. Alas, my Portuguese is a bit rusty, so this might be a good chance to learn some important phrases from the 6th most popular language in the world. So lets start with “Nada de Juízo Final em 2012” – No Doomsday in 2012 😉
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Upcoming Radio Interviews for July

Following all the fun from chatting on Terra Chat with Colin Knight on June 8th and then Paranormal Radio with Captain Jack on June 10th, I’ve been invited back to discuss the 2012 craziness plus some other great topics. I’ll give more details closer to the time, but here’s what I have so far:

Thank you to both Jack and Colin for inviting me back, I’m very excited to be talking with them again this month…