Gordon.clausen
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03 Nov 20:03
Possible reasons for the unusual dimming of Tabby's star include super-advanced aliens
by noreply@blogger.com (brian wang)
About 1480 light-years away from Earth, a star is doing something astronomers have never seen before. Every now and then, at random intervals, its light dips by as much as 22 percent (observed by the Kepler space telescope). That's way too much to be a planet. And the star (officially named KIC 8462852, but informally called "Tabby's Star" or "Boyajian's Star") seems to have gotten dramatically darker over the past century.
This odd behavior defies all known explanations, and astronomer Jason Wright has pointed out that these light patterns are similar to what we might expect if aliens built a complex of machines around the star to harvest its energy. But even Wright admits it's much more likely there's a natural explanation.
Bradley Schaefer looked at old DASCH photometry and found that Boyajian’s Star has been fading over the past 100 years, a claim at least as extraordinary as the star’s Kepler light curve.
Ben Montet and Josh Simon very cleverly recently used the Kepler full-frame imagery—some calibration data that doesn’t get much attention because you can’t use it to find planets—to get accurate long-term photometry of Boyajian’s Star over the course of the mission. Amazingly (to everyone but Bradley, I suspect), they found that the star got 4% dimmer over 4 years, in a monotonic but irregular way. What’s more it is the only star out of > 200 that show this effect.
This independent confirmation of the unprecedented effect Schaefer claimed—even if not covering the same time period—shows that Shaefer’s analysis is correct and the star really has dimmed a lot. Adding the two effects, the star is now apparently at least 17% dimmer than it was in 1890.
We now have two inexplicable things going on: long-term, secular dimming of 17% in 115 years, and these days-long, deep “dips” of up to 22%. Both are very hard to explain.
Some call it “Boyajian’s Star“. Dr Tabetha Boyajian herself calls it the “WTF” star, ostensibly after the subtitle of her paper (“Where’s the Flux?”) Others call it Tabby's star.
Read more »
This odd behavior defies all known explanations, and astronomer Jason Wright has pointed out that these light patterns are similar to what we might expect if aliens built a complex of machines around the star to harvest its energy. But even Wright admits it's much more likely there's a natural explanation.
Bradley Schaefer looked at old DASCH photometry and found that Boyajian’s Star has been fading over the past 100 years, a claim at least as extraordinary as the star’s Kepler light curve.
Ben Montet and Josh Simon very cleverly recently used the Kepler full-frame imagery—some calibration data that doesn’t get much attention because you can’t use it to find planets—to get accurate long-term photometry of Boyajian’s Star over the course of the mission. Amazingly (to everyone but Bradley, I suspect), they found that the star got 4% dimmer over 4 years, in a monotonic but irregular way. What’s more it is the only star out of > 200 that show this effect.
This independent confirmation of the unprecedented effect Schaefer claimed—even if not covering the same time period—shows that Shaefer’s analysis is correct and the star really has dimmed a lot. Adding the two effects, the star is now apparently at least 17% dimmer than it was in 1890.
We now have two inexplicable things going on: long-term, secular dimming of 17% in 115 years, and these days-long, deep “dips” of up to 22%. Both are very hard to explain.
Some call it “Boyajian’s Star“. Dr Tabetha Boyajian herself calls it the “WTF” star, ostensibly after the subtitle of her paper (“Where’s the Flux?”) Others call it Tabby's star.
Read more »
10 Aug 18:54
Screengrabber Something Unfortunate Has Happened In The Olympic Diving Venue | Jezebel A Woman Was F
by Kinja! on Kinja Roundup, shared by Adam Clark Estes to io9
21 Jun 21:46
Adequate Man How To Plan Your Lunches And Eat Like A Human Being All Week | Jezebel Ticketmaster’s F
by Kinja! on Kinja Roundup, shared by Adam Clark Estes to io9
07 Jan 20:37
Drone able to transport humans shown at Consumer Electronics Show by Chinese drone company
by noreply@blogger.com (brian wang)
At CES 2016 in Las Vegas, Chinese UAV company EHang has shown a drone which can transports humans.
However, there is no actual footage of a human actually flying around inside of the EHang 184 drone.
EHang said that the drone will be totally automated, meaning passengers will input a destination and have no control during the flight. The company says this will make the machine safer by eliminating “the most dangerous part of standard modes of transportation, human error.”
EHang was founded in 2014 and has raised about $50 million in venture funding.
The drone is about four-and-a-half feet tall, weighs 440 pounds, and will be able to carry a single passenger for 23 minutes at a speed of 60 MPH. The 184 also has gull-wing doors and arms that fold up.
Read more »
However, there is no actual footage of a human actually flying around inside of the EHang 184 drone.
EHang said that the drone will be totally automated, meaning passengers will input a destination and have no control during the flight. The company says this will make the machine safer by eliminating “the most dangerous part of standard modes of transportation, human error.”
EHang was founded in 2014 and has raised about $50 million in venture funding.
The drone is about four-and-a-half feet tall, weighs 440 pounds, and will be able to carry a single passenger for 23 minutes at a speed of 60 MPH. The 184 also has gull-wing doors and arms that fold up.
Read more »
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