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5103247

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metasepia%20tullbergi

Metasepia tullbergi

The paintpot cuttlefish (Metasepia tullbergi) is a small, poorly researched species of cuttlefish found in the Indo-Pacific, between Japan and Hong Kong. It is one of the two species classified in the genus Metasepia. Metasepia cuttlefish are characterized by their small, thick, diamond-shaped cuttlebone, and distinctive body coloration. The World Register of Marine Species lists the paintpot cuttlefish under the genus Ascarosepion; within this genus it is grouped with 13 other species, such as the broadclub cuttlefish, the reaper cuttlefish, and the giant cuttlefish. This reclassification renders the genus Metasepia obsolete Description Paintpot cuttlefish are a slow-moving, bottom-dwelling species in the neritic zone found at a depth of 20 to 100 meters in subtropical climates. Their mantle (the "body") is about 70mm long; it has a broad, oval-shape with 10 to 13 pores on each side. Their fins are joined in the back of the animal with arms located on the opposite end of the squid at the head, like all coleoids. Their arms typically have 10 to 12 rows of shorter suckers followed by larger ones and then tapering in size through to the arm tip. Their adult weight ranges from 30 to 40 grams. The hectocolytus (male sperm) is present in the left ventral arm. Unlike other species of cuttlefish, Metasepia have a cuttlebone that is much smaller than their mantle. Characteristic of cephalopods, chitin is present as a thin film covering the entire dorsal surface of the cuttlebone and tapers into a sharp point on the dorsal corner. The anterior surface of the cuttlebone is entirely covered in chitin; the posterior surface is calcareous. The paintpot cuttlefish's chromatophores are mostly set to be darkly colored with bright yellow spots on the head, dorsal side of mantle, and arms. The protective membranes on the arms are red. Habitat The paintpot cuttlefish is typically found in the subtropical Indo-Pacific, in the seas surrounding Japan, China and Korea. Sightings have been recorded in Japan from southern Honshu, the Sea of Japan, Yellow Sea, East China Sea to Taiwan and Hong Kong, South China Sea, the Philippines and the Gulf of Thailand. In these regions, the paintpot cuttlefish is found in the continental shelf between 20 and 100 meters deep on sandy to muddy substrate or on sea pens in rocky substrate. It is unknown if it is sympatric with its conspecific the flamboyant cuttlefish. Life history Like its sister species, the paintpot cuttlefish lives directly on the benthos; its buoyancy regulating organ, the cuttlebone, is too small to efficiently lift it off the seabed; thus it walks on its tentacles and protrusions of its mantle. Like all members of class Cephalopoda, paintpot cuttlefish are gonochoric. Each individual is either male or female. Male individuals have sperm stored in the hectocotylus, a modified arm organ that specialized to store and transfer spermatophores to a female. Males perform various displays to attract a female for copulation during which they insert their hectocotylus into a female’s mantle cavity and fertilize the eggs. Egg masses are laid in rocky areas at around 20 meters deep and hatch during the summer. Freshly hatched cuttlefish, which resemble miniature adults, migrate to 80 meters depth in sandy-mud areas from August to September to grow and develop, after which the mature squid moves towards the shallows to spawn. This migration occurs in March. Embryos hatch and live as plankton in the water column for several weeks before becoming benthic adults. Research The paintpot cuttlefish was used as a research specimen to analyze how neuronal activity may propagate through the body. One phenomenon that many cephalopods share is the ability for their skin to change colors due to the presence of chromatophores on their skin. The change of color is activated by an action potential traveling through the cephalopod skin. Because all neural activity in biological systems are controlled by the propagation of action potentials, neuroscientists are especially interested in this visual representation of action potential propagation. Cuttlefish have a mode of color change typified by dark bands traveling across the animal’s body in a coordinated pattern called “passing clouds”. The paintpot cuttlefish is especially conducive to this kind of research due to their small size, slow speed and the frequency of the passing clouds display. The results of this study concluded that the passing clouds phenomenon was a result of central wave generation indicating that the action potential originated at a single point controller. This may indicate that cephalopods may have a central nervous system similar to humans which can lead to larger implications in neuroscience. References Cuttlefish Molluscs described in 1886 Taxa named by Adolf Appellöf Pacific Ocean cephalopods

5115302

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/African%20easterly%20jet

African easterly jet

The African easterly jet is a region of the lower troposphere over West Africa where the seasonal mean wind speed is at a maximum and the wind is easterly. The temperature contrast between the Sahara Desert and the Gulf of Guinea causes the jet to form to the north of the monsoon trough. The jet's maximum wind speeds are at a height of . The jet moves northward from its south-most location in January, reaching its most northerly latitude in August. Its strongest winds are in September while it begins shifting back towards the equator. Within the easterly jet, tropical waves form. Convective complexes associated with these waves can form tropical cyclones. If the jet is south of its normal location during August and September, tropical cyclogenesis is suppressed. If desertification continues across Sub-Saharan Africa, the strength of the jet could increase, although tropical wave generation probably would decrease, which would decrease the number of tropical cyclones in the Atlantic basin. Formation and characteristics During January, the African easterly jet lies at above sea level at five degrees north latitude. Winds within it increase in speed from in January to in March. Shifting northward in April to the seventh parallel, winds within the jet increase to . By June, it shifts northward into northwest Africa. From June into October, the thermal low over northern Africa leads to a low-level westerly jet stream to the south of the Intertropical Convergence Zone. The mid-level African easterly jet develops because heating of the West African land mass during this time of year creates a surface temperature and moisture gradient between the Gulf of Guinea and the Sahara Desert. The atmosphere responds by generating vertical wind shear to maintain thermal wind balance. The jet reaches its zenith in August, lying between the 16th and 17th parallels. In September, winds maximize near between the 12th and 13th parallels. The easterly jet weakens and drops southward during October and November. Impact The mid-level African easterly jet is considered to play a crucial role in the West African monsoon, and helps form the tropical waves that move across the tropical Atlantic and eastern Pacific oceans during the warm season. The jet exhibits both barotropic and baroclinic instability, which produces synoptic scale, westward-propagating disturbances in the jet known as African easterly waves or tropical waves. These instabilities, particularly in the presence of moist-convection, cause intense lower-layer cyclonic vortices at the northern flank of the jet. A small number of mesoscale storm systems embedded in these waves develop into tropical cyclones after they move from west Africa into the tropical Atlantic, mainly during August and September. When the jet is south of normal during the peak months of the Atlantic hurricane season, tropical cyclone formation is suppressed. See also Saharan Air Layer References Further reading Kerry H. Cook: Generation of the African Easterly Jet and Its Role in Determining West African Precipitation Holton, James R.: An Introduction to Dynamic Meteorology, 2004. Atmospheric dynamics

5126202

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aviator%20sunglasses

Aviator sunglasses

Aviator sunglasses are a style of sunglasses that was developed by a group of American firms. The original Bausch & Lomb design is now commercially marketed as Ray-Ban Aviators, although other manufacturers also produce aviator-style sunglasses. Design Aviator style sunglasses are intended to be worn under headgear and are characterised by dark, oftentimes reflective lenses and thin monel, steel or titanium metal frames with double or triple bridges and bayonet earpieces or flexible cable temples that hook more securely behind the ears. The large lenses are not flat but slightly convex. The design attempts to cover the entire field of vision of the human eye and significantly reduce the amount of transmitted visible light and (near) infrared radiation and prevent (erythemal) ultraviolet radiation from entering the eye from any angle. For selecting sunglasses, the United States Federal Aviation Administration has published an aeromedical safety brochure for general aviation pilots, commercial pilots and physicians. Polarized and photochromic lenses are not recommended for use by pilots. The UK Civil Aviation Authority has also provided guidance on the use of sunglasses by pilots. History U.S. Army Air Corps D-1 sunglasses The first aviator style sunglasses contracted by the US military in 1935 were the U.S. Army Air Corps D-1 Sunglasses made by American Optical. They have a conspicuous USAC engraving on the hinged bridge. The D-1 flying goggle assembly was standardized on 13 August 1935, and was actually a pair of sun glasses with a rigid frame and plastic insulated arms. The D-1 sunglasses were superseded by the more comfortable AN6531 flying sun glasses (comfort cable) in November 1941. AN6531 military sunglasses In the second half of the 1930s and early 1940s, a group of American firms continued developing sunglasses. The military "flying sun glasses (comfort cable)" were standardized in November 1941. They were produced in huge quantities (several million pieces) for pilots and sailors. The lenses were made to a joint standard shared by the U.S. Army Air Corps and the U.S. Navy. As a result, the lens carried an "AN" (Army/Navy) specification number: the AN6531. The U.S. Government specified the shape of the lens and the color, which was initially a green tinted lens that transmitted 50% of incoming visible daylight. This AN6531 Type 1 lens proved insufficient to protect the pilot's eyes from sun glare so this lens was superseded by the darker AN6531 Type 2 lens in rose smoke. Various contractors made the frames and ground the lenses. These included American Optical, Bausch & Lomb, The Chas. Fischer Spring Co., Willson Optical and Rochester Optical Co. Frame and hinge design varied slightly from contractor to contractor. Despite being designed for utility, these glasses had advanced properties: teardrop-shaped and convex lenses, plastic nose pads and a prominent brow bar and featured flexible cable temples. The nickel plated frame was made of a copper based alloy to prevent offsetting compasses. The "teardrop" shape lens of the AN 6531 was designed to accommodate Air Force pilots who were constantly looking down at their instrument panel while in flight, and that influenced all future Aviator style lens shapes. The AN6531 Comfort Cable aviator sunglasses frame kept being issued by the U.S. military as No. MIL-G-6250 glasses after World War II with different lenses as Type F-2 (arctic) and Type G-2 aviator sunglasses but fitted with darker lenses until their substitute the Type HGU-4/P aviator sunglasses became available in the late 1950s. After World War II AN6531 Comfort Cable aviator sunglasses were available for civilians on the surplus market. Subsequently, civilian models and options appeared without a frontal brow bar and with plastic earhooks. Since everything military was in fashion in those years, these glasses became popular among the people and companies got their bearings on time and began to promote such glasses for civilian use in the 1940s and 1950s. Commercial history Bausch & Lomb In 1929, US Army Air Corps Colonel John A. Macready worked with Bausch & Lomb, a Rochester, New York-based medical equipment manufacturer, to create aviation sunglasses that would reduce the distraction for pilots caused by the intense blue and white hues of the sky. Specifically, MacCready was concerned about how pilots' goggles would fog up, greatly reducing visibility at high altitudes. The prototype, created in 1936 and known as "Anti-Glare", had plastic frames and green lenses that could cut out the glare without obscuring vision. It went on sale to the public in 1937. Impact-resistant lenses were added in 1938. Ray-Ban Aviator The sunglasses were redesigned with a metal frame in 1939 and promoted by Bausch & Lomb as the Ray-Ban Aviator. According to the BBC, the glasses used "Kalichrome lenses designed to sharpen details and minimise haze by filtering out blue light, making them ideal for misty conditions." In 1936 Ray-Ban had been founded as a civilian division of Bausch & Lomb. This style of sunglasses is credited with being one of the first popularized styles of sunglasses to be developed. In its military usage, the sunglasses replaced the outmoded flight goggles used previously, as they were lighter, thinner, and "more elegantly designed". Writing about the transition of aviators from military gear to a commercial product, Vanessa Brown wrote that, "The War was a ... revelation of the sheer might, scale, power, and horror of the modern world ... [which] necessitated a new kind of military demeanor and gave rise to new definitions of the heroic stance which was to have a profound influence on modern fashion." Eventually, the aviator sunglasses produced by Bausch & Lomb were trademarked as "Ray-Bans". Aviators became a well-known style of sunglasses when US General Douglas MacArthur landed on a beach in the Philippines in World War II and newspaper photographers snapped several pictures of him in October 1944 wearing them that became a lasting image of the Second World War. Bausch & Lomb dedicated a line of sunglasses to him in 1987. The first advertisements for Ray-Ban Aviators stated they would provide "real scientific glare protection" and were sold as sporting equipment. At this time, they had not yet taken on their name of "aviators", the Second World War has not yet begun. During the 1950s, aviator sunglasses were a part of the cultural style, mimicking the military style. In addition to popularity in the 1950s, aviators were popular in the 1970s and 1980s, being worn by public figures like Slash, Michael Jackson, George Michael, Tom Cruise, Freddie Mercury, Jeff Lynne, Roger Waters and Elvis Presley. Besides flexible cable temples and bayonet temples, non-military issued glasses often feature traditional skull temples. Ray-Ban Aviator variations Besides the standard model there are several different Ray-Ban Aviator sunglasses variations designed as functional, technical and recreational sunglasses . The Ray-Ban Shooter variant was introduced in 1938 and the Ray-Ban Outdoorsman variant in 1939. These sunglasses both feature a large brow bar above the nose intended to keep sweat and debris from inhibiting the wearer's vision. The brow bar and temple end pieces of the Shooter and Outdoorsman variants have been covered through years with different materials. Aimed at the sports enthusiast and outdoorsman, The Ray-Ban Shooter variant incorporates a cigarette holder, a circular device located at the center of the nose bridge originally intended to free the sportsman's hands while taking aim. In 1953 Ray-Ban introduced G-15 tempered glass lenses. These neutral gray/green lenses transmit 15% of incoming visible light whilst providing "true" color and contrast distribution. Military type HGU-4/P aviator sunglasses In 1958, American Optical created the Flight Goggle 58 according to the then-new U.S. Air Force Type HGU-4/P aviator sunglasses standard. Type HGU-4/P sunglasses feature semi-rectangular lenses with less lens surface area and are lighter compared to the preceding Type G-2 sunglasses. The HGU-4/P design frame allowed the visor to reliably clear the aviator's spectacles when a flight helmet is worn, and covers the full field of vision. The frame additionally features bayonet temples designed to slip under a flight helmet or other headgear and was more compatible with oxygen masks. They are commercially known as "Original Pilot Sunglass", and were issued by the U.S. military in 1959 to pilots shortly after the HGU4/P was officially recommended by military optometrists in November 1958. The HGU-4/P design frame is also issued to military personnel that require various corrective clear or other types of lenses and allows corrected vision through the full field of vision. Besides the military, Type HGU-4/P aviator sunglasses were also issued to and used by NASA astronauts. By 1982, Randolph Engineering had become the prime contractor for military-style Type HGU-4/P aviation flight glasses for the United States Department of Defense. They are commercially known as "Randolph Aviator" sunglasses. HGU-4/P aviation flight glasses are still built to the guidelines of the MIL-S-25948 military specification, a document detailing the manufacturing specifications. One of the many specifications is that the neutral grey lenses used in Type HGU-4/P aviator sunglasses must transmit between 12% and 18% of incoming visible daylight whilst providing "true" color and contrast distribution. The military HGU-4/P Aviator and the Modified HGU-4/P Apache spectacles intended for Apache attack helicopter aircrew are under regular review to determine their functionality. Gallery See also Aviator hat References Sunglasses Aviation wear 1960s fashion 1970s fashion 1980s fashion 1990s fashion 2000s fashion 2010s fashion

5134226

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ritek

Ritek

RITEK Corporation manufactures optical discs such as compact discs (CDs), DVDs, and Blu-ray, as well as storage cards such as CompactFlash cards, SD cards and MultiMediaCards, flash drives. Ritek also produces solar modules and touch panel products such as passive-matrix OLED and ITO glass. Ritek has also launched some products in nano- and biotechnology. Ritek Corporation was established in 1988 with the goal of manufacturing CDs in Taiwan. In 1990 the company produced the first CD in Taiwan. In November 2005, the company had a market share of 20 percent in rewritable DVDs and CD-RWs and was the biggest disc-manufacturer worldwide. , Ritek has 5,900 employees. Locations Hsinchu, Taiwan (headquarters) Chungli, Taiwan Yangzhou, China Kunshan, China Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam Cheongwon County, South Korea Ridderkerk, Netherlands Los Angeles, United States History In 1952, Yeh Ching-Tai created Min Li Plastics (). The factory produced plastic cigarette boxes and polyethylene milk bottles. During that period, he purchased a second-hand electroplating tool from Japan, with the original intention of plating chromium on plastics to enhance durability; this did not work. He then moved to electroplate copper and nickel on the stampers of vinyl records, entering the record business. Yeh Ching-Tai established First Vintage Record and Platinum Studio. He set up vinyl record production facilities in Sanchungpu in 1960. As part of the business for First Vintage Record, he took singer Sally Yeh to perform and market albums throughout department stores. Mr. Yeh Ching-Tai also introduced the recording technology from Japan to establish Platinum Studio. In 1980, Yeh imported from Switzerland 24-track recorders and invited a technician from Japan for instructions. At that time, he mentioned that digitalization was the trend for the record industry. Japan was already trial producing compact disks. To ensure time to market, Mr. Yeh Ching-Tai recruited a group of engineers from the Industrial Technology Research Institute in 1985 to manufacture compact disks. They started with simple plastic pressing to accumulate technological expertise. In 1988, Yeh founded RITEK Corporation. The company's English name is a portmanteau of the words "right" and "technology". In May 1990, the company manufactured the first compact disk in Taiwan with support from the Mechanical and Systems Research Laboratories, Industrial Technology Research Institute. The company became a formal member of the IFPI Members Foundation in Taiwan in 1991. The company set up facilities for the production of compact discs in Australia in 1994. In 1996, Ritek Corporation had its IPO in Taiwan. The company created the Compact Disk Manufacturers Association (CMA), aiming to protect copyright for CD replication. The company set up facilities for the production of CDs in the United States, and manufactured the first CD-RW and the first DVD in Taiwan. The company manufactured the first DVD-R in Taiwan in 1997. Also in 1997, Ritek signed a copyright verification agreement with the Taiwan offices of the Music Publishers Association and became the first CD manufacturer in Taiwan to obtain ISO 9001 certification. The company also set up facilities for the production of CDs in the United Kingdom.In 1998, Ritek manufactured the first DVD-RAM in Taiwan. In 1999, U-TECH Media Corporation was formed as the largest pre-recorded medium manufacturer in Taiwan. Ritek Foundation was established. Ritek became the first CD maker in Taiwan that obtained the ISO 14001 certification, and in 2000 it became the first Taiwanese CD maker to obtain QS9000 certification., and Ritek's MiniDisc won a Taiwan Excellence Award. In November 2006, Ritek became the exclusive producer of Maxell CD-Rs and DVDs. In 2008, Ritek's USB flash drive received a product design award from iF International Forum Design. In 2013, Ritek launched M-DISC DVD and Bluray. In 2017, RiData OTG Flash Drive won the Gold Award for Technology Trends by PC HOME and PC ADV 3C. Ritek entered into a licensing agreement with Imation in 2019. OLED In 1999 the company manufactured the first OLED in Taiwan. In 2001, the company built fully automated OLED mass production lines and RiTdisplay Corporation was established as OLED manufacturer in Taiwan. In 2015, Ritek started to manufacture passive-matrix OLED wearables. Solar energy In 2008, Ritek entered into a strategic alliance with Scheuten, a solar energy company in Europe. PV Next, a thin-film solar manufacturer dedicated to (copper indium gallium selenide), was established in 2009. In 2011, Ritek Solar worked with SolarEdge and showcased new IM series solar modules at the Intersolar Europe conference in Munich. Ritek's solar module won the Taiwan Excellent PV Award from the Bureau of Energy, Ministry of Economic Affairs, R.O.C (Taiwan) in 2016. International activities In 1999, The company set up with Philips joint venture facilities for the manufacturing of CD-R in Germany (PrimeDisc Technologies in Wiesbaden). In 2003, RME was set up in Germany as a printing and packaging plant for compact discs. In 2004, Ritek's Japanese subsidiary, Ritek Japan, was established. In 2007, Ritek's North Africa subsidiary, Ritek North Africa, was established. In 2018, Ritek became Japan Panasonic's only overseas Archival Disc (AD) production partner. In 2016, Ritek collaborated with Japan's largest chain elderly daycare center to found Ricare Day Service Center. Equity investments AimCore Technology Co., Ltd. – ITO glass, established 2007 U-TECH Media Corporation – pre-recorded compact disks U-Chain – warehousing and logistics RiTdisplay Corporation – passive-matrix OLED RiteDia – diamond-like carbon coating RitFast Corporation – touch panels CASHIDO – nanotechnology PRORIT Corporation – high-precision plastic injection RitPower – solar modules See also List of companies of Taiwan References Electronics companies of Taiwan Photovoltaics Thin-film cell manufacturers Manufacturing companies based in Hsinchu Taiwanese companies established in 1988 Taiwanese brands

5143446

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michel%20Desjoyeaux

Michel Desjoyeaux

Michel Desjoyeaux (born 16 July 1965 in Concarneau) is a French sailor, known for competing successfully in several long-distance single-handed races. He won the Vendée Globe race in 2000-01 and 2008–09, making him the only person to win that race more than once. In 2014-15, he was watch captain, on leg 1 on Mapfre in the Volvo Ocean Race. Race Results Highlights See also Mini Transat 6.50 Scow References External links Official Mer agitée 1965 births Living people People from Concarneau French male sailors (sport) Volvo Ocean Race sailors Sportspeople from Finistère French Vendee Globe sailors 2000 Vendee Globe sailors 2008 Vendee Globe sailors Vendée Globe finishers Single-handed circumnavigating sailors

5150399

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Puget%20Sound%20Convergence%20Zone

Puget Sound Convergence Zone

The Puget Sound Convergence Zone (PSCZ) is a meteorological phenomenon that occurs over Puget Sound in the U.S. state of Washington. It is formed when the large-scale air flow splits around the Olympic Mountains and then converges over Puget Sound. This convergence zone generally occurs between north Seattle and Everett and can cause updrafts and convection, which leads to a narrow band of precipitation. A second, weaker convergence zone can occur between approximately Victoria, British Columbia, and Bellingham, Washington, over the San Juan Islands, as a result of southwesterly air blowing from the Strait of Juan de Fuca meeting northerly air moving southward down the Strait of Georgia. The National Weather Service publishes special reports, forecasts, and graphical analyses for the PSCZ region. Most common locations Puget Sound Convergence Zones, variable in both location and strength, tend to form in the general vicinity of central and southern Snohomish and northern King counties in Washington, from Everett to the Northgate neighborhood of Seattle. The strongest part of the Convergence Zone (where the heaviest precipitation falls) tends to lie along and adjacent to the King-Snohomish County line so that neither county is left dry. The proximity of the Convergence Zone to the King-Snohomish County line is the reason that cities located just north or south of the line, which are located within the rain shadow of the Olympic Mountains, approach Seattle in annual precipitation. The effect of the Puget Sound Convergence Zone nearly offsets that of the rain shadow. Without PSCZ, cities such as Edmonds, Mountlake Terrace, and Lynnwood in Snohomish County and Shoreline, Lake Forest Park, and Bothell in King County would be noticeably drier than Seattle. The PSCZ has been suggested as the cause of greater precipitation over Glacier Peak relative to other mountains in the Cascades to the east of Puget Sound. As there are no weather stations near Glacier Peak, it remains unclear whether that area actually receives greater precipitation than elsewhere in the Cascade Range. Events April 18, 2008 On April 18, 2008, a strong and very unseasonable snow-producing Puget Sound Convergence Zone storm formed around Everett, and spread south throughout the course of the afternoon and evening. By evening, the Zone had spread into northern King County, dumping of snow in Shoreline, and of snow in Woodinville. As the Zone slowly sank south of Shoreline into Seattle (past NE 145th Street), snow amounts began to taper off. The snow-producing part of the Zone ended abruptly at Roosevelt High School, a mere ten blocks north of the beginnings of the University District and the University of Washington community. Just north of Roosevelt High School, an inch of snow coated the ground, and due west of the school in the Green Lake neighborhood of Seattle, an inch of snow had also fallen. In line with the known "abrupt edge" of the Puget Sound Convergence Zone, areas to the south of this Green Lake-to-Roosevelt High line (marked by NE 68th Street), including the U-District, witnessed only a dusting of snow. Port Orchard tornado On December 18, 2018, a tornado formed in Port Orchard, Washington during an atmospheric river event that lasted for several weeks. The tornado was rated EF2 with winds near and caused approximately $1.8 million (2018 USD) of damage and was the strongest tornado in the state since the 1980s. References Mesoscale meteorology Natural history of Washington (state) Atmospheric circulation

5150737

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cell%20of%20origin

Cell of origin

Cell of origin (COO) is a mobile-positioning technique for finding a caller's cell (the basic geographical coverage unit of a cellular telephone system) location. Overview Crude COO positioning considers the location of the base station to be the location of the caller. This is not very accurate, as the majority of mobile network cells are projected from an antenna with a spread of 120° (i.e. three mounted on a mast to give complete coverage) giving a signal coverage area with the base station at one corner, rather than the centre. Omnidirectional cells may be used in rural locations (which typically have large ranges and hence uncertain locations for phones within them) and in cities (where they may have ranges of a few hundred metres). The underlying issue is that mobile phone networks are optimised for capacity and call handling rather than locating phones. Most commercially implemented systems rely on 'enhanced' COO. In the GSM system this relies on the fact that the phones constantly measure the signal strength from the closest 6 base stations and lock on to the strongest signal (the reality is slightly more complex than this and includes parameters that each individual network can optimise, including signal quality and variability. Most networks endeavour to optimise for minimum power consumption, but the overall effect approximates to each phone locking onto the strongest signal). All networks generate 'splash maps' predicting signal coverage when planning and managing their networks. These maps can be processed to analyse the area which will be dominated by each base station and to approximate each area by a circle (the actual area of coverage may not be exactly where predicted... and in any case will be an irregular shape, rather than a circle). In practice a network offering location services to third parties will present an API to which queries can be sent by validated users, to which a reply will be sent comprising the centre of a circle and a radius representing the expected error (the size of the circle in which the phone is expected to be). For this reason, when precision is important COO is often used in conjunction with some other technology, such as the Global Positioning System (GPS) or Time of Arrival (TOA). COO is the only positioning technique that is widely used in wireless networks and is used for Phase 1 of 911 service in the United States. Location service using COO have been adopted by the emergency services in many countries. Commercial services have been slower to take off than many in the industry expected. One of the first services to make widespread use of COO based mobile location was the Zingo taxi hailing system, launched in London in 2003 Mobile technology Geopositioning

5155121

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard%20S.%20Westfall

Richard S. Westfall

Richard S. Westfall (April 22, 1924 – August 21, 1996) was an American academic, biographer and historian of science. He is best known for his biography of Isaac Newton and his work on the scientific revolution of the 17th century. Life Born in Fort Collins, Colorado, Westfall graduated from high school in 1942 and enrolled at Yale University. His time at Yale was interrupted by two years of service in World War II, but he returned to complete his B.A. degree in 1948. He subsequently earned M.A. and Ph.D. degrees from Yale, with a dissertation entitled Science and Religion in Seventeenth Century England. The work was an early example of his lifelong interest in the history of science and its relationship to religion. Westfall taught history at various universities in the 1950s and 1960s: California Institute of Technology (1952–53), State University of Iowa (1953–57), and Grinnell College (1957–63). He began teaching at Indiana University in 1963 and worked his way up the faculty ranks until his retirement in 1989 as Distinguished Professor Emeritus. He died in 1996 in Bloomington, Indiana at the age of 72. Work In 1980 Westfall published what is widely regarded as the definitive biography of Isaac Newton, Never at Rest. Westfall considered Newton a driven, neurotic, often humorless and vengeful individual. Despite these personal faults, Westfall ranked Newton as the most important man in the history of European civilization. Westfall published a condensed and simplified version of the biography as The Life of Isaac Newton in 1993. Westfall published other books on the history of science, including The Construction of Modern Science: Mechanisms and Mechanics (1971), Force in Newton's Physics: the Science of Dynamics in the Seventeenth Century (1971), and Essays on the Trial of Galileo (1989). Late in life he constructed a database of information on the lives and careers of more than 600 scientists of the early modern era, his Catalog of the Scientific Community in the 16th and 17th Centuries, which he made available to other researchers. Recognition and awards Westfall received many awards, most notably election as a fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and the Royal Society of Literature, and the Sarton Medal of the History of Science Society. His Never at Rest earned the History of Science Society's Pfizer Award in 1983 as the best book in the history of science and the American Historical Association's Leo Gershoy Award in 1982 as the most outstanding work published in English on any aspect of seventeenth- and eighteenth-century European history. He also received the History of Science Society's Pfizer Award in 1972 for his Force in Newton's Physics and the society's Derek Price Prize in 1987 for his article, "Scientific Patronage: Galileo and the Telescope." Notes References Religion, Science, and Worldview : Essays in Honor of Richard S. Westfall, edited by Margaret J. Osler and Paul Lawrence Farber, Cambridge University Press 1985 External links Galileo Project page for Richard S. Westfall Archives Online at Indiana University: Richard S. Westfall papers, 1942-1996 1924 births 1996 deaths 20th-century American historians American male non-fiction writers Historians of science 20th-century American biographers Newton scholars 20th-century American male writers

5156607

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Institute%20of%20Astronomy%2C%20NCU

Institute of Astronomy, NCU

The Institute of Astronomy of Nicolaus Copernicus University in Toruń, known prior to 1 October 2019 in scientific publications as the Toruń Centre for Astronomy, is an optical and radio observatory located at () in Piwnice, about 15 km north of Toruń, Poland. It houses two single-dish antenna telescopes, 32 metres and 15 metres in diameter, as well as the largest Polish optical telescope – 90 cm Schmidt-Cassegrain camera. The facility is operated by the Nicolaus Copernicus University. Also, photometry using 60 cm Cassegrain telescope is made and radio measurements of the Sun at 127 MHz frequency have been recorded on a daily basis since 1958 using a 23 m interferometer. Radio astronomy Since 1981 the observatory has been a part of worldwide network of radio telescopes participating in VLBI (Very Long Baseline Interferometry). The 32 m telescope is a 620-ton construction designed by Zygmunt Bujakowski based on initial geometric parameters created by Dr Jerzy Usowicz. It is used in VLBI experiments, as well as spectroscopic, flux, polarisation measurements and pulsar observations. Currently receivers for frequencies 1.4–1.8 GHz, 5 GHz, 6.5 GHz, 10.8 GHz and 30 GHz are in use. The 15 m telescope is used for training students of the Nicolaus Copernicus University. The observatory's role as a VLBI station is unique in central/eastern Europe. International collaboration and involvement in various European research projects is the major activity of this department. The research concentrates on observations and theoretical interpretation of physical processes in compact active regions of radio galaxies and quasars, observational cosmology, the timing of pulsars, the search for new planetary systems and Solar System studies. In addition, the development of instrumentation for radio astronomy (ultra low noise receivers, spectrometers, frequency converters, digital electronics, control systems) is also a significant part of activities in the observatory. From 1997 to 2019, the Department of Radio Astronomy was a part of what was known in publications as the Toruń Centre for Astronomy, at the Faculty of Physics, Astronomy and Applied Informatics of the Nicolaus Copernicus University in Toruń. From 1998, the department undertook the additional function of a National Facility with a major aims of serving Polish astronomers and emphasizing international cooperation. Reorganisation of the university in the context of the 2018–2019 led to the closing of the administrative structures of the Department of Radio Astronomy and the Department of Astronomy and Astrophysics. The astronomy research centre, without substructures, was recreated as the Institute of Astronomy starting on 1 October 2019. WASP-3c & TTV Transit Timing Variation (TTV), a variation on the transit method, was used to discover an exoplanet WASP-3c by Rozhen Observatory, Jena Observatory, and Toruń Centre for Astronomy. See also List of radio telescopes References External links Radio Observatory website Radio observatories Astronomical observatories in Poland Piwnice Science and technology in Poland Toruń County Buildings and structures in Kuyavian-Pomeranian Voivodeship

5158118

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inter-Agency%20Space%20Debris%20Coordination%20Committee

Inter-Agency Space Debris Coordination Committee

The Inter-Agency Space Debris Coordination Committee (IADC) is an inter-governmental forum whose aim is to co-ordinate efforts to deal with debris in orbit around the Earth founded in 1993. The primary purposes of the IADC is information exchange on space debris research activities, facilitating opportunities for joint research, and reviewing progress of ongoing activities. All of these are designed to support identification of space debris mitigation options. Debris mitigation guidance In March 2020, the organization has developed recommendations that each program or project establish and document a feasible Space Debris Mitigation Plan. The plan should include the following items: A management plan addressing space debris mitigation activities A plan for the assessment and mitigation of risks related to space debris, including applicable standards The measures minimising the hazard related to malfunctions that have a potential for generating space debris A plan for disposal of the spacecraft and/or orbital stages at end of mission Justification of choice and selection when several possibilities exist Compliance matrix addressing the recommendations of these Guidelines Members Members of the IADC include: Agenzia Spaziale Italiana (ASI) Centre National d'Etudes Spatiales (CNES) China National Space Administration (CNSA) Canadian Space Agency (CSA) German Aerospace Center (DLR) European Space Agency (ESA) Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) Korea Aerospace Research Institute (KARI) National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) Russian Federal Space Agency (ROSCOSMOS) State Space Agency of Ukraine (SSAU) United Kingdom Space Agency (UKSA) See also Orbital Debris Co-ordination Working Groupっっっっｍش References External links Web Archive: Report of the IADC Activities on Space Debris Mitigation Measures (PDF, 129kB) Space organizations Space debris

5163454

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Waste%20heat

Waste heat

Waste heat is heat that is produced by a machine, or other process that uses energy, as a byproduct of doing work. All such processes give off some waste heat as a fundamental result of the laws of thermodynamics. Waste heat has lower utility (or in thermodynamics lexicon a lower exergy or higher entropy) than the original energy source. Sources of waste heat include all manner of human activities, natural systems, and all organisms, for example, incandescent light bulbs get hot, a refrigerator warms the room air, a building gets hot during peak hours, an internal combustion engine generates high-temperature exhaust gases, and electronic components get warm when in operation. Instead of being "wasted" by release into the ambient environment, sometimes waste heat (or cold) can be used by another process (such as using hot engine coolant to heat a vehicle), or a portion of heat that would otherwise be wasted can be reused in the same process if make-up heat is added to the system (as with heat recovery ventilation in a building). Thermal energy storage, which includes technologies both for short- and long-term retention of heat or cold, can create or improve the utility of waste heat (or cold). One example is waste heat from air conditioning machinery stored in a buffer tank to aid in night time heating. Another is seasonal thermal energy storage (STES) at a foundry in Sweden. The heat is stored in the bedrock surrounding a cluster of heat exchanger equipped boreholes, and is used for space heating in an adjacent factory as needed, even months later. An example of using STES to use natural waste heat is the Drake Landing Solar Community in Alberta, Canada, which, by using a cluster of boreholes in bedrock for interseasonal heat storage, obtains 97 percent of its year-round heat from solar thermal collectors on the garage roofs. Another STES application is storing winter cold underground, for summer air conditioning. On a biological scale, all organisms reject waste heat as part of their metabolic processes, and will die if the ambient temperature is too high to allow this. Anthropogenic waste heat can contribute to the urban heat island effect. The biggest point sources of waste heat originate from machines (such as electrical generators or industrial processes, such as steel or glass production) and heat loss through building envelopes. The burning of transport fuels is a major contribution to waste heat. Conversion of energy Machines converting energy contained in fuels to mechanical work or electric energy produce heat as a by-product. Sources In the majority of energy applications, energy is required in multiple forms. These energy forms typically include some combination of: heating, ventilation, and air conditioning, mechanical energy and electric power. Often, these additional forms of energy are produced by a heat engine, running on a source of high-temperature heat. A heat engine can never have perfect efficiency, according to the second law of thermodynamics, therefore a heat engine will always produce a surplus of low-temperature heat. This is commonly referred to as waste heat or "secondary heat", or "low-grade heat". This heat is useful for the majority of heating applications, however, it is sometimes not practical to transport heat energy over long distances, unlike electricity or fuel energy. The largest proportions of total waste heat are from power stations and vehicle engines. The largest single sources are power stations and industrial plants such as oil refineries and steelmaking plants. Air conditioning Conventional air conditioning systems are a source of waste heat by releasing waste heat into the outdoor ambient air whilst cooling indoor spaces. This expelling of waste heat from air conditioning can worsen the urban heat island effect. Waste heat from air conditioning can be reduced through the use of passive cooling building design and zero-energy methods like evaporative cooling and passive daytime radiative cooling, the latter of which sends waste heat directly to outer space through the infrared window. Power generation The electrical efficiency of thermal power plants is defined as the ratio between the input and output energy. It is typically only 33% when disregarding usefulness of the heat output for building heat. The images show cooling towers which allow power stations to maintain the low side of the temperature difference essential for conversion of heat differences to other forms of energy. Discarded or "Waste" heat that is lost to the environment may instead be used to advantage. Industrial processes Industrial processes, such as oil refining, steel making or glass making are major sources of waste heat. Electronics Although small in terms of power, the disposal of waste heat from microchips and other electronic components, represents a significant engineering challenge. This necessitates the use of fans, heatsinks, etc. to dispose of the heat. For example, data centers use electronic components that consume electricity for computing, storage and networking. The French CNRS explains a data center is like a resistor and most of the energy it consumes is transformed into heat and requires cooling systems. Biological Humans, like all animals, produce heat as a result of metabolism. In warm conditions, this heat exceeds a level required for homeostasis in warm-blooded animals, and is disposed of by various thermoregulation methods such as sweating and panting. Fiala et al. modelled human thermoregulation. Disposal Low temperature heat contains very little capacity to do work (Exergy), so the heat is qualified as waste heat and rejected to the environment. Economically most convenient is the rejection of such heat to water from a sea, lake or river. If sufficient cooling water is not available, the plant can be equipped with a cooling tower or air cooler to reject the waste heat into the atmosphere. In some cases it is possible to use waste heat, for instance in district heating systems. Uses Conversion to electricity There are many different approaches to transfer thermal energy to electricity, and the technologies to do so have existed for several decades. An established approach is by using a thermoelectric device, where a change in temperature across a semiconductor material creates a voltage through a phenomenon known as the Seebeck effect. A related approach is the use of thermogalvanic cells, where a temperature difference gives rise to an electric current in an electrochemical cell. The organic Rankine cycle, offered by companies such as Ormat, is a very known approach, whereby an organic substance is used as working medium instead of water. The benefit is that this process can reject heat at lower temperatures for the production of electricity than the regular water steam cycle. An example of use of the steam Rankine cycle is the Cyclone Waste Heat Engine. Cogeneration and trigeneration Waste of the by-product heat is reduced if a cogeneration system is used, also known as a Combined Heat and Power (CHP) system. Limitations to the use of by-product heat arise primarily from the engineering cost/efficiency challenges in effectively exploiting small temperature differences to generate other forms of energy. Applications utilizing waste heat include swimming pool heating and paper mills. In some cases, cooling can also be produced by the use of absorption refrigerators for example, in this case it's called trigeneration or CCHP (combined cooling, heat and power). District heating Waste heat can be used in district heating. Depending on the temperature of the waste heat and the district heating system, a heat pump must be used, to reach sufficient temperatures. An easy and cheap way to use waste heat in cold district heating systems, as these are operated at ambient temperatures and therefore even low-grade waste heat can be used without needing a heat pump at the producer side. Pre-heating Waste heat can be forced to heat incoming fluids and objects before being highly heated. For instance outgoing water can give its waste heat to incoming water in a heat exchanger before heating in homes or power plants. Anthropogenic heat Anthropogenic heat is heat generated by humans and human activity. The American Meteorological Society defines it as "Heat released to the atmosphere as a result of human activities, often involving combustion of fuels. Sources include industrial plants, space heating and cooling, human metabolism, and vehicle exhausts. In cities this source typically contributes 15–50 W/m2 to the local heat balance, and several hundred W/m2 in the center of large cities in cold climates and industrial areas." In 2020, the overall anthropogenic annual energy release was 168,000 terawatt-hours; given the 5.1×10 m surface area of Earth, this amounts to a global average anthropogenic heat release rate of 0.04 W/m. Environmental impact Anthropogenic heat is a small influence on rural temperatures, and becomes more significant in dense urban areas. It is one contributor to urban heat islands. Other human-caused effects (such as changes to albedo, or loss of evaporative cooling) that might contribute to urban heat islands are not considered to be anthropogenic heat by this definition. Anthropogenic heat is a much smaller contributor to global warming than greenhouse gases are. In 2005, anthropogenic waste heat flux globally accounted for only 1% of the energy flux created by anthropogenic greenhouse gases. The heat flux is not evenly distributed, with some regions higher than others, and significantly higher in certain urban areas. For example, global forcing from waste heat in 2005 was 0.028 W/m2, but was +0.39 and +0.68 W/m2 for the continental United States and western Europe, respectively. Although waste heat has been shown to have influence on regional climates, climate forcing from waste heat is not normally calculated in state-of-the-art global climate simulations. Equilibrium climate experiments show statistically significant continental-scale surface warming (0.4–0.9 °C) produced by one 2100 AHF scenario, but not by current or 2040 estimates. Simple global-scale estimates with different growth rates of anthropogenic heat that have been actualized recently show noticeable contributions to global warming, in the following centuries. For example, a 2% p.a. growth rate of waste heat resulted in a 3 degree increase as a lower limit for the year 2300. Meanwhile, this has been confirmed by more refined model calculations. A 2008 scientific paper showed that if anthropogenic heat emissions continue to rise at the current rate, they will become a source of warming as strong as GHG emissions in the 21st century. See also Cost of electricity by source Heat recovery steam generator Pinch analysis Thermal pollution Urban metabolism Waste heat recovery unit References Heat transfer Thermodynamics Energy conversion Climate forcing Atmospheric radiation Heat

5168442

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Admiral%20Farragut%20Academy

Admiral Farragut Academy

Admiral Farragut Academy, established in 1933, is a private, college-prep school serving students in grades K-12. Farragut is located in St. Petersburg, Florida in Pinellas County and is surrounded by the communities of Treasure Island, Gulfport, Pasadena, Tierra Verde, and Seminole. Farragut also serves North Pinellas County, which includes the communities of Clearwater, Belleair, and Palm Harbor. History Founded in 1933 on the banks of the Toms River in Pine Beach, New Jersey, Admiral Farragut Academy was a college prep school named after Admiral David Glasgow Farragut, the first American naval officer to rise to that rank. Over Farragut's first 12 years, the school became so popular that a second campus was purchased in 1945 on the shores of Boca Ciega Bay in St. Petersburg, Florida. Since then, the school has undergone many changes, such as accepting day students, becoming co-ed, and adding an elementary school. The school's New Jersey campus in Pine Beach closed at the end of the 1994 school year after financial difficulties. Notable alumni Two of the 12 men who walked on the Moon graduated from Admiral Farragut: Rear Admiral Alan Shepard, USN, was the first American in space and, in 1971, became the fifth person to walk on the Moon as part of the Apollo 14 mission. Shepard graduated in 1941 from the New Jersey campus. Brigadier General Charles Duke, USAF, was a 1953 graduate of the St. Petersburg campus and, in 1972, became the tenth person to walk on the Moon as part of the Apollo 16 mission. In the spring of 2006, NASA presented a Moon rock to General Duke, who then donated it to the school. It is displayed in a showcase in front of the Quarter-Deck at the entrance to the main building, Farragut Hall. Other notable alumni: William Colepaugh, who defected to the Nazis during World War II, and returned to spy for Germany against the United States. Actor Lorenzo Lamas graduated in 1975 from the New Jersey campus. Actor Casper Van Dien graduated from the St. Petersburg, FL campus and later performed in many films, of which Starship Troopers is the most notable. Chef Spike Mendelsohn, class of 2000, competed on both Top Chef and Top Chef: All Stars. Spike is the owner of "Good Stuff Eatery," a restaurant with locations on Capitol Hill and in Georgetown in the District of Columbia, as well as in the Crystal City business neighborhood of northern Virginia. Major Megan McClung, one of the first female students at the Academy in 1990 and the first female United States Marine Corps officer killed in combat during the Iraq War Animator/Producer Andy Luckey attended from 1980-'81 at St. Petersburg but transferred before graduation. Lieutenant General Sidney "Tom" Weinstein, ‘52N, was the Army Deputy Chief of Staff for Intelligence during the 1980s. He is recognized as the principal architect of the modern service intelligence corps, and was the crucial player in its expansion and professionalization. Richard W. Fisher '67N, President of the Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas since 2005 William N. Small, New Jersey campus; United States Navy Admiral, former Vice Chief of Naval Operations Stephen Stills attended as child, before he left for Woodrow Wilson Junior High in nearby Tampa. Tom Thompson '68S, NCAA football record holder. Paul F. Gleason, served as Grand Master of Masons in Massachusetts from 2017 to 2019. Robert A. Jensen, 1983 graduate, an American writer and crisis management expert. The NJROTC Program An integral part of an education at Admiral Farragut Academy is the required involvement in NJROTC. Every eighth-grade student in the Upper School takes one year of Naval Science–an in-depth study of the history, operation and core concepts of the United States Navy. Upper School students may join the NJROTC program and continue taking Naval Science courses. Student body There are approximately 500 students in K-12th grade with a 3:1 ratio of boys to girls. There are 330 students in the Upper School and approximately 50% of the Upper School students are boarding students. References Academy Alan Shepard Charles Duke Preparatory schools in Florida Educational institutions established in 1933 High schools in Pinellas County, Florida Private high schools in Florida Private middle schools in Florida Private elementary schools in Florida 1945 establishments in Florida

5173796

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hara%20Berezaiti

Hara Berezaiti

Hara Berezaiti (), is a legendary mountain around which the stars and planets revolve in the Avestan language. In Iranian legend, it was on Hara Berezaiti that the hero Fereydun fettered Zahhak. See also *Harahvati Aredvi Sura Anahita, the source of all waters in the world that descends from the mythical Mount Hara. Airyanem Vaejah, the first of the lands created by Ahura Mazda. References Bibliography Zoroastrianism Locations in ancient Iranian mythology Locations in Persian mythology Iranian words and phrases Places in Shahnameh Mythological mountains Sacred mountains

5174684

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coat%20of%20arms%20of%20Liberia

Coat of arms of Liberia

The coat of arms of Liberia consists of a shield containing a picture of a 19th-century ship arriving in Liberia. The ship represents the ships which brought the freed slaves from the United States to Liberia. Above the shield, the national motto of Liberia appears on a scroll: The Love of Liberty Brought Us Here, and below the shield another scroll contains the official name of the country, Republic of Liberia. The plow and the shovel represent the dignity of labor and hard work through which the nation will prosper. The rising sun in the background represents the birth of a nation. The palm tree, the nation's most versatile source of food, represents prosperity. The white dove with a scroll represents the breath of peace. History On July 22, 1974, the Legislature of Liberia passed an act giving authorization to the president to establish a commission to give consideration to possible changes to a number of national symbols, including the national seal and motto. President William Tolbert appointed 51 members to the Commission on National Unity. The commission was headed by McKinley Alfred Deshield Sr., and was also called the Deshield Commission. The commission sought to reexamine the symbols, and remove divisive or uninclusive aspects of them. The commission submitted their report on January 24, 1978. The report recommended changing the motto from "The Love of Liberty Brought Us Here" to "Love, Liberty, Justice, Equality". The proposed change to the motto was never made. Older versions Description The coat of arms of Liberia has no heraldic blazon. According to David Kazanjian's article The Speculative Freedom of Colonial Liberia, the national device of Liberia was adopted at the 1847 constitutional convention. The article quotes the following description as the design guidelines: Seal: A dove on the wind with an open scroll in its claws. A view of the ocean with a ship under sail. The sun just emerging from the waters. A palm tree, and in its base a plough and spade. Beneath the emblems, the words REPUBLIC OF LIBERIA and above the emblems, the national motto: "THE LOVE OF LIBERTY BROUGHT US HERE". References Liberia National symbols of Liberia Liberia Liberia Liberia Liberia Liberia Liberia Liberia Liberia

5174939

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1322%20Coppernicus

1322 Coppernicus

1322 Coppernicus, provisional designation , is a stony background asteroid from the inner regions of the asteroid belt, approximately 10 kilometers in diameter. Discovered by Karl Reinmuth at Heidelberg Observatory in 1934, the asteroid was later named after Polish astronomer Nicolaus Copernicus. Discovery Coppernicus was discovered on 15 June 1934, by German astronomer Karl Reinmuth at the Heidelberg-Königstuhl State Observatory in southwest Germany. On the same night, it was independently discovered by Belgian astronomer Eugène Delporte at Uccle Observatory. The Minor Planet Center only recognizes the first discoverer. Orbit and classification Coppernicus is a non-family asteroid from the main belt's background population. It orbits the Sun in the inner asteroid belt at a distance of 1.9–3.0 AU once every 3 years and 9 months (1,377 days; semi-major axis of 2.42 AU). Its orbit has an eccentricity of 0.23 and an inclination of 23° with respect to the ecliptic. The body's observation arc begins at Heidelberg/Uccle in June 1934, on the night of its official discovery observation. Physical characteristics In the Tholen classification, Coppernicus is a common, stony S-type asteroid. Rotation period Published in 1991, a first rotational lightcurve of Coppernicus was obtained by Polish astronomer Wiesław Wiśniewski. Lightcurve analysis gave a relatively short rotation period of 3.967 hours with a brightness variation of 0.22 magnitude (). In 2006, photometric observations by Italian astronomer Federico Manzini gave a tentative period of 5.37 and 5.375 hours with an amplitude of 0.01 and 0.04, respectively (). Diameter and albedo According to the surveys carried out by the Japanese Akari satellite and the NEOWISE mission of NASA's Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer, Coppernicus measures between 9.996 and 10.70 kilometers in diameter and its surface has an albedo between 0.133 and 0.211. The Collaborative Asteroid Lightcurve Link assumes a standard albedo for stony asteroids of 0.20 and derives a diameter of 9.80 kilometers based on an absolute magnitude of 12.41. Naming This minor planet was named after Polish astronomer and mathematician Nicolaus Copernicus (1473–1543), the founder of modern astronomy who formulated the heliocentric model that placed the Sun rather than the Earth at the center of the Universe. The official naming citation was mentioned in The Names of the Minor Planets by Paul Herget in 1955 (). The lunar crater Copernicus as well as the Martian crater Copernicus are both named in his honor. The asteroid's unusual spelling, "Coppernicus", is attributed to German biographer Leopold Prowe. Notes References External links Asteroid Lightcurve Database (LCDB), query form (info ) Dictionary of Minor Planet Names, Google books Asteroids and comets rotation curves, CdR – Observatoire de Genève, Raoul Behrend Discovery Circumstances: Numbered Minor Planets (1)-(5000) – Minor Planet Center 001322 Discoveries by Karl Wilhelm Reinmuth Named minor planets 19340615

5183852

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Accretion%20%28geology%29

Accretion (geology)

Accretion, in geology, is a process by which material is added to a tectonic plate at a subduction zone, frequently on the edge of existing continental landmasses. The added material may be sediment, volcanic arcs, seamounts, oceanic crust or other igneous features. Description Accretion involves the addition of material to a tectonic plate via subduction, the process by which one plate is forced under the other when two plates collide. The plate which is being forced down, the subducted plate, is pushed against the upper, over-riding plate. Sediment on the ocean floor of the subducting plate is often scraped off as the plate descends. This accumulated material is called an accretionary wedge (or accretionary prism), which is pushed against and attaches to the upper plate. In addition to accumulated ocean sediments, volcanic island arcs or seamounts present on the subducting plate may be amalgamated onto existing continental crust on the upper plate, increasing the continental landmass. Continent building Continental crust differs significantly from oceanic crust. Oceanic crust is primarily composed of basaltic rocks, which have a higher density than the rocks making up the majority of continental crust. Island arcs and other volcanic rocks are also lower in density than the oceanic crust, and are therefore not easily subducted along with the oceanic crust that surrounds them. Instead, these less-dense bits of crust will collide with existing continental crust on the upper plate once the oceanic crust separating them is completely subducted. Most continents are composed of multiple accreted "terranes", pieces of low-density continental crust with different origins. For example, North America is made up of multiple accreted terranes that collided with the Laurentian proto-continent, such as the Proterozoic Yavapai, Mazatzal, and Grenville Province Terranes. Accreted terranes along modern subduction plate boundaries include the Nankai accretionary complex of Japan (subduction of the Philippine Plate beneath the Eurasian Plate), the Barbados Ridge in the Caribbean (subduction of the Caribbean Plate beneath the North American Plate), and the Mediterranean Ridge (subduction of the African Plate beneath the Eurasian Plate). These examples of accreted terranes also all include accretionary wedges. References Plate tectonics

5188524

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2202%20Pele

2202 Pele

2202 Pele, provisional designation , is an eccentric asteroid and near-Earth object of the Amor group, approximately 1–2 kilometers in diameter. It was discovered by American astronomer Arnold Klemola at the U.S. Lick Observatory on Mount Hamilton, California, on 7 September 1972. The asteroid was named after Pele from native Hawaiian religion. Orbit and classification Pele orbits the Sun at a distance of 1.1–3.5 AU once every 3 years and 6 months (1,265 days). Its orbit has an eccentricity of 0.51 and an inclination of 9° with respect to the ecliptic. It is an Amor asteroid, the second largest subgroup of near-Earth objects, that approach the orbit of Earth from beyond, but does not cross it. It has an Earth minimum orbit intersection distance of , which corresponds to 55.6 lunar distances. No precoveries were taken. The asteroid's observation arc starts two days after the official discovery observation. Physical characteristics As of 2017, Peles effective size, composition, and albedo, as well as its rotation period and shape remain unknown. It measures between 1 and 2 kilometers, based on a generic magnitude-to-diameter conversion, which assumes an albedo in the range of 0.05 to 0.25. Naming This minor planet was named after Pele, the goddess of fire, lightning, and volcanoes from Hawaiian mythology. Pele created the Hawaiian Islands and made Kīlauea her home, after she was forced to go away by her rival sister and goddess of the sea, Nāmaka. The official naming citation was published by the Minor Planet Center on 1 June 1980 (). References External links Asteroid Lightcurve Database (LCDB), query form (info ) Dictionary of Minor Planet Names, Google books Asteroids and comets rotation curves, CdR – Observatoire de Genève, Raoul Behrend 002202 Discoveries by Arnold Klemola Named minor planets 19720907

5190038

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maria%20Margaretha%20Kirch

Maria Margaretha Kirch

Maria Margaretha Kirch (née Winckelmann, in historic sources named Maria Margaretha Kirchin; 25 February 1670 – 29 December 1720) was a German astronomer. She was one of the first famous astronomers of her period due to her writing on the conjunction of the sun with Saturn, Venus, and Jupiter in 1709 and 1712 respectively. Early life Maria was educated from an early age by her father, a Lutheran minister, who believed that she deserved an education equivalent to that given to young boys. By the age of 13 she had lost both her father and mother. By that time, she had also received a general education from her brother-in-law Justinus Toellner and the well-known self taught astronomer Christoph Arnold, who lived nearby in the town of Sommerfeld and was credited with being the first to discover a passing comet. She became Arnold's unofficial apprentice and later his assistant, living with him and his family. Astronomy was not organized entirely along guild lines during this time period. As a result, the journey to become an astronomer often looked very different on a case by case basis. Through Arnold, Maria met the famous German astronomer and mathematician Gottfried Kirch, who was 30 years her senior and had received training in astronomy by Johannes Hevelius and a formal education at the University of Jena. They married in 1692, later having four children, all of whom followed their parents by studying astronomy. Kirch benefited from his union with Maria in that he had a wife to take care of his children and an assistant to run calculations, gather data, and otherwise assist him. Meanwhile, Maria was able to continue her education in astronomy. Without their union, it is unlikely that Maria would have been able to participate in astronomy independently. In 1700, the couple moved to Berlin, as the elector ruler of Brandenburg Frederick III, later Frederick I of Prussia, had appointed Gottfried Kirch as the Astronomer Royal, a position awarded to an eminent astronomer. Career, observations, and publications Women were not afforded journeyman years during their apprenticeship, which left them dependent on those in their household for training. As a result, Gottfried Kirch gave his wife further instruction in astronomy, as he did for his sister and all his children starting from a young age. Due to societal norms and beliefs of the given time period, women were not allowed to attend universities in Germany. This did not completely exclude woman from practicing astronomy, however, because the work of astronomy and the observation of the heavens took place largely outside the universities. The majority of astronomers during this time period did not have official degrees in astronomy. Instead, most astronomers boasted degrees in medicine, law, or theology. Prominent scientific universities in Kirch's time included the French Academie Royal des Sciences, Berlin Akademie der Wissenschaften and the Royal Society of London -all of which catered to a male audience. Thus, Kirch became one of the few women active in astronomy in the 1700s. She became widely known as the Kirchin, the feminine version of the family name. It was not unheard of in the Holy Roman Empire that a woman should be active in astronomy. Maria Cunitz, Elisabeth Hevelius, and Maria Clara Eimmart had been active astronomers in the seventeenth century. Through an edict, Friedrich III introduced a monopoly for calendars in Brandenburg, and later Prussia, imposing a calendar tax. The income from this monopoly was to pay astronomers and members of the Berlin Academy of Sciences that Friedrich III founded in July 1700. Friedrich III also went on to build an observatory that was inaugurated in January 1711. Assisted by his wife, Gottfried Kirch prepared the first calendar of a series, entitled Chur-Brandenburgischer Verbesserter Calender Auff das Jahr Christi 1701, which became very popular. Maria and Gottfried worked together as a team. In typical guild fashion she advanced from her position as Arnold's apprentice, to become assistant to her husband. Her husband had studied astronomy at the University of Jena and had served as apprentice to Johannes Hevelius. At the academy she worked as his unofficial, but recognised assistant. Women's position in the sciences was akin to their position in the guilds, valued, but subordinate. Together they made observations and performed calculations to produce calendars and ephemerides. From 1697, the Kirchs also began recording weather information. Their data was used to produce calendars and almanacs and it was also very useful in navigation. The Academy of Sciences in Berlin handled sales of their calendars. During the first decade of her work at the academy as her husband's assistant Kirch would observe the heavens, every evening starting at 9 p.m. During such a routine observation she discovered a comet. On 21 April 1702 Kirch discovered the so-called "Comet of 1702" (C/1702 H1). Today there is no doubt about Kirch's priority in discovering C/1702 H1. However, at the time her husband was credited with the discovery. In his notes from that night her husband recorded: "Early in the morning (about 2:00 AM) the sky was clear and starry. Some nights before, I had observed a variable star and my wife (as I slept) wanted to find and see it for herself. In so doing, she found a comet in the sky. At which time she woke me, and I found that it was indeed a comet... I was surprised that I had not seen it the night before". This comet was actually discovered a day prior by two astronomers in Rome, Italy, Francesco Bianchini and Giacomo Filippo Maraldi. Germany's only scientific journal at the time, Acta Eruditorum, was in Latin. Kirch's subsequent publications in her own name were all in German. At the time, her husband did not hold an independent chair at the academy and the Kirchs worked as a team on common problems. The couple observed the heavens together: he observed the north and she the south, making observations that a single person could not have conducted accurately. Kirch continued to pursue her astronomy work, publishing in German under her own name, and with the proper recognition. Her publications, which included her observations on the Aurora Borealis (1707), the pamphlet Von der Conjunction der Sonne des Saturni und der Venus on the conjunction of the sun with Saturn and Venus (1709), and the approaching conjunction of Jupiter and Saturn in 1712 became her lasting contributions to astronomy. Before Kirch, the only female astronomer in the Holy Roman Empire who had published under her own name had been Maria Cunitz. The family friend and vice president of the Berlin Academy of Sciences, Alphonse des Vignoles said in Kirch's eulogy: "If one considers the reputations of Frau Kirch and Frau Cunitz, one must admit that there is no branch of science… in which women are not capable of achievement, and that in astronomy, in particular, Germany takes the prize above all other states in Europe." In 1709 Berlin Academy of Sciences president Gottfried von Leibniz presented her to the Prussian court, where Kirch explained her sightings of sunspots. He said about her: "There is a most learned woman who could pass as a rarity. Her achievement is not in literature or rhetoric but in the most profound doctrines of astronomy... I do not believe that this woman easily finds her equal in the science in which she excels... She favors the Copernican system (the idea that the sun is at rest) like all the learned astronomers of our time. And it is a pleasure to hear her defend that system through the Holy Scripture in which she is also very learned. She observes with the best observers and knows how to handle marvelously the quadrant and the telescope." After her husband died in 1710, Kirch attempted to assume his place as astronomer and calendar maker at the Royal Academy of Sciences. Her actions were representative of a well established principle that allowed widow's to take over their husbands craft after their death. Despite her petition being supported by Leibniz, the president of the academy, the executive council of the academy rejected her demand for a formal position saying that "what we concede to her could serve as an example in the future." The council did not wish to set a precedent by appointing a woman. Despite the fact that roughly 14% of astronomers in the early 18th century were female, it was still extremely uncommon at the time for women to become members of scientific academies. Winkelmann's denial to the academy was important in that it emphasized the separation between men and women's role in the workplace and the normalcy of women's exclusion to scientific academies at the time and for many years after. In her petition Kirch set out her qualifications for the position. She couched her application in the terms acceptable to the times, arguing that she was well-qualified because she had been instructed by her husband in astronomical calculation and observation. She emphasized that she had engaged in astronomical work since her marriage and had worked at the academy since her husband's appointment ten years earlier. In her petition Kirch said that "for some time, while my dear departed husband was weak and ill, I prepared the calendar from his calculations and published it under his name." For Kirch, an appointment at the academy would have not been just a mark of honor but a vital source of income for her and her children. She even clarified this in her petition, explaining that her husband had not left her with sufficient means in terms of supporting herself and her family. In the old guild tradition of trades, it would have been possible for Kirch to take over her husband's position after his death, but the new institutions of science tended not to follow that tradition. Despite Maria and Gottfried both having spent years working on calendars and discovering a comet each, the one item Maria did not have that almost everyone in the Academy did was a university education. Leibniz was the only prominent figure that supported her appeal. Unfortunately, negative opinion towards her gender out weighed her history of competent work. The Berlin Academy of Sciences secretary Johann Theodor Jablonski cautioned Leibniz "that she be kept on in an official capacity to work on the calendar or to continue with observations simply will not do." The academy was very concerned with their reputation, stating, "If she were now to be kept on in such a capacity, mouths would gape even wider." Ultimately, Winklemann's application to work at the Berlin Academy was rejected. Leibniz later tried to secure housing and salary for Winkelmann in 1711 and was able to secure housing for Winkelmann to stay in for an undetermined amount of time, however the Academy denied Leibniz's petition for Winkelmann's salary. Later in 1711, the academy relented upon Maria enough to give her a medal for her work in astronomy. Despite this, Winkelmann continued to apply for over a year to become a member of the Berlin Academy, however with Leibniz leaving Berlin in 1711, the Academy became even more adamant on refusing Maria's entrance until in early 1712 when she received the final rejection. Kirch felt sure that her petitions were denied due to her gender. This is somewhat supported by the fact that Johann Heinrich Hoffmann, who had little experience, was appointed to her husband's place instead of her. Hoffmann soon fell behind with his work and failed to make required observations. It was even suggested that Kirch become his assistant. Kirch wrote "Now I go through a severe desert, and because... water is scarce... the taste is bitter." However, in an exceptional achievement for the times she was admitted by the Berlin Academy of Sciences. In 1711, she published Die Vorbereitung zug grossen Opposition, a well-received pamphlet in which she predicted a new comet, followed by a pamphlet concerning Jupiter and Saturn. In 1712, Kirch accepted the patronage of Bernhard Friedrich von Krosigk, who was an enthusiastic amateur astronomer, and began work in his observator. She and her husband had worked at Krosigk's observatory while the academy observatory was being built. At Krosigk's observatory she reached the rank of master astronomer. After Baron von Krosigk died in 1714 Kirch moved to Danzig to assist a professor of mathematics for a short time before returning to Berlin in 1716. Kirch and her son, who had just finished university, received an offer to work as astronomers for the Russian czar Peter the Great, but preferred to remain in Berlin where she continued to calculate calendars for locales such as Nuremberg, Dresden, Breslau, and Hungary from her home. She had trained her son Christfried Kirch and daughters Christine Kirch and Margaretha Kirch to act as her assistants in the family's astronomical work, continuing the production of calendars and almanacs as well as making observations. In 1716, her son Christfried and Johann Wilhelm Wagner were appointed observers at the academy observatory following Hoffmann's death. Kirch moved back to Berlin to act as her son's assistant together with her daughter Christine. She was once again working at the academy observatory calculating calendars. Male academy members complained that she took too prominent a role and was "too visible at the observatory when strangers visit." Kirch was ordered to "retire to the background and leave the talking to... her son." In 1717 the Berlin Academy gave Maria two options, either continue to fight for a position of her own or she could retire in the interests of her son's reputation. She chose to retire and continue her own observations at home, which the Academy requested be nearby so that her son could still dine at home without neglecting his duties at the Academy. Kirch died of a fever in Berlin on 29 December 1720. Publications Kirch, Gottfried; Kirch, Maria Margaretha. Das älteste Berliner Wetter-Buch 1700 - 1701. Edited by G. Hellmann. Berlin, 1893. https://www.digi-hub.de/viewer/resolver?urn=urn:nbn:de:kobv:11-d-4723758 Kirch, Maria Margaretha. Vorbereitung, zur grossen Opposition, oder, Merckwürdige Himmels-Gestalt im 1712 Jahre, worauf im folgenden 1713 ... . Cölln an der Spree Druckts Ulrich Liebpert, könighl. Preuss. Hof-Buchdr., [1713?] http://www.worldcat.org/oclc/319882766 See also List of astronomers Timeline of women in science Women in science References 18th-century German astronomers Women astronomers 1670 births 1720 deaths Scientists from Leipzig People from the Electorate of Saxony Discoverers of comets 17th-century German women scientists 18th-century German women scientists 17th-century German astronomers German women scientists

5193812

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Orbital%20Express

Orbital Express

Orbital Express was a space mission managed by the United States Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) and a team led by engineers at NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center (MSFC). The Orbital Express program was aimed at developing "a safe and cost-effective approach to autonomously service satellites in orbit". The system consisted of two spacecraft: the ASTRO servicing satellite, and a prototype modular next-generation serviceable satellite; NEXTSat. The mission launched from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station on 8 March 2007, aboard an Atlas V expendable launch vehicle. The launch was part of the United States Air Force Space Test Program STP-1 mission. Program management and contractors The Orbital Express program was managed by the Tactical Technology Office (TTO), one of the six technical offices in DARPA. TTO programs included both "Aerospace Systems" such as Orbital Express, and "Tactical Multipliers" such as the "Magneto Hydrodynamic Explosive Munition (MAHEM) program". ASTRO was developed by Boeing Integrated Defense Systems, which included the Orbital Express Demonstration Manipulator System (OEDMS) developed by MacDonald, Dettwiler and Associates, and NEXTSat was developed by Ball Aerospace & Technologies Corp. NASA's involvement was through the Automated Systems and Automated Rendezvous and Docking Division of the Engineering Directorate at MSFC. The MSFC Engineering Directorate also managed the Advanced Video Guidance System (AVGS) for Orbital Express project. The refueling mechanism was designed, developed and produced by VACCO Industries. The docking mechanism, as well as the launch adapter, were designed, developed and produced by Sierra Nevada Corporation (SNC) Space Systems. Goals The project hoped to demonstrate several satellite servicing operations and technologies including rendezvous, proximity operations and station keeping, capture, docking, fluid transfer (specifically, hydrazine on this mission), and ORU (Orbit Replaceable Unit) transfer. A prime military mission would be to refuel reconnaissance satellites so they can improve coverage, increase surprise and be more survivable. The fluid (fuel) and ORU (battery) transfers were completed successfully at the lowest levels of spacecraft autonomy. Subsequent transfers over a three-month period were intended to demonstrate greater autonomy. Robotics: the Demonstration Manipulator System (OEDMS) The Orbital Express Demonstration Manipulator System (OEDMS), provided by MDA Corp., was the mission's integrated robotics solution. It consisted primarily of a 6-DOF rotary joint robotic arm, its flight avionics (the Manipulator Control Unit or MCU) and arm vision system, two On-Orbit Replaceable Units (ORUs) and their spacecraft attachment interfaces, a visual target and grapple fixture installed on NEXTSat, and the Manipulator Ground Segment. The OEDMS was mounted on the ASTRO. It was used to capture and service the NEXTSat, the client satellite provided by Ball Aerospace. Using a robotic arm on-orbit, the Orbital Express mission demonstrated autonomous capture of a fully unconstrained free-flying client satellite, autonomous transfer of a functional battery ORU between two spacecraft, and autonomous transfer of a functional computer ORU. These operations were executed as part of mission scenarios that demonstrated complete sequences of autonomous rendezvous, capture, berthing and ORU transfer. All robotic operations were scripted prior to execution and performed autonomously as part of increasingly complex mission scenarios. The arm was commanded to perform its operations by either direct command from the ground, or autonomously by the ASTRO Mission Manager software. Scenarios in the early phases of flight operations incorporated a number of Authority to Proceed (ATP) pause points, which required a signal to be sent from the ground to authorize the ASTRO Mission Manager to continue the sequence. This allowed the ground operations team to verify that the scenario was proceeding as planned before continuing to the next step. Later scenarios incorporated fewer ATPs. The final scenarios were compound autonomous sequences, performing rendezvous, capture, ORU transfer and fluid transfer without any ATPs. End of mission The final rendezvous and docking between the two spacecraft occurred on 29 June 2007. This was followed by the final demonstration, the changeout of a flight computer aboard ASTRO. NASA's plans for an extended mission were abandoned. The two craft demated for a final time, with ASTRO backing out to greater than in a test of sensor performance. Following this the craft performed a rendezvous to a standoff, where decommissioning took place. The NEXTSat spacecraft was deactivated on 21 July, when its computers were turned off, and solar panels pointed away from the Sun. Subsequently, ASTRO vented its Hydrazine propellant, and was deactivated on 22 July 2007. The satellites were left to decay naturally. NextSat was expected to take three to five years to decay, while the heavier ASTRO satellite was expected to take fifteen years. However, ASTRO reentered the atmosphere on 25 October 2013, after only 6.5 years. See also Kosmos 186 and Kosmos 188 ETS-VII or KIKU-7, also known as Orihime/Hikoboshi SPADEX (Space Docking Experiment) References 1. https://web.archive.org/web/20100203220541/http://www.boeing.com/bds/phantom_works/orbital.html External links Global Security's Orbital Express web page Orbital Express To Test Full Autonomy for On-Orbit Service, Aviation Week, 4 Jun 2006. Includes overview of several predecessor missions of unmanned orbital servicing technologies. Spacecraft launched in 2007 DARPA Military space program of the United States Robotic satellite repair vehicles Spacecraft which reentered in 2013

5196620

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Enzacamene

Enzacamene

Enzacamene (INN; also known as 4-methylbenzylidene camphor or 4-MBC) is an organic camphor derivative that is used in the cosmetic industry for its ability to protect the skin against UV, specifically UV B radiation. As such, it is used in sunscreen lotions and other skincare products claiming a SPF value. Its tradenames include Eusolex 6300 (Merck) and Parsol 5000 (DSM). Mechanism All the camphor-derived sunscreens dissipate the photon energy by cis-trans isomerisation. However, for enzacamene the quantum yield for this isomerization is only between 0.13-0.3. This low quantum yield means that other photochemical processes are also occurring. Endocrine disruptor Studies have raised the issue that enzacamene acts as an endocrine disruptor. There is controversy about the estrogenic effects of enzacamene and while one study showed only a relatively minor effect. In addition, there is some evidence that enzacamene may suppress the pituitary-thyroid axis, leading to hypothyroidism. Approval status Enzacamene is approved in Canada by Health Canada. It is not approved for use in the United States by the Food and Drug Administration and it is not permitted in Japan nor in Denmark. See also Xenoestrogen References Sunscreening agents Enones 4-Tolyl compounds

5197166

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/V354%20Cephei

V354 Cephei

V354 Cephei is a red supergiant star located within the Milky Way. It is an irregular variable located over 8,900 light-years away from the Sun. It has an estimated radius of . If it were placed in the center of the Solar System, it would extend to between the orbits of Mars and Jupiter. Identification V354 Cephei is identified as a red supergiant variable star and included on surveys such as IRAS and 2MASS, but prior to its inclusion in the General Catalogue of Variable Stars in 1981, it was referred to only by its listings on relatively obscure catalogs. It is too faint to be included in catalogs such as the Henry Draper Catalogue or Bonner Durchmusterung. It was included on a 1947 Dearborn Observatory survey as star 41575, but that ID is hardly ever used. V354 Cephei has been referred to as Case 75. This is from one of several listings of cool stars made using the Burrell Schmidt telescope at the Warner and Swasey Observatory of Case Western Reserve University, although Case 75 is mistakenly identified as the nearby F3V star BD+58°2450. The carbon star AT Persei is listed as star 75 in another of the survey papers and is also known as Case 75. The SIMBAD astronomical portal prefers to restrict that usage to AT Persei and has devised a different unique acronym for V354 Cephei. Distance V354 Cephei is near the Cepheus OB1 stellar association and considered a likely member. This association is at a distance of between 2,750 and 3,500 parsecs, but currently thought to be at 3,400 parsecs based on reliable Gaia Data Release 2 parallaxes of neighbouring OB stars. Its Gaia Data Release 2 parallax is , implying a much smaller distance of around . The Gaia Early Data Release 3 parallax is , implying a larger distance. Both Gaia results carry significant statistical margin of error, as well as indicators that the astrometric excess noise is far beyond acceptable levels so that the parallax should be considered unreliable. Properties The properties of V354 Cephei are disputed, but the star is classed as a cool supergiant star with a spectral and luminosity class given as M2.5 Iab, indicating it is an intermediate-size luminous supergiant, but was later given as M3.5 Ib, indicating it is rather a less luminous supergiant. A 2005 study led by Levesque described the four red supergiant stars, KW Sagittarii, V354 Cephei, KY Cygni and Mu Cephei as the largest and most luminous galactic red supergiants with radii of roughly and bolometric luminosity of roughly , which is consistent with the empirical upper radius and luminosity boundary for the red supergiants. Despite it, larger sizes and luminosities have been published for few other galactic red supergiants, such as VV Cephei A and the peculiar star VY Canis Majoris at and . V354 Cephei, based on a MARCS model, was found to be the largest and most luminous of these four stars measured, with a high luminosity of and consequently very large size of based on the assumption of an effective temperature of . Newer calculations of the luminosity of V354 Cep determined the luminosity of the star to be somewhat much lower, below , which implies much smaller sizes below . A 2011 study notes the discrepancy but is unable to explain it. There are similar differences in the visual extinctions derived, between two and six magnitudes. Other more recent published data assumes the smaller Gaia distance, and hence derives lower luminosities. Notes References External links Space.Com Universe Today M-type supergiants Slow irregular variables Cepheus (constellation) Cephei, V354 J22333464+5853470 IRAS catalogue objects Population I stars

5197206

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Buena%20Vista%2C%20Peru

Buena Vista, Peru

Buena Vista is an 8 hectare (20 acre) archaeological site located in Peru about 25 miles inland in the Chillon River Valley and an hour's drive north of Lima, the capital. It is in the Santa Rosa de Quives District, Canta Province, in the foothills of the Andes. The site was first excavated by Frederic Engel (1987). He obtained radiocarbon dates of artifacts that pertained to the Early Preceramic Period (9700 ± 200 uncalibrated radiocarbon years before present), and to the Early Intermediate Period (1960 ± 80 uncalibrated radiocarbon years before present). Temple of the Fox In June 2004, archaeologist Robert Benfer and his team discovered Buena Vista's most significant feature—the Temple of the Fox. It is named for the mural flanking the temple entrance, which depicts a fox curled up inside a llama. The Temple of the Fox dates back approximately 4200 years to a civilization that occupied the area a few millennia before the Inca. These ancient peoples had no writing system, and their name was not preserved; they are considered a late pre-ceramic culture and are believed to have followed the Kotosh religious tradition. Many archaeologists refer to them as the Andeans. The temple complex measures 33 feet tall and 55 feet long. It is most notable for the astronomical observatory at its top, which is the oldest of its kind in the Americas; it predates records of similar artistic and scientific achievements of the region by 800 years. Large rocks placed on a ridge to the east of the observatory entrance served as a calendar. The most prominent rock marked the summer solstice—on that day each year, from the perspective of the temple, the sun would rise directly over the rock. In the hours just before dawn on the summer solstice, a constellation known as the fox rose between two other large rocks on the same ridge. The temple's reverence to the fox, apparent in both the entrance mural and its astrological orientation, may provide clues to the purpose of the temple. Among many indigenous peoples of South America, the fox is a symbol of water and cultivation. Benfer hypothesizes that the ancient inhabitants of Buena Vista used the Temple of the Fox to appeal to their gods for good harvests on the summer solstice, which would have been planting time for the civilization. Researchers' discovery of the remains of plants and vegetables inside the temple's offering chamber has supported this theory. The observatory is further distinguished by its sophisticated carvings, and a three-dimensional life-size sculpture of a musician, unique for a period known in that region for two-dimensional reliefs. Other ruins The Buena Vista site as a whole includes ruins ranging in age from 10,000 years to fewer than 3,000 years ago. Besides the temple, the site encompasses a ceremonial center, stepped pyramids, and residences for the elites and for commoners. These buildings are from varying time periods, many of which were built later than the heyday of the temple. Most of these structures have been looted. The Temple of the Fox narrowly escaped looting as it was buried beneath several layers of earth. See also List of archaeoastronomical sites sorted by country References Sources Buildings and structures completed in the 8th millennium BC Archaeoastronomy Archaeological sites in Peru Archaeological sites in Lima Region Andean preceramic Astronomical observatories in Peru 1987 archaeological discoveries Summer solstice Foxes in religion

5200104

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solar%20plage

Solar plage

A plage is a bright region in the Sun's chromosphere, typically found in and around active regions. Historically, they have been referred to as bright flocculi, in contrast to dark flocculi, and as chromospheric faculae, in contrast to photospheric faculae. Etymology The term is often believed to be poetically taken from the French word for "beach"; however, this is likely a misunderstanding of an 1893 article by Henri-Alexandre Deslandres where the name facular flames was suggested. In the article, Deslandres also refers to them as plages brillantes, meaning bright regions, which became the more commonly used term. Description Classically plage have been defined as regions that are bright in Hα and other chromospheric emission lines. but nowadays most researchers identify plage based on the photospheric magnetic field concentration of the faculae below. The magnetic field of plage is confined to the intergranular lanes in the photosphere with a strength of around 1500 G, but expands into a volume filling canopy in the chromosphere with a field of around 450G. It is believed that plage is formed from decaying emerging flux regions, and often acts as a footprint for coronal loops and fibrils, which makes them an important interface for coronal heating. See also Solar cycle Solar spicule Solar granule References External links Encyclopedia of Astrobiology, Astronomy & Spaceflight: Plage Stellar phenomena Solar phenomena

5201544

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/THEMIS

THEMIS

Time History of Events and Macroscale Interactions during Substorms (THEMIS) mission began in February 2007 as a constellation of five NASA satellites (THEMIS-A through THEMIS-E) to study energy releases from Earth's magnetosphere known as substorms, magnetic phenomena that intensify auroras near Earth's poles. The name of the mission is an acronym alluding to the Titan Themis. Three of the satellites orbit the Earth within the magnetosphere, while two have been moved into orbit around the Moon. Those two were renamed ARTEMIS for Acceleration, Reconnection, Turbulence and Electrodynamics of the Moon's Interaction with the Sun. THEMIS-B became ARTEMIS-P1 and THEMIS-C became ARTEMIS-P2. ARTEMIS-P1 and -P2 together comprise the THEMIS-ARTEMIS mission. The THEMIS satellites were launched 17 February 2007 from SLC-17B aboard a Delta II launch vehicle. Each satellite carries five identical instruments, including a fluxgate magnetometer (FGM), an electrostatic analyzer (ESA), a solid state telescope (SST), a search-coil magnetometer (SCM) and an electric field instrument (EFI). Each probe has a mass of , including of hydrazine fuel. THEMIS data can be accessed using the SPEDAS software. Canada, Austria, Germany, and France also contributed to the mission. Spacecraft Swales Aerospace, now part of Orbital ATK which is now part of Northrop Grumman, Beltsville, Maryland, manufactured all five probes for this mission. Each was built-up and tested at the Beltsville facility, before being delivered to University of California, Berkeley for instrument integration. Swales was responsible for integrating the BAU, IRU, Solar arrays, antenna, battery, and other components necessary for functionality. This was the second major satellite built by Swales, the first being the Earth Observing-1 (EO-1) spacecraft, which continues to orbit Earth. Swales was also responsible for designing and building the Electrical Ground Support Equipment (EGSE) used for monitoring the probes during all phases of pre-launch activities, including use at the launch site. Testing After the installation of instruments at SSL, Berkeley, pre-launch testing including thermal-vacuum, vibration and acoustic tests, was conducted at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California. Launch THEMIS was originally scheduled to launch on 19 October 2006. Owing to delays caused by workmanship problems with Delta II second stages — an issue that also affected the previous mission, STEREO — the THEMIS launch was delayed to 15 February 2007. Due to weather conditions occurring on 13 February 2007, fueling of the second stage was delayed, and the launch pushed back 24 hours. On 16 February 2007, the launch was scrubbed in a hold at the T-4 minute point in the countdown due to the final weather balloon reporting a red, or no-go condition for upper-level winds. A 24-hour turnaround procedure was initiated, targeting a new launch window between 23:01 and 23:17 UTC on 17 February 2007. Favorable weather conditions were observed on 17 February 2007, and the countdown proceeded smoothly. THEMIS successfully launched at 23:01:00 UTC. The spacecraft separated from the launch vehicle approximately 73 minutes after liftoff. By 03:07 UTC, on 18 February, mission operators at the Space Sciences Laboratory (SSL) of the University of California, Berkeley, commanded and received signals from all five spacecraft, confirming nominal separation status. The launch service was provided by the United Launch Alliance through the NASA Launch Services Program (LSP). FAST The Fast Auroral SnapshoT Explorer (FAST) mission supported THEMIS in 2008 and 2009 before being retired. FAST was a Small Explorer program (SMEX) mission launched in 1996. Mission status From 15 February 2007 until 15 September 2007, the five THEMIS satellites coasted in a string-of-pearls orbital configuration. From 15 September until 4 December 2007, the satellites were moved to more distant orbits in preparation for data collection in the magnetotail. This phase of the mission was called the "Dawn Phase" because the satellites' orbits were in apogee on the dawn side of the magnetosphere. On 4 December 2007, the first tail science phase of the mission began. In this segment of the mission scientists will collect data from the magnetotail of the Earth's magnetosphere. During this phase the satellites' orbits are in apogee inside the magnetotail. The scientists hope to observe substorms and magnetic reconnection events. During these events charged particles stored in the Earth's magnetosphere are discharged to form the aurora borealis. Tail science is performed in the winter of the northern hemisphere because the ground magnetometers that Themis scientists correlate the satellite data with have relatively longer periods of night. During the night, observations are not interrupted by charged particles from the Sun. In 2007, THEMIS "found evidence of magnetic ropes connecting Earth's upper atmosphere directly to the Sun", reconfirming the theory of solar-terrestrial electrical interaction (via "Birkeland currents" or "field-aligned currents") proposed by Kristian Birkeland circa 1908. NASA also likened the interaction to a "30 kiloVolt battery in space", noting the "flux rope pumps 650,000 Ampere current into the Arctic!" On 26 February 2008, THEMIS probes were able to determine, for the first time, the triggering event for the onset of magnetospheric substorms. Two of the five probes, positioned approximately one third the distance to the Moon, measured events suggesting a magnetic reconnection event 96 seconds prior to Auroral intensification. Vassilis Angelopoulos of the University of California, Los Angeles, who is the principal investigator for the THEMIS mission, claimed, "Our data show clearly and for the first time that magnetic reconnection is the trigger". Extended mission On 19 May 2008, the Space Sciences Laboratory (SSL) at University of California, Berkeley announced NASA had extended the THEMIS mission to the year 2012. NASA officially approved the movement of THEMIS-B and THEMIS-C into lunar orbit under the mission name "ARTEMIS" (Acceleration, Reconnection, Turbulence and Electrodynamics of the Moon's Interaction with the Sun), which was revised to "THEMIS-ARTEMIS" in 2019. In February 2017, THEMIS celebrated ten years of science operations. As of August 2017, the three THEMIS inner probes continue to collect valuable data on the Sun's interaction with the Earth's magnetosphere. ARTEMIS In early 2010, ARTEMIS-P1 (THEMIS-B) performed two lunar flybys and one Earth flyby, and approached insertion into a Lissajous orbit around a lunar Lagrange point. Lunar orbit insertion was targeted for April 2011. ARTEMIS-P2 (THEMIS-C) completed a lunar flyby and was on the inbound leg of the first of three deep space excursions on its way to a Lissajous orbit and was targeted for lunar orbit in April 2011. On 22 June 2011, ARTEMIS-P1 began firing its thrusters to move out of its kidney-shaped libration orbit on one side of the Moon, where it had been since January 2011. On 2 July 2011 at 16:30 UTC, ARTEMIS-P1 entered lunar orbit. The second spacecraft, ARTEMIS-P2, moved into lunar orbit on 17 July 2011. Along the way, the two spacecraft were the first to ever achieve orbit around the Moon's Lagrange points. As of October 2019, both lunar probes are in stable orbits, and are expected to remain operational for a long time. Instruments Aboard the spacecraft Digital Fields Board (DFB): uses a Field-programmable gate array (FPGA) to perform configurable on-board band pass processing and Fast Fourier transform (FFT) on instrument data Electric Field Instruments (EFI): is designed and built to sense the electric field in Earth's ever-changing magnetosphere Electrostatic Analyzer (ESA): measures thermal electrons and ions to identify and track high-speed flows through the magnetotail and identify pressure pulses Fluxgate magnetometer (FGM): measures the background magnetic field to identify and time the abrupt reconfigurations of the magnetosphere during substorm onset, contributed by the German Aerospace Center and the Austrian Space Agency Instrument Data Processing Unit (IDPU): houses most of the electronics for the instruments on the THEMIS spacecraft Search-coil magnetometer (SCM): measures low frequency magnetic field fluctuations and waves in three directions in Earth's magnetosphere, built by the Centre d'étude des Environnements Terrestres et Planétaire (CETP) and Centre national de la recherche scientifique (CNRS) Solid State Telescope (SST): measures energetic particle distribution functions Ground based As the satellites monitor the magnetosphere from orbit, twenty ground stations in North America simultaneously monitor auroras. Ground station mission and science operations are being managed by the University of California's Space Sciences Laboratory. Ground-Based All-Sky Imager (ASI) Array: ground-based All-Sky Imager (ASI) array observes the aurora over the Northern American continent from Canada to Alaska in order to determine where and when the auroral substorm onset occurs. Ground-Based Magnetometer (GMAG) Array: GMAG Measures changes in Earth's magnetic field near Earth's surface due to substorm onset to help determine the timing of substorm events. Research results The THEMIS instruments have been used to track whistler-mode chorus waves during can persist in periods of low geomagnetic activity. Lists of relevant topics List of active Solar System probes List of heliophysics missions List of objects at Lagrangian points List of Solar System probes List of space telescopes Timeline of Solar System exploration SPEDAS software for space physics data Other relevant spacecraft Advanced Composition Explorer (ACE), launched in 1997, still operational. Cassini–Huygens Cluster Double Star launched on Cluster. Helios MESSENGER (MErcury Surface, Space ENvironment, GEochemistry and Ranging), launched in 2004, impacted on Mercury on 30 April 2015. Van Allen Probes Solar Dynamics Observatory (SDO), launched in 2010, still operational. Solar and Heliospheric Observatory (SOHO), launched in 1995, still operational. Solar Maximum Mission (SMM), launched in 1980, decommissioned 1989. Solar Orbiter (SOLO), launched in 2020. Parker Solar Probe, launched in 2018. STEREO (Solar TErrestrial RElations Observatory), launched in 2006, still operational. Transition Region and Coronal Explorer (TRACE), launched in 1998, decommissioned 2010. Ulysses, launched in 1990, decommissioned 2009. WIND, launched in 1994, still operational. ELFIN (Electron Losses and Fields INvestigation), launched in 2018. See also Explorer program References External links NASA THEMIS page THEMIS mission page (UCB) THEMIS Mission Profile by NASA's Solar System Exploration Space Ref news release Canadian Ground-based observatory web page Berkeleyan Launch Coverage See page 8 in this document for antenna reference THEMIS email lists Explorers Program NASA space probes Space probes launched in 2007 Spacecraft launched by Delta II rockets Satellites orbiting the Moon Space weather Articles containing video clips Spacecraft using Lissajous orbits Geospace monitoring satellites

5205784

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List%20of%20largest%20universities%20and%20university%20networks%20by%20enrollment

List of largest universities and university networks by enrollment

This list of largest universities by enrollment in the world includes total active enrollment across all campuses, as well as off-campus study. The enrollment numbers listed are the sum of undergraduate and graduate students in active enrollment. The universities included below confer degrees of bachelor-level or higher, and either share a central board of governance and a single chancellor or president, or confer degrees with the same institution name. Many of these universities, particularly those in the United States, are actually systems of separate university campuses, and may not accurately represent a comparable student body. For example, the enrollment listed for the University of California is the population of the entire student body in the University of California system, which is composed of several individual campuses statewide. All University of California campuses are entitled "University of California" and then denoted further by the campus location, such as "University of California, Irvine". Other states organize their public universities differently in ways that further complicate any direct comparisons. Indicates if most or all students are enrolled in a fully Distance Learning modality See also List of largest universities in the world by country List of United States universities by undergraduate enrollment List of the largest United States colleges and universities by enrollment List of United States public university campuses by enrollment List of universities in the United Kingdom by enrollment References Universities Largest by enrollment Lists of education-related superlatives

5212093

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gran%20Desierto%20de%20Altar

Gran Desierto de Altar

The Gran Desierto de Altar is one of the major sub-ecoregions of the Sonoran Desert, located in the State of Sonora, in northwest Mexico. It includes the only active erg dune region in North America. The desert extends across much of the northern border of the Gulf of California, spanning more than east to west and over north to south. It constitutes the largest continuous wilderness area within the Sonoran Desert. The eastern portion of the area contains the volcanic Pinacate Peaks region; together with the western portion, the area forms the El Pinacate y Gran Desierto de Altar Biosphere Reserve and a UNESCO World Heritage Site. Geography The Gran Desierto covers approximately , most of it in the Mexican state of Sonora. The northernmost edges reach across the international border into Organ Pipe Cactus National Monument and Cabeza Prieta National Wildlife Refuge in southwestern Arizona, United States. The region is dominated by sand sheets and dunes ranging in thickness from less than to greater than . The total volume of sand in the Gran Desierto is about . Most of that volume was delivered by the Colorado River during the Pleistocene, which flowed through the present-day Gran Desierto area approximately 120,000 years before present. This Pleistocene delta migrated westward concomitant with strike-slip faulting and rifting associated with the opening of the Salton Trough and the Gulf of California. The eastern margin of the Gran Desierto abuts the Cenozoic volcanic complex of the Sierra Pinacate, a composite volcanic field covering more than with a summit elevation of . Aeolian sands have climbed onto many of the western slopes of the Sierra Pinacate, defining the eastern limit of the dune field. To the north, the sands thin out against the distal margins of alluvial fans from the Tinajas Altas and Tule Mountains along the Arizona–Sonora border. The southern border of the sand sea is the northern shore of the Gulf of California. The southernmost extension of the San Andreas Fault cuts across the area and lies beneath several prominent granite inselbergs, most notably the Sierra del Rosario mountains, which are surrounded by the erg on all sides. The Sierra Enterrada is a smaller inselberg almost completely buried by the sand near the boundary of the Gran Desierto and the Pinacate volcanic complex. Sand dune distribution The Gran Desierto is best known for its magnificent star dunes, many in excess of high. More than two-thirds of the Gran Desierto is covered by sand sheets and sand streaks. The remaining area is split equally between a western population of star dunes and an eastern set of transverse or crescentic dunes. Some of the larger crescentic dunes in the northeastern sand sea exhibit reversing crests, a transitional morphological feature associated with star dunes. Flora Vegetation assemblages of the Gran Desierto are typical of the lower Sonoran Desert with a marked difference in vegetation type and density with location. Large areas of the southern and eastern sand sea, especially near the margins, have a moderately dense (up to 20%) cover of perennial low shrubs and herbs such as bursage (Ambrosia dumosa) and longleaf jointfir (Ephedra trifurca) with creosote bush (Larrea tridentata) in areas of thin sand cover. Palo verde/acacia/ocotillo communities occur on alluvial slopes on the northern side of the sand sea, particularly in arroyos and washes. The region's estimated total vegetation cover is 15% in the star dunes and about 10% in the low transverse or crescentic dunes areas. These percentages are substantially greater than in most active dune fields, where vegetation covers of 15% are more typical. Several teams have examined the middens built by pack rats as a proxy for ancient vegetation regimes. All have concluded that the Gran Desierto has been an ecological refuge for desert plants since at least the late Pleistocene. The Gran Desierto has served as a refuge for most dominant Mojave Desert plant species during cooler pluvial epochs as well. Carbon-14 dating for a midden from the Tinajas Altas Mountains shows assemblages of juniper and Joshua trees coexisting with contemporary Gran Desierto flora and fauna more than 43,000 years before present. Although midden studies do not provide information beyond the late Pleistocene, they do indicate that, in gross form, the climate of the Gran Desierto as recorded by plant communities has been desert-like since at least the peak of the Wisconsinan glaciation. Fauna Climate The Gran Desierto has a warm to hot arid climate. Mean annual rainfall, most of which occurs between September and December, is at Puerto Peñasco, Sonora (located at the southeastern margin of the sand sea on the Gulf of California) and decreases northward toward Yuma, Arizona (on the northwestern edge) to per year. Mid-summer highs in excess of are common in the central sand sea. Mid-winter lows of less than are rare. Winds are controlled in part by the position and strength of the Sonoran Low in summer, creating southerly winds, and by the Great Basin High in winter, with north-to-northeasterly winds. Paleoclimate The well-documented pluvial epochs which occurred over much of the southwestern United States during the most-recent (Wisconsin) ice age may not have extended as far south as the Gran Desierto. It appears that the climatic regime of the past 150,000 years at this site has been one of gradually increasing aridity with current hyper-arid conditions being firmly in place by at least 43,000 years ago. As a minimum, it may be assumed that onshore coastal winds from the south were less important to sand movement when the Wisconsin shoreline was located seaward of its current position. Geology The geological history of the Gran Desierto is intimately linked to the opening of the Gulf of California and the capture of the ancestral Colorado River; source areas that were adjacent to the Gran Desierto have shifted in position, basement topography has been altered continuously, and bedforms have been created, modified, or completely destroyed and then reworked. The Gran Desierto sand sheets and dunes are located atop deltaic deposits of the Pleistocene Colorado River. The lower Colorado River was captured by the Gulf of California 1.2 million years before present. This event places an upper bound on the age of the Gran Desierto with the Colorado's major clastic sediment sources. Conglomeritic sands and silts beneath the Mesa Arenosa were examined by Colletta and Ortlieb and dated at between 700,000 and 120,000 years before present. Vertebrate fossils found by Merriam within the deltaic deposits include Equus, Gomphotherium, and Bison and were assigned to Irvingtonian age (0.5 to 1.8 million years before present), dates consistent with the aforementioned capture of the lower Colorado River. Evidence of a giant anteater, Myrmecophaga tridactyla, was found in the deltaic deposits in the southern Gran Desierto. Van Devender notes that the specimen was found in association with fossils of mammoths, sloths, and boa constrictors, a tropical faunal assemblage which supports a contention that the Colorado River delta of a previous interglacial period (>120,000 years ago) was much warmer and wetter than in the present interglacial. Paleo-deltaic deposits near Salina Grande correlate with a ubiquitous indurated shell deposit dated by Io/U radiometric methods at 146,000 +13,000/-11,000 years of age. Slate (1985) obtained K-Ar ages for basalt flows in the western Pinacates; based on this work, some aeolian activity may have been present as early as 700,000 years ago, as evidenced by the dated accretionary mantles on basalt flows of the Pinacate volcanic field. Blount and Lancaster proposed that by late Pleistocene time, the Colorado River was a highly competent stream flowing through the area which is occupied today by the massive western star dune zone. The seashore at this time was at least south of its present-day location. Primary bed loads of poorly sorted gravel were deposited from present-day Yuma, Arizona to an area south of the present-day Sierra del Rosario mountains. As rifting of the Gulf of California progressed to the northwest, and uplift along the coast began, the river channel shifted westward, leaving primary bedload deposits in the former channel and floodplain. Deltaic sediments beneath the Gran Desierto may be as much as deep. Annual sediment loads prior to the damming of the Colorado River were prodigious. A single flood event deposited an estimated of coarse to medium sand as a sheet deposit on the modern delta just south of the international boundary. Events like this, even if rare, could fill up the Gran Desierto in only a few millennia. Tectonics The Gran Desierto is located adjacent to a rapidly subsiding tectonic basin, the Salton Trough, which is a northern extension of the Gulf of California, itself an embayment created by rifting initiated during the Pliocene along the East Pacific Rise and the San Andreas fault system. Regional subsidence has propagated to the northwest as rifting and strike-slip faulting continues into the present day. The central portion of the nearby Salton Trough is more than below sea level; it is protected from marine embayment only by the natural dike of the Colorado River Delta. Ongoing tectonic activity modifies the Gran Desierto today. The southernmost extension of the San Andreas fault system, the Cerro Prieto Fault, passes directly through the area before continuing offshore into the Gulf of California. Strike-slip movement in the area is as high as 60 mm/year. Since 1900, one magnitude 6.3 and two magnitude 7.1 earthquakes have originated within the erg. Most seismicity within the Gran Desierto originates at depths of , corresponding to the transition between deltaic deposits and basement crystalline rocks. Local uplift is still occurring along the Mesa Arenosa, a drag folded fault block forming the coastal boundary. Offshore features The synchronous development of the Colorado River Delta and the associated Gran Desierto sand sink continues offshore into the Gulf of California. Reports on the submarine topography of the Gulf of California by van Andel describe three former river channels on the seafloor: one originating at the present-day Colorado delta, another from the area of the paleo-delta between El Golfo and Salina Grande, and a third to the area of present-day Puerto Peñasco. Rusnak reported on sonar soundings which discovered the valleys and also describe two elongate depressions, each about in length, into which the valley networks terminate at a depth of approximately below sea level. Those incised valley systems were also interpreted as fluvial in origin. See also El Pinacate y Gran Desierto de Altar Biosphere Reserve Pinacate Peaks Sonoran Desert Colorado Desert Lechuguilla Desert Tule Desert Yuma Desert Chihuahuan Desert References Biehler, S., Kovach, R.L. and Allen, C.R., Geophysical framework of the northern end of the Gulf of California structural province, in Marine Geology of the Gulf of California, van Andel, T .H. and Shor, G.G., eds., A.A.P.G., Memoir 3, 126–143, 1964. Guzman, A.E., Petroleum possibilities in Altar Desert, Sonora, Mexico, abs., A.A.P .G., 64, 716, 1980. MacDougal, D.T., Across Papagueria, Bull. American Geographical Soc., 40, 705–725, 1908. External links World Heritage Centre: Official UNESCO El Pinacate and Gran Desierto de Altar Biosphere Reserve website UNESCO: Photo gallery of Reserve ElPinacate.gob.mx: Reserva de la Biosfera El Pinacate y Gran Desierto de Altar ElPinacate.gob.mx: "Historia" (la ocupación humana) Sonoran Desert Deserts of Mexico Deserts and xeric shrublands Dunes of Mexico Ergs Geography of Sonora Gulf of California Natural history of Sonora Landforms of Sonora

5215428

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Giovanni%20Domenico%20Cassini

Giovanni Domenico Cassini

Giovanni Domenico Cassini, also known as Jean-Dominique Cassini (8 June 1625 – 14 September 1712) was an Italian (naturalised French) mathematician, astronomer and engineer. Cassini was born in Perinaldo, near Imperia, at that time in the County of Nice, part of the Savoyard state. Cassini is known for his work on astronomy and engineering. He discovered four satellites of the planet Saturn and noted the division of the rings of Saturn; the Cassini Division was named after him. Giovanni Domenico Cassini was also the first of his family to begin work on the project of creating a topographic map of France. The Cassini space probe, launched in 1997, was named after him and became the fourth to visit the planet Saturn and the first to orbit the planet. Life Time in Italy Cassini was the son of Jacopo Cassini, a Tuscan, and Giulia Crovesi. In 1648 Cassini accepted a position at the observatory at Panzano, near Bologna, to work with Marquis Cornelio Malvasia, a rich amateur astronomer, initiating the first part of his career. During his time at the Panzano Observatory, Cassini was able to complete his education under the scientists Giovanni Battista Riccioli and Francesco Maria Grimaldi. In 1650 the senate of Bologna appointed him as the principal chair of astronomy at the University of Bologna. While in his position in Bologna, he observed and wrote a treatise on the comet of 1652. He was also employed by the senate of Bologna as hydraulic engineer, and appointed by Pope Alexander VII inspector of fortifications in 1657. He was subsequently director of waterways in the papal states. In San Petronio, Bologna, Cassini convinced church officials to create an improved sundial meridian line at the San Petronio Basilica, moving the pinhole gnomon that projected the Sun's image up into the church's vaults 66.8 meters (219 ft) away from the meridian inscribed in the floor. The much larger image of the Sun's disk projected by the camera obscura effect allowed him to measure the change in diameter of the Sun's disk over the year as the Earth moved toward and then away from the Sun. He concluded the changes in size he measured were consistent with Johannes Kepler's 1609 heliocentric theory, where the Earth was moving around the Sun in an elliptical orbit instead of the Ptolemaic system where the Sun orbited the Earth in an eccentric orbit. Cassini remained in Bologna working until Colbert recruited him to come to Paris to help set up the Paris Observatory. Cassini departed from Bologna on 25 February 1669. Moving to France Cassini's determinations of the rotational periods of Jupiter and Mars in 1665–1667 enhanced his fame, and in 1669, with the reluctant assent of the Pope, he moved to France and through a grant from Louis XIV of France helped to set up the Paris Observatory, which opened in 1671; he would remain the director of the observatory for the rest of his career until his death in 1712. For the remaining forty-one years of his life Cassini served as astronomer/astrologer to Louis XIV ("The Sun King"); serving the expected dual role yet focusing the overwhelming majority of his time on astronomy rather than the astrology he had studied so much in his youth. Cassini thoroughly adopted his new country, to the extent that he became interchangeably known as Jean-Dominique Cassini, although that is also the name of his great-grandson, Dominique, comte de Cassini. During this time, Cassini's method of determining longitude was used to measure the size of France accurately for the first time. The country turned out to be considerably smaller than expected, and the king quipped that Cassini had taken more of his kingdom from him than he had won in all his wars. On July 14, 1673 Cassini obtained the benefits of French citizenship. In 1674 he married Geneviève de Laistre, the daughter of the lieutenant general of the comté of Clermont. "From this marriage Cassini had two sons; the younger, Jacques Cassini, succeeded him as astronomer and geodesist under the name of Cassini II." In 1711 Cassini went blind and he died on 14 September 1712 in Paris at the age of 87. Astronomer Cassini observed and published surface markings on Mars (earlier seen by Christiaan Huygens but not published), determined the rotation periods of Mars and Jupiter, and discovered four satellites of Saturn: Iapetus and Rhea in 1671 and 1672, and Tethys and Dione (1684). Cassini was the first to observe these four moons, which he called Sidera Lodoicea (the stars of Louis), including Iapetus, whose anomalous variations in brightness he correctly ascribed as being due to the presence of dark material on one hemisphere (now called Cassini Regio in his honour). In addition he discovered the Cassini Division in the rings of Saturn (1675). He shares with Robert Hooke credit for the discovery of the Great Red Spot on Jupiter (ca. 1665). Around 1690, Cassini was the first to observe differential rotation within Jupiter's atmosphere. In 1672 he sent his colleague Jean Richer to Cayenne, French Guiana, while he himself stayed in Paris. The two made simultaneous observations of Mars and, by computing the parallax, determined its distance from Earth. This allowed for the first time an estimation of the dimensions of the Solar System: since the relative ratios of various Sun-planet distances were already known from geometry, only a single absolute interplanetary distance was needed to calculate all of the distances. In 1677, the English philosopher John Locke visited Cassini in Paris. He writes, "At the Observatory, we saw the Moon in a twenty-two foot glass, and Jupiter, with his satellites, in the same. The most remote was on the east, and the other three on the west. We also saw Saturn and his rings, in a twelve-foot glass, and one of his satellites." Cassini initially held the Earth to be the centre of the Solar System, though later observations compelled him to accept the model of the Solar System proposed by Nicolaus Copernicus, and eventually that of Tycho Brahe. "In 1659 he presented a model of the planetary system that was in accord with the hypothesis of Nicolaus Copernicus. In 1661 he developed a method, inspired by Kepler's work, of mapping successive phases of solar eclipses; and in 1662 he published new tables of the sun, based on his observations at San Petronio." Cassini also rejected Newton's theory of gravity, after measurements he conducted which wrongly suggested that the Earth was elongated at its poles. More than forty years of controversy about the subject were closed in favour of Newton's theory after the measurements of the French Geodesic Mission (1736 to 1744) and the Lapponian expedition in 1737 led by Pierre Louis Moreau de Maupertuis Cassini was also the first to make successful measurements of longitude by the method suggested by Galileo, using eclipses of the Galilean satellites as a clock. In 1683, Cassini presented the correct explanation of the phenomenon of zodiacal light. Zodiacal light is a faint glow that extends away from the Sun in the ecliptic plane of the sky, caused by dusty objects in interplanetary space. Cassini is also credited with introducing Indian Astronomy to Europe. In 1688, the French envoy to Siam (Thailand), Simon de la Loubère, returned to Paris with an obscure manuscript relating to the astronomical traditions of that country, along with a French translation. The Siamese Manuscript, as it is now called, somehow fell into Cassini's hands. He was intrigued enough by it to spend considerable time and effort deciphering its cryptic contents, also determining on the way that the document originated in India. His explication of the manuscript appeared in La Loubère's book on the Kingdom of Siam in 1691,. Astrologer Attracted to the heavens in his youth, his first interest was in astrology. While young he read widely on the subject of astrology, and soon was very knowledgeable about it; this extensive knowledge of astrology led to his first appointment as an astronomer. Later in life he focused almost exclusively on astronomy and all but denounced astrology as he became increasingly involved in the Scientific Revolution. In 1645 the Marquis Cornelio Malvasia, a senator of Bologna with a great interest in astrology, invited Cassini to Bologna and offered him a position in the Panzano Observatory, which he was constructing at that time. Most of their time was spent calculating newer, better, and more accurate ephemerides for astrological purposes using the rapidly advancing astronomical methods and tools of the day. Engineering In 1653, Cassini, wishing to employ the use of a meridian line, sketched a plan for a new and larger meridian line but one that would be difficult to build. His calculations were precise; the construction succeeded perfectly; and its success gave Cassini a brilliant reputation for working with engineering and structural works. Cassini was employed by Pope Clement IX in regard to fortifications, river management, and flooding of the Po River. "Cassini composed several memoirs on the flooding of the Po River and on the means of avoiding it; moreover, he also carried out experiments in applied hydraulics." In 1663 he was named superintendent of fortifications and in 1665 inspector for Perugia. The Pope asked Cassini to take Holy Orders to work with him permanently but Cassini turned him down because he wanted to work on astronomy full-time. In the 1670s, Cassini began work on a project to create a topographic map of France, using Gemma Frisius's technique of triangulation. The project was continued by his son Jacques Cassini and eventually finished by his grandson César-François Cassini de Thury and published as the Carte de Cassini in 1789 or 1793. It was the first topographic map of an entire country. Works Cassini's works digitalized and available on the digital library of Paris Observatory See also 24101 Cassini, an asteroid Aerial telescope – large telescopes used by Cassini Cassini (lunar crater) Cassini (Martian crater) Cassini Division in Saturn's rings Cassini oval Cassini Regio, dark area on Iapetus Cassini–Huygens Mission to Saturn Cassini's identity for Fibonacci numbers Cassini's laws History of the metre Neith (hypothetical moon) Seconds pendulum References Further reading Dominique, comte de Cassini, Giovanni Dominico Cassini biography Cassini, Anna, Gio. Domenico Cassini. Uno scienziato del Seicento, Comune di Perinaldo, 1994. (Italian) Giordano Berti (a cura di), G.D. Cassini e le origini dell'astronomia moderna, catalogo della mostra svoltasi a Perinaldo -Im-, Palazzo Comunale, 31 agosto – 2 novembre 1997. (Italian) Giordano Berti e Giovanni Paltrinieri (a cura di), Gian Domenico Cassini. La Meridiana del Tempio di S. Petronio in Bologna, Arnaldo Forni Editore, S. Giovanni in Persiceto, 2000. (Italian) Narayanan, Anil, History of Indian Astronomy: The Siamese Manuscript, Lulu Publishing, 2019. External links Giovanni Domenico Cassini – complete digitization of 14 volumes belonging to the Old Fund's Department of Astronomy, University of Bologna, held to mark the celebrations of the Cassini in 2005 (website in Italian) Giovanni Cassini Biography -Space.com esa.int — Jean-Dominique Cassini: Astrology to astronomy -ESA Geoastro.de Earth shape Virtual exhibition on Paris Observatory digital library Discoverers of moons Fellows of the Royal Society Italian astrologers 17th-century Italian astronomers Italian emigrants to France Naturalized citizens of France Italian Roman Catholics Members of the French Academy of Sciences People from the Province of Imperia Selenographers 1625 births 1712 deaths 17th-century astrologers 17th-century Italian mathematicians 17th-century Roman Catholics 18th-century astrologers 18th-century Italian mathematicians 18th-century Roman Catholics

5217933

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saturn%20INT-21

Saturn INT-21

The Saturn INT-21 was a study for an American orbital launch vehicle of the 1970s. It was derived from the Saturn V rocket used for the Apollo program, using its first and second stages, but lacking the third stage. The guidance unit would be moved from the top of the third stage to the top of the second stage. The INT-21 was never flown. A related variant was launched once, from the Kennedy Space Center, Florida carrying the Skylab space station into orbit, at 17:30 UTC, on May 14, 1973. As Skylab was built from an S-IVB stage, there was no need to move the guidance unit. This version was intended to be used for other flights in the Apollo Applications Program, and would have also been used to launch other American space stations, including Skylab B. See also Comparison of orbital launch systems Apollo program Saturn I Saturn IB Saturn V Skylab Apollo Applications Program S-IC S-II Saturn I SA-1 References External links Saturn INT-21 in Encyclopedia Astronautica Skylab, US Centennial of Flight Commission 1973 in spaceflight INT-21 Cancelled space launch vehicles

5219762

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prize%20%28law%29

Prize (law)

In admiralty law prizes are equipment, vehicles, vessels, and cargo captured during armed conflict. The most common use of prize in this sense is the capture of an enemy ship and her cargo as a prize of war. In the past, the capturing force would commonly be allotted a share of the worth of the captured prize. Nations often granted letters of marque that would entitle private parties to capture enemy property, usually ships. Once the ship was secured on friendly territory, she would be made the subject of a prize case: an in rem proceeding in which the court determined the status of the condemned property and the manner in which the property was to be disposed of. History and sources of prize law In his book The Prize Game, Donald Petrie writes, "at the outset, prize taking was all smash and grab, like breaking a jeweler's window, but by the fifteenth century a body of guiding rules, the maritime law of nations, had begun to evolve and achieve international recognition." Grotius's seminal treatise on international law called De Iure Praedae Commentarius (Commentary on the Law of Prize and Booty), published in 1604—of which Chapter 12, "Mare Liberum" inter alia founded the doctrine of freedom of the seas—was an advocate's brief justifying Dutch seizures of Spanish and Portuguese shipping. Grotius defends the practice of taking prizes as not merely traditional or customary, but just. His Commentary claims that the etymology of the name of the Greek war god Ares was the verb "to seize", and that the law of nations had deemed looting enemy property legal since the beginning of Western recorded history in Homeric times. Prize law fully developed between the Seven Years' War of 1756–1763 and the American Civil War of 1861–1865. This period largely coincides with the last century of fighting sail and includes the Napoleonic Wars, the American and French Revolutions, and America's Quasi-War with France of the late 1790s. Much of Anglo-American prize law derives from 18th Century British precedents – in particular, a compilation called the 1753 Report of the Law Officers, authored by William Murray, 1st Earl of Mansfield (1705–1793). It was said to be the most important exposition of prize law published in English, along with the subsequent High Court of Admiralty decisions of William Scott, Lord Stowell (1743–1836). American Justice Joseph Story, the leading United States judicial authority on prize law, drew heavily on the 1753 report and Lord Stowell's decisions, as did Francis Upton, who wrote the last major American treatise on prize law, his Maritime Warfare and Prize. While the Anglo-American common law case precedents are the most accessible description of prize law, in prize cases, courts construe and apply international customs and usages, the Law of Nations, and not the laws or precedents of any one country. Fortunes in prize money were to be made at sea as vividly depicted in the novels of C. S. Forester and Patrick O'Brian. During the American Revolution the combined American naval and privateering prizes totaled nearly $24 million; in the War of 1812, $45 million. Such huge revenues were earned when $200 were a generous year's wages for a sailor; his share of a single prize could fetch ten or twenty times his yearly pay, and taking five or six prizes in one voyage was common. With so much at stake, prize law attracted some of the greatest legal talent of the age, including John Adams, Joseph Story, Daniel Webster, and Richard Henry Dana Jr. author of Two Years Before the Mast. Prize cases were among the most complex of the time, as the disposition of vast sums turned on the fluid Law of Nations, and difficult questions of jurisdiction and precedent. One of the earliest U.S. cases for instance, that of the Active, took fully 30 years to resolve jurisdictional disputes between state and federal authorities. A captured American privateer captain, 20-year-old Gideon Olmsted, shipped aboard the British sloop Active in Jamaica as an ordinary hand in an effort to get home. Olmsted organized a mutiny and commandeered the sloop. But as Olmsted's mutineers sailed their prize to America, a Pennsylvania privateer took the Active. Olmsted and the privateer disputed ownership of the prize, and in November 1778 a Philadelphia prize court jury came to a split verdict awarding each a share. Olmsted, with the assistance of then American General Benedict Arnold, appealed to the Continental Congress Prize Committee, which reversed the Philadelphia jury verdict and awarded the whole prize to Olmsted. But Pennsylvania authorities refused to enforce the decision, asserting the Continental Congress could not intrude on a state prize court jury verdict. Olmsted doggedly pursued the case for decades until he won, in a U.S. Supreme Court case in 1809 which Justice Stanley Matthews later called "the first case in which the supremacy of the Constitution was enforced by judicial tribunals against the assertion of state authority". Commission Although Letters of Marque and Reprisal were sometimes issued before a formal declaration of war, as happened during the American Revolution when the rebelling colonies of Massachusetts, Maryland, Virginia, and Pennsylvania all granted Letters of Marque months before the Continental Congress's official Declaration of Independence of July 1776, by the turn of the 19th century it was generally accepted that a sovereign government first had to declare war. The "existence of war between nations terminates all legal commercial intercourse between their citizens or subjects," wrote Francis Upton in Maritime Warfare and Prize, since "[t]rade and commerce presuppose the existence of civil contracts … and recourse to judicial tribunals; and this is necessarily incompatible with a state of war." Indeed, each citizen of a nation "is at war with every citizen of the enemy," which imposes a "duty, on every citizen, to attack the enemy and seize his property, though by established custom, this right is restricted to such only, as are the commissioned instruments of the government." The formal commission bestowed upon a naval vessel, and the Letter of Marque and Reprisal granted to private merchant vessels converting them into naval auxiliaries, qualified them to take enemy property as the armed hands of their sovereign, and to share in the proceeds. Capturing a prize When a privateer or naval vessel spotted a tempting vessel—whatever flag she flew or often enough flying none at all—they gave chase. Sailing under false colors was a common ruse, both for predator and prey. The convention was that a vessel must hoist her true colors before firing the first shot. Firing under a false flag could cost dearly in prize court proceedings, possibly even resulting in restitution to the captured vessel's owner. Often a single cannon shot across the bow was enough to persuade the prey to heave-to, but sometimes brutal hours and even days of cannonading ensued, along with boarding and hand-to-hand fighting with cutlasses, pistols, and boarding pikes. No matter how furious and bloody the battle, once it was over the victors had to collect themselves, put aside anger and exercise forbearance, treating captives with courtesy and civility to the degree prudence allowed. Officers restrained the crew to prevent pillaging defeated adversaries, or pilfering the cargo, known as breaking bulk. Francis Upton's treatise on Maritime Warfare cautioned: Embezzlements of the cargo seized, or acts personally violent, or injuries perpetrated upon the captured crew, or improperly separating them from the prize-vessel, or not producing them for examination before the prize-court, or other torts injurious to the rights and health of the prisoners, may render the arrest of the vessel or cargo, as prize, defeasible, and also subject the tort feasor for damages therefore. Taking the prize before a prize court might be impractical for any number of reasons, such as bad weather, shortage of prize crew, dwindling water and provisions, or the proximity of an overpowering enemy force—in which case a vessel might be ransomed. That is, instead of destroying her on the spot as was their prerogative, the privateer or naval officer would accept a scrip in form of an IOU for an agreed sum as ransom from the ship's master. On land this would be extortion and the promise to pay unenforceable in court, but at sea it was accepted practice and the IOUs negotiable instruments. On occasion a seized vessel would be released to ferry home prisoners, a practice which Lord Stowell said "in the consideration of humanity and policy" Admiralty Courts must protect with the utmost attention. While on her mission as a cartel ship she was immune to recapture so long as she proceeded directly on her errand, promptly returned, and did not engage in trading in the meantime. Usually, however, the captor put aboard a prize crew to sail a captured vessel to the nearest port of their own or an allied country, where a prize court could adjudicate the prize. If while sailing en route a friendly vessel re-captured the prize, called a rescue, the right of postliminium declared title to the rescued prize restored to its prior owners. That is, the ship did not become a prize of the recapturing vessel. However, the rescuers were entitled to compensation for salvage, just as if they had rescued a crippled vessel from sinking at sea. Admiralty court process The prize that made it back to the capturing vessel's country or that of an ally which had authorized prize proceedings would be sued in admiralty court in rem—meaning "against the thing", against the vessel itself. For this reason. decisions in prize cases bear the name of the vessel, such as The Rapid (a U.S. Supreme Court case holding goods bought before hostilities commenced nonetheless become contraband after war is declared) or The Elsebe (Lord Stowell holding that prize courts enforce rights under the Law of Nations rather than merely the law of their home country). A proper prize court condemnation was absolutely requisite to convey clear title to a vessel and its cargo to the new owners and settle the matter. According to Upton's treatise, "Even after four years' possession, and the performance of several voyages, the title to the property is not changed without sentence of condemnation". The agent of the privateer or naval officer brought a libel, accusing the captured vessel of belonging to the enemy, or carrying enemy cargo, or running a blockade. Prize commissioners took custody of the vessel and its cargo, and gathered the ship's papers, charts, and other documents. They had a special duty to notify the prize court of perishable property, to be sold promptly to prevent spoilage and the proceeds held for whoever prevailed in the prize proceeding. The commissioners took testimony from witnesses on standard form written interrogatories. Admiralty courts rarely heard live testimony. The commissioners' interrogatories sought to establish the relative size, speed, and force of the vessels, what signals were exchanged and what fighting ensued, the location of the capture, the state of the weather and "the degree of light or darkness," and what other vessels were in sight. That was because naval prize law gave assisting vessels, defined as those that were "in signal distance" at the time, a share of the proceeds. The written interrogatories and ship's papers established the nationality of the prize and her crew, and the origin and destination of the cargo: the vessel was said to be "confiscated out of her own mouth." One considerable difference between prize law and ordinary Anglo-American criminal law is the reversal of the normal onus probandi or burden of proof. While in criminal courts a defendant is innocent until proven guilty, in prize court a vessel is guilty unless proven innocent. Prize captors need show only "reasonable suspicion" that the property is subject to condemnation; the owner bears the burden of proving the contrary. A prize court normally ordered the vessel and its cargo condemned and sold at auction. But the court's decision became vastly more complicated in the case of neutral vessels, or a neutral nation's cargo carried on an enemy vessel. Different countries treated these situations differently. By the close of the 18th century, Russia, Scandinavia, France, and the United States had taken the position that "free ships make free goods": that is, cargo on a neutral ship could not be condemned as a prize. But Britain asserted the opposite, that an enemy's goods on a neutral vessel, or neutral goods on an enemy vessel, may be taken, a position which prevailed in 19th century practice. The ingenuity of belligerents in evading the law through pretended neutrality, false papers, quick title transfers, and a myriad of other devices, make up the principal business of the prize courts during the last century of fighting sail. Neutral vessels could be subject to capture if they ran a blockade. The blockade had to be effective to be cognizable in a prize court, that is, not merely declared but actually enforced. Neutrals had to be warned of it. If so then any ships running the blockade of whatever flag were subject to capture and condemnation. However passengers and crew aboard the blockade runners were not to be treated as prisoners of war, as Upton's Maritime Warfare and Prize enjoins: "the penalty, and the sole penalty ... is the forfeiture of the property employed in [blockade running]." Persons aboard blockade runners could only be temporarily detained as witnesses, and after testifying, immediately released. The legitimacy of an adjudication depended on regular and just proceedings. Departures from internationally accepted standards of fairness risked ongoing litigation by disgruntled shipowners and their insurers, often protracted for decades. For example, during America's Quasi-War with France in the 1790s, corrupt French Caribbean prize courts (often sharing in the proceeds) resorted to pretexts and subterfuges to justify condemning neutral American vessels. They condemned one for carrying alleged English contraband because the compass in the binnacle showed an English brand; another because the pots and pans in the galley were of English manufacture. Outraged U.S. shipowners, their descendants, and descendants of their descendants (often serving as fronts for insurers) challenged these decisions in litigation collectively called the French Spoliation Cases. The spoliation cases last over a century, from the 1790s until 1915. Together with Indian tribal claims for treaty breaches, the French Spoliation Cases enjoy the dubious distinction of figuring among the longest-litigated claims in U.S. history. Paris Declaration Respecting Maritime Law (1856) Most privateering came to an end in the late-19th century, when the plenipotentiaries who agreed on the Treaty of Paris in March 1856 that did put an end to the Crimean War, also did agree on the Paris Declaration Respecting Maritime Law renouncing granting letters of marque. Proposal to the Declaration came from the French Foreign Minister and president of the Congress Count Walewski. In the plain wordings of the Declaration: Privateering is and remains abolished; The neutral flag covers enemy's goods, with the exception of contraband of war; Neutral goods, with the exception of contraband of war, are not liable to capture under enemy's flag; Blockades, in order to be binding, must be effective-that is to say, maintained by a force sufficient really to prevent access to the coast of the enemy. The Declaration did contain a juridical novelty, making it possible for the first time in history that nations not represented at the establishment and/or the signing of a multilateral treaty, could access as a party afterwards. Again in the plain wordings of the treaty: "The present Declaration is not and shall not be binding, except between those Powers who have acceded, or shall accede, to it." The declaration has been written in French, translated in English and the two versions have been sent to nations worldwide with the invitation to access, leading to the acceding of altogether 55 nations, a big step towards the globalisation of international law. This broad acceptance wouldn't otherwise have been possible in such a short period. The United States however, were not a signatory and had reasons not to accede the treaty afterwards. After having received the invitation to accede, the US Secretary of State, William L. Marcy a lawyer and judge, wrote a letter dated 14 July 1856 to other nations, among which The Netherlands: "The United States have learned with sincere regret that in one or two instances, the four propositions, with all the conditions annexed, have been promptly, and this Government cannot but think, unadvisedly accepted without restriction or qualification." The US didn't want to restrict privateering and did strive for protection of all private property on neutral of enemy ships. Marcy did warn countries with large commercial maritime interests and a small navy, like The Netherlands, to be aware that the end of privateering meant they would be totally dependent on nations with a strong navy. Marcy did end the letter hoping: “(…) that it may be induced to hesitate in acceding to a proposition which is here conceived to be fraught with injurious consequences to all but those Powers which already have or are willing to furnish themselves with powerful navies.” The US did accept the other points of the Declaration, being a codification of custom law. End of privateering and the decline of naval prizes During the American Civil War, Confederate privateers cruised against Union merchant shipping. Likewise, the Union (though refusing to recognize the legitimacy of Confederate letters of marque) allowed its navy to take Confederate vessels as prizes. Under US Constitution Article 1 Section 8, it is still theoretically possible for Congress to authorize letters of marque, but in the last 150 years it has not done so. An International Prize Court was to be set up by treaty XII of the Hague Convention of 1907, but this treaty never came into force as only Nicaragua ratified it. Commerce raiding by private vessels ended with the American Civil War, but Navy officers remained eligible for prize money a little while longer. The United States continued paying prizes to naval officers in the Spanish–American War, and only abjured the practice by statute during World War I. The U.S. prize courts adjudicated no cases resulting from its own takings in either World War I or World War II (although the Supreme Court did rule on a German prize—SS Appam in the case The Steamship Appam—that was brought to and held at Hampton Roads). Likewise Russia, Portugal, Germany, Japan, China, Romania, and France followed the United States in World War I, declaring they would no longer pay prize money to naval officers. On November 9, 1914, the British and French governments signed an agreement establishing government jurisdiction over prizes captured by either of them. The Russian government acceded to this agreement on March 5, 1915, and the Italian government followed suit on January 15, 1917. Shortly before World War II France passed a law which allowed for taking prizes, as did the Netherlands and Norway, though the German invasion and subsequent capitulation of all three of those countries quickly put this to an end. Britain formally ended the eligibility of naval officers to share in prize money in 1948. Under contemporary international law and treaties, nations may still bring enemy vessels before their prize courts, to be condemned and sold. But no nation now offers a share to the officers or crew who risked their lives in the capture: Self-interest was the driving force that compelled men of the sea to accept the international law of prize ... [including merchants] because it brought a valuable element of certainty to their dealings. If the rules were clear and universal, they could ship their goods abroad in wartime, after first buying insurance against known risks. ... On the other side of the table, those purchasing vessels and cargoes from prize courts had the comfort of knowing that what they bought was really theirs. The doctrine and practice of maritime prize was widely adhered to for four centuries, among a multitude of sovereign nations, because adhering to it was in the material interest of their navies, their privateersmen, their merchants and bankers, and their sovereigns. Diplomats and international lawyers who struggle in this world to achieve a universal rule of law may well ponder on this lesson. See also Alabama Claims Commerce raiding Confederate privateer Court of Appeals in Cases of Capture Blockade runners of the American Civil War Letter of marque War trophy Prize of war Altmark incident Notes References James Scott Brown (ed.), Prize Cases Decided in the United States Supreme Court (Oxford: Clarendon Press 1923) Colombos, A Treatise on the Law of Prize (London: Longmans, Green & Co. Ltd. 1949) Gawalt & Kreidler, eds., The Journal of Gideon Olmsted (Washington DC: Library of Congress 1978) Grotius, De Iure Praedae Commentarius (Commentary on the Law of Prize and Booty)(Oxford: Clarendon Press 1950) Edgar Stanton Maclay, A History of American Privateers (London: S. Low, Marston & Co. 1900) Donald Petrie, The Prize Game: lawful looting on the high seas in the days of fighting sail (Annapolis, Md.: Naval Institute Press, 1999) Theodore Richard, Reconsidering the Letter of Marque: Utilizing Private Security Providers Against Piracy (April 1, 2010). Public Contract Law Journal, Vol. 39, No. 3, pp. 411–464 at 429 n.121, Spring 2010. Available at SSRN: http://ssrn.com/abstract=1591039 William Morrison Robinson Jr., The Confederate Privateers (Columbia, S.C.: University of South Carolina Press, 1928) Lord Russell of Liverpool, The French Corsairs (London: Robert Hale, 2001) Carl E. Swanson, Predators and Prizes: American Privateering and Imperial Warfare, 1739–1748 (Columbia, SC: U. South Carolina Press, 1991) Francis Upton, Upton's Maritime Warfare and Prize (New York: John Voorhies Law Bookseller and Publisher, 1863) External links summary of US Prize laws 1868 Law of the sea Prize warfare

5220169

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Venus%20%28Tackey%20%26%20Tsubasa%20song%29

Venus (Tackey & Tsubasa song)

"Venus" is Tackey & Tsubasa's sixth single under the Avex Trax label. Overview "Venus" is Tackey & Tsubasa's sixth single, and currently their best selling single, reaching the 300,000 copies sold mark. The a-side song "Venus" was used in commercials for the ringtone service site, Mu-Mo. The b-side song "Kimi no Na wo Yobitai" was used as the ending theme for the TBS show "Zubari Iu wa yo." The other b-side song "Never Ever" was used as the opening theme song for the anime "Capeta." Sample of the translated lyrics: Burn, Venus, hotly, Venus Your eyes scorch my heart Love is a long silk road And if I hesitate, you'll want to forget me Feel, Venus, hotly, Venus Show me a wind like that of a storm You know the answer Let loose the sparkling of your love Track listing Regular CD Format "Venus" (Hitoshi Haneda) - 4:11 "" (Takizawa Hideaki) (Mikio Sakai, Hideyuki Obata) - 5:39 "Never Ever" (Imai Tsubasa) (Kazuko Kobayashi, Shunsuke Yazaki) - 4:23 "Venus: Korean Version" - 4:11 "Venus: Chinese Version" - 4:11 "Venus: Thai Version" - 4:11 "Venus: karaoke" - 4:10 ": '06 Remix" - 4:13 Limited CD Format "Venus" (Hitoshi Haneda) - 4:09 "" (Takizawa Hideaki) (Mikio Sakai, Hideyuki Obata) - 5:37 "Never Ever" (Imai Tsubasa) (Kazuko Kobayashi, Shunsuke Yazaki) - 4:21 "Venus: Korean Version" - 4:09 "Venus: Chinese Version" - 4:09 "Venus: Thai Version" - 4:09 "Venus: karaoke" - 4:09 CD+DVD Format CD Portion "Venus" (Hitoshi Haneda) - 4:09 "" (Takizawa Hideaki) (Mikio Sakai, Hideyuki Obata) - 5:37 "Never Ever" (Imai Tsubasa) (Kazuko Kobayashi, Shunsuke Yazaki) - 4:21 "Venus: Korean Version" - 4:09 "Venus: Chinese Version" - 4:09 "Venus: Thai Version" - 4:09 "Venus: karaoke" - 4:09 DVD Portion "Venus Choreography Video" Personnel Takizawa Hideaki - vocals Imai Tsubasa - vocals TV performances ?, 2006 - Music Fighter January 19, 2006 - Utaban January 29, 2006 - Utawara February 17, 2006 - Music Station May 5, 2006 - Music Station Charts Oricon Sales Chart (Japan) RIAJ Certification As of February 2006, "Venus" has been certified platinum for shipments of over 250,000 by the Recording Industry Association of Japan. References Translated Lyrics 2006 singles Tackey & Tsubasa songs Oricon Weekly number-one singles

5220483

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Krasnoludek

Krasnoludek

Krasnoludek or krasnal is the Polish name for a mythological type of gnome or dwarf, common in many Polish and translated folk tales (for example, Brothers Grimm Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs is translated into the Polish language as Królewna Śnieżka i siedmiu krasnoludków). They resemble small humans and wear pointy red hats. Due to the popularization of fantasy literature, they are now differentiated from both gnomes (Polish: gnom) and dwarfs (Polish: krasnolud), both of which are used in fantasy literature context, while the word krasnoludek still remains mostly the domain of older folk tales. The word krasnal ogrodowy is also used to describe garden gnomes. The mythological dwarf is of Germanic origin and appeared in Polish folktales in the 16th or 17th century. The word krasnoludek comes from the old Polish krasny, kraśny ("red, colorful," "nice-looking," or "good") and Polish ludek (small person or human-like creature). See also Wrocław's dwarfs References Gnomes Dwarves (folklore)

5224873

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The%20Mysteries%20of%20the%20Horizon

The Mysteries of the Horizon

The Masterpiece or The Mysteries of the Horizon () is a 1955 Surrealist oil painting by René Magritte. The painting depicts three seemingly identical men in bowler hats. They are in an outdoor setting at twilight. Though they appear to be sharing the same space each one also seems to exist in a separate reality. Each is facing a different direction. In the sky above each figure is a separate waxing crescent moon. Men in bowler hats appear frequently in Magritte's work starting with his 1926 painting The Musings of a Solitary Walker. They are represented as having undefined or identical personalities. Magritte himself is often seen wearing a bowler hat in photographs. Magritte made a gouache in 1964 with the same subject matter, also titled Le Chef-d'Oeuvre ou les Mystères de l'Horizon (The Masterpiece or the Mysteries of the Horizon) The painting has been parodied many times, including by surrealist comedy group the Firesign Theatre on the cover of their 1977 album Just Folks... A Firesign Chat. On the parody, each member of the Firesign Theatre appears wearing a different tie but identical suits and hats. Something strange is happening to three of the four hats: one is on fire; only one has the crescent Moon above his head, and he is smoking a pipe; another's hat appears to be floating above his head. One smiles at the viewer, and there is nothing unusual about his hat. See also List of paintings by René Magritte References The Mystery of Magritte CD-ROM by Shend Bunjaku Paintings by René Magritte Surrealist paintings 1955 paintings Moon in art

5227247

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/S%C5%ABryaprabha

Sūryaprabha

Sūryaprabha (literally "Sunlight", Chinese: 日光菩薩; pinyin: Rìguāng Púsà; Rōmaji: Nikkō Bosatsu) is a bodhisattva whose specialty is sunlight and good health. Sūryaprabha is often seen with Candraprabha, as the two siblings serve Bhaiṣajyaguru. Statues of the two closely resemble each other and are commonly found together, sometimes flanking temple doors. They are also recognized in mainland Asia as devas. In Chinese folk religion, the solar god Taiyang Xingjun is depicted as his incarnation. His sacred day is the first day of the second lunar month in the Chinese calendar. See also Index of Buddhism-related articles Secular Buddhism References Shinto and Buddhist Corner, accessed 20 May 2006 Bodhisattvas Bhaiṣajyaguru Twenty-Four Protective Deities Solar gods

5228701

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Posthomerica

Posthomerica

The Posthomerica (, translit. tà meth᾿ Hómēron; lit. "Things After Homer") is an epic poem in Greek hexameter verse by Quintus of Smyrna. Probably written in the 3rd century AD, it tells the story of the Trojan War, between the death of Hector and the fall of Ilium. The poem is an abridgement of the epic poems Aethiopis and Iliou Persis by Arctinus of Miletus and the Little Iliad by Lesches, all now-lost poems of the Epic Cycle. The first four books, covering the same ground as the Aethiopis, describe the doughty deeds and deaths of Penthesileia the Amazon, of Memnon, son of the Morning, and of Achilles; and the funeral games in honour of Achilles. Books five through twelve, covering the same ground as the Little Iliad, span from the contest between Ajax and Odysseus for the arms of Achilles, the death of Ajax by suicide after his loss, the exploits of Neoptolemus, Eurypylus and Deiphobus, the deaths of Paris and Oenone, to the building of the wooden horse. The remaining books, covering the same ground as Iliou Persis, relate the capture of Troy by means of the wooden horse, the sacrifice of Polyxena at the grave of Achilles, the departure of the Greeks, and their dispersal by the storm. Summary The plot of Posthomerica begins where Homer's Iliad ends, immediately after Hector's body was regained by the Trojans. Penthesileia, a daughter of Ares, arrives at Troy with a group of Amazon warriors. They arrive from the Thermodon River. Penthesileia has come to share the hardships of war and to escape her people after accidentally killing her sister; she was aiming for a stag. Priam thinks she will save Troy and kill Achilles. Andromache doesn't think that Penthesileia is capable. Priam prayed to Zeus to let Penthesileia return, but he sees an eagle holding a dove, a sign that she will die. Ajax and Achilles are in the city resting. Hippoclameia tries to convince the Trojan women to fight, but Theano convinces them it is a suicidal idea. Penthesileia kills Podarces in battle. Ajax convinces Achilles that it is time to fight: Achilles kills Penthesileia by impaling her and her horse, but Achilles notices her beauty and realizes that he should have made her his wife. Thersites tells Achilles not to worry about women, Achilles eventually kills him and upsets Diomedes. Thymoites tells Troy if they are to stay in the city, they will die, therefore everyone should leave. Priam and Paris say that fighting is the answer and Memnon, son of Dawn, and the Ethiopian army will be here soon. Polydamas says that Ethiopians will lose. Zeus thinks that tomorrow's battle will be ugly and full of death. Memnon kills Nestor's son Antilochos in battle. Eventually, after a long and difficult struggle; Achilles kills Memnon. Dawn will not let the sun rise because she is so upset and retreats to Hades, until Zeus convinces her to leave. After Achilles tells him to stop interfering in the battle, Apollo tries to shoot Achilles, wounding his ankle; this will later prove fatal. Zeus is furious with Apollo as he is not supposed to interfere in the mortal world. The Trojans are still scared to fight the injured Achilles. Achilles dies and Paris attempts to remove his corpse. Ajax defends the body, killing Glaucos, who falls on top of Achilles. Ajax also injures Aeneas. Odysseus helps Ajax defend Achilles’ body. Ajax stuns Paris by hitting him with a rock, forcing Paris to give up his attempt to take the corpse. The Greeks successfully drive the Trojans off and rescue Achilles’ body, bringing it back to the Greek camp. Ajax is the first to eulogize Achilles, then Phoinix, Agamemnon, Briseis, and Thetis, Achilles' mother. Calliope tells Thetis that her son will always be remembered. The Greeks then compete in funeral games to commemorate the death of Achilles. There is a heated argument between Odysseus and Ajax over which one of them is most deserving of receiving Achilles armor. The Trojan prisoners are asked to decide which one of them was the better warrior during the defense of Achilles’ body. The hero that fought most bravely and valiantly will be awarded the armor. It is decided that Odysseus will receive the armor. Similar to Sophocles' play Ajax, this leads to Ajax's suicide, and Odysseus speaks his regret at the funeral. He is cremated at sea. At this point, the gods give Eurypylus to the Trojans. Eurypylus is able to kill many Argive soldiers and drives the Argives to despair. They draw near to the ships, but Neoptolemos arrives to fight the Trojans back. Ares demoralizes the Argives, but Neoptolemos holds his ground and slays Eurypylus. He continues to kill Trojans, such that the author expresses surprise at his body count. Deiphobos challenges him, but Apollo saves the Trojans from Neoptolemos. Apollo tries to kill Neoptolemos, but Zeus threatens to destroy Ilion if he does. The battle is halted by Calchas, who declares that the battle is not fated to end until Philoctetes joins the Argives. Philoctetes had been left on the island of Lemnos due to receiving a bite on the foot from a poisonous water snake that became infected and repulsive to the other Greeks. This scenario draws on source material from Sophocles' Philoctetes. Philoctetes is rescued from his cave. They tell him that his wound can be healed by the surgeon Podaleninos if he agrees to come with them to Troy. Although Philoctetes considers Odysseus at fault for leaving him on the island, he forgives Odysseus. Aeneas attempts to convince the Trojans to stay within the city walls, without success. Panic, Fear and Strife arrive at the day's battle. Philoctetes shoots Paris with his poisoned arrows, grazing him on the hand and striking him in the groin. Paris, mortally wounded, tries to get help from his first wife, Oenone, who spurns him because of his affair with Helen. Paris passes away. Priam laments that he was his second best son, and Helen curses the position he put her in. Oenone, regrets her actions and commits suicide by jumping on Paris' funeral pyre. They are buried next to one another, their headstones facing opposite ways. The battle evens out for both sides. Apollo pushes Aeneas and Eurymachos to fight like madmen against the Greeks, pushing them back until they are rallied by Neoptolemos. The Greeks surge forwards and Aeneas manages to rally the Trojans and check the Greek advance. A dust storm settles over the battle. The next morning, the Argives hide under their shields to get to the gates of Troy, led by Odysseus. Ares gives Aeneas the strength to retaliate by throwing huge rocks. Aeneas exhorts the Trojans to leave the city, but the battle continues around the gates. Philoctetes shoots at Aeneas, but his shield protects him, allowing the arrow to hit Mimas instead. The seer Calchas sees an omen of a hawk and dove, suggests that the Greeks try a new strategy to take Troy. Odysseus comes up with a plan to create the Trojan Horse. He gets Epeios to construct the horse. Neoptolemos and Philoctetes do not like the plan, because they prefer a more direct battle. Epeios prays to Athena. The horse causes the gods to break out in a brief fight until Zeus ends it. Neoptolemos, Menelaos, Odysseus, Sthenalos, Diomedes and Philoctetes are among those that board the horse. Agamemnon and Nestor stay behind. The Argives leave the horse and Sinon at Troy and pretend to flee. Sinon is heavily disfigured and left as a messenger. He says that the horse is a tribute to Tritogeneia, but Laocoon sees through the deception. He tries to urge the Trojans to burn the horse, but he is struck with blindness by Athena. He and his children are killed by two serpents. The Trojans attempt to sacrifice to the gods, but the sacrifices refuse to catch fire. Statues begin to weep and temples are stained with blood, but the Trojans are not impressed by these negative omens. Cassandra also knows the truth about the horse, but is cursed so that nobody believes her. She attempts to burn the horse but is prevented from doing so. The Trojans celebrate their victory, but are left unprepared for the Argives as they exit the horse and kill the Trojans. Priam is killed by Neoptolemos. Menelaos kills Deiphobos, who has married Helen after Paris' death. Troy is burned to the ground. The women of Troy are given to the heroes of the Argives. Much of the events here are similar to the events in Euripides' Trojan Women. Ajax the Lesser rapes Cassandra in Athena's shrine, so he is killed by the gods. The major characters The Argives (Ἀργεĩοι). Agamemnon — King of Mycenae; leader of the Greeks. Achilles — Son of Thetis; champion of the Greeks. Odysseus — King of Ithaca. Ajax the Greater — son of Telamon, with Diomedes, he is second to Achilles in martial prowess. Menelaus — King of Sparta; husband of Helen and brother of Agamemnon. Diomedes — son of Tydeus, King of Argos. Nestor - King of Pylos. Ajax the Lesser — son of Oileus Calchas — Seer Neoptolemus — Son of Achilles Philoctetes — Wielder of Heracles' bow Trojans Aeneas — son of Anchises and Aphrodite. Alexander (Paris) — Helen's captor. Priam — King of Troy. Polydamas - Son of Priam; Strategist. Deiphobus - Brother of Hector Cassandra - Prophetess of Troy Hecuba - Wife of Priam; Queen of the Trojans. Andromache - Wife of Hector Warriors other than those that dwell in Troy are brought in to fight as well. Penthesileia - Amazonian queen Memnon - King of the Aithiopians Eurypylus - Commander of the Mysians Major gods: Zeus Hera Apollo Aphrodite Ares Athena Hermes Poseidon Hephaestus Minor gods: Eris Iris Thetis Themis Relationship to previous epics Its style has been criticized by many scholars as subpar to Homer, but it is valuable as the earliest surviving account of this period in the Trojan War. The Iliad ends with "Such was the funeral of Hector, tamer of horses"; later poets changed this to however it might fit their needs. Quintus used it as an opening line: "Such was the funeral of Hector. And now there came an Amazon..." The purpose of the story seems to be to complete the Iliad and give the characters a sense of closure. Many of the characters who had hated an ally in prior works, such as Philoctetes to Odysseus in Sophocles' play, now easily overcome the anger to create harmony. Critical editions A. Zimmermann, Quinti Smyrnaei Posthomericorum libri XIV, Leipzig 1891 (reprinted Stuttgart 1969). F. Vian, La suite d'Homère. Texte établi et traduit par Francis Vian, I-III, Paris 1963–9. G. Pompella, Quinti Smyrnaei Posthomerica. Olms-Weidmann, Hildesheim & New York 2002. Alan James, Quintus of Smyrna, The Trojan War: Posthomerica, English translation, Johns Hopkins 2004. References External links (translation by Arthur Sanders Way) 4th-century poems Ancient Greek epic poems Trojan War literature Agamemnon Achilles Amazons (Greek mythology) Sororicide in fiction Priam Apollo Zeus Odysseus Thetis

5230861

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Madagascar%20dry%20deciduous%20forests

Madagascar dry deciduous forests

The Madagascar dry deciduous forests represent a tropical dry forest ecoregion situated in the western and northern part of Madagascar. The area has high numbers of endemic plant and animal species but has suffered large-scale clearance for agriculture. They are among the world's richest and most distinctive dry forests and included in the Global 200 ecoregions by the World Wide Fund. The area is also home to distinctive limestone karst formations known as tsingy, including the World Heritage Site of Bemaraha. Geography There are two separate areas within the ecoregion: the western side of Madagascar from the Ampasindava peninsula in the north to Belo-sur-Tsiribihina and Maromandia in the south (this is most of Mahajanga Province); and the northern tip of the island (apart from the high areas of Amber Mountain). Geological substrate is varied and includes the tsingy limestone massifs. These dry deciduous forests span the coastal plain with its limestone plateaus emanating virtually at sea level to higher altitudes to roughly . The area includes wetlands and grasslands (mostly created by forest clearance for agriculture) as well as dry forests characterized by a deciduous canopy extending to a height of . Climate is tropical, with summer daytime temperatures commonly exceeding , and a wet season between October and April. Rainfall, ranging from 1,000 to 1,500 mm, is more abundant than in the spiny thickets and succulent woodlands, but lower than in the eastern lowland rainforests. Flora While the absolute number of plant species is lower than in the eastern rainforests of the island, the dry deciduous forests of Madagascar have a higher ratio of endemic species. Trees have adapted to the dry climate by shedding leaves in the dry winter season to limit evapotranspiration. Moreover, some species like baobabs and Moringa have adapted by evolving the ability to store copious water in their large bulbous trunks. Four species of baobabs, including three endemics (Adansonia grandidieri, A. madagascariensis and A. suarezensis) occur in this ecoregion. Other notable tree species include flamboyant tree (Delonix regia), Pachypodium species, and several Fabaceae and Rubiaceae. Forest understory plants include Lissochilus orchids such as Oeceoclades calcarata, a large, cool growing, showy, terrestrial orchid which grows at medium elevation (1000 to 2000 meters) in western Madagascar. Its habitat is semi-arid and it is found growing in sandy or rocky soils in dry moss and lichen forests. Fauna One characteristic in common with other tropical and subtropical dry broadleaf forests is the presence of relatively high densities of mammalian biomass. Several of Madagascar's characteristic lemur species are found here including the fat-tailed dwarf lemur, five subspecies of Propithecus, three species of Lepilemur, and five species of Microcebus. Endemic mammals include three endangered species, golden-crowned sifaka (Propithecus tattersalli) and Perrier's sifaka (Propithecus diadema perrieri) and western forest rat (Nesomys lambertoni) as well as mongoose lemur (Eulemur mongoz), golden-brown mouse lemur (Microcebus ravelobensis), northern rufous mouse lemur (M. tavaratra), pygmy mouse lemur (M. myoxinus), Milne-Edwards' sportive lemur (Lepilemur edwardsi), and greater big-footed mouse (Macrotarsomys ingens). As well as lemurs the dry forests are home to the island's largest predator, the fossa (Cryptoprocta ferox) and some smaller carnivorans. The lakes and rivers of the dry forest region are homes to most of Madagascar's bird species. Among reptiles, many chameleon and gecko species occur here, as well as the Madagascar sideneck turtle and the critically endangered ploughshare tortoise. Threats and conservation Most dry forests have already been destroyed by human action, especially near the Central Highlands. The remaining forest is severely fragmented. Burning, grazing, and logging are the major threats, and siltation, overfishing and invasive species impact the wetlands. Some species such as lemurs suffer from hunting. 5.79% of the ecoregion is in protected areas. They include: Ankarafantsika National Park Baie de Baly National Park Bemaraha National Park Montagne d'Ambre National Park Namoroka National Park Tsingy de Bemaraha Strict Nature Reserve Ambohijanahary Reserve Analamerana Special Reserve Ankarana Special Reserve Bemarivo Reserve Bora Reserve Kasijy Special Reserve Maningoza Reserve Manongarivo Reserve Tampoketsa Analamaitso Special Reserve Particular localities Ankarana Special Reserve The Ankarana Massif consists of a limestone shelf which imposes a picturesque land-form on the few adventurers who find this remote forest. As the limestone has weathered over geologic time, this karst formation often exhibits spiry pinnacles, called "tsingy" locally. The name derives from the Malagasy word which means "walk on tiptoe", used by the earliest settlers from around 1500 years ago to describe the sharpness of the rugged limestone shelves. There are an abundance of limestone caves and virgin forests that shelter the diverse wildlife of the Ankarana region. In places the cave roofs have collapsed to form isolated forests and the vegetation of the gorges is also protected by the topography. Subterranean rivers provide a natural perennial irrigation system. The Ankarana Special Reserve is one of the northernmost reaches of the Madagascar dry deciduous forests, and is very hot from December through March with this equatorial proximity. Access to wildlife viewing is through strenuous hiking, given the elevation differences, complex terrain and heat, but four-wheel drive vehicles can reach most of the actual campsites. Below the massif, and to the west, is a grassy savannah-with-palms that leads to the Indian Ocean. Within the massif, Lac Vert is found among tsingy formations. Mammals found in this forest include the apex predator fossa (Cryptoprocta ferox), the fanaloka (Fossa fossana), northern ring-tailed mongoose and numerous bat species. Lemurs occurring here include the crowned lemur, northern sportive lemur, gray mouse lemur, Sanford's brown lemur and the aye-aye. Numerous geckos inhabit the reserve including the Henkel's leaf-tailed gecko, big-headed gecko and day gecko. Other local reptiles are the Madagascar ground boa, the white-lipped chameleon (Furcifer minor) and Oustalet's chameleon, the world's largest chameleon, which can attain 68 centimetres in length. Some bird species commonly seen are the hook-billed vanga, Madagascar pygmy kingfisher, crested coua, white-breasted mesite and Madagascar ibis. Raptors sighted in the reserve include the Madagascar harrier-hawk and the Madagascar scops owl. Other avafauna occurring here include red-capped coua and Coquerel's coua, and the vangas Van Dam's vanga, rufous vanga and sickle-billed vanga. Vangas are significant in Madagascar, as 15 of the 16 vanga species are endemic to Madagascar. The greater vasa parrot and Madagascar green pigeon are also indigenous. An important endangered species, the Madagascar fish eagle, has a number of breeding pairs located in the Ankarana Reserve. Anjajavy Forest Anjajavy Forest is an example of a purely lowland dry deciduous forest in northwest Madagascar. It is punctuated with numerous tsingy outcroppings and limestone karst caves, and in many locations abuts the Indian Ocean, especially where the dramatic tsingy formations jut out into the ocean. The canopy height is typically 15 to 25 meters high, and is at its lowest at the coastal verge, where growth may be impeded by saline rocky soils. The forest resides on a small peninsula of land poking into the Indian Ocean, that is bounded on the north and part of its eastern extent by the Bay of Narinda and on the south by the Bay of Majajamba. Access to this forest is difficult since there are no roads connecting this peninsula to the Madagascar highway system; however, arrival by sea and by air are accomplished with some effort. In many places at the ocean edge as well as forest interior, several tree species are capable of taking root directly in the tsingy rocks. Several species of baobab and tamarind are among the tallest species forming the canopy. Considering the lower precipitation rates on the west coast (about 1,300 mm per annum at Anjajavy Forest), the vegetation is surprisingly verdant in the beginning of the dry season, but eventually will become mostly leafless by late winter. The forest understory is moderately dense but not impenetrable. Nor is the understory heavily thorned in most locations. The Anjajavy Forest is named for a kind of Salvadora species, the jajavy tree, which might be endemic only to the forest itself. Abundant diurnal lemurs that are found here include the Coquerel's sifaka and the common brown lemur. Three nocturnal species of mouse lemur are seen, but their precise species are yet to be documented. A large variety of birds are present including the endangered Madagascar fish eagle, which has four (of the approximately 99 known) breeding pairs resident in Anjajavy Forest. Other birdlife present are the sacred ibis, crested coua, kingfishers and Madagascar wagtail. Butterflies include the magpie crow. Numerous lizards, chameleons and snakes populate the forest and are easily seen from the sparse trail network. The dry forest is invaded by fingers of mangrove swamp in the form of riparian zones at several small coastal estuaries at the western verge of the Anjajavy Forest, where small tidal streams flow into the Indian Ocean. The species of the mangrove swamps are, of course, totally different from the dry forest, and the transition zone supports an interesting ecotone, providing unusual niches for several species of animals. See also Ecoregions of Madagascar References External links Ankarana Reserve, Parcs et reserves de Madagascar, le site officiel Anjajavy Forest Google satellite map Further detail on Kirindy and Ampijoroa Forests Ecoregions of Madagascar Forests of Madagascar Tropical and subtropical dry broadleaf forests Boeny Melaky Menabe Diana Region Sofia Region Betsiboka

5233169

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shabbaton

Shabbaton

Hebrew translation The Hebrew term shabbaton () may be translated into English to mean sabbatical. The concept of a sabbatical year (shmita) has a source in several places in the Bible (e.g. Leviticus 25), where there is a commandment to desist from working the fields in the seventh year. Use in Israel In contemporary Israel, when one takes a shabbaton, one takes the year off in search of other pursuits. It is an extended rest from work, a hiatus, typically 2 months plus. This period is called (a) sabbatical. Use in English-speaking countries In English-speaking countries, the term shabbaton is often employed to mean an event or program of education, and usually celebration, that is held on a Shabbat (Jewish sabbath). Sometimes a shabbaton is an entire weekend with the main focus on the Shabbat. Many communities have such events, including youth groups, singles groups, synagogues, schools, social groups, charitable groups or even family reunions. These events can be multi-generational and wide open, or limited to a small specific group. A shabbaton can be held where a group usually meets, or at an off-site location. By calling such a program a shabbaton, rather than just a "retreat", one signifies recognition of the importance of Shabbat in the event or program. See also List of Jewish youth organizations Shomer Shabbat References Shabbat Hebrew words and phrases

5235884

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/EF%20Johnson%20Technologies

EF Johnson Technologies

EF Johnson Technologies, Inc. is a two-way radio manufacturer founded by its namesake, Edgar Frederick Johnson, in Waseca, Minnesota, United States in 1923. Today it is a wholly owned subsidiary of JVCKenwood of Yokohama, Japan. EF Johnson Technologies offers a wide range of equipment for use by law enforcement, firefighters, EMS, and military. Products include Project 25 systems, portable/mobile two-way radios, and radio encryption products. (Recent) Product introductions 2013: Introduced Viking VP900 multi-band portable radio. 2012: Introduced Viking VP600 portable radio. 2011: Introduced ATLAS P25 System Solutions. Named the Hot Product by APCO's Public Safety Communications magazine. 2010: Introduced the 51FIRE ES, the first portable radio engineered specifically for firefighters. 2009: Introduced Hybrid IP25, a Project 25 compliant wide area conventional system and a hybrid network intended to allow first responders to operate and interoperate between the conventional and trunked systems and eliminate the need for dispatchers to manually patch calls between the two systems. 2009: Introduced StarGate Dispatch Console, an IP-based dispatch console for first responders. StarGate was named the Hot Product by Public Safety Communications, the official magazine of the Association of Public-Safety Communications Officials (APCO). 2008: Introduced the Lightning Control Head, a mobile radio control head that incorporates electroluminescent technology. 2007: Introduced IP25 MultiSite, a switchless Project 25 trunked infrastructure system that is specifically designed for first responders. This Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) based system meets the NTIA mandates for narrowband operation in VHF and UHF frequencies as well as DOD mandates for Project 25 compliance. 2006: EF Johnson introduces the Enhanced (AMBE+2) Project 25 Vocoder in its entire radio product line. History The company was founded in 1923 by Edgar F. Johnson and his wife Ethel Johnson. The company began as a mail order business, selling radio transmitting parts to amateurs and early radio broadcasters from space shared with a woodworking shop located in downtown Waseca. In 1936, E.F. Johnson Co. built its first factory and office building in Waseca, and had 17 employees. The company designed and produced electronic components in volume, and was active in World War II defense production. By 1945, the company had grown to 500 employees with expanded facilities in a garage, a nearby grocery store and the Odd Fellows Hall. In 1949, the first of the company's amateur radio transmitters were manufactured, the Viking I model. The Viking line of amateur transmitters included the Valiant, Ranger and Pacemaker. In 1958, the company manufactured equipment for the Class D Citizens Band Radio. One such transceiver, the Johnson Messenger, is exhibited in the Smithsonian Institution as an example of early American-made technology. The company transitioned to development and manufacturing of land-mobile radio products such as the Logic Trunked Radio trunking format. EFJohnson's discontinued Viking line of amateur radio transmitter products are collected, restored, and operated by a number of vintage amateur radio enthusiasts. In 1982, the company merged with Western Union, and was later purchased in 1997 by software manufacturer Transcrypt International. Headquarters relocated to Irving, Texas in 2005 and the company became EF Johnson Technologies in 2008. In 2010, EF Johnson Technologies, Inc. was acquired by Francisco Partners, and later absorbed by Japanese electronics company JVCKenwood in 2014. See also Zetron JVCKenwood Notes External links E.F. Johnson Rigs Waseca County, Minnesota Radio technology Amateur radio companies Companies based in Minnesota Electronics companies established in 1923 Electronics companies of the United States 1923 establishments in Minnesota JVCKenwood American subsidiaries of foreign companies Radio manufacturers

5240327

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dvorak%20technique

Dvorak technique

The Dvorak technique (developed between 1969 and 1984 by Vernon Dvorak) is a widely used system to estimate tropical cyclone intensity (which includes tropical depression, tropical storm, and hurricane/typhoon/intense tropical cyclone intensities) based solely on visible and infrared satellite images. Within the Dvorak satellite strength estimate for tropical cyclones, there are several visual patterns that a cyclone may take on which define the upper and lower bounds on its intensity. The primary patterns used are curved band pattern (T1.0-T4.5), shear pattern (T1.5–T3.5), central dense overcast (CDO) pattern (T2.5–T5.0), central cold cover (CCC) pattern, banding eye pattern (T4.0–T4.5), and eye pattern (T4.5–T8.0). Both the central dense overcast and embedded eye pattern use the size of the CDO. The CDO pattern intensities start at T2.5, equivalent to minimal tropical storm intensity (40 mph, 65 km/h). The shape of the central dense overcast is also considered. The eye pattern utilizes the coldness of the cloud tops within the surrounding mass of thunderstorms and contrasts it with the temperature within the eye itself. The larger the temperature difference is, the stronger the tropical cyclone. Once a pattern is identified, the storm features (such as length and curvature of banding features) are further analyzed to arrive at a particular T-number. The CCC pattern indicates little development is occurring, despite the cold cloud tops associated with the quickly evolving feature. Several agencies issue Dvorak intensity numbers for tropical cyclones and their precursors, including the National Hurricane Center's Tropical Analysis and Forecast Branch (TAFB), the NOAA/NESDIS Satellite Analysis Branch (SAB), and the Joint Typhoon Warning Center at the Naval Meteorology and Oceanography Command in Pearl Harbor, Hawaii. Evolution of the method The initial development of this technique occurred in 1969 by Vernon Dvorak, using satellite pictures of tropical cyclones within the northwest Pacific Ocean. The system as it was initially conceived involved pattern matching of cloud features with a development and decay model. As the technique matured through the 1970s and 1980s, measurement of cloud features became dominant in defining tropical cyclone intensity and central pressure of the tropical cyclone's low-pressure area. Use of infrared satellite imagery led to a more objective assessment of the strength of tropical cyclones with eyes, using the cloud top temperatures within the eyewall and contrasting them with the warm temperatures within the eye itself. Constraints on short term intensity change are used less frequently than they were back in the 1970s and 1980s. The central pressures assigned to tropical cyclones have required modification, as the original estimates were 5–10 hPa (0.15–0.29 inHg) too low in the Atlantic and up to 20 hPa (0.59 inHg) too high in the northwest Pacific. This led to the development of a separate wind-pressure relationship for the northwest Pacific, devised by Atkinson and Holliday in 1975, then modified in 1977. As human analysts using the technique lead to subjective biases, efforts have been made to make more objective estimates using computer programs, which have been aided by higher-resolution satellite imagery and more powerful computers. Since tropical cyclone satellite patterns can fluctuate over time, automated techniques use a six-hour averaging period to lead to more reliable intensity estimates. Development of the objective Dvorak technique began in 1998, which performed best with tropical cyclones that had eyes (of hurricane or typhoon strength). It still required a manual center placement, keeping some subjectivity within the process. By 2004, an advanced objective Dvorak technique was developed which utilized banding features for systems below hurricane intensity and to objectively determine the tropical cyclone's center. A central pressure bias was uncovered in 2004 relating to the slope of the tropopause and cloud top temperatures which change with latitude that helped improve central pressure estimates within the objective technique. Details of the method In a developing cyclone, the technique takes advantage of the fact that cyclones of similar intensity tend to have certain characteristic features, and as they strengthen, they tend to change in appearance in a predictable manner. The structure and organization of the tropical cyclone are tracked over 24 hours to determine if the storm has weakened, maintained its intensity, or strengthened. Various central cloud and banding features are compared with templates that show typical storm patterns and their associated intensity. If infrared satellite imagery is available for a cyclone with a visible eye pattern, then the technique utilizes the difference between the temperature of the warm eye and the surrounding cold cloud tops to determine intensity (colder cloud tops generally indicate a more intense storm). In each case a "T-number" (an abbreviation for Tropical Number) and a Current Intensity (CI) value are assigned to the storm. These measurements range between 1 (minimum intensity) and 8 (maximum intensity). The T-number and CI value are the same except for weakening storms, in which case the CI is higher. For weakening systems, the CI is held as the tropical cyclone intensity for 12 hours, though research from the National Hurricane Center indicates that six hours is more reasonable. The table at right shows the approximate surface wind speed and sea level pressure that corresponds to a given T-number. The amount a tropical cyclone can change in strength per 24-hour period is limited to 2.5 T-numbers per day. Pattern types Within the Dvorak satellite strength estimate for tropical cyclones, there are several visual patterns that a cyclone may take on which define the upper and lower bounds on its intensity. The primary patterns used are curved band pattern (T1.0-T4.5), shear pattern (T1.5-T3.5), central dense overcast (CDO) pattern (T2.5-T5.0), banding eye pattern (T4.0-T4.5), eye pattern (T4.5 – T8.0), and central cold cover (CCC) pattern. Both the central dense overcast and embedded eye pattern utilize the size of the CDO. The CDO pattern intensities start at T2.5, equivalent to minimal tropical storm intensity (). The shape of the central dense overcast is also considered. The farther the center is tucked into the CDO, the stronger it is deemed. Tropical cyclones with maximum sustained winds between and can have their center of circulations obscured by cloudiness of the central dense overcast within visible and infrared satellite imagery, which makes diagnosis of their intensity a challenge. The CCC pattern, with its large and quickly developing mass of thick cirrus clouds spreading out from an area of convection near a tropical cyclone center within a short time frame, indicates little development. When it develops, rainbands and cloud lines around the tropical cyclone weaken and the thick cloud shield obscures the circulation center. While it resembles a CDO pattern, it is rarely seen. The eye pattern utilizes the coldness of the cloud tops within the surrounding mass of thunderstorms and contrasts it with the temperature within the eye itself. The larger the temperature difference is, the stronger the tropical cyclone. Winds within tropical cyclones can also be estimated by tracking features within the CDO using rapid scan geostationary satellite imagery, whose pictures are taken minutes apart rather than every half-hour. Once a pattern is identified, the storm features (such as length and curvature of banding features) are further analyzed to arrive at a particular T-number. Usage Several agencies issue Dvorak intensity numbers for tropical cyclones and their precursors. These include the National Hurricane Center's Tropical Analysis and Forecast Branch (TAFB), the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's Satellite Analysis Branch (SAB), and the Joint Typhoon Warning Center at the Naval Pacific Meteorology and Oceanography Center in Pearl Harbor, Hawaii. The National Hurricane Center will often quote Dvorak T-numbers in their tropical cyclone products. The following example is from discussion number 3 of Tropical Depression 24 (eventually Hurricane Wilma) of the 2005 Atlantic hurricane season: BOTH TAFB AND SAB CAME IN WITH A DVORAK SATELLITE INTENSITY ESTIMATE OF T2.5/35 KT. HOWEVER ...OFTENTIMES THE SURFACE WIND FIELD OF LARGE DEVELOPING LOW PRESSURE SYSTEMS LIKE THIS ONE WILL LAG ABOUT 12 HOURS BEHIND THE SATELLITE SIGNATURE. THEREFORE... THE INITIAL INTENSITY HAS ONLY BEEN INCREASED TO 30 KT. Note that in this case the Dvorak T-number (in this case T2.5) was simply used as a guide but other factors determined how the NHC decided to set the system's intensity. The Cooperative Institute for Meteorological Satellite Studies (CIMSS) at the University of Wisconsin–Madison has developed the Objective Dvorak Technique (ODT). This is a modified version of the Dvorak technique which uses computer algorithms rather than subjective human interpretation to arrive at a CI number. This is generally not implemented for tropical depressions or weak tropical storms. The China Meteorological Agency (CMA) is expected to start using the standard 1984 version of Dvorak in the near future. The Indian Meteorological Department (IMD) prefers using visible satellite imagery over infrared imagery due to a perceived high bias in estimates derived from infrared imagery during the early morning hours of convective maximum. The Japan Meteorological Agency (JMA) uses the infrared version of Dvorak over the visible imagery version. Hong Kong Observatory and JMA continue to utilize Dvorak after tropical cyclone landfall. Various centers hold on to the maximum current intensity for 6–12 hours, though this rule is broken when rapid weakening is obvious. Citizen science site Cyclone Center uses a modified version of the Dvorak technique to categorize post-1970 tropical weather. Benefits and disadvantages The most significant benefit of the use of the technique is that it has provided a more complete history of tropical cyclone intensity in areas where aircraft reconnaissance is neither possible nor routinely available. Intensity estimates of maximum sustained wind are currently within of what aircraft are able to measure half of the time, though the assignment of intensity of systems with strengths between moderate tropical-storm force () and weak hurricane- or typhoon-force () is the least certain. Its overall precision has not always been true, as refinements in the technique led to intensity changes between 1972 and 1977 of up to . The method is internally consistent in that it constrains rapid increases or decreases in tropical cyclone intensity. Some tropical cyclones fluctuate in strength more than the 2.5 T numbers per day limit allowed by the rule, which can work to the technique's disadvantage and has led to occasional abandonment of the constraints since the 1980s. Systems with small eyes near the limb, or edge, of a satellite image can be biased too weakly using the technique, which can be resolved through use of polar-orbiting satellite imagery. Subtropical cyclone intensity cannot be determined using Dvorak, which led to the development of the Hebert-Poteat technique in 1975. Cyclones undergoing extratropical transition, losing their thunderstorm activity, see their intensities underestimated using the Dvorak technique. This led to the development of the Miller and Lander extratropical transition technique which can be used under these circumstances. See also Other tools used to determine tropical cyclone intensity: Quikscat TRMM References External links Agencies issuing Dvorak intensity estimates Joint Typhoon Warning Center UW–CIMSS (Advanced Dvorak Technique) NOAA/NESDIS Satellite Analysis Branch About the TAFB Other Tropical Cyclone Intensity Analysis and Forecasting from Satellite Imagery Dvorak, 1974. (PDF, 1.3 MB) Dvorak Tropical Cyclone Wind Speed Biases Determined from Reconnaissance-based "Best Track" Data (1997–2003) Franklin and Brown The Dvorak Technique Through Time Dr. Jack Beven. (WRF File. Requires WebEx player) Satellite interpretation Tropical cyclone meteorology

5243796

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aerofilms

Aerofilms

Aerofilms Ltd was the UK's first commercial aerial photography company, founded in 1919 by Francis Wills and Claude Graham White. Wills had served as an Observer with the Royal Naval Air Service during World War I, and was the driving force behind the expansion of the company from an office and a bathroom (for developing films) in Hendon to a business with major contracts in Africa and Asia as well as in the UK. Co-founder Graham-White was a pioneer aviator who had achieved fame by making the first night flight in 1910. History Operations began from the Stag Lane Aerodrome at Edgware, using the aircraft of the London Flying School. Subsequently, the Aircraft Manufacturing Company (later the De Havilland Aircraft Company), hired an Airco DH.9 along with pilot entrepreneur Alan Cobham. In its early years, Aerofilms had links with pioneer cinematographer Claude Friese-Greene. From 1921, Aerofilms carried out vertical photography for survey and mapping purposes. During the 1930s, the company pioneered the science of photogrammetry (mapping from aerial photographs), with the Ordnance Survey amongst the company's clients. In its earliest days, the main work of the company had been oblique photography, and the images were often sold to postcard manufacturers. In 1925, Aircraft Operating Company took over Aerofilms, and expanded its operations, based at Hendon. In 1940, the company's staff and state-of-the-art equipment were co-opted into the war effort, forming the nucleus of the Allied Photographic Interpretation Unit at Medmenham. It was at this time that Sir Percy Hunting became interested in the company, which led Aerofilms to become a member of the Hunting Group of Companies in 1942. After the war, Aerofilms became responsible for oblique photography, whilst Hunting Aerosurveys undertook vertical photography for survey. Post-war redevelopment and industrial expansion kept both Aerofilms and Hunting Surveys Ltd hard at work, which has resulted in an expansive library of historic aerial photography. Unlike other photographic libraries, a significant percentage of Aerofilms photos is already in the public domain, albeit protected by copyright. The company would send out batches of photos to public libraries, and many remain there today. In addition, key images were reproduced as postcards from the 1920s through to the 1980s. In addition to Aerofilms’ own imagery, the firm expanded its holdings with the purchase of two smaller collections – AeroPictorial (1934-1960) and Airviews (1947-1991). In 1997, the parent company of Simmons Mapping (UK) Ltd acquired Aerofilms Limited, and in 2001, the two companies merged to form Simmons Aerofilms Ltd. In 2005, Simmons Aerofilms was taken over by Norwegian-based geographical information and offshore technology company Blom and is now known as Blom Aerofilms / Blom UK. In June 2007, Blom sold the historic Aerofilms oblique library to English Heritage in partnership with The Royal Commission on the Ancient and Historical Monuments of Scotland (RCAHMS) and The Royal Commission on the Ancient and Historical Monuments of Wales (RCAHMW). Since then the bulk of the negatives from 1919 to the early 1950s have been digitised, geo-referenced and made available online as Britain from Above. The digitization project took 4 years with financial help from the Heritage Lottery Fund, The Foyle Foundation and other donors and now, over 95,000 images are available on the website. Photographs attributed to Aerofilms Ltd are also held in the Conway Library at The Courtauld Institute of Art whose archive, of primarily architectural images, is being digitised under the wider Courtauld Connects project. Publication of photos Aerofilms photographs have been used in books relating to geography, topography and travel, and have featured in books such as The Aerofilms Book of England from the Air (1988) and Coastlines from the Air (1996). In addition its photographs are used in the series Aerofilms Guide: Football Grounds, first published in 1993 and updated on an annual basis. Another example of the company's work was the title-sequence mosaic of east London, used until 2009, for the BBC soap EastEnders. Photographs from the archive feature in the 2008 book British Seaside Piers by Richard Riding and Chris Mawson, former Aerofilms librarian. The Aerofilms Historic Collection is an archive of oblique aerial photography of the United Kingdom. It now includes 1.26 million negatives and more than 2000 photograph albums—The Times reporting in 1995 that Aerofilms had 1.12 million photographs spanning 75 years. Its chronological and geographical coverage documents the face of Britain dating from 1919 to recent years, providing evidence of a period of change and, according to English Heritage, "includes the largest and most significant number of air photographs of Britain taken before 1939". The collection covers the countryside, industrial and urban landscapes, archaeological sites and historic buildings and charts the growth of new towns and the spread of motorways across the landscape. Almost every community is represented, many with a series of views taken over the decades showing how cities, towns and villages have changed and grown. This provides a resource for understanding and managing the built and natural environments. The albums containing photographs are held in England, Wales and Scotland according to their coverage. In England the negatives, albums and associated documentation are in specialist archival storage at the Historic England Archive in Swindon. References External links The Britain from Above Project - over 95,000 of the oldest photographs online British companies established in 1919 Aerial photography Postcard publishers

5247535

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mysteries%20of%20the%20Unknown

Mysteries of the Unknown

Mysteries of the Unknown is a series of books about the paranormal, published by Time-Life Books from 1987 through 1991. Each book focused on a different topic, such as ghosts, UFOs, psychic powers and dreams. This book series includes books like The UFO Phenomenon, Witches and Witchcraft (Mysteries of the Unknown Series), Hauntings, and several more. The idea for the series was conceived following the popularity of the publisher's previous Enchanted World book series. The Mysteries of the Unknown series used scientific aspects for credibility of its theories. The books broke the sales record for the company. Time-Life published a companion series, Collector's Library of the Unknown, from 1991 through 1993. Titles in the series There were 33 volumes in the series: 01. Mystic Places: Discusses places known for supernatural activity or ancient mysteries yet unsolved. Topics include the search for Atlantis, traveling to the Earth's center, the Great Pyramid of Giza, Stonehenge, and the Nazca lines. 02. Psychic Powers: Discusses ESP and other people who claim to possess psychic abilities. Includes information on Patience Worth and the involvement of psychics in the Yorkshire Ripper case. 03. The UFO Phenomenon: Discusses sightings and controversies regarding unidentified flying objects. Topics include alien encounters, the Roswell incident, and allegations of government cover-ups. 04. Psychic Voyages: Discusses accounts of out-of-body experiences, near-death experiences, and reincarnation. 05. Phantom Encounters: Discuses encounters with mysteries apparitions. Includes stories haunted families, banishing ghosts, and various ghost stories from Japan. 06. Visions and Prophecies 07. Mysterious Creatures: Discusses cryptozoology, with a focus on sea monsters and ape-men. Topics include Nessie, the Patterson–Gimlin film, Ameranthropoides loysi, and mokele-mbembe. 08. Mind Over Matter: Deals predominantly with people who possess abilities considered abnormal, though not necessarily supernatural. Discusses hypnosis, poltergeists, levitation and Uri Geller. 09. Cosmic Connections: Discusses mankind's long curiosity about the influence of celestial bodies. Includes extensive looks at the solar system and the zodiac. 10. Spirit Summonings: Discusses mediums and seances. Topics include the Fox sisters, Daniel Dunglas Home, and Harry Houdini's debunking of mediums. 11. Ancient Wisdom and Secret Sects: Includes details on Hermeticism and secret societies. 12. Hauntings: Discusses the apparent haunting of people and places by ghosts, as well as ghosting hunting. Includes information on poltergeists, the Moberly–Jourdain incident, ghost ships and the Bell witch. 13. Powers of Healing: Discusses unexplained alternatives to traditional medicine. Topics include medicine men, Edgar Cayce, acupuncture, Rasputin and chakras. 14. Search for the Soul 15. Transformations: Discusses human transformation into animals or other supernatural creatures. Focuses on werewolves and vampires. Topics include tricksters, feral children, Peter Stubbe and Elizabeth Báthory. 16. Dreams and Dreaming 17. Witches and Witchcraft 18. Time and Space: Deals predominantly with the history of human interpretations of time and space, as well as unusual phenomena associated with the two (such as time slips). Quantum physics and Pythagorean mysticism are discussed at length. 19. Magical Arts 20. Utopian Visions 21. Secrets of the Alchemists 22. Eastern Mysteries 23. Earth Energies 24. Cosmic Duality: The concept of duality (good/evil, black/white, male/female) is discussed in depth. Topics include Zoroastrianism, Satanism, conceptions of God and Goddess, demon possession and exorcism. 25. Mysterious Lands and Peoples 26. The Mind and Beyond 27. Mystic Quests 28. Search for Immortality 29. The Mystical Year 30. The Psychics 31. Alien Encounters: Discusses extraterrestrial encounters and possible abductions. 32. The Mysterious World 33. Master Index and Illustrated Symbols Complete 33-Volume Set: Time Life; Mysteries of the Unknown Hardcover – 1991 Commercials Time-Life's Mysteries of the Unknown commercials would air during prime time through broadcast and cable television networks such as TNN, Nick At Nite, MTV, VH-1, and TNT. The first commercial advertising Mysteries of the Unknown aired in September 1987; the voice-over narration started with "Chicago: a man is about to board a routine flight and suddenly he pauses, and walks away. An hour later the plane goes down in flames. It's dismissed as chance." One- and two-minute versions of this commercial were aired. A second commercial aired in September 1988; the voice-over narration began with: "How can you explain it? A woman in Wisconsin is doing the dishes, while suddenly she has a feeling that her daughter has been just been in an accident. She gets a desperate phone call and finds out her feeling has just become true. How can you explain that various people around the world – who had never met before – had encounters with beings from outer space and their descriptions of the creature match almost exactly [sketch art of grey aliens appear on screen during this narration]? That's why Time-Life Books presents a remarkable new series, Mysteries of the Unknown, which takes a clear and comprehensive look at our own untapped capabilities. Maybe no one can explain these things but they can no longer be ignored. How can you explain this? Four men enter a ring of trees and without warning one is grabbed by an unseen force, lifted five feet in the air, and suspended for thirty seconds." Images of Stonehenge and a picture of bloody hands on a window are shown. In 1989, actress Julianne Moore appeared in a Mysteries of the Unknown commercial explaining out-of-body experiences. The narration describes her waking up in the middle of the night with the feeling of something cold on her shoulder, only to find that she was affixed to the ceiling, looking down at her own body from above. On New Year's Day of 1990, Time-Life aired another commercial for Mysteries of the Unknown in conjunction with TV Guide. References Book series introduced in 1987 Occult books Books about the paranormal Time Life book series

5247888

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Disaster%20Monitoring%20Constellation

Disaster Monitoring Constellation

The Disaster Monitoring Constellation for International Imaging (DMCii) or just Disaster Monitoring Constellation (DMC) consists of a number of remote sensing satellites constructed by Surrey Satellite Technology Ltd (SSTL) and operated for the Algerian, Nigerian, Turkish, British and Chinese governments by DMC International Imaging. The DMC provides emergency Earth imaging for disaster relief under the International Charter for Space and Major Disasters, which the DMC formally joined in November 2005. Other DMC Earth imagery is used for a variety of civil applications by a variety of governments. Spare available imaging capacity is sold under contract. The DMC provides far larger areas of imagery than, but at comparable resolution to, established government imaging satellites such as Landsat. DMC imagery was deliberately designed to be comparable to Landsat imagery, in order to leverage the expertise and software of the large established remote sensing community used to working with Landsat images. Imagery can be provided far more rapidly from the DMC than from Landsat, thanks to having multiple similar satellites in orbit ready to cross over a point of interest, and the larger images produced. This brings the responsiveness that is needed for emergencies and for disaster support, with images provided across the Internet from the responsive satellite and a member country's ground station within a day or less of a request being made. The DMC has monitored the effects and aftermath of the Indian Ocean Tsunami (December 2004), Hurricane Katrina (August 2005), and many other floods, fires and disasters. Satellites The sun-synchronous orbits of these satellites are coordinated so that the satellites follow each other around an orbital plane, ascending north over the Equator at 10:15 am local time (and 10:30 am local time for Beijing-1). Some of these satellites also include other imaging payloads and experimental payloads: onboard hardware-based image compression (on BilSAT), a GPS reflectometry experiment and onboard Internet router (on the UK-DMC satellite). The DMC satellites are notable for communicating with their ground stations using the Internet Protocol for payload data transfer and command and control, so extending the Internet into space, and allowing experiments with the Interplanetary Internet to be carried out. Many of the technologies used in the design of the DMC satellites, including Internet Protocol use, were tested in space beforehand on SSTL's earlier UoSAT-12 satellite. First Generation AlSAT-1 (Algeria), launched November 2002, which completed its mission in August 2010. BILSAT-1 (Turkey), launched September 2003, which completed its mission in August 2006 due to failed battery cells. NigeriaSAT-1 (Nigeria), launched September 2003, completed mission October 2012. UK-DMC (United Kingdom), launched September 2003, completed mission November 2011. Second Generation Beijing-1 (China), launched October 2005. Completed its mission in 2013. UK-DMC 2 (United Kingdom), launched July 2009. Deimos-1 (Spanish commercial), launched July 2009. NigeriaSAT-2 and NigeriaSAT-X (NX) launched 2011. References External links Surrey Satellite Technology Ltd International Charter for Space and Major Disasters DMC International Imaging Description of the Disaster Monitoring Constellation from the Computerworld Honors Awards Description of the Disaster Monitoring Constellation from the Earth Observation Portal See also University of Surrey Satellite Internet access Satellites orbiting Earth Earth imaging satellites Disaster preparedness Satellite constellations

5247901

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Journey%20to%20the%20Center%20of%20the%20Earth%20%28TV%20series%29

Journey to the Center of the Earth (TV series)

Journey to the Center of the Earth is an American science fiction Saturday-morning cartoon, consisting of 17 episodes, each running 30 minutes. Produced by Filmation in association with 20th Century Fox Television, it aired from September 9, 1967, to September 6, 1969, on ABC Saturday Morning. It featured the voice of Ted Knight as Professor Lindenbrook/Sacknussem. It was later shown in reruns on Sci Fi Channel's Cartoon Quest. It appears to have taken the 1959 film, Journey to the Center of the Earth, as its starting point rather than Jules Verne's original 1864 novel; e.g., including the character of Count Sacknussem and Gertrude the duck. However, it moved even further away from Verne's novel than the 1959 film did. There are currently no plans to release the series on DVD and/or Blu-ray Disc from 20th Century Studios Home Entertainment, although most of the series is available for viewing on YouTube. Opening narration Long ago, a lone explorer named Arne Sacknussem made a fantastic descent to the fabled lost kingdom of Atlantis at the Earth's core. After many centuries, his trail was discovered: first by me, Professor Oliver Lindenbrook, my niece Cindy, student Alec McEwen, our guide Lars and his duck Gertrude. But we were not alone. The evil Count Sacknussem, last descendant of the once noble Sacknussem family, had followed us... to claim the center of the Earth for his power-mad schemes. He ordered his brute-like servant, Torg, to destroy our party. But the plan backfired, sealing the entrance forever. And so, for us, began a desperate race to the Earth's core... to learn the secret of the way back. This is the story of our new journey to the center of the Earth! Episodes Series credits Directed By Hal Sutherland Co-Directed By Norm McCabe, Lou Zukor Production Designer: Don Christensen Layout: Wes Herschensohn, Marilee Heyer, Ken Hultgren, Ray Jacobs, Mel Keefer, Dan Noonan Storyboards: Jan Green, Sherman Labby Background Supervisor: Ervin Kaplan Backgrounds: Venetia Epler, Martin Forte, Jack Healey, Ted Littlefield, Lorraine Morgan, Paul Xander Animators: Bob Bransford, Clark Davis, Otto Feuer, Ed Friedman, George Grandpre, Bill Hajee, Bob Kirk, Clarke Mallery, Jack Ozark, Amby Paliwoda, Virgil Raddatz, Lenn Redman, Len Rogers, Virgil Ross, Herb Rothwill, Bob Trochim, Xenia Ink and Paint Supervisor: Martha Buckley Assistant Ink and Paint Supervisor: Betty Brooks Animation Check: Ruth Craig, Renee Henning, Barbara Koponen, Ann Oliphant, Jane Philippi, Marion Turk Editorial Supervisor: Joseph Simon Assistant Film Editor: Lester Meisenheimer Film Coordinator: June Gilham Production Coordinator: Joe Lynch Production Assistant: Greg Kirsanoff Background Music Composed By John Gart Music Supervised By Gordon Zahler Sound By Ryder Sound Service Color By Technicolor Voice Talents Of Ted Knight, Pat Harrington, Jr., Jane Webb Produced By Lou Scheimer And Norm Prescott See also Where Time Began, 1978 Spanish adventure film based on Journey to the Center of the Earth by Jules Verne. References External links Journey to the Center of the Earth Cartoon Info @ The Big Cartoon Database Television shows based on works by Jules Verne Works based on Journey to the Center of the Earth American Broadcasting Company original programming 1960s American animated television series 1967 American television series debuts 1969 American television series endings American children's animated science fantasy television series Animated television shows based on films Television shows based on French novels Television series by Filmation Television series by 20th Century Fox Television Travel to the Earth's center

5250141

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Auroral%20chorus

Auroral chorus

An auroral chorus is a series of electromagnetic waves at frequencies which resemble chirps, whistles, and quasi-musical sounds in predominantly rising tones when played as pressure waves (sound), which are created by geomagnetic storms also responsible for the auroras. The sounds last approximately 0.1 to 1.0 seconds. Other auroral sounds includes hissing, swishing, rustling and cracking. The electromagnetic waves are a type of natural radio waves, vibrations of electric and magnetic energy occurring at the same frequency as sound. Detection Auroral chorus can be detected primarily around the magnetic equator, specifically in two distinct frequency bands, one above the equatorial half gyro-frequency and one below it. The gyro-frequency ranges from 0.6 kHz to about 1.6 kHz. Distinguishable on high resolution wideband spectrographs, the wave amplitude grows linearly then switches to non-linear. Demonstrating a peak distribution near dawn, the auroral chorus is most detectable via ELF/VLF Radio receivers in the middle latitude around 30-60 degrees N. The most numerous recordings of the auroral chorus has been by the Iowa Plasma Wave Group. They have released many audio interpretations of chorus recordings online along with spectrograph measurements. Historically, the sounds have been associated with spiritual events by Inuit in Canada who regularly experienced auroral chorus on cold, windless nights. Explanation The specific nature and source of the auroral chorus is a continuing question in space and atmospheric research. Cluster satellite observations suggest that the sounds are seemingly generated by numerous sources in rapid motion. Studies have shown a definite correlation on/off with fluctuations of solar wind and southward turning of IMF (which is correlated with aurora). The strength of noise correlates with strength of geomagnetic activity in the Earth's ionosphere. Other studies show a clear correlation peak at upper infrasound range (less than 20 Hz). A delay between the peak of auroral sounds and the peak of electromagnetic activity, corresponds to the speed of sound as if it were traveling from the auroral heights (80–100 km) to the Earth's surface. However, local electric field signals do not correlate well with sound signals. Some believe that it is probable that the auroral chorus doesn't originate at the point of aurorae but rather is transformed from slight wave ripples in the air into audible sound waves by objects closer to the observer. There remains a question of whether real sound waves exist or if somehow electromagnetic waves affects the human ear. See also Dawn chorus (electromagnetic) Aurora Geomagnetic storm Radio waves in the Ionosphere References External links N. G. Kleimenova and O. V. Kozyreva. "ELF Polar Chorus and Magnetic Storms",Schmidt Institute of Physics of the Earth, Russian Academy of Sciences, Russia, Geomagnetism and Aeronomy, 2007, Vol. 47, No. 3, pp. 336–342. © Pleiades Publishing, Ltd., 2007. Yang JunYing, CAO JinBin, Yan ChunZiao, Li LiuYuan, Ma YuDuan "The mid-high latitude whistler mode chorus waves observed around substorm onsets", Science in China Series E: Technological Sciences, October 2008, Vol.51, No 10, Springerlink Earth phenomena Electrical phenomena

5252179

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mozhayets-5

Mozhayets-5

The Mozhayets 5 was a Russian satellite launched on Thursday, 27 October 2005. Manufactured by AO Polyot and Mozhaisky Military Space Academy the satellite's purpose was to carry a set of scientific equipment for studying the effects of outer space factors on the operation of microelectronic devices and onboard computers. Shortly after launch telemetry fell silent as its Kosmos-3M class launch vehicle failed to separate from its third rocket stage and never reached an operational state. However, another satellite launched into orbit with Mozhayets-5 – the European Space Agency's (ESA) student-built SSETI Express spacecraft – was placed in a safe mode due to an undervoltage caused by battery charging problems, after reaching its own proper orbit. The Mozhayets-5 glitch follows a series of problems afflicting Russian launchers and satellites, including the loss of Europe's Cryosat spacecraft and the Demonstrator spacecraft, an inflatable reentry vehicle that appeared to launch properly but could not be found later by recovery crews. References 2005 in spaceflight Spacecraft launched in 2005 Satellites of Russia

5253593

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/114P/Wiseman%E2%80%93Skiff

114P/Wiseman–Skiff

114P/Wiseman–Skiff is a periodic comet in the Solar System. It was discovered by Jennifer Wiseman in January 1987 on two photographic plates that had been taken on December 28, 1986, by Brian A. Skiff of Lowell Observatory. Wiseman and Skiff confirmed the comet on January 19, 1987. Comet 114P/Wiseman–Skiff is believed to have been the parent body of a meteor shower on Mars and the source of the first meteor photographed from Mars on March 7, 2004. Aphelion is located near the orbit of Jupiter. On February 25, 2043, the comet will pass from Jupiter. The nucleus of the comet has a radius of 0.78 ± 0.05 kilometers, assuming a geometric albedo of 0.04. References External links 114P at Kronk's Cometography Periodic comets 0114 Comets in 2013 19861228

5253627

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sun%20protective%20clothing

Sun protective clothing

Sun protective clothing is clothing specifically designed for sun protection and is produced from a fabric rated for its level of ultraviolet (UV) protection. A novel weave structure and denier (related to thread count per inch) may produce sun protective properties. In addition, some textiles and fabrics employed in the use of sun protective clothing may be pre-treated with UV-inhibiting ingredients during manufacture to enhance their effectiveness. In addition to special fabrics, sun protective clothing may also adhere to specific design parameters, including styling appropriate to full coverage of the skin most susceptible to UV damage. Long sleeves, ankle-length trousers, knee- to floor-length skirts, knee- to floor-length dresses, and collars are common styles for clothing as a sun protective measure. A number of fabrics and textiles in common use today need no further UV-blocking enhancement based on their inherent fiber structure, density of weave, and dye components, especially darker colors and indigo dyes. Good examples of these fabrics contain full percentages or blends of heavy-weight natural fibers like cotton, linen and hemp or light-weight synthetics such as polyester, nylon, spandex and polypropylene. Natural or synthetic indigo-dyed denim, twill weaves, canvas and satin are also good examples. However, a significant disadvantage is the heat retention caused by heavier-weight and darker-colored fabrics. As sun protective clothing is usually meant to be worn during warm and humid weather, some UV-blocking textiles and clothing may be designed with ventilated weaves, moisture wicking and antibacterial properties to assist in cooling and breathability. UPF (ultraviolet protection factor) represents the ratio of sunburn-causing UV without and with the protection of the fabric, similar to SPF (sun protection factor) ratings for sunscreen. While standard summer fabrics have UPF ~6, sun protective clothing typically has UPF ~30, which means that only 1 out of ~30 units of UV will pass through (~3%). History Although clothing has been used for protection against solar exposure for thousands of years, modern sun protective clothing was popularized (but not exclusively used) in Australia as an option or adjunct to sunscreen lotions and sunblock creams. Sun protective clothing and UV protective fabrics in Australia now follow a lab-testing procedure regulated by a Commonwealth agency: ARPANSA. This standard was established in 1996 after work by Australian swimwear companies. The British standard was established in 1998 by the National Radiological Protection Board and the British Standards Institute. Using the Australian method as a model, the US standard was formally established in 2001, and now employs a more-stringent testing protocol that includes fabric longevity, abrasion/wear and washability. UPF testing is now widely used on clothing for outdoor activities. The original UPF rating system was enhanced in the United States by the American Society for Testing and Materials (ASTM) Committee D13.65, at the behest of the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) and the Consumer Product Safety Commission, to qualify and standardize the emerging sun protective clothing and textile industry. When the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) discontinued regulating sun-protective clothing, the Solar Protective Factory (whose CEO chaired the ASTM Committee) took the lead in developing the UPF testing protocols and labeling standards that are presently used in the United States. In 1992, the FDA reviewed clothing that was being marketed with claims of sun protection (SPF, % UV blockage, or skin cancer prevention). Only one brand of sun protective clothing, Solumbra, was cleared under medical device regulations. The FDA initially regulated sun protective clothing as a medical device, but later transferred oversight for general sun protective clothing to the FTC. The UPF rating system may eventually be adopted by interested apparel/textile/fabric manufacturers as a "value added" program for consumer safety and awareness. Before UPF standards were in place (which directly measure a fabric's ability to block UV radiation), clothing was previously rated using SPF standards (which measure how long a person's skin takes to redden). Fabric Factors that affect the level of sun protection provided by a fabric, in approximate order of importance, include weave, color, weight, stretch, and wetness. The less open or more dense the fabric (weave, weight, stretch), the better the protection. Getting a fabric wet reduces the protection as much as half, except for silk and viscose which can get more protective when wet. Polyester contains a benzene ring that absorbs UV light. In addition, UV absorbers may be added at various points in the manufacturing process to enhance protection levels. In 2003, chemical company BASF embedded nanoparticles of titanium dioxide into a nylon fabric, which can be used for sun protective clothing that maintains its UV protection when wet. There is some indication that washing fabrics in detergents containing fabric brighteners, which absorb UV radiation, might increase their protective capability. Studies at the University of Alberta also indicate that darker-colored fabrics offer more protection than lighter-colored fabrics. While there is some correlation between the percentages of visible light and UV that pass through the same fabric, it is not a strong relationship. With new-technology textiles designed for the sole purpose of UV blocking, it is not always possible to judge the UV protection level simply by holding up the fabric and examining how much visible light passes through. Provide more protection: specially manufactured fabrics cotton viscose fabrics black or dark blue denim jeans wool garments satin-finished silk of any weight tightly woven Bamboo/Lycra fabric polyacrylonitrile 100% polyester shiny polyester blends tightly woven fabrics REPREVE fabric unbleached cotton (most cotton sold is bleached) bamboo/cotton blend Provide less protection: polyester crepe bleached cotton viscose knits undyed/white jeans worn/old fabric UPF rating A relatively new rating designation for sun protective textiles and clothing is UPF (ultraviolet protection factor), which represents the ratio of sunburn-causing UV measured without and with the protection of the fabric. For example, a fabric rated UPF 30 means that, if 30 units of UV fall on the fabric, only 1 unit will pass through to the skin. A UPF 30 fabric that blocks 29 out of 30 units of UV is therefore blocking 96.7%. Unlike SPF (sun protection factor) measurements that traditionally use human sunburn testing, UPF is measured using a laboratory instrument (spectrophotometer or spectroradiometer) and an artificial light source, and then applying a sunburn weighting curve (erythemal action spectrum) across the relevant UV wavelengths. Theoretically, human SPF testing and instrument UPF testing both generate comparable measurements of a product's ability to protect against sunburn. Below is the ASTM Standard for Sun Protective Clothing and Swimwear: According to testing by Consumer Reports, UPF 30+ is typical for protective fabrics, while UPF 20 is typical for standard summer fabrics. UPF testing protocol Developed in 1998 by Committee RA106, the testing standard for sun protective fabrics in the United States is the American Association of Textile Chemists and Colorists (AATCC) Test Method 183. This method is based on the original guidelines established in Australia in 1994. AATCC 183 should be used in conjunction with other related standards including ASTM D 6544 and ASTM D 6603. ASTM D 6544 specifies simulating the life cycle of a fabric so that a UPF test can be done near the end of the fabric's life, when it typically provides the least UV protection. ASTM D 6603 is a consumer format recommended for visible hangtag and care labeling of sun protective clothing and textiles. A manufacturer may publish a test result to a maximum of UPF 50+. Sun protective clothing and textile/fabric manufacturers are currently a self-regulating industry in North America, prescribed by the AATCC and ASTM methods of testing. See also Dress code Hemline Rash guard Sunglasses Sun hat Sunlight Umbrellas UV index Notes References Safety clothing Sun tanning

5257261

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Melaveh%20Malkah

Melaveh Malkah

Melaveh Malkah (also, Melave Malka or Melava Malka) (, lit. "Escorting the Queen") is the name of a meal that, as per Halakha, is customarily held by Jews after the Sabbath (Shabbat), in other words, on Saturday evening. The intent of the meal is to figuratively escort the "Sabbath Queen" (the traditional metaphor for Shabbat in Jewish liturgy) on her way out via musical performances, singing and eating, as one would escort a monarch upon his departure from a city. This meal is alternatively called "the fourth meal." Sources The source for the custom is found in the Babylonian Talmud: A man shall always set his table after Shabbat — even though he needs but a ke'zayit of chamin [meaning, even though he is quite full and satisfied. This custom is also referred to as Se'udata d'David Malka Meshicha (Aramaic: סעודתא דדוד מלכא משיחא), "The meal of David, King Messiah." King David asked God when he would die and God revealed to him that he would die on a Shabbat. From that time on, David made a meal for the members of his household at the conclusion of each Shabbat to thank God that he was still alive. Kabbalistic reasons According to the Yaakov Chaim Sofer, the luz bone — which is located at the base of the skull where the knot of the head tefillin is placed, and which God will use to "reconstruct" a person at the time of the resurrection of the dead — is nourished solely from the meal of Melaveh Malkah (Kaf Hachayim 300:1-2). Rabbi Isaac Luria is claimed to have said that the 'additional soul' () which is given to each Jew for the duration of each Shabbat does not leave a person until after the Melaveh Malkah. For this reason, many people refrain from work and remain in their Shabbat clothes until after Melaveh Malkah. The eating of the Melaveh Malkah meal is said to be a segula for easy childbirth, as well as for injecting blessings of health, wealth and spiritual gain into the following week. Conducting the meal Melaveh Malkah is a mitzvah that is incumbent on both men and women. After the conclusion of Shabbat and the saying of Havdalah, a fresh tablecloth is spread and candles are lit for the meal of Melaveh Malkah. The meal should be eaten as close to the end of Shabbat as possible, although in cases of need one may delay it until later, but preferably no later than midnight. Some Hasidic rebbes would eat Melaveh Malkah on Sunday morning, but they would make sure to eat some food on Saturday night. Ideally, only food that was specifically prepared for the Melaveh Malkah meal should be served, rather than leftovers from Shabbat. One may fulfill the mitzvah by eating as little as a ke'zayit of bread. Some say that if one is not hungry, he may fulfill the custom of Melaveh Malkah by drinking a cup of fresh-brewed tea or coffee, or by eating a piece of cake or fruit. Those seeking to beautify the mitzvah prepare a special dish for this meal. The Talmud tells of the household of Rabbi Abbahu, in which they would slaughter a calf at the conclusion of each Shabbat and Rabbi Abbahu would eat one of its kidneys. When his son grew up, he asked why an additional calf had to be slaughtered after Shabbat especially for the Melaveh Malkah, when they could instead save the kidney from the calf that they regularly slaughtered for their Shabbat meals? His advice was well taken, and a bit of the Shabbat meat was set aside for the Melaveh Malkah. But then a lion came and devoured the calf, so that nothing was gained by the suggestion. This story appears in the Talmud to show that it is proper to beautify the mitzvah by preparing a special dish in honor of the Melaveh Malkah meal, and to not be satisfied with eating leftovers from the Shabbat foods. Special songs have been composed for singing at this meal, the most popular of which welcomes the coming of the Prophet Elijah, who will announce the advent of the Messianic age. Melaveh Malkah has become a popular venue for Saturday-night get-togethers among friends and larger group social events. Many Jewish organizations hold Melaveh Malkahs for hundreds of guests as a fundraising event. See also Shabbat meals Seudah shlishit Seudat Chiyat HaMatim Seudat mitzvah References External links Chabad.org: The Melaveh Malkah Aish.com: Melaveh Malkah Shabbat Jewish ceremonial food and drink Jewish festive meals Hebrew words and phrases in Jewish law

5257635

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NICMOSlook

NICMOSlook

NICMOSlook is a computer program to analyze spectral data obtained with the Near Infrared Camera and Multi-Object Spectrometer (NICMOS) on board the Hubble Space Telescope (HST). The program originated as Calnic C, which was designed at the Space Telescope European Coordinating Facility (ST-ECF) and programmed in IDL. NICMOSlook is available from their website. One of the capabilities of NICMOS is its grism mode for slitless spectrometry at low resolution. Typically, a direct image is taken in conjunction with grism images for wavelength calibration. NICMOSlook is a highly specialized interactive tool to extract one-dimensional spectra (flux versus wavelength) from such data. NICMOSlook is most commonly used for small amounts of data when users prefer to have full control of all the parameters for individual spectrum extraction, or for cases where Calnic C did not extract the spectra satisfactorily. Unlike Calnic C, NICMOSlook requires the user to determine the best way to find an object and provides a number of different ways to accomplish this. Similarly, the user decides whether to use a weighting appropriate for point sources or weighting by the size of the object for the extraction of the spectra. Calnic C Calnic C is a non-interactive counterpart, a program that performs a subset of NICMOSlook's functions with a "pipelined" approach. Maintenance of Calnic C stopped in 2000 and the program is now considered to be obsolete. External links ST-ECF page for NICMOSlook Hubble Space Telescope Astronomy software

5257643

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The%20Prodigal

The Prodigal

The Prodigal is a 1955 Eastmancolor biblical epic CinemaScope film made by MGM starring Lana Turner and Edmund Purdom. It was based on the New Testament parable about a selfish son who leaves his family to pursue a life of pleasure. The film also features James Mitchell, Louis Calhern, Joseph Wiseman, Cecil Kellaway, Audrey Dalton, and Walter Hampden. Dancer Taina Elg made her film debut in The Prodigal. Plot In the times before Christianity, only a few people believed in one God. Most people believed in many gods. It was mainly the believers in Jehovah who stood against a multitude of some 65,000 strange and different gods. Of these, two of the most notorious were Baal and Astarte, the male and the female. Gods of the flesh, not of the soul. They were supposed to renew the fertility of the earth every year. In exchange, they demanded of their believers the sacrifice of money, jewelry and human life. Out of these times comes our story, based upon the Parable of the Prodigal Son as told in Luke, Chapter 15. The story is loosely based on Jesus Christ's parable of the prodigal son, from the Gospel According to Luke 15:11-32, although considerable liberties are taken with the source material, chief among them being the addition of a female lead in the form of the high priestess of Astarte, Samarra. Micah, a young Hebrew farm boy, sees Samarra and says he will have her. He demands that his father give him his inheritance and journeys to the city of Damascus. There Samarra seduces him into losing his inheritance and betraying his religious faith. Enduring a number of difficulties, Micah finally realizes where he belongs and returns home to his father, who forgives Micah all of his sins and orders a lavish celebration of his return. Cast Lana Turner as Samarra Edmund Purdom as Micah Louis Calhern as Nahreeb Audrey Dalton as Ruth James Mitchell as Asham Neville Brand as Rhakim Walter Hampden as Eli Taina Elg as Elissa Francis L. Sullivan as Bosra Joseph Wiseman as Carmish Sandy Descher as Yasmin John Dehner as Joram George Sawaya as Kavak Cecil Kellaway as the Governor Gordon Richards as Nahreeb's Scribe Production In the 1950s films with Biblical themes were very popular. Two friends, Sam Larson and Joseph Breen Jnr, became interested in the cinematic possibilities of the famous parable. Larson had muscular dystrophy and thought the story had resonance to the problems of young people today; he was also interested in setting of Damascus and Joppa in 70 BC, which had been rarely seen on screen. Larson and Breen wrote a 60-page treatment together. They took it to Dore Schary, head of production at MGM, who was interested. He assigned Charles Schnee to produce and Maurice Zimm to write a script. The film was originally to star Edmund Purdom, Ava Gardner and Vittorio Gassman. Maurice Zimm's script was based on the original parable but was technically an original work. It was set in Syria and Palestine in 79 BC. Eventually Gardner and Grassman dropped out. Dore Schary later said he "hustled Lana Turner into playing it" and "the sorry fact is I liked the script. I thought it would draw an audience. What I forgot was that C.B. De Mille had an exclusive on the Bible. Poor Lana swayed her way through the film but it was a hopeless task. The script was lifeless." Schary says after two weeks filming "I saw we were in quicksand" and asked the MGM production office to calculate the cost if the studio abandoned the film. Since the sets had been built, costumes designed and contracts signed (over $200,000 was spent on costumes) the studio would have incurred a loss of $1.2 million. Schary decided to finish the picture on an accelerated schedule instead "and hoped that we wouldn't fare too badly". Reception According to MGM records the film earned $2,153,000 in the US and Canada and $1,990,000 elsewhere, resulting in a loss of $771,000. Dore Schary later called the film "the biggest and most embarrassing failure" and "the worst film I ever supported" in his time at MGM. The Prodigal was satirized in Mad #26 (November 1955) as The Prodigious. See also List of American films of 1955 References External links The Prodigal at TCMDB 1955 films 1955 drama films American epic films CinemaScope films Films based on the Gospels Films directed by Richard Thorpe Films scored by Bronisław Kaper Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer films Films based on short fiction 1950s English-language films Religious epic films Astarte 1950s American films

5258131

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/POA%20CALFOS

POA CALFOS

POA CALFOS is the improved Post Operational Archive version of the Faint Object Spectrograph (FOS) calibration pipeline, an earlier instrument aboard the Hubble Space Telescope (HST). STScI made an improved version of the FOS calibration pipeline called POA_CALFOS. POA CALFOS replaces CALFOS, which performed the routine calibration of FOS data in the standard IRAF/STSDAS FOS calibration pipeline. The current version corrects for image motion problems that have led to significant wavelength scale uncertainties in the FOS data archive. The improvements in the calibration enhance the scientific value of the data in the FOS archive, making it a more homogeneous and reliable resource. The Faint Object Spectrograph was one of the 4 original axial instruments aboard the HST. FOS was designed to make spectroscopic observations of astrophysical sources from the near ultraviolet to the near infrared. The instrument was removed from HST during the Second Servicing Mission in February 1997 and replaced by the Space Telescope Imaging Spectrograph (STIS). Consequently, no more new FOS observations can be made, and only Archival Research programs may be submitted to make use of FOS data. The Instrument Physical Modeling Group (IPMG) of the Space Telescope European Coordinating Facility (ST-ECF) currently has the main responsibility for FOS. External links ST-ECF page for POA CALFOS Hubble Space Telescope

5258208

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Space%20Telescope%20Science%20Data%20Analysis%20System

Space Telescope Science Data Analysis System

The Space Telescope Science Data Analysis System (STSDAS) is an IRAF-based suite of astronomical software for reducing and analyzing astronomical data. It contains general purpose tools and packages for processing data from the Hubble Space Telescope. STSDAS is produced by Space Telescope Science Institute (STScI). The STSDAS software is in the public domain and the source code is available. See also Space flight simulation game List of space flight simulation games Planetarium software List of observatory software References External links STSDAS Home Page Free astronomy software Hubble Space Telescope

5258927

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ESO/ST-ECF%20Science%20Archive%20Facility

ESO/ST-ECF Science Archive Facility

The ESO/ST-ECF Science Archive Facility is an electronic archive for astronomical data. It currently contains more than 40.0 Terabytes of scientific data obtained with the ESA/NASA Hubble Space Telescope (HST), with the ESO New Technology Telescope (NTT) and Very Large Telescope (VLT) and with the Wide Field Imager on the ESO/MPI 2.2m Telescope. External links The ESO/ST-ECF Science Archive Facility The European Southern Observatory The Space Telescope-European Coordinating Facility Works about astronomy Hubble Space Telescope

5259012

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/On-The-Fly%20Calibration

On-The-Fly Calibration

In observational astronomy an On-The-Fly Calibration (OTFC) system calibrates data when a user's request for the data is processed so that users can obtain data that are calibrated with up-to-date calibration files, parameters, and software. History of OTFC The OTFC processing system was developed at the Canadian Astronomy Data Centre (CADC) and the Space Telescope European Coordinating Facility (ST-ECF) and is implemented at both sites and at Space Telescope Science Institute (STScI). The OTFC system currently provides data calibration for the Wide Field and Planetary Camera 2 (WFPC2) and Space Telescope Imaging Spectrograph (STIS). In the future, the Advanced Camera for Surveys (ACS) and possibly the Near Infrared Camera and Multi-Object Spectrometer (NICMOS) will be supported. Goals of the system The main goals behind the implementation of the OTFC system are to take advantage of better calibration files and the much smaller storage area required if only raw files are kept in the archives. The system can also offer more calibration steps than were available when the data was first released and can implement improved pipeline software. Currently, for example, HST data are calibrated as they are received at the STScI. Raw and calibrated data are stored in the HST archive (DADS). Frequently, users must recalibrate the data at their home sites to take advantage of better calibration files or software. A large fraction (over 90%) of the calibrated data in the HST archive could be improved by recalibration, although the improvements are not always significant. In the past, instruments that undergo evolution of calibration files or calibration software often required users to carry out their own recalibrations at their home sites. With OTFC, the HST data archives carry out the recalibration. Hubble Space Telescope Space imagers

5259286

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Drizzle%20%28image%20processing%29

Drizzle (image processing)

Drizzle (or DRIZZLE) is a digital image processing method for the linear reconstruction of undersampled images. The method is normally used for the combination of astronomical images and was originally developed for the Hubble Deep Field observations made by the Hubble Space Telescope. The algorithm, known as variable-pixel linear reconstruction, or informally as "Drizzle", preserves photometry and resolution, can weight input images according to the statistical significance of each pixel, and removes the effects of geometric distortion on both image shape and photometry. In addition, it is possible to use drizzling to combine dithered images in the presence of cosmic rays. Drizzling is commonly used by amateur astrophotographers, particularly for processing large amounts of planetary image data (typically several thousand frames), drizzling in astrophotography applications can also be used to recover higher resolution stills from terrestrial video recordings. According to astrophotographer David Ratledge, "Results using the DRIZZLE command can be spectacular with amateur instruments." Overview Camera optics generally introduce geometric distortion of images. Undersampled images are, for example, common in astronomy because instrument designers are frequently forced to choose between properly sampling a small field of view and undersampling a larger field. This is a particular problem for the Hubble Space Telescope (HST), where the corrected optics may provide superb resolution, but the detectors are only able to take full advantage of the full resolving power of the telescope over a limited field of view. Fortunately, much of the information lost to undersampling can be restored. The most commonly used of these techniques are shift-and-add and interlacing. Drizzle was originally developed to combine the dithered images of the Hubble Deep Field North and has since been widely used for the combination of dithered images from both HST's cameras and those on other telescopes. Drizzle has the versatility of shift-and-add, yet largely maintains the resolution and independent noise statistics of interlacing. Drizzle has the advantage of being able to handle images with essentially arbitrary shifts, rotations, and geometric distortion and, when given input images with proper associated weight maps, creates an optimal statistically summed image. Drizzle also naturally handles images with "missing" data, due, for instance, to corruption by cosmic rays or detector defects. Originally packaged with the Space Telescope Science Data Analysis System (STSDAS) package in the now depreciated IRAF, Drizzle (now called MultiDrizzle) is freely available in the Drizzlepac Python package. In addition to Drizzle, a number of ancillary tasks that assist in the combination of Hubble Space Telescope imaging data are available as part of the Drizzlepac package. Detailed descriptions of the process and tutorials are provided in the Drizzlepac Handbook. Drizzle was developed as a collaboration between the Space Telescope Science Institute and the Space Telescope European Coordinating Facility. References Fruchter A. S. & Hook R. N., Drizzle: A Method for the Linear Reconstruction of Undersampled Images, PASP, 114, 144. External links The Dither/Drizzle Page at the Space Telescope Science Institute Linear Reconstruction of the Hubble Deep Field, by Fruchter and Hook. An accessible webpage version of the paper published above. Astronomical imaging Hubble Space Telescope Image processing

5259450

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hubble%20European%20Space%20Agency%20Information%20Centre

Hubble European Space Agency Information Centre

The Hubble European Space Agency Information Centre (HEIC) is a science communication office, established at the Space Telescope - European Coordinating Facility (ST-ECF) in Munich, Germany late in 1999. This initiative was taken so as to fulfil the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope (HST) outreach and education tasks for the European Space Agency (ESA), as outlined in an agreement between NASA and ESA. Over the past few years HEIC has become a very distinguished communication office of experts using the newest software and techniques. The European Hubble office has produced large amounts of astronomical material suitable both for educational purposes and wider public consumption. HEIC provides a well-assorted archive that is publicly available on its web page. The work is centred on the production of news and photo releases that highlight interesting Hubble science results and images. These are often European in origin, and so not only increase the awareness of ESA's Hubble share (15%), but the contribution of European scientists to the observatory. Furthermore, the group produces video releases, innovative educational material, CD-ROMs, brochures, posters, as well as DVDs and museum information kiosks, and much more. The Hubble Information Centre is headed by the science communication specialist Lars Lindberg Christensen and the lead graphic designer is Martin Kornmesser. External links Homepage of the Hubble European Space Agency Information Centre Space Telescope European Coordinating Facility ESO/ ST-ECF Science Archive Hubble Heritage Project European Space Agency Hubble Space Telescope Space technology research institutes

5260710

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Beta%20plane

Beta plane

In geophysical fluid dynamics, an approximation whereby the Coriolis parameter, f, is set to vary linearly in space is called a beta plane approximation. On a rotating sphere such as the Earth, f varies with the sine of latitude; in the so-called f-plane approximation, this variation is ignored, and a value of f appropriate for a particular latitude is used throughout the domain. This approximation can be visualized as a tangent plane touching the surface of the sphere at this latitude. A more accurate model is a linear Taylor series approximation to this variability about a given latitude : , where is the Coriolis parameter at , is the Rossby parameter, is the meridional distance from , is the angular rotation rate of the Earth, and is the Earth's radius. In analogy with the f-plane, this approximation is termed the beta plane, even though it no longer describes dynamics on a hypothetical tangent plane. The advantage of the beta plane approximation over more accurate formulations is that it does not contribute nonlinear terms to the dynamical equations; such terms make the equations harder to solve. The name 'beta plane' derives from the convention to denote the linear coefficient of variation with the Greek letter β. The beta plane approximation is useful for the theoretical analysis of many phenomena in geophysical fluid dynamics since it makes the equations much more tractable, yet retains the important information that the Coriolis parameter varies in space. In particular, Rossby waves, the most important type of waves if one considers large-scale atmospheric and oceanic dynamics, depend on the variation of f as a restoring force; they do not occur if the Coriolis parameter is approximated only as a constant. See also Rossby parameter Coriolis effect Coriolis frequency Baroclinic instability Quasi-geostrophic equations References Holton, J. R., An introduction to dynamical meteorology, Academic Press, 2004. . Pedlosky, J., Geophysical fluid dynamics, Springer-Verlag, 1992. . Fluid dynamics Atmospheric dynamics Oceanography

5260755

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hubble%3A%2015%20Years%20of%20Discovery

Hubble: 15 Years of Discovery

Hubble – 15 Years of Discovery () is a book that formed part of the European Space Agency's 15th anniversary celebration activities for the 1990 launch of the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope. Its main emphasis is on the exquisite Hubble images that have enabled astronomers to gain entirely new insights into the workings of a huge range of different astronomical objects. Hubble has provided the visual overview of the underlying astrophysical processes taking place in these objects, ranging from planets in the Solar System to galaxies in the young Universe. This book shows the close relationship between the results of great scientific value and of eye-catching beauty and artistic potential. The book published by Springer has 120 pages, measures 30 x 25 cm and is in full-colour. It has been translated into Finnish, Portuguese and German. Some versions include a copy of the Hubble – 15 Years of Discovery documentary (distributed in 860,000 copies). The book is authored by Lars Lindberg Christensen and Bob Fosbury. It is illustrated by Martin Kornmesser. External links Hubble - 15 Years of Discovery The European Homepage for the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope Hubble Heritage Project Space Telescope European Coordinating Facility ESO/ ST-ECF Science Archive European Space Agency Hubble Space Telescope

5265080

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Angstrom%20exponent

Angstrom exponent

The Angstrom exponent or Ångström exponent is a parameter that describes how the optical thickness of an aerosol typically depends on the wavelength of the light. Definition In 1929, the Swedish physicist Anders K. Ångström found that the optical thickness of an aerosol depends on the wavelength of light according to the power law where is the optical thickness at wavelength , and is the optical thickness at the reference wavelength . The parameter is the Angstrom exponent of the aerosol. Significance The Angstrom exponent is inversely related to the average size of the particles in the aerosol: the smaller the particles, the larger the exponent. For example, cloud droplets are usually large, and thus clouds have very small Angstrom exponent (nearly zero), and the optical depth does not change with wavelength. That is why clouds appear to be white or grey. This relation can be used to estimate the particle size of an aerosol by measuring its optical depth at different wavelengths. Determining the exponent In principle, if the optical thickness at one wavelength and the Angstrom exponent are known, the optical thickness can be computed at a different wavelength. In practice, measurements are made of the optical thickness of an aerosol layer at two different wavelengths, and the Angstrom exponent is estimated from these measurements using this formula. The aerosol optical thickness can then be derived at all other wavelengths, within the range of validity of this formula. For measurements of optical thickness and taken at two different wavelengths and respectively, the Angstrom exponent is given by The Angstrom exponent is now routinely estimated by analyzing radiation measurements acquired on Earth Observation platforms, such as AErosol RObotic NETwork, or AERONET. See also Langley extrapolation References IPCC Third Assessment Report, has extensive coverage of aerosol-climate interactions. Kuo-nan Liou (2002) An Introduction to Atmospheric Radiation, International Geophysics Series, No. 84, Academic Press, 583 p, . External links Angstrom coefficient page at NASA GSFC. AERONET: an international network of sunphotometers measuring aerosol properties. Spatial distributions of the Angstrom coefficient as derived from MISR. Scattering, absorption and radiative transfer (optics) Atmospheric radiation Visibility

5267044

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fanhui%20Shi%20Weixing

Fanhui Shi Weixing

The Fanhui Shi Weixing () series of satellites was China's first reconnaissance satellite program. The satellites were used for military reconnaissance and civilian imagery tasks and completed 23 missions between November 1974 and April 2016. There were four generations of the Fanhui Shi Weixing (FSW) satellites: FSW-0 from 1974 to 1987; FSW-1 from 1987 to 1993; FSW-2 from 1992 to 1996; and FSW-3 from 2003 to 2005. Two derivative models, the Shijian-8 (SJ-8) and Shijian-10 (SJ-10), were developed and launched as 'seed satellites' conducting bioastronautic experiments for the Chinese Ministry of Agriculture. All FSW-series satellites were launched into orbit using Long March rockets from the Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center (JSLC). The successful recovery of an FSW-0 recoverable satellite in 1974 established China as the third nation to launch and recover a satellite following the United States and the Soviet Union. This success served as the basis for the second Chinese crewed space program, the third crewed program (Project 863) during the late 1980s, and the current Shenzhou program (active since 1992). A novel feature of the spacecraft's re-entry module was the use of impregnated oak, a natural material, as the ablative material for its heat shield. The Fanhui Shi Weixing (FSW) imagery reconnaissance satellite program was succeeded by the ongoing Yaogan Weixing satellite program which began in 2006 and consists of imagery, synthetic aperture radar (SAR), and ocean surveillance payloads. History Fanhui Shi Weixing-0 The beginnings of the FSW-0 (military designation "Jianbing-1") recoverable satellite began in 1965 when Qian Xuesen conceived and proposed the idea and, after significant and tragic setbacks, finally completed it in 1974. Having returned to Mainland China from the United States after pressure from FBI and Ku Klux Klan during the Second Red Scare, "father of the Chinese missile program" Qian Xuesen began a remarkably successful career in rocket science, boosted by the reputation he garnered for his past achievements, and eventually rose through the Party's ranks to become a Central Committee of the Chinese Communist Party member. Purportedly out of his dream of crewed spaceflight but also recognizing the military value, Qian Xuesen urged the Chinese Central Planning Committee to invest in the development of recoverable satellite technologies, similar to those the United States and Soviet Union had been successfully operating since the early 1960s. Interested more in the military value recoverable satellites would provide, the committee accepted and tasked space physicist and engineer Zhao Jiuzhang (who is today known as the "father of the Chinese satellite program" for his work as the chief designer of China's first satellite, Dong Fang Hong 1) to head the project. Earnest work on the project began in 1965 after Jiuzhang's team submitted a preliminary analysis of requirements having toured military and civilian organizations to assess potential applications of a recoverable satellite program. Wang Xiji, an American-educated rocket scientist and designer of the Long March 1 rocket which would launch the Dong Fang Hong 1 satellite in 1970, was named chief designer of the recoverable satellite program. In May 1966, Mao Zedong, with the help of the Cultural Revolution Group, launched the Cultural Revolution with the stated goal of preserving Chinese communism by purging remnants of capitalist and traditional elements from Chinese society and to re-impose Mao Zedong Thought (known outside China as Maoism) as the dominant ideology in China. Among other groups, the purges of Mao's Red Guards focused heavily on academics and intellectuals regarded as the "Stinking Old Ninth" which included the seizure of the Chinese Academy of Sciences and the persecution of 131 of the 171 senior members and the killings of 229 members. Zhao Jiuzhang was killed (though some sources say he committed suicide under the pressures of persecution), Qian Xeusen was reduced to the role of a common worker, and Wang Xiji was accused of sabotaging an FSW test parachute for which he fought to prove his innocence. Later in 1971, when Mao's successor Lin Biao died in a plane crash following an abortive coup d'état, Mao initiated an immense witch-hunt to oust potential supporters of Lin Biao. As a result, many departments of the Academy were closed to include the Shuguang project, China's proposed first crewed spacecraft, which had shared much of its technology with the recoverable satellite program costing the team valuable development money and time. Only after several months of persistent attack by Mao's Red Guards did Premier of the PRC Zhou Enlai intervene to put fifteen key scientists in critical missile programs under state protection while others did their best to survive the violence. Despite the challenges and four years past its goal, the China Association for Science and Technology (CAST) completed the FSW-0 satellite which weighed 1,800 kilograms and carried photographic film and two cameras intended to support both military and civilian needs. FSW-0 carried a prism-scanning panoramic camera and a stellar camera both designed by the Changchun Institute of Optics and tested on two T7A rockets in July 1967. In 1972, several technician teams were dispatched to Laiyang in Shandong, Xinhua in Hunan, Lhasa in Tibet, and Kashgar in Xinjiang to establish the nation's first satellite control, tracking, and telemetry stations. Having established four fixed stations and two mobile, technicians tested the control network with Soviet-made Il-14 aircraft flying at high-altitudes. On 8 September 1974, FSW-0 No. 1 was transported to the Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center (JSLC) for launch on a Long March 2 rocket (derived from the Dongfeng 5 ballistic missile). The first attempt to launch an FSW-0 satellite into orbit on 5 November 1974 failed with the rocket exploding approximately twenty seconds after launch and debris crashing 300 meters from the launch pad. Analysis of the recovered debris led Chinese scientists to blame copper wire damage in the rocket during the second stage. Maiden launch The first successful FSW-0 launched on 26 November 1975 from Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center in Inner Mongolia Pad 138, Launch Complex 2. Immediately after launch, it became apparent the satellite would be irrecoverable due to a loss of pressure in the gas orientation system. Qian Xeusen estimated the chances of recovery to be near zero while Yang Jiachi (developer of the FSW-0's attitude control system) believed the seeming loss of pressure was only the result of the gasses cooling (Charles' Law) as the spacecraft cooled exiting the atmosphere. Despite Yang's adamance that the mission should continue, the decision was made and Xian Ground Station commanded the satellite to reenter the atmosphere after only three days flight time. With observers waiting in the mountains of Sichuan, four coal miners seated in a mess hall in Guizhou Province about 400 kilometers away watched a red-hot object crash into a nearby grove of trees around noon. Venturing out to see the crashed object, one reportedly threw a rock and was relieved to hear a metallic sound confirming the object was of terrestrial origin. The miners reported the object to local authorities and the recovery team eventually arrived to find the spacecraft intact and the imagery undamaged. The reentry vehicle was damaged by reentry and the parachute partially burned, however the film was declared undamaged and the mission was deemed as success making China the third nation to capture space-based imagery after the United States' CORONA satellite in 1960 and the Soviet Union's Zenit satellite in 1962. The extracted imagery was in extremely low resolution and suffered significant distortion from in-orbit movements, however the FSW-0 was launched eight more times on an imagery mission with the final mission purposed to conduct microgravity experiments. The microgravity experiments of the last mission tested the smelting and recrystallization of alloys and semiconductor materials including gallium arsenide and would continue as part of the larger FSW satellite program. Fanhui Shi Weixing-1 The FSW-1 series of reconnaissance satellites represents the application of lessons learned from the FSW-0 series, particularly in stabilizing the imagery obtained in-orbit. Launched one month following the last launch of the FSW-0 series, changes made with the new series included an increased in-orbit time (three days to five days) and precision while imaging was improved from 1° to 0.7°. The mass of the newer satellite increased from 1,800 kilograms to 2,100 kilograms and the FSW-1 series was launched into a more circular orbit with a slightly increased orbital perigee and reduced orbital apogee. These improvements reportedly improved the accuracy and stability of the collected imagery to improve the quality of maps produced. Unlike its contemporaries, American and Soviet (later Russian) photographic reconnaissance satellites, and like its predecessor the FSW-0, FSW-1 series satellites had no in-orbit maneuvering capabilities to enable prolonged observations over areas of interest. FSW-1 satellites, though believed to be fulfilling a secondary military purpose, were primarily cartographic in purpose featuring a higher-resolution (10–15 meter resolution) camera system and a lower-resolution charge-coupled device (CCD) camera (50 meter resolution) that transmitted images to the ground in near-real-time to avoid squandering the limited on-board film used by the higher-resolution camera. The lower-resolution camera was reportedly used to image when unfavorable environmental conditions such as cloud cover prevented the collection of high-quality imagery. FSW-1 4 carried in an open trunk below the imaging capsule the Swedish Freja magnetospheric research payload. The nineteen million USD 214 kilogram Freja payload was designed by the Swedish Space Corporation on behalf of the Swedish National Space Board and carried eight experiments in the subjects of electric fields for Sweden's Royal Institute of Technology, magnetic fields for Johns Hopkins University in the United States, cold plasma for the National Research Council of Canada, hot plasma and waves for the Swedish Institute of Space Physics, auroral imagery for the University of Calgary in Canada, and electron beams and particle correlators for the Max-Planck Institute in Germany. FSW-1 5 carried, in addition to its earth-imaging payload and microgravity research equipment, a diamond-studded medallion commemorating the 100th anniversary of Chairman Mao Zedong's birth. Satellites of the FSW-1 series were developed by the China Academy of Space Technology (CAST), used a celestial camera for positional information, were stabilized by a 3-axis system, powered by a FG-23 retro motor, battery powered, and communicated at 179.985 MHz (VHF). After atmospheric reentry, the reentry capsule deployed a single drogue at high velocities 10–20 kilometers above the ground followed by a main parachute deployed at a more arrested speed of 5 kilometers altitude to slow the capsule's descent to around 10 meters per second by the time the reentry capsule struck the ground. All five FSW-1 series satellites were launched using a Long March-2C rocket from the Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center (JSLC) and controlled via the Xi'an Satellite Monitor and Control Center (XSCC) in Shaanxi Province. With five successful launches and four successful recoveries, the FSW-1 program was largely a success however the failure of the final FSW-1 satellite in-part marred the legacy of the series by gaining worldwide attention for its uncontrolled orbital decay. Uncontrolled Decay FSW-1 No. 5, the last satellite of the series launched on 8 October 1993, experienced a failure in the satellite's attitude control system which rendered it unable to properly reenter the atmosphere. The failure of the attitude control system when the satellite was instructed to return on 16 October 1993 tilted the spacecraft 90° from its intended position causing the reentry capsule to enter a highly elliptical orbit of 179 km × 3,031 km instead of returning to Earth. The re-entry capsule entered the atmosphere on 12 March 1996 over the South Atlantic, in a tumbling fashion which exposed much of the spacecraft unprotected by the heat shield to extreme heat and friction during reentry. Although the extent of the destruction is unknown, U.S. Space Command reported that some fragments had survived the conditions of reentry that had fallen into the Pacific Ocean near the coast of Peru. The loss of the FSW-1 5 was the only failed recovery of the larger FSW program. Although in the end only a few fragments had likely reached the ocean's surface, the abortive reentry was widely reported on American and European television and in newspapers. Five days before the satellite's atmospheric reentry, the orbit was so unpredictable that studies could guess its reentry time with no less than a 10-hour error and could not predict where the fragments would land nor if it would strike a populated area. Western news followed the updates and predictions released by Air Force Major Don Planalp of U.S. Space Command in Colorado and was concerned largely with the novel and potential dangers of heavy metal fragments striking residential areas. News on the satellite frequently likened the satellite's decay to that of the Soviet Salyut-7 and become uniquely enamored with the onboard diamond-studded medallion celebrating the 100th birthday of the late Mao Zedong. Press organizations were unable to receive a comment from the Chinese Embassy in Washington on the satellite's fall as the Chinese government was still tight-lipped on the satellite's existence. Although experts stressed the low probability that the decaying satellite would strike of in a place of significance, some governments did issue be-prepared orders to law enforcement in the case of the potential disaster, most prominently the United Kingdom's Home Office. Specifications The FSW-0 was the first generation of China's returnable satellites. Its primary use was for the inspection of national land and natural resources. First-generation FSW-0 satellites all carried prism-scan panoramic cameras. The FSW-0 did not have a complete orbit control system, so its decay or attenuation of orbit was quick, and it had a relatively short orbital duration. Its landing or return location accuracy was also relatively low. The next generation, the FSW-1, carried more powerful cameras than its predecessor and was mainly used for drawing maps. Its spatial resolution was as high as 10m (able to discern objects 10 meters apart). The next two generations were called FSW-2 and FSW-3. Satellites Notes: FSW-3 No. 2 and No. 4 are sometimes referred to as FSW-4 1 and 2 due to design variations and the military designation's transition from Jianbing-2 to Jianbing-4, however most sources retain the original FSW-3 name. Because Jianbing-4 No. 1 and No. 2 are differently designed, some sources refer to them as Jianbing-4A (JB-4A) and Jianbing-4B (JB-4B) respectively. References Bibliography 《返回式卫星》 (Returnable Satellite); Author: Lin Baohua (林华宝); Press: Tsinghua University Press, Jinan University Press; () 《太空情报与国家安全》 (Space Intelligence & National Security); Author: Lin Ziyang (林子洋); Press: Youshi Press; () External links FSW at Astronautix.com Military equipment introduced in the 1970s Reconnaissance satellites of China Spacecraft launched by Long March rockets

5267093

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/UoSAT-12

UoSAT-12

UoSAT-12 is a British satellite in Low Earth Orbit. It is the twelfth satellite in the University of Surrey series and was designed and built by Surrey Satellite Technology Ltd. (SSTL). It was launched into orbit in April 1999 on board a Dnepr rocket from Yasny Russia. Mission UoSAT-12 was an experimental mission used to demonstrate and test a number of new technologies. Imaging cameras and a high-speed 1 Mbit/s S-band downlink (the MERLION experiment) were tested. An Internet Protocol stack was uploaded to the satellite, allowing experiments in extending the Internet to space to be made by NASA Goddard as part of its Operating Missions as Nodes on the Internet (OMNI) effort. These now-proven technologies were later adopted by SSTL in the design of its Disaster Monitoring Constellation satellites. References University of Surrey Amateur radio satellites Satellites of the United Kingdom Spacecraft launched in 1999 Satellite Internet access Spacecraft launched by Dnepr rockets

5268322

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coat%20of%20arms%20of%20La%20Rioja

Coat of arms of La Rioja

The Spanish autonomous community and province of La Rioja has a coat of arms, which was assigned to the former province of Logroño in 1957, and to the present autonomous community on its foundation in 1982. It consists of a shield which is divided vertically into two halves, featuring respectively the Cross of Saint James and a castle, and is surmounted by a royal crown. Also depicted are Monte Laturce and the Ebro river. Law According to the third article of the Statute of Autonomy of La Rioja, Organic Law 3/1982: "The Autonomous Community of La Rioja has its own anthem and coat of arms, which may be modified only by law of La Rioja Parliament, supported by two thirds of its members" According to the sixth and seventh article of Law 4/1985, May 31 (BOLR n. 64, June 4): "The coat of arms of La Rioja is, structurally, a parted one, crowned by the closed royal crown. The first partition, or, charged with the red cross of St. James on top of Laturce mount and supported by two pilgrim shells, tinctured in argent and bordered in gules. On the second partition, gules, an or castle with three merloned towers over a bridge mazoned sable, and under it, a river argent. On the bordure, three fleur-de-lis." "The coat of arms of La Rioja can appear in the middle of the flag." The arms must appear: In La Rioja Government and Parliament sites. On titles, honors and distinctions of Autonomous Community of La Rioja. In emblems used by authorities of the Community and members of regional parliament. There is also a simplified version of the arms, more symbolic and suitable for black and white and color sketch reproductions, according to Corporative Identity Manual, Decree 20/2003, 20 May 2003, which defines the Institutional Graphic identity of Autonomous Community of La Rioja and its President (BOR n. 70, June 5, 2003). Heraldic description A non-official description, but more theoretically correct according to classic heraldry would be: "Per pale or, a cross of St. James gules between two escallops argent fimbriated gules, in base a mount vert; and gules a castle triple towered, merloned, on a bridge, or masonned sable and pierced gules on a river barry wavy argent and azure; all within a bordure azure charged with three fleurs-de-lis or, two on chief cantons and one in base" History and meaning The present shield was approved 5 April 1957 by decree of the Ministry of the Interior (then known as Ministerio de la Gobernación), for use by the then province of Logroño. Those were the same arms adopted by the autonomous community of La Rioja in 1985. The images on the left side relate to the Way of St. James, which crosses La Rioja from East to West: they are the red cross of Santiago (St. James); below it Monte Laturce, recalling the fictional Battle of Clavijo); and beside the cross are two pilgrim shells. On the right side, the castle has an integrating function, as all the largest municipalities (except Calahorra) show a castle on their arms. Under it is depicted the Ebro river, which irrigates the lands of La Rioja. Both the fleur-de-lis and Royal Crown are distinctions given to the region by Spanish monarchs in recognition of "heroic deeds performed". The fleur-de-lis come from the arms of the city of Logroño and were granted by Carlos V. See also Flag of La Rioja References External links Coat of Arms of La Rioja according to regional government (Spanish) Rioja, La La Rioja La Rioja La Rioja La Rioja La Rioja La Rioja

5277297

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rincon%201

Rincon 1

Rincon 1 was a CubeSat built by the Student Satellite Program of the University of Arizona. The primary payload was furnished by Rincon Research, hence the name. Rincon 1 was the product of the work of about 50 students, ranging from college freshmen to Ph.D. students, over the course of several years. It was launched, after being postponed several times, on board a Dnepr on July 26, 2006, but the rocket failed and the satellite was destroyed. Listening If the launch had been successful, persons on the ground would have needed this information to be able to hear the beacons from the satellite. The keplerian elements, in order to know where the satellite is pointed. A radio capable of operating on 436.870 MHz, which will change with doppler shifting. There is also a beacon operating on 437.345 MHz. It is a very weak signal. A 1200 baud AFSK modem, preferably a very low-end, that does no modulation on its own. Cubesat Ground Station uses a custom-built hardware modem, and possibly a software modem (using the sound card as an Analog-to-Digital converter). The Cubesat GS software would help, however, it is not currently available to the public. A good antenna system, the design of the antennas is not optimal. Components Rincon 1 had the following components included: 6 solar cells Aluminum frame - built to spin-stabilize through sunlight Power board (used to hold batteries, maintain 5V and 3.3V charges, measure voltages and currents in several spots, and convert the power from the solar cells to usable power.) Microcontroller board, which is used to gather and transmit telemetry Radio board, which is used for 2 way communication Experiment - Contains a 10 mW beacon board, which is being used by Rincon Research to prove new technologies Specifications These specifications are without respect to the payload. Dimensions - 10 cm×10 cm×10 cm Mass - max 1 kg (Actual ~900 grams) Power Generation - Optimum ~2 W, average on sun side ~1.5 W Max power output - 3W when transmitting data Min power output - 400 mW when in a quiet state Current status Rincon 1 was launched with UA's satellite, SACRED on a Dnepr rocket on July 26, 2006 at 19:43 UTC. The launch failed shortly after takeoff. See also List of CubeSats External links University of Arizona SSP website (Outdated) University of Arizona Cubesat website (official) (Outdated) Cubesat Wiki Most up-to-date website Satellite launch failures University of Arizona Spacecraft launched in 2006 CubeSats Spacecraft launched by Dnepr rockets Space accidents and incidents in Kazakhstan

5277306

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SACRED

SACRED

SACRED was a Cubesat built by the Student Satellite Program of the University of Arizona. It was the product of the work of about 50 students, ranging from college freshmen to Ph. D. students, over the course of several years. It was launched, after being postponed several times, on board a Dnepr on July 26, 2006. The launch was a failure. Listening To listen to SACRED if it had made orbit, a person would have needed the following: The keplerian elements, in order to know where the satellite is pointed. A radio capable of operating on 436.870 MHz, which will change with doppler shifting. A 1200 baud AFSK modem, preferably a very low-end, that does no modulation on its own. Cubesat Groundstation uses a custom-built hardware modem, and possibly a software modem (using the sound card as an Analog-to-Digital converter). The UA Cubesat GS software would help, however, it is not currently available to the public. A good antenna system, the design of the antennas is not optimal. Components SACRED had the following components included: 6 solar cells Aluminum frame - built to spin-stabilize through sunlight Power board (used to hold batteries, maintain 5V and 3.3V charges, measure voltages and currents in several spots, and convert the power from the solar cells to usable power.) Microcontroller board, which is used to gather and transmit telemetry. Radio board, which is used for 2 way communication Experiment - A radiation experiment, which will monitor the radiation effect on several components over long periods of time. Specifications These specifications are without respect to the payload. Dimensions - 10 cm×10 cm×10 cm Mass - max 1 kg (Actual ~900 gram) Power Generation - Optimum ~2 W, average on sun side ~1.5 W Max power output - 3W when transmitting data Min power output - 100 mW when in quiet state Current status SACRED was launched with UA's satellite, Rincon 1 on July 26, 2006, at 19:43 UTC on board a Dnepr rocket. The launch failed shortly after takeoff and SACRED was destroyed. See also List of CubeSats External links University of Arizona Student Satellite website (Outdated) University of Arizona Cubesat website (official) (Outdated) Cubesat Wiki Most up-to-date website Satellite launch failures University of Arizona Spacecraft launched in 2006 CubeSats Spacecraft launched by Dnepr rockets Space accidents and incidents in Kazakhstan

5279341

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aufeis

Aufeis

Aufeis ( ) (German for "ice on top") is a sheet-like mass of layered ice that forms from successive flows of ground or river water during freezing temperatures. This form of ice is also called overflow, icings, or the Russian term, naled (). The term "Aufeis" was first used in 1859 by Alexander von Middendorff following his observations of the phenomenon in northern Siberia. When thawed, aufeis leave footprints in the form of aufeis glades or, perhaps more accurately in tundra habitats, aufeis barrens, because of the near absence of vascular plants due to ice cover during much of the growing season. Etymology Aufeis literally translates from German to “on-ice”. In 1859 the Baltic German scientist and explorer Alexander von Middendorff used this term to describe his observations of the phenomenon in northern Siberia. Formation Aufeis accumulates during winter along stream and river valleys in arctic and subarctic environments. It forms by upwelling of river water behind ice dams, or by ground-water discharge. The latter mechanism prevails in high-gradient alpine streams as they freeze solid. Ground-water discharge is blocked by ice, perturbing the steady-state condition and causing a small incremental rise in the local water table until discharge occurs along the bank and over the top of the previously formed ice. Successive ice layers can grow and expand, attaining areas of ~25+ km2 and thicknesses of 6+ m. Aufeis typically melts out during summer and will often form in the same place year after year. River aufeis form when the cross-sectional area of a stream channel becomes locally restricted as ice accumulates during winter. Such restrictions or “choke-points” result in bulk overflow and local increases in hydrostatic pressure, causing water to move upward through fissures onto the original ice layer. This overflowing water subsequently freezes to produce additional ice layers, thus explaining the origin of the term aufeis. This process, repeated through the long arctic winter, can generate large volumes of ice, with some aufeis in arctic Alaska—where they are also known as “icings”—attaining areas of 20+ km2 and localized thicknesses of 6+ m. The cumulative area of late-winter aufeis in the Sagavanirktok River drainage alone, for example, ranges from 102 to 103 km2. Impact Sheets of aufeis may block stream channels and cause their flood plains to widen as spring floodwaters are forced to flow around the ice. Research on aufeis has to a large extent been motivated by the variety of engineering problems the ice sheets can cause (e.g. blocking drainages and causing flooding of roads). Aufeis can present an extreme danger to recreational boaters even during summer months, who can find themselves trapped between walls of ice or pulled under aufeis by the current of the river. Breaking dams of aufeis can cause flash floods downriver. When thawed, aufeis leave footprints in the form of “aufeis glades” or more accurately in tundra habitats, aufeis barrens, because of the near absence of vascular plants due to ice cover during much of the growing season. Aufeis barrens are distinctive landscape features of the arctic tundra and provide reliable indicators of aufeis locations". City cooling In late 2011, Mongolia planned to test the use and storage of artificial naleds as a way of cooling Ulan Bator in the hot Mongolian summer, and reducing the use of energy-intensive air conditioning. Occurrence River aufeis are common and widespread features of the arctic cryosphere, particularly in northern Alaska and Siberia. In eastern Siberia, where aufeis are known as naleds,  10,000 aufeis with a cumulative area of ~ 50,000 km2 containing 30 km3 of water have been documented in 2015. Sheets of aufeis have been observed in Alaska, Arctic Canada, Russia, and Mongolia. Analysis of satellite imagery from 2000 to 2015 has shown that the extent and duration of many Alaskan river icings has decreased due to climate change. References Further reading External links Earth sciences Water ice Glaciology Geography of the Arctic Lithosphere

5284206

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bertrand%27s%20theorem

Bertrand's theorem

In classical mechanics, Bertrand's theorem states that among central-force potentials with bound orbits, there are only two types of central-force (radial) scalar potentials with the property that all bound orbits are also closed orbits. The first such potential is an inverse-square central force such as the gravitational or electrostatic potential: with force . The second is the radial harmonic oscillator potential: with force . The theorem is named after its discoverer, Joseph Bertrand. Derivation All attractive central forces can produce circular orbits, which are naturally closed orbits. The only requirement is that the central force exactly equals the centripetal force, which determines the required angular velocity for a given circular radius. Non-central forces (i.e., those that depend on the angular variables as well as the radius) are ignored here, since they do not produce circular orbits in general. The equation of motion for the radius r of a particle of mass m moving in a central potential V(r) is given by motion equations where , and the angular momentum L = mr2ω is conserved. For illustration, the first term on the left is zero for circular orbits, and the applied inwards force equals the centripetal force requirement mrω2, as expected. The definition of angular momentum allows a change of independent variable from t to θ: giving the new equation of motion that is independent of time: This equation becomes quasilinear on making the change of variables and multiplying both sides by (see also Binet equation): As noted above, all central forces can produce circular orbits given an appropriate initial velocity. However, if some radial velocity is introduced, these orbits need not be stable (i.e., remain in orbit indefinitely) nor closed (repeatedly returning to exactly the same path). Here we show that a necessary condition for stable, exactly closed non-circular orbits is an inverse-square force or radial harmonic oscillator potential. In the following sections, we show that those two force laws produce stable, exactly closed orbits (a sufficient condition) [it is unclear to the reader exactly what is the sufficient condition]. Define J(u) as where f represents the radial force. The criterion for perfectly circular motion at a radius r0 is that the first term on the left be zero: where . The next step is to consider the equation for u under small perturbations from perfectly circular orbits. On the right, the J function can be expanded in a standard Taylor series: Substituting this expansion into the equation for u and subtracting the constant terms yields which can be written as where is a constant. β2 must be non-negative; otherwise, the radius of the orbit would vary exponentially away from its initial radius. (The solution β = 0 corresponds to a perfectly circular orbit.) If the right side may be neglected (i.e., for small perturbations), the solutions are where the amplitude h1 is a constant of integration. For the orbits to be closed, β must be a rational number. What's more, it must be the same rational number for all radii, since β cannot change continuously; the rational numbers are totally disconnected from one another. Using the definition of J along with equation (), Since this must hold for any value of u0, which implies that the force must follow a power law Hence, J must have the general form For more general deviations from circularity (i.e., when we cannot neglect the higher-order terms in the Taylor expansion of J ), η may be expanded in a Fourier series, e.g., We substitute this into equation () and equate the coefficients belonging to the same frequency, keeping only the lowest-order terms. As we show below, h0 and h2 are smaller than h1, being of order . h3, and all further coefficients, are at least of order . This makes sense, since must all vanish faster than h1 as a circular orbit is approached. From the cos(βθ) term, we get where in the last step we substituted in the values of h0 and h2. Using equations () and (), we can calculate the second and third derivatives of J evaluated at u0: Substituting these values into the last equation yields the main result of Bertrand's theorem: Hence, the only potentials that can produce stable closed non-circular orbits are the inverse-square force law (β = 1) and the radial harmonic-oscillator potential (β = 2). The solution β = 0 corresponds to perfectly circular orbits, as noted above. Classical field potentials For an inverse-square force law such as the gravitational or electrostatic potential, the potential can be written The orbit u(θ) can be derived from the general equation whose solution is the constant plus a simple sinusoid: where e (the eccentricity), and θ0 (the phase offset) are constants of integration. This is the general formula for a conic section that has one focus at the origin; e = 0 corresponds to a circle, 0 < e < 1 corresponds to an ellipse, e = 1 corresponds to a parabola, and e > 1 corresponds to a hyperbola. The eccentricity e is related to the total energy E (see Laplace–Runge–Lenz vector): Comparing these formulae shows that E < 0 corresponds to an ellipse, E = 0 corresponds to a parabola, and E > 0 corresponds to a hyperbola. In particular, for perfectly circular orbits. Harmonic oscillator To solve for the orbit under a radial harmonic-oscillator potential, it's easier to work in components r = (x, y, z). The potential can be written as The equation of motion for a particle of mass m is given by three independent Euler equations: where the constant must be positive (i.e., k > 0) to ensure bounded, closed orbits; otherwise, the particle will fly off to infinity. The solutions of these simple harmonic oscillator equations are all similar: where the positive constants Ax, Ay and Az represent the amplitudes of the oscillations, and the angles φx, φy and φz represent their phases. The resulting orbit r(t) = [x(t), y(y), z(t)] is closed because it repeats exactly after one period The system is also stable because small perturbations in the amplitudes and phases cause correspondingly small changes in the overall orbit. References Further reading Classical mechanics Eponymous theorems of physics Orbits

5286813

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vasudhara

Vasudhara

Vasudhārā whose name means "stream of gems" in Sanskrit, is the Buddhist goddess of wealth, prosperity, and abundance. Her popularity peaks in Nepal where she has a strong following among the Buddhist Newars of the Kathmandu Valley and is thus a central figure in Newar Buddhism. She is one of the most popular goddesses worshipped in many Buddhist countries and is a subject of Buddhist legends and art. Her short mantra is Oṃ Vasudhārāyai Svāhā. Parallels with Bhūmidevī Vasudhara is often compared to the Hindu goddess Bhūmidevī. As goddesses of wealth, both deities have a similar iconography and are worshipped for their role in an abundant harvest. Both assume a golden hue in artistic representations, perform the same mudra, and hold similar objects. For example, Vasudhara and Prithvi are often depicted holding gems or having pots of treasure under their feet. It is believed that the convention of depicting Vasudhara standing on vases originated from earlier representations of Bhūmi . Furthermore, both goddesses are often depicted paired with their respective consorts, Prithvi alongside Vishnu and Vasudhara alongside Jambhala. Mantra Her mantra is "Om Śri Vasudhara Ratna Nidhana Kashetri Svāhā", when one takes up Vasudhara practice, 800 mantras (8 rounds of a mala) should be recited on the first day, then 300 mantras (3 rounds of a mala) on every day afterwards, one mala's worth of mantras in the morning, when time permits before work, another mala's worth of mantras when time permits in the late afternoon/evening, perhaps after work, the final mala's worth of mantras before sleeping, or 3 malas all at once any time of the day. It is said that devotees will accumulate 7 kinds of prosperity - wealth, quality, offspring, long life, happiness, praise and wisdom, enabling her devotees to be better equipped to practise generosity, in itself a cause for wealth, as well as having enough resources to be able to engage in spiritual practices. It also believed her practise leads to Enlightenment. Legends The Inquiry of the Layman Sucandra The origin of Vasudhārā in Buddhism appears in the Buddhist text The Vasudhara Dharani. According to a legend in the text known as “The Inquiry of the Layman Sucandra,” an impoverished layman named Sucandra approaches the Buddha Shakyamuni requesting a way to obtain large amounts of gold, grain, silver, and gems in order to feed his large family and engage in acts of charity with the surplus fortune. Shakyamuni, aware of a mantra about the bodhisattva Vasudhara that would suit his purposes, bestows Sucandra with an incantation and religious ritual that when followed would result in good fortune and prosperity brought on by Vasudhara herself. Upon commencing the rituals and teaching them to others, Sucandra begins to prosper. Noticing his success, the monk Ananda asked Shakyamuni how he had obtained this fortune so quickly. Shakyamuni instructs Ananda to also practice the Vasudhara Dharani and “impart it to others ‘for the good of many’.”. Although “The Inquiry of the Layman Sucandra” seems to contradict the Buddha’s renunciation of material possessions and earthly pleasures, Shakyamuni does not instruct the monk to recite the mantra for material benefit but instead he stresses that the mantra is for “‘the good of many’ and for ‘the happiness of many’.” Thus the mantra is meant more as means of alleviating suffering rather than obtaining wealth through Vasudhara, who not only grants physical wealth and abundance but also spiritual wealth and abundance. Legends from Taranatha Several other legends describing Vasudhara’s generosity are found in the writings of Taranatha (1575–1634), a prominent Tibetan monk and scholar. According to his history, the bodhisattva Vasudhara granted the monk Buddhajnana three hundred pearl necklaces every day. Buddhajnana was also blessed with a steady stream of buyers to purchase these necklaces. With this success, the monk was able to invest his fortune into the monastery by supporting his fellow monks and students, purchasing votive statues and ritual objects, and making generous donations to the monastery. Because he did not use the money amassed for his own personal gain, Vasudhara continued to bestow these gifts on Buddhajnana for the rest of his life. Another legend in Taranatha’s history echoes the legend of “The Inquiry of the Layman Sucundra.” According to the legend, a poor philosopher was struggling to support his family. He encounters a monk devoted to the practice of meditation who teaches him the rites and rituals necessary to meditate on the goddess Vasudhara. He began the rituals and quickly prospered, receiving a large amount of land and a prestigious teaching post at a monastery. As a result, he, like the monk who had once helped him in his time of need, also shared the rites and rituals of Vasudhara with others. Like the legend of the Inquiry of the Layman Sucandra" these legends are significant because they encourage both the lay and monastic worship of Vasudhara. In addition, they stress the importance of charity, teaching worshippers to share in their good fortune rather than amassing it for themselves. Iconography in Buddhist art In Buddhist art, Vasudhara has a consistent iconography. She can easily be identified as a bodhisattva by the elaborate headdress and the extensive amount of jewelry she wears. Her skin has a golden hue in bronze and painted images. This color is associated with precious metals and symbolizes opulence, fertility, and generosity in Buddhist iconography. Vasudhara is typically seated on a lotus flower base in the lalitasana, or royal pose, with one foot tucked in towards her and the other hanging of the flower base but resting on a small treasure. She can, however, also be represented in a standing position. When standing, Vasudhara has a full vase representing abundance underneath each foot. Despite this consistency in her representations, the number of her arms may differ from image to image. In visual representations, Vasudhara can have as few as two arms and as many as six. The two-armed representations are more common in Tibetan art and Indian art, while six-armed representations are almost exclusive to Nepalese art. Although the six-armed image originates in India, they are rare and only few examples have been found. Vasudhara, the 'treasure holder', is a popular Newar goddess of fertility and prosperity, and a consort of the wealth-god Jambhala. She sits in the posture of 'royal ease' on a moon disc and a pink lotus, with her left leg drawn up and her extended right foot resting (similar posture to Green Tara - showing her willingness to "come down from her lotus throne" to help those who call upon her) upon a white conch shell (symbolising having conquered/having perfect control of speech) and a golden treasure-vase (wealth/prosperity). She is beautiful and attractive, as youthful as a sixteen-year-old, and her golden body scintillates with radiant light. Her three beautiful and smiling faces are coloured red (right - red being the colour of controlling), golden (centre, golden being the colour of increasing), and red (left), representing perfect compassion, wisdom understanding, awareness and insight into the past, present and future, she is adorned with the five divine silks and the eight jewelled ornaments. Her first right hand makes the gesture of generosity, while her other two right hands hold the 'Three Jewels' of the Buddha, Dharma and Sangha, - symbolising the necessity of maintaining the commitments of refuge to the three jewels, and a golden rosary, symbolising continuous practise and self-examination, vital to enlightenment. With her three left hands she holds a small treasure-vase, for long life and initiation, an ear of grain, for abundant harvests and earthly benefits, and a sacred text to grant wisdom. In her hands, Vasudhara holds a variety of objects attributed to her. Most representations show her holding a sheaf of corn in her left hand, symbolizing an abundant harvest. She may also be holding a gem or small treasure, a symbol of wealth. Representations with more arms, such as the six-armed Nepali representation, also depict her holding a full vase and the Book of Wisdom. With her free hands, Vasudhara performs mudras. A commonly seen mudra in paintings and figurines featuring Vasudhara is the varada mudra, also known as the charity mudra, which symbolizes the “pouring forth of divine blessings.” In her 2 armed one faced form, she has a golden body, representing the earth element, Ratnasambhava in her crown, sometimes 2 eyes or 3 eyes, if with 3 eyes - representing perfect awareness, understanding, compassion, wisdom and insight into the past, present and future. Her 2 hands holding a sheaf or corn for agricultural prosperity and to "sew the seeds" of enlightenment, and either a single wishfulfilling jewel or a bowl of wish fulfilling jewels for wealth and wish fulfilment. Vasudhara is the subject of numerous bronzes and paintings. She is predominantly the central figure of bronze sculptures or painted mandalas. She may also, however, appear alongside her consort, Vaiśravaṇa (Jambhala) the Buddhist God of Riches. Despite his status, she surpasses him in popularity and is more commonly the central figure of her own mandalas. In Nepali Buddhism Vasudhara is particularly popular in Nepali Buddhism among the Buddhist Newars of the Kathmandu Valley. In this region she is a common household deity. This is known from the countless number of bronzes and paintings found representing her. These images are small in size, typically 18 cm or smaller. Because of their small size it is known that these images were primarily for private use, namely household veneration of the goddess. Additionally, there is a cult dedicated to her worship followed by the Buddhist Newars. Followers of this cult believe that her worship brings wealth and stability. Despite the strong following of this cult by the Buddhist Newars, unfortunately, it is now in decline. As the Bodhisattva of abundance and prosperity, her popularity in this region is due to the predominance of agriculture and trade essential to the economy of the Kathmandu Valley. The Newars believe that her veneration will generally result in good fortune. Mandala One of the earliest Nepalese representations of Vasudhara is a pauhba (textile art depicting Hindu and Buddhist images on course cotton), dating back to 1015 C.E. This pauhba is known as the Mandala of Vasudhara. The goddess is the central image of this mandala, which depicts scenes of dedication, ritual initiation, festive music, and dance associated with her worship. Its purpose is didactic (to teach). The mandala teaches the importance of worshipping Vasudhara primarily through the narrative of a non-believer whom she converted to belief. In Tibetan Buddhism In addition to her popularity in Nepal, Vasudhara is also an important “wealth deity” in Tibetan Buddhism. Although popular in Tibet, Vasudhara does not assume as important a role as she does in Newar Buddhism. In Tibet, the worship of Vasudhara is limited to mostly lay people as opposed to worship by both lay and monastic life. This is because Tibetan monastic life regards Vasudhara as a “benefactor of the laity” and instead primarily engages in the worship of the goddess Tara for all their needs. This, however, does not mean that monastic life disregards her completely. They do perform rites and rituals to the goddess habitually but it is usually at the request of a patron. She is considered to be one of the 21 Taras, also known as "Golden/Yellow Tara" Tibetan: Dolma Sermo, another name is Norgyunma. Differences in Iconography The iconography of Vasudhara varies slightly in this region. In Tibetan art she appears more commonly with two arms. The six-armed representations, however, also exist and it is believed they filtered into Tibet through Nepal because of the late appearance of these images in manuscripts and art. Unlike Newar art Vasudhara rarely appears alone in Tibetan art. Instead she is paired with Jambhala or appears alongside other deities. Despite these slight differences, most of her iconography remains unchanged and Vasudhara can be easily recognized by her attributes in most Buddhist art. Burmese water libation In Burmese Buddhism, the water ceremony, called yay zet cha, which involves the ceremonial pouring of water from a glass into a vase, drop by drop, concludes most Buddhist ceremonies including donation celebrations and feasts. This ceremonial libation is done to share the accrued merit with all other living beings in all 31 planes of existence. While the water is poured, a confession of faith, called the hsu taung imaya dhammanu, is recited and led by the monks. Then, the merit is distributed by the donors, called ahmya wei by saying Ahmya ahmya ahmya yu daw mu gya ba gon law three times, with the audience responding thadu, Pali for "well done." The earth goddess Vasudhara is invoked to witness these meritorious deeds. Afterward, the libated water is poured on soil outside, to return the water to Vasudhara. See also Lakshmi Kisshōten -- Lakshmi's Shinto counterpart Bodhisattva Phra Mae Thorani cult of Vasudhara peculiar to people of Burma, Cambodia, Thailand and Laos References Further reading Getty, Alice. The Gods of Northern Buddhism. Online HTML version Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1928. Pal, Pratapaditya. Art from the Himalayas and China. New Haven: Yale University Press, 2003. Pal, Pratapaditya. Art of Nepal. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1985. Shaw, Miranda. Buddhist Goddesses of India. Princeton, New Jersey: Princeton University Press, 2006. External links The Gods of Northern Buddhism / Online HTML version with Footnotes and Images HimalayanArt.org AsianArt.com http://threeroyalwarriors.tripod.com/vasudhara.html Bodhisattvas Buddhism in Nepal Female buddhas and supernatural beings Buddhist iconography Tibetan Buddhist deities Buddhist mantras Twenty-Four Protective Deities Earth goddesses

5293176

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The%20Desperate%20Hours%20%28Hayes%20novel%29

The Desperate Hours (Hayes novel)

The Desperate Hours is a thriller novel written by Joseph Hayes in 1954. It concerns three escaped convicts and their invasion of a suburban home and its family. Adaptations The Desperate Hours (1955 play) The Desperate Hours (1955 film) The Desperate Hours (1967 TV movie) 36 Ghante (1974 film) Desperate Hours (1990 film) Foreign Language Adaptions 36 Ghante (1974)-Hindi language film in India 1954 American novels American thriller novels American novels adapted into films American novels adapted into plays Random House books

5302446

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Timeline%20of%20Mars%20Reconnaissance%20Orbiter

Timeline of Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter

Timeline for the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO) lists the significant events of the launch, aerobraking, and transition phases as well as subsequent significant operational mission events; by date and brief description. Launch and cruise timeline April 30, 2005: the MRO spacecraft was delivered to the launch site. August 9, 2005: the August 10 launch opportunity was postponed because of reliability concerns over the Atlas V's gyroscopes. August 10, 2005: concerns over the gyroscopes were resolved. Launch was scheduled for 7:50 am EST, August 11. August 11, 2005: concerns over weather cause a rescheduling of the launch to 9:00 am EST. Conflicting sensor readings during fueling of the Centaur stage's liquid hydrogen fuel tank could not be corrected in time, causing the launch to be scrubbed and rescheduled for 7:43 am EST August 12. August 12, 2005: at 7:43 am EST, MRO was launched. There were no significant anomalies reported during launch and deployment into interplanetary transfer orbit. August 15, 2005: MARCI was tested and calibrated. August 25, 2005: at 15:19:32 UTC, MRO was 100 million kilometers from Mars. August 27, 2005: the first trajectory correction maneuver was executed. The burn used the same main thrusters that are needed for the orbital insertion maneuver and lasted 15 seconds. A velocity change of 7.8 m/s was achieved. September 8, 2005: MRO completed calibration and testing of the HiRISE and CTX cameras by taking pictures of the Moon from 10 million kilometers away. November 18, 2005: MRO underwent its second scheduled course correction by firing its 6 medium thrusters for 20 seconds and changing its velocity by 75 cm/s. January 29, 2006: at 06:59:24 UTC, MRO was 10 million kilometers from Mars. February 3, 2006: MRO began the Approach Phase, in preparation for orbital insertion. Orbital insertion/ Aerobraking timeline March 10, 2006: MRO successfully completed orbital insertion. March 23, 2006: test images from three of MROs cameras were taken. HiRISE images were taken over the course of two orbits, the first returned from a height of 2500 km (at about ten times poorer resolution than when the camera is in its final orbit). The CTX and MARCI cameras also took test images. March 30, 2006: MRO fired its intermediate thrusters for 58 seconds and dropped its periapsis by 94 km, in preparation to begin aerobraking. April 7, 2006: MRO begun a five-month-long Aerobraking Stage to reduce its highly elliptical orbit to a circular, low Mars orbit by mid-November 2006. August 30, 2006: Aerobraking ended with a 6-minute burn of ''MROs Trajectory Correction Maneuver (TCM) thrusters. September 5, 2006: The first of two burns to correctly position MRO into its final science orbit was performed. September 11, 2006: The second of two burns to finalize MRO's orbit was performed, officially ending the Aerobraking Stage. Transition timeline September 16, 2006: SHARAD was successfully deployed from MRO. September 24, 2006: MCS and MARCI commenced operations, beginning a martian weather forecast. September 27, 2006: CRISM was powered on for the first time in space, and its lens cap was removed. In addition, SHARAD, HiRISE, and CTX were also powered on for the first time. September 28, 2006: CRISM took its first picture at Mars. Mission events September 29, 2006: All instruments were tested from the science orbit. October 5, 2006: Instruments were powered down for the Solar Conjunction. November 2006: Primary Science Phase (PSP) started. May 25, 2008: HiRISE photographs Phoenix during its descent through the Martian atmosphere to a landing in Vastitas Borealis, making MRO the first probe to photograph another probe landing on the surface of another planet (not including the Moon). August 6, 2009: The spacecraft entered safe mode and switched to its backup computer. This is the third incident in 2009 and the seventh since launch. August 26, 2009: The spacecraft entered safe mode for the second time in August. The spacecraft is in communication with Earth and is being kept in this safe mode with scientific and rover communications relay activities discontinued while engineers study the data. December 8, 2009: The spacecraft is finally being taken out of safe mode that it has been in since August. The mission uploaded new software last week and plans to resume science operations once a check of all the science instruments is concluded in about a week. August 6, 2012: HiRISE photographs Curiosity during its descent through the Martian atmosphere to a landing in Gale crater. April 11, 2013: NASA announced that HiRISE may have achieved imaging the 1971 Soviet Mars 3 lander (and rover) hardware on the surface of Mars. On 2 December 1971, Mars 3 became the first spacecraft to attain soft landing on Mars and the second one on another planet, right after Venera 7, transmitting the first image data ever from Mars. Prior to that, amateur astronomers found what may be the parachute, retrorockets, heat shield and lander on MRO images from November 2007 and on 10 March 2013. July 29, 2015: MRO successfully completed a maneuver to put the spacecraft in an adjusted orbit for supporting InSight Mars lander in its descent and landing (originally scheduled for September 28, 2016, later shifted to Nov. 26, 2018). It was the biggest orbital maneuver of MRO, since its arrival at Mars in 2006. October 20, 2016: CTX took a picture of two spots, not existing in this area on a previously taken image, what is supposed to show the site of ESA's crash landed Schiaparelli lander (on October 19, 2016). January 9, 2018: HiRISE takes a reference picture of an area for further investigations due to unexpectedly blurred images, since 2017, delimiting its practical resolution. Early February, 2018: MRO evaluated its test of a solely stellar navigation. Goal is to indefinitely swap over to this navigation mode to maintain the spacecraft's orientation without staying dependent on its aging gyroscopes and accelerometers. February 15, 2018: The spacecraft turned into safe mode again as it temporarily entered the martian shadow on its orbit. This response to sensing an unexpectedly low voltage indicates a problem with its aged batteries, which are essential for the solar-powered orbiter in this short period of shade in its orbit. February 23, 2018: MRO was brought out of safe mode for diagnostics and solution finding. Meanwhile, science observations and its service as communications relay for the Mars rovers have been suspended. June 13, 2018: A Perfect Storm of Science Awaits NASA May 15, 2019: NASA’s MRO completes 60,000th Mars Orbit Milestone. February 18, 2020: NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter is being updated to ensure its batteries charge correctly and that it knows where it is in space. August 12, 2020: Mars's aerial perspectives offered by the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter. July 26, 2021: Clay seems to be probable source of Mars "lakes" instead of water. September 28, 2021: NASA halts Mars communication during solar conjunction. January 26, 2022: NASA discovers water flowed on Mars more recently than thought. April 25, 2022: Nasa extends Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter and other 7 planetary science missions. June 23, 2022: NASA is releasing one of the last maps from its Mars orbiter that uses color to represent the different minerals found on the planet. October 26, 2023: A new map from NASA reveals the locations of ice on Mars. April 25, 2023: NASA’s Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter has retired its mineral mapping instrument, CRISM, after 17 years of service. April 5, 2023: NASA’s new mosaic shows Mars in stunning detail using its imagery. Mission prospects On February 9, 2018, NASA announced that it would keep using the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter past the mid-2020s, although in the meantime the spacecraft and mission must face signs of age-related functional disturbances: 1. flagging batteries, 2. blurred images from HiRISE since 2017, 3. lowering reliability of gyroscopes or accelerometers for navigation, which will require a challenging examination on a matching mission design. Despite those challenges the reasons for this decision are: the loss of Mars Global Surveyor in 2006, the postponement of the Mars 2022 orbiter as the proposed successor of MRO and MAVEN'''s shortage of fuel, that makes MRO now the critical element of the NASA's further Mars Exploration Program. References Exploration of Mars Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter

5305089

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hugh%20Percy%20Wilkins

Hugh Percy Wilkins

Hugh Percy Wilkins (4 December 1896 –23 January 1960) was a Welsh-born engineer and amateur astronomer. He was born Hugh Percival Wilkins in Carmarthen, where he received his early education, then lived near Llanelli prior to moving to England. During the First World War he served in the Royal Army Corps. By profession, he was a mechanical engineer and civil servant, but his reputation rests on his achievements as an amateur astronomer, particularly as a selenographer. He was initially elected to the British Astronomical Association (BAA) on 27 February 1918 at the invitation of W F Denning and Fiammetta Wilson. At some point his membership lapsed and he rejoined on 25 March 1936 this time at the invitation of Robert Barker and Walter Goodacre. Wilkins was elected to the fellowship of the Royal Astronomical Society on 11 May 1945. He was Director of the BAA's Lunar Section from 1946 to 1956. He produced a 100" map of the Moon, which included new names for a number of features. In 1948 he put forward a request to the IAU that twenty-two new names be adopted. His proposals were turned down on the premise that the features were small or near the limb and already had letter designations. In 1951 he published a 300"-diameter map of the Moon, considered by some as the culmination of the art of selenography prior to the space age. His maps were dense with detail, some of which was fictitious, making them less useful. He made additional requests to the IAU in 1952 and 1955, which were turned down. However the Goodacre and Mee crater names from a 1926 map he had produced did become part of the lunar nomenclature. He also published a number of books intended to popularize astronomy, including two works in collaboration with Sir Patrick Moore. The most notable was his work, The Moon, which included his map. For many years Wilkins took the astronomy evening class at Crayford Manor House where they continue to use a copy of his 300-inch map regularly in the observatory. Wilkins died on 23 January 1960, having only retired on 31 December 1959. The crater Wilkins on the Moon is named after him. Bibliography H.P. Wilkins, "300-inch Moon map", 1951. H.P. Wilkins, "The True Book About the Stars", 1953, London, Muller. H.P. Wilkins, "Our Moon", 1954, London, Muller. H.P. Wilkins and P. Moore, "The Moon; A Complete Description of the Surface of the Moon", 1955, London, Faber and Faber. H.P. Wilkins, "Mysteries of Space and Time", 1955, London, Muller. H.P. Wilkins, "Clouds, Rings and Crocodiles: By Spaceship Round the Planets," 1955. H.P. Wilkins and P. Moore, "Making and using a telescope; the home assembly and applications of astronomical equipment", 1956, London, Eyre & Spottiswoode. H.P. Wilkins, "Guide to the Heavens", 1956, London, F. Muller. H.P. Wilkins, "Instructions to Young Astronomers", 1957, London, Museum Press. H.P. Wilkins, "The True Book About the Moon", 1960, London, F. Muller. He also wrote several articles for Popular Astronomy. References E.A. Whitaker, "Mapping and Naming the Moon", 1999. Crayford Manor House Astronomical Society M.E.Coombes (Daughter) letter to Kentish Times 6 August 2009 Llanelli Community Heritage 1896 births 1960 deaths Amateur astronomers Welsh astronomers Selenographers 20th-century cartographers

5305415

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/6267%20Rozhen

6267 Rozhen

6267 Rozhen, provisional designation , is a stony Florian asteroid from the inner regions of the asteroid belt, approximately 3 kilometers in diameter. In 1987, the asteroid was discovered by Eric Elst at Rozhen Observatory, Bulgaria, and was later named after the discovering observatory. Discovery Rozhen was discovered on 20 September 1987, by Belgian astronomer Eric Elst at Rozhen Observatory near Smoljan, Bulgaria. For four days, between 27 and 31 January 2005, the body was briefly and erroneously renamed 6267 Smolyan. In November 1949, a precovery was taken at Palomar Observatory, extending the body's observation arc by 38 years prior to its official discovery observation at Rozhen. Orbit and classification The S-type asteroid is a member of the Flora family, one of the largest groups of stony asteroids in the main-belt. It orbits the Sun in the inner main-belt at a distance of 2.0–2.4 AU once every 3 years and 2 months (1,161 days). Its orbit has an eccentricity of 0.09 and an inclination of 2° with respect to the ecliptic. Physical characteristics Lightcurves In January 2014, two rotational lightcurves of Rozhen were obtained from photometric observations at the Palomar Transient Factory in California, United States. They gave a rotation period of and hours with a brightness variation of 0.14 and 0.12 magnitude, respectively (). Diameter and albedo The Collaborative Asteroid Lightcurve Link assumes an albedo of 0.24, derived from 8 Flora, the asteroid family's largest member and namesake, and calculates a diameter of 3.0 kilometers with an absolute magnitude of 14.77. Naming This minor planet was named for the discovering Rozhen Observatory, also known as the "Bulgarian National Astronomical Observatory", that has been established at Rozhen in 1981. Rozhen is located near the city of Smoljan and in proximity to the border with Greece. At 1700 meters above sea leavel, the observatory benefits from favorable instrumental and observational conditions. An exhaustive survey for the discovery of minor planets was launched at Rozhen in 1986. The approved naming citation was published by the Minor Planet Center on 20 November 2002 (). References External links 6267 Rozhen (1987 SO9) was renamed 6267 Smolyan Asteroid Lightcurve Database (LCDB), query form (info ) Dictionary of Minor Planet Names, Google books Asteroids and comets rotation curves, CdR – Observatoire de Genève, Raoul Behrend Discovery Circumstances: Numbered Minor Planets (5001)-(10000) – Minor Planet Center 006267 Discoveries by Eric Walter Elst Named minor planets 19870920

5306982

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aeronomy%20of%20Ice%20in%20the%20Mesosphere

Aeronomy of Ice in the Mesosphere

The Aeronomy of Ice in the Mesosphere (AIM or Explorer 90) is a NASA satellite launched in 2007 to conduct a planned 26-month study of noctilucent clouds (NLCs). It is the ninetieth Explorer program mission and is part of the NASA-funded Small Explorer program (SMEX). In March 2023, NASA announced that battery power on the spacecraft had declined below the level needed to sustain operation. Mission The scientific purpose of the Aeronomy of Ice in the Mesosphere (AIM) mission is focused on the study of polar mesospheric clouds (PMCs) that form about above the surface of Earth in summer and mostly in the polar regions of Earth. The overall goal is to resolve why PMCs form and why they vary. AIM expected lifetime was at least two years. AIM measures PMCs and the thermal, chemical and dynamical environment in which they form. This will allow the connection to be made between these clouds and the meteorology of the polar mesospheric summer echoes. This connection is important because a significant variability in the yearly number of noctilucent ("glow in the dark") clouds (NLCs), one manifestation of PMCs, has been suggested as an indicator of global change. The body of data collected by AIM will provide the basis for a rigorous study of PMCs that can be reliably used to study past PMC changes, present trends and their relationship to global change. In the end, AIM will provide an expanded basis for the study of long-term variability in the climate of Earth. The AIM scientific objectives will be achieved by measuring near simultaneous PMC abundances, PMC spatial distributions, cloud particle size distributions, gravity wave activity, cosmic dust influx to the atmosphere needed to study the role of these particles as nucleation sites and precise, vertical profile measurements of temperature, , OH, , , , NO, and aerosols. AIM carries three instruments: an infrared solar occultation differential absorption radiometer, built by the Space Dynamics Laboratory, Utah State University (Solar Occultation for Ice Experiment - SOFIE); a panoramic ultraviolet imager (Cloud Imaging and particle Size Experiment - CIPS); and, an in situ dust detector (Cosmic Dust Experiment - CDE), both designed and built by the Laboratory for Atmospheric and Space Physics, University of Colorado. Ball Aerospace & Technologies Corporation constructed the spacecraft bus and GATS, Inc., Newport News, Virginia, led the data management effort. First seen in 1885, two years after the powerful eruption of the Indonesian volcano Krakatoa, scientists originally thought PMC's formed from the plumes of ash propelled into the sky during that eruption. But the clouds have persisted long after the effects of Krakatoa were felt. These days, some scientists think they are caused by space dust, while others believe that modern-day PMC's are indicators of changing climate of Earth. One thing is for certain: PMC's are shaped by the meteorology of the mesosphere, which does appear to be changing. Spacecraft The AIM satellite is a , spacecraft, powered by two solar panels, carrying three instruments: Instruments Launch On 25 April 2007, AIM was launched into a circular Sun-synchronous orbit by a Pegasus-XL launch vehicle, which was air-launched from the Lockheed L-1011 Stargazer aircraft operated by Orbital Sciences Corporation (OSC). See also Aeronomy Explorer program References External links AIM home SOFIE Instrument and science description, view or download data AIM Mission Profile by NASA Taking AIM at Night-Shining Clouds: 10 Years, 10 Science Highlights Earth observation satellites of the United States NASA satellites NASA satellites orbiting Earth Spacecraft launched in 2007 Explorers Program Spacecraft launched by Pegasus rockets Geospace monitoring satellites

5308109

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The%20Taking%20of%20Pelham%20One%20Two%20Three%20%28novel%29

The Taking of Pelham One Two Three (novel)

The Taking of Pelham One Two Three (1973) is a thriller novel by Morton Freedgood, writing under the pen name John Godey. The novel's title is derived from the train's radio call sign. When a New York City Subway train leaves to start a run, it is given a call sign based upon the time it left and where; in this case, Pelham Bay Park station at 1:23 p.m. Plot A normal day on the subway is disrupted by the hijacking of a 6 train, designated Pelham One Two Three to indicate its point and time of origin. Four men armed with submachine guns detach the lead car and drive it into a tunnel with its 17 passengers as hostages. The hijackers are led by Ryder, a former mercenary, and consist of disgruntled former motorman Longman, violent ex-Mafia thug Joey Welcome, and powerful, laconic brute Steever. The gang threaten to execute one hostage per minute unless the city delivers to them a one million dollar ransom within one hour. One of the hostages is an armed undercover police officer, who considers the odds too overwhelming to attempt any confrontation and remains seated and quiet. While the city authorities weigh it up and agree to pay, the transit police try to figure out the hijackers' plan, particularly their escape from a tunnel while completely surrounded. They do not suspect that the hijackers have a mechanism, "The Gimmick", for defeating the train's dead-man's switch, which prevents the train from running without a driver's hand pressing down on it. The hijackers intend to let the train and its hostages speed along the track by itself, chased by the police above surface, while they get away. They will discard their weapons and escape through an emergency exit, disappearing into the busy flow of New York pedestrians. The ransom is delivered to the hijackers, who then demand that the track ahead is cleared all the way to South Ferry. They move the train a short distance down the tunnel, fit The Gimmick, get off the train, and engage The Gimmick to hold down the dead-man's switch. Once the train is underway the gang makes their way to an emergency exit and the undercover police officer jumps off into the tunnel. At the emergency exit, Welcome refuses to leave his submachine gun behind and argues with Ryder. Ryder fatally shoots him, but the delay allows the undercover cop to shoot Steever from the darkness of the tunnel. Longman escapes while Ryder fires back and wounds the cop. As Ryder goes to finish him off with a head shot, he is himself shot dead by DCI Daniels of the Special Operations Division. Later, the transit police go through their records of dismissed motormen and track down and arrest Longman. Adaptations The novel has been adapted to film and television three times: The Taking of Pelham One Two Three (1974) The Taking of Pelham One Two Three (1998) The Taking of Pelham 123 (2009) Aftermath After the 1974 movie adaptation was released, for many years the New York City Transit Authority barred its planners from scheduling trains leaving Pelham station at 1:23 AM or PM, realizing that it would become too much of a reminder to the public. Eventually this policy was rescinded, but due to the superstitions involved, dispatchers have continued to avoid scheduling a Manhattan-bound train to leave Pelham at 1:23. Book References External links 1973 American novels American novels adapted into films American thriller novels G. P. Putnam's Sons books Novels set in New York City Works set on the New York City Subway Novels set on trains Novels set in one day

5314849

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Galileo%27s%20escapement

Galileo's escapement

Galileo's escapement is a design for a clock escapement, invented around 1637 by Italian scientist Galileo Galilei (1564–1642). Galileo was one of the leading minds of the Scientific Revolution. He was dubbed the founder of theoretical physics. He is also credited with the invention of the celatone (a type of telescope) and the geometric and military compass. Galileo's escapement was the earliest design of a pendulum clock. Since Galileo was by then blind, he described the device to his son Vincenzio, who drew a sketch of it. The son began construction of a prototype, but both he and Galileo died before it was completed. Overview Galileo was the first to investigate the timekeeping properties of pendulums, beginning around 1603. His interest was sparked by his discovery that, at least for small swings, the pendulum is isochronous: its period of swing is the same for different size swings. He realized that this property made the pendulum useful for timekeeping. He also discovered that the pendulum's period is dependent on its length, but independent of the mass of the pendulum bob. He used free-swinging pendulums as timers in scientific experiments and for keeping time for music. In 1637, when he was 73, Galileo had the idea of a mechanism that would keep the pendulum swinging by giving it pushes, an escapement, thus allowing it to be applied to clocks. Since he was by then totally blind, he described the mechanism to his son Vincenzio, who drew a picture from his description. Galileo's student and biographer, Vincenzo Viviani, describes the invention: One day in 1641, while I was living with him at his villa in Arcetri, I remember that the idea occurred to him that the pendulum could be adapted to clocks with weights or springs, serving in place of the usual tempo, he hoped that the very even and natural motions of the pendulum would correct all the defects in the art of clocks. But because his being deprived of sight prevented him making drawings and models to the desired effect, and his son Vincenzio came one day from Florence to Arcetri, Galileo told him his idea and several discussions followed. Finally, they decided on the scheme shown in the accompanying drawing, to be put in practice to learn the fact of those difficulties in machines which are usually not foreseen in simple theorizing. The existing clocks of the time, which used the verge escapement with a crude balance wheel, were very inaccurate. The pendulum, due to its isochronism, could be a much better timekeeper. His son Vincenzio began building a clock, but both he and Galileo died before it was completed. The first pendulum clock was built in 1657 by Christiaan Huygens using a different design. The pendulum clock remained the world's most accurate timekeeper for 300 years, until the 1930s. Since his time, various working models of Galileo's clock have been built (see picture at top). References Escapements Inventions by Galileo Galilei

5315001

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Massalia%20family

Massalia family

The Massalia family (adj. Massalian; FIN: 404) is a family of asteroids in the inner asteroid belt, named after its parent body, 20 Massalia. It consists of S-type asteroids with very low inclinations, straddling the 1:2 resonances with Mars. There are more than 6,000 known Massalian asteroids. Characteristics This is a definite cratering family consisting of 20 Massalia and a mass of small fragments excavated from Massalia's surface by an impact. Massalia is by far the largest member with a diameter of about 150 km, while the next largest body, is only about 7 km in diameter. The mass of all the small members is negligible, less than about 1%, compared to Massalia. The family is fairly young, estimated to have been created by an impact 100 to 200 million years ago. It has a distinctly two-lobed appearance in proper a--e space, with one lobe centered at semi-major axes of 2.38 AU, the other at about 2.43 AU, with the parent body Massalia itself located in between. The bodies in the lobes tend to be smaller on average than those in the central region. It has been shown that this structure is likely caused by slow drift of the semi-major axis caused by the Yarkovsky and YORP effects. Details of the lobes were used to calculate the age of the family. A strong 1:2 orbital resonance with Mars crosses the family at 2.42 AU, and appears responsible for some "leakage" of family members away from the area into higher inclination orbits. The Massalia family or a recent minor collision within it may be the source for the prominent α dust band, the other candidate being a recent collision within the Themis family. Location and size The Massalian asteroids are located at very low inclinations, straddling the 1:2 resonances with Mars. A HCM numerical analysis by Zappalà in 1995, determined a group of core family members, whose proper orbital elements lie in the approximate ranges * The Zappalà core members only reach e=0.170 but inspection of more modern proper elements reveals that the family extends at least to e=0.175 At the present epoch, the range of osculating orbital elements of these core members is The analysis by Zappalà found 42 core members in 1995, while a HCM-analysis by Nesvorný in 2014 yielded 6,424 member asteroids based on the proper elements of a catalog of 398,000 bodies. List Interlopers A number of Interlopers have been identified, which share the same orbital elements as the true family members, but cannot have come from the same cratering event because of spectral (hence, compositional) differences. 2946 Muchachos and some other bodies were noted as interlopers during a detailed study of the family, while 2316 Jo-Ann is seen to have the wrong spectrum by inspection of the PDS asteroid taxonomy data set. Muchachos is larger than any of the true family members apart from Massalia itself. References Asteroid groups and families

5317325

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scotch%20and%20Wry

Scotch and Wry

Scotch and Wry is a Scottish television comedy sketch show produced by BBC Scotland and starring Rikki Fulton and a revolving ensemble cast which over the years included Gregor Fisher, Tony Roper, Claire Nielson, Juliet Cadzow and John Bett. Initially running for two series from 1978 to 1979, the show went on to become a top-rating annual Hogmanay special for over a decade. The series also gave early exposure to emerging Scottish actors such as Gerard Kelly and Miriam Margolyes. In later years, cast members from sister BBC Scotland comedy show Naked Video would also make sporadic appearances. History Scotch and Wry was developed from The Scotched Earth Show, a one-off special based on Scottish humorous writing, broadcast on New Year's Day 1977. Fulton starred in the special, having made sporadic television appearances since his ill-fated Rikki series for STV, which ended mid-run in 1967. Scotch and Wry first aired on BBC1 Scotland at 10.30pm on Saturday 30 September 1978. Its comedic focus was on predominantly Scottish (and in particular Glaswegian) humour, although the series also included material from London-based writers, including rejected scripts for The Two Ronnies The show's signature tune throughout its entire run was a library track, Sexy Sox, composed by Reg Tilsley. Overall, the viewer had to be familiar with the Glasgow patter in order to understand many of the jokes. As a result, much of the humour was constructed around distinctly Glaswegian themes; such as the city's suburbs, its football clubs, and even its famous sectarian divide was also played for laughs. The programmes (and some personalities) of rival ITV station STV (most notably Late Call) were frequently parodied on the show. In the later Hogmanay specials, a greater emphasis was placed on major news events that had happened during the previous year as their basis. Another regular target in many sketches was Lanarkshire singer Sydney Devine, who later became one of the show's many guest stars, appearing in a parody of Phantom of the Opera. In the first years of the Hogmanay specials, singer Barbara Dickson performed musical interludes. It also became customary of Scotch and Wry to include a post-closing credits sketch, which was often a dig at The Hogmanay Show which followed immediately afterwards. The best remembered skit – from the 1985 special – involved Fulton interrupting a party to throw his television out of the window just before the show started. For several years, Scotch and Wry also aired on BBC1 Northern Ireland but was given only one full networked airing by the BBC – the 1982 Hogmanay special aired outside Scotland on New Year's Day 1983. The last new episode – produced by regular cast member Tony Roper – aired on Thursday 31 December 1992. Comedy specials have continued to air each Hogmanay on BBC1 Scotland, including Chewin' the Fat, Still Game and Only an Excuse?. Fulton also revived his Reverend I.M. Jolly character for several Hogmanay spin-off specials during the 1990s – Tis' the Season to the Jolly (1993), A Man for All Seasons (1994), Jolly: A Life (1995) and It's A Jolly Life (1999), which marked the character's farewell appearance. A specially recorded compilation, introduced by Fulton, aired in 1996 to mark the 50th anniversary of his showbusiness career. Characters Last Call: the programme's signature sketch was a parody of Scottish Television's nightly epilogue Late Call (its name being a play on the bar term “last call”). Each episode ended with a monologue delivered by a series of fictional ministers – each with a pun name and played by Fulton. The 'epilogues' were at first deemed controversial and blasphemous by the Church of Scotland. Fulton defended the sketches, stating Last Call was parodying the STV epilogues rather than the Kirk itself. The sketches opened and closed with an excerpt of the second movement from Tchaikovsky's Symphony No. 5. Among the ministers who delivered Last Call sermonettes: Reverend I.M. Jolly, an ironically named and perpetually depressed minister who delivered the majority of the Last Call epilogues. The Jolly monologues usually contained references to his mysterious wife "Ephesia", and the antics of church organist "Mr. Bampot" – neither of which are seen (but are referred to) in the spin-off specials. After featuring in both series, Jolly went on to feature in every Hogmanay special and a number of spin-off specials during the 1990s. Reverend David Goodchild: in a variant of a popular American vaudeville sketch from Red Skelton's repertoire, Goodchild's water decanter is accidentally spiked with gin by a floor manager, and as a result, he slowly gets more and more drunk as his monologue progresses. This sketch is regarded as one of the most memorable and popular in the show, and can also be regarded as one of Fulton's finest comic performances. Reverend W.E Free, a hypocritical Free Presbyterian minister who uses his epilogue to go into an angry diatribe about the "sins" of his parishioners—only to reveal he envied their ability to partake in such sins. Mrs Ida Closeshave, a woman who talked about the events surrounding her missionary work. Father Kevin Dulally, a Roman Catholic priest who must hold his bladder through the entire epilogue, due to not being able to use the bathroom before recording. The Very Rev. A. King Bones, an elderly and befuddled minister with thick eyeglasses, who misses his cues and ends up overrunning his timeslot. Rev. Justin Thyme, a retiring minister who recounted his contentious departure from his congregation in a series of hymn titles. Andrew (Andy) Ross the Supercop, an incompetent traffic policeman with the catchphrase OK, Stirling, oot the car!, only to find himself dealing with Batman, an extraterrestrial, DCI Jim Taggart, Dr Crippen or any other unlikely traffic offender (including, in one sketch, the Reverend I.M. Jolly). Dirty Dickie Dandruff, an extremely unhygienic television chef billed as the Gallowgate Gourmet, based at "Dick's Delicatmessen". Aloycious {AKA Tam} McGlinchey, a colourful Rab C Nesbitt-esque character. Alky Broon, similar to the Dickie Dandruff character, who first appeared in 1983 as a terminally unhygienic barber, and later, as a cack-handed dentist. Are Ye Dancin?, a spoof of dancing shows featuring effeminate hosts Francie (Fulton) and Josie (Jack Milroy); a revival of a double act Fulton and Milroy had done since the 1960s. Ticket Clerk, an unsympathetic ticket clerk, intended to poke fun at British Rail. He regularly would pull the shutter down in front of an unfortunate passenger with the line the last train left five minutes ago. Notable one-offs Rangers F.C. were regularly parodied (as were its Old Firm rival, Celtic F.C.). The best known football sketch from the series saw the Rangers manager (Fulton) being convinced by a new scout (Fisher) to sign a stand-out player (Gerard Kelly), only to discover, immediately after having signed the contract, that the young prospect is a Roman Catholic. The humour from the sketch derives from the sectarian rivalry between the traditionally Protestant Rangers and traditionally Catholic Celtic, and the manager's failed attempts to, as subtly as possible, find an excuse to get out of the contract and prevent him from playing. Big Chief Swift Half, an unemployed Glaswegian who dresses up as an American Indian to get out of getting a job. Michael Jackson from Jordanhill, Fulton again plays an unemployed Glaswegian trying to be hired by a nightclub manager, but dressed in a bizarre disguise as Michael Jackson (parodying Jackson's famous costume from the album Bad). When the ruse fails, he tries again, this time as "Shirley Bassey from Bearsden". S.W Duff, a funeral director. Key one-off parodies included Bonnie Prince Charlie, Robert the Bruce, The Beechgrove Garden, The Curries (a send up of The Corries) and Box 2001 1/2 (a parody of STV's community broadcasting slot Box 2000). Feature guest stars from the series of Hogmanay specials included Barry McGuigan, Jim Watt, Mark McManus, Gavin Hastings, and BBC Scotland sports pundits Dougie Donnelly and Archie Macpherson. Repeats and releases Several compilation programmes have been broadcast, including a Hogmanay special in 1996 – marking Fulton's 50-year anniversary in show business – and a six-part series, The Very Best of Scotch and Wry, aired in 2004 following the death of Rikki Fulton. The original series was also aired on UK Gold from 1994 to 1995. Scotch and Wry first became available on VHS with four special compilations released by BBC Video during the mid to late 1980s and early 1990s. The first was Scotch & Wry, which was released in 1986, and proved such a massive hit that a second compilation, Double Scotch & Wry, followed in 1987, proving almost as popular. Each video was 90 minutes in length and featured sketches right up to the 1985 and 1986 specials respectively. A third video, Triple Scotch & Wry, was released in 1990 and finally a fourth video, Scotch & Wry 4: Prince of Pochlers, in 1992. For copyright reasons, none of the DVD releases feature the Barbara Dickson musical interludes which formed part of the early Hogmanay specials, and musical soundtracks (such as the Dirty Dick's Delicatmessen skits – which originally featured Something's Cooking in the Kitchen by Dana) have been edited out. All four compilations were subsequently re-released on DVD in 2006, and again as part of The Ultimate Rikki Fulton Collection DVD box set in 2007. However, a full release of the first two full series and all 12 subsequent Hogmanay specials remains unlikely. References BBC Scotland television shows BBC Scotland television sketch shows New Year's television specials 1978 Scottish television series debuts 1992 Scottish television series endings BBC television comedy Hogmanay 1970s Scottish television series 1980s Scottish television series 1990s Scottish television series 1970s British television sketch shows 1980s British television sketch shows 1990s British television sketch shows

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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cissonius

Cissonius

Cissonius (also Cisonius, Cesonius) was an ancient Gaulish/Celtic god. After Visucius, Cissonius was the most common name of the Gaulish/Celtic Mercury; around seventeen inscriptions dedicated to him extend from France and Southern Germany into Switzerland. Name The name has been interpreted as meaning 'carriage-driver' (from cissum 'carriage'), or 'dream-bringer' (from cit- attached to souno- 'sleep, dream'). A goddess Cissonia is also recorded. Cult He was probably a god of trade and protector of travellers, since Mercury exercised similar functions in the Roman pantheon. In one inscription from Promontogno in Switzerland, Cissonus is identified with Matutinus. References Bibliography Gaulish gods Commerce gods Mercurian deities

5319068

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apollo%2015%20postal%20covers%20incident

Apollo 15 postal covers incident

The Apollo 15 postal covers incident, a 1972 NASA scandal, involved the astronauts of Apollo 15, who carried about 400 unauthorized postal covers into space and to the Moon's surface on the Lunar Module Falcon. Some of the envelopes were sold at high prices by West German stamp dealer Hermann Sieger, and are known as "Sieger covers". The crew of Apollo 15—David Scott, Alfred Worden, and James Irwin—agreed to take payments for carrying the covers; though they returned the money, they were reprimanded by NASA. Amid much press coverage of the incident, the astronauts were called before a closed session of a Senate committee and never flew in space again. The three astronauts and an acquaintance, Horst Eiermann, had agreed to have the covers made and taken into space. Each astronaut was to receive about $7,000 (). Scott arranged to have the covers postmarked on the morning of the Apollo 15 launch on July 26, 1971. They were packaged for space and brought to him as he prepared for liftoff; he brought them aboard in a pocket of his space suit. They were not included on the list of the personal items he was taking into space. The covers spent July 30 to August 2 on the Moon inside Falcon. On August 7, the date of splashdown, the covers were postmarked again on the recovery carrier . One hundred were sent to Eiermann (and passed on to Sieger); the remaining covers were divided among the astronauts. Worden had agreed to carry 144 additional covers, largely for an acquaintance, F. Herrick Herrick; these had been approved for travel to space. Apollo 15 carried a total of approximately 641 covers. In late 1971, when NASA learned that the Herrick covers were being sold, the astronauts' supervisor, Deke Slayton, warned Worden to avoid further commercialization of what he had been allowed to take into space. After Slayton heard of the Sieger arrangement, he removed the three as backup crew members for Apollo 17, though the astronauts had by then returned compensation from Sieger. The Sieger matter became generally known in the newspapers in June 1972. There was widespread coverage; some commentators argued that astronauts should not be allowed to reap personal profits from NASA missions. By 1977, all three former astronauts had left NASA. In February 1983, Worden sued, alleging the seizure of the envelopes without a hearing had violated the Constitution. The Department of Justice concluded it had no grounds for fighting the suit, and the government returned all the covers in an out-of-court settlement that July. One of the postal covers given to Sieger sold for over $50,000 in 2014 (). Background After the start of the Space Age with the launch of Sputnik I on October 4, 1957, astrophilately (space-related stamp collecting) began. Nations such as the United States and USSR issued commemorative postage stamps depicting spacecraft and satellites. Astrophilately was most popular during the years of the Apollo program's Moon landings from 1969 to 1972. Collectors and dealers sought philatelic souvenirs related to the American space flight program, often through specially-designed envelopes (known as covers). Cancelling covers submitted by the public became a major duty of the employees of the Kennedy Space Center (KSC) post office on space mission launch days. The American astronauts participated in creating collectables. Beginning in the late 1960s, Harold G. Collins, head of the Mission Support Office at KSC, arranged for specially designed envelopes to be printed for the different missions, and to be canceled on the launch dates. Such unflown philatelic covers were often gifts for the astronauts' friends, or for employees of NASA and its contractors. Although it was not publicly known until September 1972, 15 of the men who entered space as Apollo program astronauts before Apollo 15 had agreed with a West German named Horst Eiermann to autograph 500 philatelic items (postcards and blocks of stamps) in exchange for $2,500. This included a member of each mission between Apollo 7 (1968) and Apollo 13 (1970). These items were not taken into space. The astronauts were allowed to take Personal Preference Kits (PPKs) into space with them. These small bags, with their contents limited in size and weight, contained personal items the astronauts wanted to be flown as souvenirs of the mission. As the spaceflights moved toward and culminated in the Moon landings, the public's fascination with items flown in space increased, as did their value. Covers were prepared by the crews and flown on Apollo 11, Apollo 13 and Apollo 14. Ed Mitchell, lunar module pilot for Apollo 14, took his to the Moon's surface in a PPK. These were often retained by the astronauts for many years; Apollo 11's Neil Armstrong kept his until he died, and they were not offered for sale until 2018, when one sold for $156,250. The Apollo 15 mission began when the Saturn V launch vehicle blasted off from KSC on July 26, 1971, and ended when the astronauts and the Command Module Endeavour were recovered by the helicopter carrier on August 7. Onboard Endeavour were Mission Commander David Scott, Command Module Pilot Alfred Worden and Lunar Module Pilot James Irwin. The Lunar Module Falcon, with Scott and Irwin aboard, landed on the Moon on July 30, and remained there for just under 67 hours. The mission set several space records and was the first to use the lunar rover. Scott and Irwin rode it to explore the area around the landing site during three periods of extravehicular activity (EVA). On August 2, before finishing the final EVA and entering the Lunar Module, Scott used a special postmarking device to cancel a first day cover provided by the United States Postal Service bearing two new stamps, whose designs depicted lunar astronauts and a rover, commemorating the tenth anniversary of Americans entering space. That cover was returned to the Postal Service after the mission, and is now in the Smithsonian Institution's National Postal Museum. Preparation Eiermann knew a stamp dealer named Hermann Sieger from Lorch, West Germany. The two had met by chance while on a bus to observe the launch of Apollo 12 in late 1969; Eiermann heard by Sieger's Swabian inflection that they were from the same part of Germany, and invited him to his house. Sieger got the idea for the lunar covers after hearing that the Apollo 12 astronauts had taken a Bible with them. When Sieger learned that Eiermann knew many astronauts, he proposed that an Apollo crew be persuaded to take covers to the Moon. Eiermann did not think astronauts would take money to do so, but agreed to ask them when Sieger characterized the payments as investments for the astronauts' children. Eiermann did not mention Sieger's name in his approach to the astronauts. Eiermann lived in Cocoa Beach, Florida at the time of Apollo 15, and was a local representative of Los Angeles-based Dyna-Therm Corporation, which was a NASA contractor. According to Scott's autobiography, one night several months before launch, the astronauts' supervisor, Director of Flight Crew Operations Deke Slayton, had Scott and the other crew members come to dinner at Eiermann's house; Scott described Eiermann as a longtime friend of Slayton. Worden, in his autobiography, agreed that the crew was invited to dinner there, but described Scott as inviting his crewmates, and did not mention involvement by Slayton. In his testimony before a congressional committee in 1972, Scott described Eiermann as a "friend of ours", someone with whom he had dined and who knew many people at KSC, including a number of the astronauts. Scott also told the committee that he had met Eiermann at a party, rather than through another astronaut. At the dinner, Eiermann proposed the astronauts carry 100 special stamp covers, to be flown to the Moon. Worden stated that he and Irwin, who had not previously gone into space, were assured that this was common practice. Worden recalled that the astronauts were told the covers would not be sold until some time in the future after the Apollo program had ended. They would receive $7,000 each. They were informed that other Apollo crews had made and profited from similar agreements. Earlier astronauts had been given free life insurance by Life magazine. This benefit was no longer available by the time of Apollo 15. Worden wrote that to ensure their families were provided for given the severe risks and dangers of their profession, the astronauts agreed to the deal, planning to put the payments aside as funds for their children. At the time, Scott earned $2,199 a month ($13,000 as of 2020) as an astronaut, Worden $1,715 and Irwin $2,235. According to Scott, the astronauts also decided the covers would make good gifts and requested an additional 100 each for a total of 400 covers. Scott indicated in his testimony that after discussion with his crewmates, he expected the covers to be a "very private and noncommercial enterprise." He added: "I admit that this is wrong. I understand it very clearly now. But at the time, for some naive and thoughtless reason, I did not understand the significance of it." Irwin wrote in his autobiography that the initial meeting with Eiermann took place in May 1971, and that the astronauts met with him twice thereafter. Eiermann relayed instructions from Sieger on how to prepare the covers: they were to be postmarked twice, at KSC on the date of launch and on the recovery ship on the date of splashdown, and carry a signed statement from the astronauts with a certification from a notary. The certification would make the covers more sellable in Europe, where a notary is a legal professional who often verifies the document, not just the signatures. An additional 144 covers were flown pursuant to an understanding between Worden and F. Herrick Herrick of Miami, a retired movie director and a stamp collector. According to a letter reporting on the stamp incident from NASA Administrator James C. Fletcher to the chairman of the Senate Committee on Aeronautical and Space Sciences, Clinton P. Anderson, Herrick was a friend of the three astronauts who had arranged for Worden, also a stamp collector, to buy an album full of stamps and proposed the astronauts take covers into space. These would be split and set aside for some years, and then sold. In his book Worden said he had been introduced to Herrick at lunch by former race car driver Jim Rathmann, and that Herrick proposed the plan. Worden also related his insistence the covers must be held, unsold and unpublicized, until after the Apollo program had ended, and he had retired from NASA and the Air Force. "I didn't want to do anything that would embarrass either myself or NASA, and I believed Herrick was as good as his word. It was a huge lapse in judgment on my part to trust this stranger. I was too old to believe in Santa Claus." In his 1972 testimony before the Senate committee, Worden described Herrick as a friend with whom he had had past dealings, and with whom he discussed the possibility of commemorative covers. According to a 1978 Justice Department report, before the Apollo 15 flight Herrick advised Worden that taking covers to the Moon would be a prudent investment because they would be valuable to stamp collectors. While Scott and his crewmates were completing their mission training, a controversy developed within NASA and Congress over some of the souvenir silver medallions the crew of Apollo 14 had carried to the Moon. The private Franklin Mint, which had supplied the medallions in question, melted down some of those that had been flown. These were mixed with a large quantity of other metal, and commemorative medallions were struck from the mass, used as a premium to attract people to pay to join the Franklin Mint Collector's Club. The fact that some part of the medals had flown to the Moon was used in the mint's advertisements. Because the Apollo 14 crew had accepted no money, they were not disciplined. Slayton reduced the number of medallions each member of Apollo 15 could take along by half. He warned the Apollo 15 crew against carrying any items into space that could make money for them or others. In August 1965, Slayton had issued regulations requiring that items astronauts planned to carry be listed, approved by him, and checked for safety in space if similar items had not already been flown. Each crew member was bound by NASA standards of conduct issued in 1967 forbidding using one's position to make money for oneself or another person. Creation and spaceflight Eiermann was supposed to create the cachet for the special covers he had proposed, but time ran short and Scott did it instead. He used the Apollo 15 mission patch to create the design, and gave it to Collins of the Mission Support Office. Collins arranged with the Brevard Printing Company of Cocoa, Florida for the design to be reproduced on both regular and lightweight envelopes. The company performed the work and billed Alvin B. Bishop Jr. $156 for the lightweight envelopes and $209 for the regular ones. Bishop, a public relations executive who specialized in the aerospace industry, and knew many astronauts, created specially designed covers for a number of the Apollo missions, which he supplied only to the crew and their families. He was at the time employed by Hughes Enterprises in Las Vegas; the company paid the bill. Herrick secured the services of a commercial artist, Vance Johnson, with whom Worden discussed the design, resulting in 100 envelopes depicting the phases of the Moon. Worden listed these covers as part of the contents of his PPK for Slayton's approval, along with 44 first day covers that he owned. Ad-Pro Graphics, Inc. of Miami printed the Herrick envelopes, along with card inserts stating the accompanying cover had been carried on Apollo 15. Herrick paid the firm's bill of $50.50; he also obtained the postage stamps for the covers, and two rubber stamps stating the dates of the launch and splashdown. The design was printed on labels that were affixed to the envelopes. Not all Herrick covers are identical, as different cachets, rubber stamp impressions and combinations of postage stamps were used. Worden also carried a cover postmarked in 1928, autographed by aviation pioneer Orville Wright. In addition to those brought by Scott and by Worden, Irwin carried 96 covers, one with a "flown-to-the-Moon" theme, eight with an Apollo 15 design, and 87 covers honoring Apollo 12, carried as a favor for Barbara Gordon, wife of Apollo 12 astronaut Dick Gordon. Barbara Gordon, a stamp collector, had wanted her husband to take the covers on his lunar mission, but he had refused. The flown-to-the-moon cover was a favor for a friend of Dick Gordon. Apollo 15 carried the cover from the Postal Service to be canceled on the surface of the Moon. The agency also sent a backup, stowed in the Command Module with another cancellation device, for use on the homeward journey if Scott did not get to postmark the lunar cover. All covers except the group of 400 had been approved by Slayton, who stated in his testimony that he would almost certainly have approved them if asked (assuming their weight could be negotiated with the Flight Manager), on condition that they stay in the Command Module and not go to the lunar surface. In July 1972, after the story broke, William Hines of the Chicago Sun-Times wrote that "the idea that this complicated caper could have been carried out without the knowledge and at least tacit permission of Slayton is regarded by people familiar with NASA as ludicrous. Slayton's tight rein over his sometimes fractious charges is legendary". The crew bought several hundred of the ten-cent First Man on the Moon postage stamp issue. These were affixed to the lightweight envelopes by secretaries in the Astronaut Office. Collins had made arrangements for the KSC post office to open at 1:00 am EDT on launch day—opening this facility so early on an Apollo launch morning was not unusual—and brought several hundred of the stamped covers. Once the envelopes had been run through the cancellation machine, he took them to the astronaut quarters, where members of the Flight Crew Support Team vacuum sealed them in Teflon-covered fiberglass to fireproof them for space. Normally, if the Flight Crew Support Team found that an item was not on an astronaut's PPK list, they would add it, and make sure it was approved, but team leader James L. Smotherman stated that he "goofed", explaining that he had confused the 400 covers with the Herrick envelopes, which had been approved by Slayton. Since the 400 covers had not been approved by Slayton, they were considered unauthorized. Scott stated, "I never intended to bootleg the covers. If I had intended to bootleg the covers, I certainly would not have allowed Mr. Collins to handle them or the rest of the people to assist me." Like other items being placed in the pockets on Scott's space suit (for example, his sunglasses), they were first shown to him by the suit technicians helping him dress. Divided into two packets, the bundled covers were about thick and weighed about ; they entered the spacecraft in Scott's pocket. Apollo 15 blasted off for the Moon at 9:34 am on July 26, 1971, with three astronauts and about 641 covers aboard. At some point while the mission was en route to the Moon, the 400 covers were moved into the lunar lander Falcon; in his testimony, Scott agreed this violated the rules. He stated he did not recall how the transfer took place, and that he was only certain that the envelopes went to the lunar surface because they were in the bag of items taken out of the Falcon in preparation for the return to Earth. Worden stated in his testimony that they were aware of the presence of the covers in the Command Module after the mission's launch, but he did not recall if the covers had been among the many items moved into the Falcon in preparation for the lunar landing; he did not believe the matter had been discussed during the flight. He wrote in his autobiography that the night he had agreed to the deal with Eiermann "was the last I heard or thought of about the covers until after the flight ... What arrangements Dave [Scott], Eiermann, and Sieger made to get the covers onto the flight, I never knew until later. Dave later told a congressional committee that he had placed them in a pocket of his spacesuit, but he never shared that information with me". He indicated that the covers he had arranged to have on board, including those from Herrick, remained in his PPK in the Command Module throughout the flight. The testimony before Congress, from multiple individuals including Apollo 15 astronauts, was that carrying the covers did not interfere with the mission in any way. Apollo 15 splashed down about north of Honolulu at 4:46 pm EDT (UTC–04:00) on August 7, 1971; the crew was retrieved by helicopters from the Okinawa. Scott had asked that a supply of the twin space stamps of the design he had canceled on the Moon (issued August 2) be available on the Okinawa, and on July 14, Forrest J. Rhodes, who ran the postal facility at KSC, wrote to the Chief Petty Officer in charge of the Okinawas post office. The ship replied on the 20th, saying the stamps could be obtained in time. The stamps were secured from the post office at Pearl Harbor; 4,000 were flown to the Okinawa at sea by helicopter, reportedly in the custody of a naval officer joining the vessel. The astronauts had no money with them; their purchases were paid for by high-ranking officers aboard the Okinawa, who were later reimbursed. The crew had the assistance of Okinawa crew members in affixing the stamps to the 400 covers for cancellation by the ship's post office. The Irwin covers were not postmarked, either at liftoff or splashdown. Worden wrote in his book that he never saw the covers Scott had brought until the astronauts were on the flight to Houston. However, as Scott mentioned he was having them postmarked with the splashdown date, Worden arranged to have that done for the ones he had taken into space. On the flight, the 400 covers were autographed by the three astronauts; the Herrick covers were also signed while en route. Irwin remembered the signing took several hours. Distribution and scandal On August 31, 1971, C.G. Carsey, a clerk in the Astronaut Office in Houston, typed certifications on 100 of the covers, with the aid of other NASA employees in her office. The certifications stated the cover had been on the Moon aboard the Falcon. The covers already carried a handwritten statement signed by Scott and Irwin that they had been landed on the Moon on July 30. Carsey later stated that in signing the certifications as a Texas notary public, she only intended to certify their signatures were genuine. The question of whether Carsey had improperly certified that the covers had been landed on the Moon (something she had no personal knowledge of) was the subject of an investigation by the Texas Attorney General. With the notary certifications, the last of Sieger's requirements for the covers was fulfilled. On September 2, Scott sent the 100 covers by registered mail to Eiermann, who was in Stuttgart, where he had moved. Eiermann turned the covers over to Sieger, and was rewarded with a commission of about $15,000—ten percent of the anticipated proceeds. The remaining 300 were entrusted by the astronauts to a Houston-area stamp collector who arranged with a local printer to have an inscription stating that the cover had been carried to the Moon printed in the upper left. The printer discovered there were 298 covers, not 300; the stamp collector consulted Scott, who told him not to worry about it. One of Irwin's covers from the group of eight, with a shamrock design as its cachet, was given to Rhodes and one to the president of the Kennedy Space Center Philatelic Society; Irwin said in 1972 that he had retained the other six. Sieger notified his customers of the flown covers via a mailing, selling them at DM 4,850 (about $1,500 at the time), with a discount to those who bought more than one. He kept one for himself, and by November had sold the remaining 99. He numbered and signed the backs of the envelopes in the lower left as a token of their genuineness. Worden recalled in his book that he sent the agreed number of 44 covers to Herrick soon after returning from space. He also sent him 60 belonging to himself for safekeeping, and gave 28 to friends. Herrick consigned 70 covers to Robert A. Siegel, a prominent New York dealer. Siegel sold ten covers for a total of $7,900, receiving a commission from Herrick of 25 percent. Herrick sold three himself for $1,250 each and placed several on commission in Europe. In late October 1971, a potential customer for one of the Herrick covers wrote to NASA to inquire about its authenticity. On November 5, Slayton responded, saying NASA could not confirm whether it was genuine. He warned Worden to ensure that his covers would not be further commercialized. Worden wrote an angry letter to Herrick. In June 1972, Herrick instructed Siegel to send 60 covers to Worden in Houston, which he did by registered mail. Until this point, Siegel had assumed the 60 covers belonged to Herrick. Probably before they made an official NASA trip to Europe in November 1971, the Apollo 15 astronauts received and completed the paperwork necessary to open accounts in a Stuttgart-area bank to receive the agreed $7,000 payments. According to Scott's testimony, while they were in Europe, they heard the Sieger covers were being sold commercially. Scott called Eiermann, who promised to look into it. The astronauts indicated they received the bankbooks in early 1972. Irwin remembered in his autobiography that before their trip to Europe, Scott came to him and said, "Jim, we are in trouble now—they are starting to sell the envelopes over there", and that the covers cast a shadow over their European trip. Scott said the crew discussed it among themselves, then decided that the receipt of funds was improper. In late February they returned the bankbooks to Eiermann, who responded that the astronauts should receive something for their efforts. Howard C. Weinberger, in his account of the Apollo 15 covers, deemed the astronauts' refusal "an effort to save their careers and reputations". The crew initially agreed to accept albums filled with aerospace-themed stamps for their children, including issues in honor of Apollo 15. Scott related that they decided this too was improper and said they wanted nothing. This final refusal happened in April 1972. Worden remembered, "we did this before NASA asked us anything about a deal with Sieger—before NASA even knew about it". Discussion of the covers in European philatelic publications alerted collectors in the United States. On March 11, 1972, Lester Winick, president of a group of collectors of space stamps and covers known as the Space Topics Study Group, sent a letter to NASA's general counsel asking a number of questions about the Sieger covers. The letter was forwarded for a response to Slayton, who casually mentioned it to Irwin in late March; Irwin told him to talk to Scott. Slayton spoke with Worden on the assumption that the covers referred to were among the group of 144, but Worden told him this was not necessarily the case and that he should talk to Scott. Slayton did talk to Scott in mid-April, just before the launch of Apollo 16. Scott told him there had been 400 covers not on the approved list, and that 100 had been given to a friend. In his autobiography, Slayton wrote that he confronted Scott and Worden about what he called a "regular goddamn scandal": "they told me what the deal was, and I got pretty goddamn angry. So I was through with Scott, Worden, and Irwin. After 16 splashed down, I kicked them off the backup crew for 17." One reason for Slayton's anger was that he had defended the astronauts as rumors of the high prices being paid for the covers circulated; according to Andrew Chaikin in his history of the Apollo program, Slayton "went out on a limb to defend his people". Slayton wrote to Winick, stating that the spacecraft had carried covers, but NASA could not confirm these particular envelopes had been taken; he did not tell Winick unauthorized covers had been flown. He sent a copy of his response to the general counsel's office at NASA Headquarters in Washington, which took no action. Slayton did not inform Administrator Fletcher, Deputy Administrator George M. Low or his own superior, Christopher C. Kraft of the postage stamp incident or of the disciplinary action he had taken. In early June 1972, Low heard from a member of his staff of the possibility covers flown on Apollo 15 might have been sold in Europe. He asked Associate Administrator Dale D. Myers to enquire through NASA management channels for information. Low kept Fletcher informed of the situation as it developed. Myers made an interim report to Low on the 16th. Before he could make his final report on the 26th, the story broke with an article in The Washington Sunday Star on June 18. Kraft interviewed Scott on the 23rd. Low ordered a full investigation by NASA's Inspections Division on June 29. According to Low in his personal notes, during the investigation, Scott, who had to that point maintained that the astronauts had never intended to profit from the Sieger covers, disclosed the information about the German bank accounts. Once the facts had been developed, Low consulted with Fletcher, Kraft, Slayton and others regarding whether to expel the three men from the Astronaut Corps and return them to the Air Force, to reprimand them and retain them within NASA outside the corps, or to reprimand them but allow them to remain astronauts. Low accepted Kraft's recommendation to reprimand the astronauts, and to state that their actions would be taken into consideration in their future assignments. Low asked to meet with the crew members before making a final decision, and this took place on July 10, Scott and Worden individually at Low's Washington office and Irwin by telephone. All admitted the basic facts, with Scott making "the point for the first time that his intention had really been to use the funds for a trust fund for his children, and not for any direct personal use". Worden, also admitting the facts, stated that he felt he had "taken most of the beating", and in a way was relieved the full story was being aired. Irwin, who had already decided to leave NASA, expressed his concern for Scott's future. Later on July 10, the three astronauts were reprimanded for poor judgment, something that made it extremely unlikely that they would be selected to fly in space again. Richard S. Lewis, in his early history of the Apollo program, noted that "in the atmosphere of wheeling and dealing that has characterized government agency-industrial contractor relations in the Space Age, the unauthorized freight that the Apollo 15 crew hauled to the moon was a boyish prank. In the rhetoric of space program critics, though, it was branded as exploitation for personal gain of the most costly technological development in history. In the press, the astronauts were treated like fallen angels." Kraft remembered in his memoirs that Slayton told him, "They did it. There was no hiding. Dave just said sure, nothing wrong with it, right?" Scott, while stating, "we made a mistake in even considering it", felt that the reaction "was turning into a witch-hunt". Worden, though admitting blame for entering into the deal, felt that NASA had not adequately supported him, and that Scott had not taken full responsibility for his role. He believed that Slayton would not have required them to leave the Astronaut Corps if left to himself, but that Kraft had insisted. Irwin, who would become an evangelist after leaving the Astronaut Corps, said that NASA had no choice but to reprimand them. He hoped he could turn the experience to use in his ministry, that it would help him empathize with others who had erred. In mid-July, the media reported on the dispute over the sculpture Fallen Astronaut, left on the Moon by Scott in tribute to those killed in the American and Soviet space programs; the sculptor was having copies made for public sale, over the astronauts' objection. Due to the increasing publicity surrounding the incident, and concerned about the appearance of commercialization of Apollo 15, the Senate Committee on Aeronautical and Space Sciences set a hearing for August 3. It called a number of NASA employees including the astronauts, Slayton, Kraft, Fletcher and Low to appear. Fletcher and Low had tried to talk Senator Anderson out of having a hearing, but the chairman insisted. Worden remembered that while there were difficult questions asked about the astronauts' conduct, part of the committee's concern was why NASA management had allowed another incident to happen so quickly after the Apollo 14 Franklin Mint matter. Members also wanted to know how it was that NASA's chain of command permitted allegations against the astronauts to go unreported to senior management. Because of the efforts of Fletcher and Low, Anderson invoked a rarely used Senate rule for when testimony might impact the reputation of witnesses or others, closing the hearing to the public. Kraft recalled that while he and Low were grilled by the committee, the senators treated the astronauts "like gods". Aftermath None of the Apollo 15 crew flew in space again. Given that the reprimands meant they would likely never be promoted by the Air Force, they were offered other positions at NASA where their skills could be used. Scott was made a technical adviser on the Apollo-Soyuz Test Project (the first joint mission with the Soviet Union) and retired from the Air Force in 1975. He became director of NASA's Dryden Flight Research Center, retiring from NASA in October 1977 and entering the private sector. Worden transferred to NASA's Ames Research Center in California, remaining there until his 1975 retirement both from the Air Force and NASA, and then entered the private sector. Irwin retired in 1972 and founded an evangelical group. Fletcher asked astronauts still with NASA, and even those who were not, such as Apollo 7's Wally Schirra, to turn in all flown covers in their possession to NASA pending a determination of whether they were government property. Kraft related that there was resistance from astronauts, but "we confiscated them, sometimes under duress". These covers were returned when the Justice Department chose to take no action, "and whatever happened to them was kept quiet". Among the astronauts interviewed in NASA's investigation was Apollo 13's Jack Swigert, who denied any dealings with envelopes; after he subsequently admitted he had, Low removed him from Apollo-Soyuz. Kraft suspended some fifteen astronauts who "had broken faith with us and ignored a standing order from Deke"; some, having apologized and served their suspensions, flew on Skylab in the mid-1970s. The covers affair resulted in prejudice in the Air Force against former astronauts (all three Apollo 15 astronauts had served there). This deterred Apollo 14's Stu Roosa from returning to the Air Force when he left NASA, leading him to go into business instead. Although Apollo 16's Charles Duke had taken covers to the lunar surface in April 1972, changes to the PPK procedures instituted by NASA meant that none were taken on Apollo 17 that December. Today, astronauts are forbidden by federal regulation from taking philatelic items into space as mementos. The remaining covers in the Apollo 15 astronauts' control (298 from the group of 400 and 61 more from Worden) were held by NASA during the investigation; Worden said he surrendered them at Kraft's request on the understanding they would be returned once the investigation was over, but the covers were transferred to the National Archives in August 1973. There was a Justice Department investigation into the covers. Its Criminal Division decided in 1974 that no prosecution was warranted, but the Civil Division the following year assumed the covers would be retained by the government. Kraft wrote, "it was questionable that any law had been broken and [the Justice Department] realized that dragging astronauts into court would not be a popular pastime." In December 1978, the Justice Department issued a report indicating that while the government might have some claim to the Herrick covers (due to the appearance of having been made for profit), it probably did not have any claim to the 298 remaining covers, which the astronauts had said were intended as gifts. The department sent a secret memo to NASA that same year, effectively stating that the government took the covers without "any legal proceedings against the astronauts," and in the process "may have violated their constitutional rights," according to a press source in the Justice Department. In 1979, the department informed NASA that it had concluded that the government would likely lose if the astronauts sued for the covers. There was opposition among senators to the covers being returned, and in February 1980 Howard Cannon of Nevada introduced a joint resolution that the government should keep the covers because of their commercialization and advise the Attorney General to "defend any civic action brought" regarding them. It passed the Senate but died in the House of Representatives. In February 1983, Worden sued, alleging NASA violated the Constitution by seizing the covers without a hearing. At this time, the Justice Department reminded NASA of its 1978 secret memo. The government concluded NASA either approved the covers or knew they would be aboard Apollo 15 and, in an out-of-court settlement, returned all the envelopes to the three astronauts in July 1983. The settlement was finalized on July 15, with the government agreeing to release the covers unconditionally, whereupon Worden's legal counsel would terminate the suit. That same year, NASA announced plans to fly about 260,000 postal covers aboard the Space Shuttle STS-8 mission, with the U.S. Postal Service to sell them and split the profits with NASA; Worden remarked in his 2011 memoirs that he was amused by this, pointing out that NASA's covers were intended for "unabashed commercial exploitation." In July 1983, the Associated Press reported on the government's return of the covers, describing how the Justice Department "decided it had no grounds for fighting" the suit and that Worden had agreed to dismiss it, with the 359 envelopes returned. Justice Department lawyer John Seibert stated that NASA had either authorized the envelopes or knew they would be carried into space. The Justice Department read a statement to The Washington Post, printed July 29, explaining how in its decision to return the 61 covers claimed by Worden, it also chose to return the other 298 that Scott and Irwin carried, dividing the latter equally between all three men. Worden's lawyer, James Fleming, said the astronauts were "very happy" with the result. Lawyers also said the three men agreed among themselves not to sell the covers right away, keeping them as mementos and reminders of what had happened. In 2013, Corey S. Powell and Laurie Gwen Shapiro of Slate magazine suggested that the 1978 investigation "largely exonerated" the astronauts, and opined that the return of the covers in 1983 effectively rescinded the accusations. Some of the covers were later sold by the astronauts. One of the group of 298 covers impounded by the government and owned by Scott sold at the January 2008 Novaspace auction for $15,000. A Sieger cover sold in 2014 for over $55,000, the highest auction price to that point—the auctioneer noted that it was one of only four Sieger covers to come to public sale since the initial distribution. Worden sold many of the returned Herrick covers to pay debts from his unsuccessful 1982 run for Congress. When asked in 2011 where the covers were, he said, "Lord only knows. Some of them sold, some of them are still in a safety deposit box. They're probably all over the world by now." In his memoir, Worden expressed remorse at what had happened, writing: “Even if I didn’t break any formal rules, in hindsight I had broken an unspoken trust.” In a 2013 interview with Scott, Slate found that "he's vexed by lingering inaccuracies in the Wikipedia entry about the incidents. We ask: Why didn't he get a friend to log in and correct the entries? He responds with a startled pause. 'Is that right? I didn't know you could do that!' " Summary of covers See also Apollo insurance covers – unflown covers created by Apollo astronauts for sale by their families if they died while on the mission. Robbins medallions – space-flown medallions from the Gemini and Apollo flights. U.S. space exploration history on U.S. stamps § Space Achievement Decade Issue of 1971 (Apollo 15 mission commemorated) "The Man Who Sold the Moon" – Robert Heinlein's 1950 story about a privately funded lunar mission paid for, in part, by covers to be taken to the Moon. Notes References Additional numbers following page numbers for some books are Kindle locations. Sources External links NASA News Release 72-189, "Articles Carried on Manned Space Flights" from collectspace.com 1972 controversies Apollo 15 Space exploration on stamps Scandals in the United States 1971 in the United States 1972 in the United States History of spaceflight Postal history of the United States David Scott James Irwin Alfred Worden

5320897

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aglibol

Aglibol

Aglibol is a god from Palmyra, originating from a north Syrian immigrant community. He is a moon god who was worshiped in the ancient Syrian city of Palmyra as part of a triad alongside Bel and Yarhibol, and associated with the sun god Malakbel. Evidence of Aglibol's worship is primarily epigraphical. The earliest known mention of Aglibol was an inscription which dates back to 17 BCE and associates him with the sun god Malakbel. Several other inscriptions made by the Bene Komare also associate him with Malakbel, including a bilingual inscription from 122 CE in which Aglibol and Malakbel sponsor a citizen by the name of Manai for his piety. Several second century CE inscriptions attest that Aglibol was venerated with Malakbel in a sanctuary known as the "Sacred Garden" (gnt' 'ilym), which was one of the four principal sanctuaries of the city. The Bene Komare tended to this sanctuary. The sanctuary had two altars, a sacred cypress and a bath. One of the reliefs found in the Temple of Bel show the two altars and the two gods. See also List of angels in theology List of lunar deities References Citations Sources External links West Semitic gods Lunar gods

5320915

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Malakbel

Malakbel

Malakbel (Arabic: ملاك بعل) was a sun god worshipped in the ancient Syrian city of Palmyra, frequently associated and worshipped with the moon god Aglibol as a party of a trinity involving the sky god Baalshamin. Etymology Malakbel's name means "Angel of Bel", attesting to his mythological role as Bel's messenger and acolyte. Archaeological evidence The earliest known mention of Malakbel was an inscription which dates back to 17 BC and associates him with the lunar god Aglibol. Several other inscriptions made by the Bene Komare also associate him with Aglibol, including a bilingual inscription from 122 AD in which Aglibol and Malakbel sponsor a citizen by the name of Manai for his piety. Attestations of Malakbel's worship can be found in Rome, and as far as the province of Numidia in north Africa, as attested by a circa 178 AD inscription in the town of El Kantara, where Palmyrene archers were stationed. Sanctuaries In Palmyra Several 2nd century AD inscriptions from the city attest that Aglibol was venerated with Malakbel in a sanctuary known as the "Sacred Garden" (gnt' 'ilym) or "Holy Garden", which was one of the four principle sanctuaries of the city. The Bene Komare, well known devotees of the gods Malakbel and Aglibol, tended to this sanctuary. The sanctuary had two altars, and a sacred cypress. One of the reliefs found in the Temple of Bel show the sanctuary's two altars and depictions of the two gods. The sanctuary also had a bath, as attested by an 182 AD inscription mentioning Thomallachis, daughter of Haddudan, who contributed 2500 denarii towards the construction of the bath of Aglibol and Malakbel. In Rome A shrine of Malakbel is attested around the early 2nd century AD in Rome. The shrine was located on the right bank of the Tiber river, in the vicinity of several wine warehouses. There, Malakbel was frequently identified with the Roman divinity Sol, known as Deus Sol Sanctissimus, and occasionally bore the epithet "Invictus". Malakbel and Sol Invictus In 274, following his victory over the Palmyrene Empire, emperor Aurelian dedicated a large temple to Sol Invictus in Rome; most scholars consider Aurelian's Sol Invictus to be of Syrian origin, either a continuation of the cult of Sol Invictus Elagabalus, or Malakbel of Palmyra, as Malakbel was frequently identified with the Roman god Sol and bore the epithet Invictus. Another one of his names, "Sanctissimus", was an epithet Aurelian bore on an inscription from Capena. The relation between Malakbel and Sol Invictus, if any, can not be confirmed and will probably remain unresolved. See also List of solar deities References Citations Sources See also Yarhibol Aglibol Bene Komare External links Arabian gods Palmyra West Semitic gods Solar gods Messenger gods Hermes Baal Sol Invictus

5323695

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Capitoline%20Games

Capitoline Games

In Ancient Rome, the Capitoline Games (Latin: Ludi Capitolini) were annual games (ludi). They started out as religious holiday celebrations that "called upon divine support to ensure continued prosperity for the state." They were instituted by Camillus, 387 BC, in honor of Jupiter Capitolinus, and in commemoration of the Capitol's not being taken by the Gauls that same year. The games lasted sixteen days, starting on October 15. According to Plutarch, a part of the ceremony involved the public criers putting up the Etruscans for sale by auction. They also took an old man, tying a golden bulla (amulet) around his neck, such as were worn by children, and submitting him to public derision. Festus said that they dressed him in a praetexta, and hung a bull around his neck, not in the manner of a child, but because this was an ornament of the kings of Etruria. The original Capitoline Games fell into disuse, but new ones were instituted by Domitian in 86, modeled after the Olympic Games in Greece. Every four years, in the early summer, contestants came from several nations to participate in various events. Rewards and crowns were bestowed on the poets and placed on their heads by the Emperor himself. The feast was not for poets alone, but also for champions, orators, historians, comedians, musicians, etc. These games became so celebrated, that the manner of accounting time by lustres (periods of five years) was changed, and they began to count by Capitoline games, as the Ancient Greeks did by Olympiads. Introduction The Capitoline Games were markedly different from other Roman games. For one thing, the Games were specific Greek-styled games instituted by Domitian in 86 AD during a time of remodeling. From then on, these games were held every four years, a tradition held by today's contemporary Olympic Games. He built the first and only permanent building, the Stadium of Domitian in the Campus Martius, to house these Greek games. Previously, Greek games had appeared sporadically since early second century BC but had not been enduring until the first century AD. The Campus Martius lay just west of the seven hills and outside of the pomerium. which was a hallowed, public space and had its separate grounds away from Rome itself. It had training rooms connected to baths, a concept that beforehand was not conceived due to the pre-existing Roman thought that bathing and physical exercise were separate on the whole (they considered physical training as warfare preparation and therefore had no place near baths). This bath/training room was a uniquely Greek custom. History The typical Greek games included events for javelin, long jump, and discus. Other events had wrestling and boxing. Greek styled games had several initial functions. One of them was to celebrate generals’ successes in Greece. Other functions involved power moves exercised by rulers. Roman emperors had considerable decisions over the Campus Martius. Julius Caesar had temporary stages in the Campus, including ones with an artificial lake designed for mock water fights. The Saepta Julia was a building located in the Campus that was reserved for voting and other such political matters. It was planned by Julius Caesar. Augustus held his own games at the arena: three sets of his own (two in his name and one for his grandson). Of his games, one was named the Actia (Actian Games) in 28 BC. The Actia had gymnastics shows on a wooden stage. The Augustalia (Augustan Games), were the second in 19 BC. The third Games were held in 12 BC, used to honor his promotion to Pontifex Maximus. Rewards and recognition The appreciation that Romans give particularly to the athletes competing in the events was evident in the numerous tokens dedicated to certain athletes. In other occasions, artists such as poets, musicians, and orators were recognized for their skills. Such tokens included lamps decorated with foliage, flowers, and crowns. This was a way to commemorate the games. Growing Greek influence The prominence of Greek athletics points towards the prevailing influence Greek culture had on the minds of the Romans. The popularity of the Greek games held in the arenas only attest to the claim. Athletics was in a way a method to preserve and highlight the virility of Greek honor in a physical way, demonstrated through feats of spectacular strengths and finesse, usually naked in order to make a statement about comparing fit Greek bodies to others. This was especially contrastive with Roman morals, which decried public nudity. The Romans’ adoption of Greek games underlined a certain kind of thought reversal on Rome’s part. Such acceptance became more widely recognized, especially through the influx of Greek immigrants via slavery or other means of displacement. The ever-changing populous of Rome and its varied citizens soon added Greeks into the equations; even the governmental senators were sometimes selected from the Greek-provinces of Rome. In a sense, Rome was a cosmopolitan city, spoken in many languages such as Latin, Greek, and Oscan, this shows a multifaceted empire made up of different parts around the Mediterranean area. Greek arts, luxuries, and ideas were infused into Roman culture, so much so that it was not abnormal to see even Romans enact special sporting events like the ones above. The Romans merely adapted such values to their own lifestyle. In other ways, having Greek-styled games could be a tactic on the part of the Romans enjoying the culture of conquered lands. References Ancient Roman games festivals 387 BC 86 beginnings Domitian Jupiter (mythology)

5324761

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List%20of%20surface%20features%20of%20Mars%20visited%20by%20Spirit%20and%20Opportunity

List of surface features of Mars visited by Spirit and Opportunity

The Mars Exploration Rover mission successfully landed and operated the rovers Spirit and Opportunity on the planet Mars from 2004 to 2018. During Spirits six years of operation and Opportunitys fourteen years of operation, the rovers drove a total of on the Martian surface, visiting various surface features in their landing sites of Gusev crater and Meridiani Planum, respectively. Spirit Hills Apollo 1 Hills Grissom Hill Columbia Hills Husband Hill McCool Hill Craters Bonneville crater Gusev crater Thira crater Rocks Adirondack Home Plate Humphrey Pot of Gold Miscellaneous Larry's Lookout Sleepy Hollow Opportunity Craters Argo crater Beagle crater Bopolu crater Concepción crater Eagle crater Emma Dean crater Endeavour (crater) Cape Tribulation Marathon Valley Cape York Greeley Haven Solander Point Endurance crater Erebus crater Fram crater Naturaliste crater Nereus crater Santa Maria crater Victoria crater Cape Verde Vostok crater Rocks Block Island meteorite Bounce Rock El Capitan Heat Shield Rock Last Chance Mackinac Island meteorite Matijevic Hill Oileán Ruaidh Shelter Island meteorite See also List of craters on Mars List of rocks on Mars References Mars visited by Spirit and Opportunity, List of surface features of Visited by Spirit and Opportunity, List of surface features of Mars Surface features of Mars visited by Spirit and Opportunity. List of

5325108

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Merit%20Ptah%20%28crater%29

Merit Ptah (crater)

Merit Ptah is an impact crater on Venus, named in honor of alleged ancient Egyptian chief physician Merit Ptah whose existence was later exposed as a hoax. The only known real person by that name is the wife of Ramose (TT55), a governor of Thebes under Akhetaten. References Impact craters on Venus

5327018

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The%20Buried%20Moon

The Buried Moon

The Buried Moon or The Dead Moon is a fairy tale included by Joseph Jacobs in More English Fairy Tales. It has few variants, appearing more mythological than is common for fairy tales. It was collected by Marie Clothilde Balfour from the North Lincolnshire Carrs in the Ancholme Valley; its unusual characteristics made many people doubt its origins as a fairy tale. However, when Mrs. Balfour published her notes, they were generally found reliable. The story may evidence a form of moon worship. Synopsis Once upon a time, the Carland was filled with bogs. When the moon shone, it was as safe to walk in as by day, but when she did not, evil things, such as bogies, came out. One day the moon, hearing of this, pulled on a black cloak over her yellow hair and went to see for herself. She fell into a pool, and a snag bound her there. She saw a man coming toward the pool and fought to be free until the hood fell off; the light helped the man make his way to safety and scared off the evil creatures. She struggled to follow until the hood fell back over her hair, and all the evil things came out of the darkness, trapping her under a big stone with a will-o'-the-wyke to sit on the cross-shaped snag and keep watch. The moon stopped rising, and the people have been wondering what had happened, until the man saved by the moon told what he had seen. A wise woman sent them into the bog until they found a coffin (the stone), a candle (the will-o'-the-wyke), and a cross (the snag); the moon would be nearby. They did as the wise woman said, and freed the moon. From this time on the moon has shone brighter over the boglands than anywhere else, and the evil things were chased from the Carland. Modern adaptions Charles de Lint retold this as "The Moon Is Drowning While I Sleep". The webcomic No Rest for the Wicked uses several elements of the tale as initiating events of the story; the main character is an insomniac princess on a quest to find the missing moon. French power metal band Wildpath did a musical adaptation of the tale on their album Underneath. A music video for the song, Buried Moon, was released in 2012. See also Drawing down the Moon (ritual) References English folklore Buried Moon Buried Moon Moon myths

5327808

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coastline%20paradox

Coastline paradox

The coastline paradox is the counterintuitive observation that the coastline of a landmass does not have a well-defined length. This results from the fractal curve–like properties of coastlines; i.e., the fact that a coastline typically has a fractal dimension. Although the "paradox of length" was previously noted by Hugo Steinhaus, the first systematic study of this phenomenon was by Lewis Fry Richardson, and it was expanded upon by Benoit Mandelbrot. The measured length of the coastline depends on the method used to measure it and the degree of cartographic generalization. Since a landmass has features at all scales, from hundreds of kilometers in size to tiny fractions of a millimeter and below, there is no obvious size of the smallest feature that should be taken into consideration when measuring, and hence no single well-defined perimeter to the landmass. Various approximations exist when specific assumptions are made about minimum feature size. The problem is fundamentally different from the measurement of other, simpler edges. It is possible, for example, to accurately measure the length of a straight, idealized metal bar by using a measurement device to determine that the length is less than a certain amount and greater than another amount—that is, to measure it within a certain degree of uncertainty. The more accurate the measurement device, the closer results will be to the true length of the edge. When measuring a coastline, however, the closer measurement does not result in an increase in accuracy—the measurement only increases in length; unlike with the metal bar, there is no way to obtain a maximum value for the length of the coastline. In three-dimensional space, the coastline paradox is readily extended to the concept of fractal surfaces, whereby the area of a surface varies depending on the measurement resolution. Mathematical aspects The basic concept of length originates from Euclidean distance. In Euclidean geometry, a straight line represents the shortest distance between two points. This line has only one length. On the surface of a sphere, this is replaced by the geodesic length (also called the great circle length), which is measured along the surface curve that exists in the plane containing both endpoints and the center of the sphere. The length of basic curves is more complicated but can also be calculated. Measuring with rulers, one can approximate the length of a curve by adding the sum of the straight lines which connect the points: Using a few straight lines to approximate the length of a curve will produce an estimate lower than the true length; when increasingly short (and thus more numerous) lines are used, the sum approaches the curve's true length. A precise value for this length can be found using calculus, the branch of mathematics enabling the calculation of infinitesimally small distances. The following animation illustrates how a smooth curve can be meaningfully assigned a precise length: Not all curves can be measured in this way. A fractal is, by definition, a curve whose perceived complexity changes with measurement scale. Whereas approximations of a smooth curve tend to a single value as measurement precision increases, the measured value for a fractal does not converge. As the length of a fractal curve always diverges to infinity, if one were to measure a coastline with infinite or near-infinite resolution, the length of the infinitely short kinks in the coastline would add up to infinity. However, this figure relies on the assumption that space can be subdivided into infinitesimal sections. The truth value of this assumption—which underlies Euclidean geometry and serves as a useful model in everyday measurement—is a matter of philosophical speculation, and may or may not reflect the changing realities of "space" and "distance" on the atomic level (approximately the scale of a nanometer). Coastlines are less definite in their construction than idealized fractals such as the Mandelbrot set because they are formed by various natural events that create patterns in statistically random ways, whereas idealized fractals are formed through repeated iterations of simple, formulaic sequences. Discovery Shortly before 1951, Lewis Fry Richardson, in researching the possible effect of border lengths on the probability of war, noticed that the Portuguese reported their measured border with Spain to be 987 km, but the Spanish reported it as 1214 km. This was the beginning of the coastline problem, which is a mathematical uncertainty inherent in the measurement of boundaries that are irregular. The prevailing method of estimating the length of a border (or coastline) was to lay out n equal straight-line segments of length ℓ with dividers on a map or aerial photograph. Each end of the segment must be on the boundary. Investigating the discrepancies in border estimation, Richardson discovered what is now termed the "Richardson effect": the sum of the segments is monotonically increasing when the common length of the segments is decreased. In effect, the shorter the ruler, the longer the measured border; the Spanish and Portuguese geographers were simply using different-length rulers. The result most astounding to Richardson is that, under certain circumstances, as ℓ approaches zero, the length of the coastline approaches infinity. Richardson had believed, based on Euclidean geometry, that a coastline would approach a fixed length, as do similar estimations of regular geometric figures. For example, the perimeter of a regular polygon inscribed in a circle approaches the circumference with increasing numbers of sides (and decrease in the length of one side). In geometric measure theory such a smooth curve as the circle that can be approximated by small straight segments with a definite limit is termed a rectifiable curve. Measuring a coastline More than a decade after Richardson completed his work, Benoit Mandelbrot developed a new branch of mathematics, fractal geometry, to describe just such non-rectifiable complexes in nature as the infinite coastline. His own definition of the new figure serving as the basis for his study is: A key property of some fractals is self-similarity; that is, at any scale the same general configuration appears. A coastline is perceived as bays alternating with promontories. In the hypothetical situation that a given coastline has this property of self-similarity, then no matter how great any one small section of coastline is magnified, a similar pattern of smaller bays and promontories superimposed on larger bays and promontories appears, right down to the grains of sand. At that scale the coastline appears as a momentarily shifting, potentially infinitely long thread with a stochastic arrangement of bays and promontories formed from the small objects at hand. In such an environment (as opposed to smooth curves) Mandelbrot asserts "coastline length turns out to be an elusive notion that slips between the fingers of those who want to grasp it". There are different kinds of fractals. A coastline with the stated property is in "a first category of fractals, namely curves whose fractal dimension is greater than 1". That last statement represents an extension by Mandelbrot of Richardson's thought. Mandelbrot's statement of the Richardson effect is: where L, coastline length, a function of the measurement unit ε, is approximated by the expression. F is a constant, and D is a parameter that Richardson found depended on the coastline approximated by L. He gave no theoretical explanation, but Mandelbrot identified D with a non-integer form of the Hausdorff dimension, later the fractal dimension. Rearranging the expression yields where Fε−D must be the number of units ε required to obtain L. The broken line measuring a coast does not extend in one direction nor does it represent an area, but is intermediate between the two and can be thought of as a band of width 2ε. D is its fractal dimension, ranging between 1 and 2 (and typically less than 1.5). More broken coastlines have greater D, and therefore L is longer for the same ε. D is approximately 1.02 for the coastline of South Africa, and approximately 1.25 for the west coast of Great Britain. For lake shorelines, the typical value of D is 1.28. Mandelbrot showed that D is independent of ε. See also Alaska boundary dispute – Alaskan and Canadian claims to the Alaskan Panhandle differed greatly, based on competing interpretations of the ambiguous phrase setting the border at "a line parallel to the windings of the coast", applied to the fjord-dense region. Fractal dimension Gabriel's horn, a geometric figure with infinite surface area but finite volume "How Long Is the Coast of Britain? Statistical Self-Similarity and Fractional Dimension", a paper by Benoît Mandelbrot Paradox of the heap Zeno's paradoxes References Citations Sources Post, David G., and Michael Eisen. "How Long is the Coastline of Law? Thoughts on the Fractal Nature of Legal Systems". Journal of Legal Studies XXIX(1), January 2000. External links "Coastlines" at Fractal Geometry (ed. Michael Frame, Benoit Mandelbrot, and Nial Neger; maintained for Math 190a at Yale University) The Atlas of Canada – Coastline and Shoreline NOAA GeoZone Blog on Digital Coast What Is The Coastline Paradox? – YouTube video by Veritasium Paradoxes Coasts Cartography Topography Fractals Coastal geography Problems in spatial analysis

5328937

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Minewater%20Project

Minewater Project

The Minewater Project, based in Heerlen and other areas, aims to demonstrate how the geothermal energy stored by mine water can be used as a safe and ecological way to heat buildings. Aims The aims of the pilot projects are: to supply new, 'green' energy from old mines regeneration, including possible opportunities for new jobs an environmental solution in place of an environmental problem Funding The Minewater Project is supported by a grant from the European Union under the framework of the Interreg IIIB NWE Programme. There are five project partners and numerous European observers who are contributing their expertise and knowledge. The total costs of the project amount to €20 million to which Interreg IIIB is contributing 48%. The Project began work in March 2005, and it will run until June 2008. Heerlen The scheme in Heerlen will be located at two areas of redevelopment in the town at Heerlerheide Centrum and Stadpark Oranje Nassau. These sites are 3.5 km apart situated to the north of the town and in the centre of the town, respectively. The two sites will part of one system that will be able to both heat and cool buildings. Heerlerheide Two wells will be drilled in Heerlerheide to a depth of 825 metres. Nearly a kilometre beneath the town water can be found at about 35 °C, like a warm bath. This task will not be easy and is likely to require 350 hours of continuous drilling. By the time the drilling is complete and tests carried out, engineers will know a lot more exact detail about the water temperature and quality, and the cost of using it. Stadpark Oranje Nassau At Stadpark Oranje Nassau the drilling does not need to be so deep, because the mineshafts themselves are not so deep. An intermediate well will be drilled to 500 metres and also two shallow 250 metre wells. The shallow wells will receive the water from Heelerheide that has meanwhile been used for heating buildings. The heat will have been used up, so the water will fill the shallow wells at a temperature of 17 °C. This means that it can also be useful for cooling. References Geothermal power stations Heerlen Proposed energy infrastructure in the Netherlands Renewable energy in the Netherlands Proposed power stations in the Netherlands

5329800

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Circadian%20rhythm%20sleep%20disorder

Circadian rhythm sleep disorder

Circadian rhythm sleep disorders (CRSD), also known as circadian rhythm sleep-wake disorders (CRSWD), are a family of sleep disorders which affect the timing of sleep. CRSDs arise from a persistent pattern of sleep/wake disturbances that can be caused either by dysfunction in one's biological clock system, or by misalignment between one's endogenous oscillator and externally imposed cues. As a result of this mismatch, those affected by circadian rhythm sleep disorders have a tendency to fall asleep at unconventional time points in the day. These occurrences often lead to recurring instances of disturbed rest, where individuals affected by the disorder are unable to go to sleep and awaken at "normal" times for work, school, and other social obligations. Delayed sleep phase disorder, advanced sleep phase disorder, non-24-hour sleep–wake disorder and irregular sleep–wake rhythm disorder represents the four main types of CRSD. Overview Humans, like most living organisms, have various biological rhythms. These biological clocks control processes that fluctuate daily (e.g., body temperature, alertness, hormone secretion), generating circadian rhythms. Among these physiological characteristics, the sleep-wake propensity can also be considered one of the daily rhythms regulated by the biological clock system. Human's sleeping cycles are tightly regulated by a series of circadian processes working in tandem, allowing for the experience of moments of consolidated sleep during the night and a long wakeful moment during the day. Conversely, disruptions to these processes and the communication pathways between them can lead to problems in sleeping patterns, which are collectively referred to as circadian rhythm sleep disorders. Normal rhythm A circadian rhythm is an entrainable, endogenous, biological activity that has a period of roughly twenty-four hours. This internal time-keeping mechanism is centralized in the suprachiasmatic nucleus (SCN) of humans, and allows for the internal physiological mechanisms underlying sleep and alertness to become synchronized to external environmental cues, like the light-dark cycle. The SCN also sends signals to peripheral clocks in other organs, like the liver, to control processes such as glucose metabolism. Although these rhythms will persist in constant light or dark conditions, different Zeitgebers (time givers such as the light-dark cycle) give context to the clock and allow it to entrain and regulate expression of physiological processes to adjust to the changing environment. Genes that help control light-induced entrainment include positive regulators BMAL1 and CLOCK and negative regulators PER1 and CRY. A full circadian cycle can be described as a twenty-four hour circadian day, where circadian time zero (CT 0) marks the beginning of a subjective day for an organism and CT 12 marks the start of subjective night. Humans with regular circadian function have been shown to maintain regular sleep schedules, regulate daily rhythms in hormone secretion, and sustain oscillations in core body temperature. Even in the absence of Zeitgebers, humans will continue to maintain a roughly 24-hour rhythm in these biological activities. Regarding sleep, normal circadian function allows people to maintain balance rest and wakefulness that allows people to work and maintain alertness during the day's activities, and rest at night. Some misconceptions regarding circadian rhythms and sleep commonly mislabel irregular sleep as a circadian rhythm sleep disorder. In order to be diagnosed with CRSD, there must be either a misalignment between the timing of the circadian oscillator and the surrounding environment, or failure in the clock entrainment pathway. Among people with typical circadian clock function, there is variation in chronotypes, or preferred wake and sleep times, of individuals. Although chronotype varies from individual to individual, as determined by rhythmic expression of clock genes, people with typical circadian clock function will be able to entrain to environmental cues. For example, if a person wishes to shift the onset of a biological activity, like waking time, light exposure during the late subjective night or early subjective morning can help advance one's circadian cycle earlier in the day, leading to an earlier wake time. Diagnosis The International Classification of Sleep Disorders classifies Circadian Rhythm Sleep Disorder as a type of sleep dyssomnia. Although studies suggest that 3% of the adult population has a CRSD, many people are often misdiagnosed with insomnia instead of a CRSD. Of adults diagnosed with sleep disorders, an estimated 10% have a CRSD and of adolescents with sleep disorders, an estimated 16% may have a CRSD. Patients diagnosed with circadian rhythm sleep disorders typically express a pattern of disturbed sleep, whether that be excessive sleep that intrudes on working schedules and daily functions, or insomnia at desired times of sleep. Note that having a preference for extreme early or late wake times is not related to a circadian rhythm sleep disorder diagnosis. There must be distinct impairment of biological rhythms that affects the person's desired work and daily behavior. For a CRSD diagnosis, a sleep specialist gathers the history of a patient's sleep and wake habits, body temperature patterns, and dim-light melatonin onset (DLMO). Gathering this data gives insight into the patient's current schedule, as well as the physiological phase markers of the patient's biological clock. The start of the CRSD diagnostic process is a thorough sleep history assessment. A standard questionnaire is used to record the sleep habits of the patient, including typical bedtime, sleep duration, sleep latency, and instances of waking up. The professional will further inquire about other external factors that may impact sleep. Prescription drugs that treat mood disorders like tricyclic antidepressants, selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors and other antidepressants are associated with abnormal sleep behaviors. Other daily habits like work schedule and timing of exercise are also recorded—because they may impact an individual's sleep and wake patterns. To measure sleep variables candidly, patients wear actigraphy watches that record sleep onset, wake time, and many other physiological variables. Patients are similarly asked to self-report their sleep habits with a week-long sleep diary to document when they go to bed, when they wake up, etc. to supplement the actigraphy data. Collecting this data allows sleep professionals to carefully document and measure patient's sleep habits and confirm patterns described in their sleep history. Other additional ways to classify the nature of a patient's sleep and biological clock are the morningness-eveningness questionnaire (MEQ) and the Munich ChronoType Questionnaire, both of which have fairly strong correlations with accurately reporting phase advanced or delayed sleep. Questionnaires like the Pittsburgh Sleep Quality Index (PSQI) and the Insomnia Severity Index (ISI) help gauge the severity of sleep disruption. Specifically, these questionnaires can help the professional assess the patient's problems with sleep latency, undesired early-morning wakefulness, and problems with falling or staying asleep. Tayside children's sleep questionnaire is a ten-item questionnaire for sleep disorders in children aged between one and five years old. Types Currently, the International Classification of Sleep Disorders (ICSD-3) lists 6 disorders under the category of circadian rhythm sleep disorders. CRSDs can be categorized into two groups based on their underlying mechanisms: The first category is composed of disorders where the endogenous oscillator has been altered, known as intrinsic type disorders. The second category consists of disorders in which the external environment and the endogenous circadian clock are misaligned, called extrinsic type CRSDs. Intrinsic Delayed sleep phase disorder (DSPD): Individuals who have been diagnosed with delayed sleep phase disorder have sleep-wake times which are delayed when compared to normal functioning individuals. People with DSPD typically have very long periods of sleep latency when they attempt to go to sleep during conventional sleeping times. Similarly, they also have trouble waking up at conventional times. Advanced sleep phase disorder (ASPD): People with advanced sleep phase disorder exhibit characteristics opposite to those with delayed sleep phase disorder. These individuals have advanced sleep wake times, so they tend to go to bed and wake up much earlier as compared to normal individuals. ASPD is less common than DSPD, and is most prevalent within older populations. Familial Advanced Sleep Phase Syndrome (FASPS) is linked to an autosomal dominant mode of inheritance. It is associated with a missense mutation in human PER2 that replaces serine for glycine at position 662 (S662G). Families that have this mutation in PER2 experience extreme phase advances in sleep, waking up around 2:00a.m. and going to bed around 7:00p.m. Irregular sleep–wake rhythm disorder (ISWRD) is characterized by a normal 24-hr sleeping period. However, individuals with this disorder experience fragmented and highly disorganized sleep that can manifest in the form of waking frequently during the night and taking naps during the day, yet still maintaining sufficient total time asleep. People with ISWRD often experience a range of symptoms from insomnia to excessive daytime sleepiness. Non-24-hour sleep–wake disorder (N24SWD): Most common in individuals that are blind and unable to detect light, is characterized by chronic patterns of sleep/wake cycles which are not entrained to the 24-hr light-dark environmental cycle. As a result of this, individuals with this disorder will usually experience a gradual yet predictable delay of sleep onset and waking times. Patients with DSPD may develop this disorder if their condition is untreated. Extrinsic Shift work sleep disorder (SWSD): Approximately 9% of Americans who work night or irregular work shifts are believed to experience shift work sleep disorder. Night shift work directly opposes the environmental cues that entrain our biological clock, so this disorder arises when an individual's clock is unable to adjust to the socially imposed work schedule. Shift work sleep disorder can lead to severe cases of insomnia as well as excessive daytime sleepiness. Jet lag: Jet lag is best characterized by difficulty falling asleep or staying asleep as a result of misalignment between one's internal circadian system and external, or environmental cues. It is typically associated with rapid travel across multiple time zones. Alzheimer's disease CRSD has been frequently associated with excessive daytime sleepiness and nighttime insomnia in patients diagnosed with Alzheimer's disease (AD), representing a common characteristic among AD patients as well as a risk factor of progressive functional impairments. On one hand, it has been stated that people with AD have melatonin alteration and high irregularity in their circadian rhythm that lead to a disrupted sleep-wake cycle, probably due to damage on hypothalamic SCN regions typically observed in AD. On the other hand, disturbed sleep and wakefulness states have been related to worsening of an AD patient's cognitive abilities, emotional state and quality of life. Moreover, the abnormal behavioural symptoms of the disease negatively contribute to overwhelming patient's relatives and caregivers as well. However, the impact of sleep-wake disturbances on the subjective experience of a person with AD is not yet fully understood. Therefore, further studies exploring this field have been highly recommended, mainly considering the increasing life expectancy and significance of neurodegenerative diseases in clinical practices. Treatment Possible treatments for circadian rhythm sleep disorders include: Chronotherapy, best shown to effectively treat delayed sleep phase disorder, acts by systematically delaying an individual's bedtime until their sleep-wake times coincide with the conventional 24-hr day. Light therapy utilizes bright light exposure to induce phase advances and delays in sleep and wake times. This therapy requires 30–60 minutes of exposure to a bright (5,000–10,000 lux) white, blue, or natural light at a set time until the circadian clock is aligned with the desired schedule. Treatment is initially administered either upon awakening or before sleeping, and if successful may be continued indefinitely or performed less frequently. Though proven very effective in the treatment of individuals with DSPD and ASPD, the benefits of light therapy on N24SWD, shift work disorder, and jet lag have not been studied as extensively. Hypnotics have also been used clinically alongside bright light exposure therapy and pharmacotherapy for the treatment of CRSDs such as Advanced Sleep Phase Disorder. Additionally, in conjunction with cognitive behavioral therapy, short-acting hypnotics also present an avenue for treating co-morbid insomnia in patients with circadian sleep disorders. Melatonin, a naturally occurring biological hormone with circadian rhythmicity, has been shown to promote sleep and entrainment to external cues when administered in drug form (0.5–5.0 mg). Melatonin administered in the evening causes phase advances in sleep-wake times while maintaining duration and quality of sleep. Similarly, when administered in the early morning, melatonin can cause phase delays. It has been shown most effective in cases of shift work sleep disorder and delayed phase sleep disorder, but has not been proven particularly useful in cases of jet lag. Dark therapy, for example, the use of blue-blocking goggles, is used to block blue and blue-green wavelength light from reaching the eye during evening hours so as not to hinder melatonin production. See also Chronobiology Familial sleep traits Light effects on circadian rhythm Phase response curve Sleep diary Sleep medicine References External links Circadian Sleep Disorders Network An American Academy of Sleep Medicine Review: Circadian Rhythm Sleep Disorders: Part I, Basic Principles, Shift Work and Jet Lag Disorders. PDF, 24 pages. November 2007. An American Academy of Sleep Medicine Review: Circadian Rhythm Sleep Disorders: Part II, Advanced Sleep Phase Disorder, Delayed Sleep Phase Disorder, Free-Running Disorder, and Irregular Sleep–Wake Rhythm. PDF, 18 pages. November 2007. An American Academy of Sleep Medicine Report: ''Practice Parameters for the Clinical Evaluation and Treatment of Circadian Rhythm Sleep Disorders, November 1, 2007 NASA Sleep–Wake Actigraphy and Light Exposure During Spaceflight-Long Experiment Sleep disorders Circadian rhythm Neurophysiology Sleep physiology

5333514

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2644%20Victor%20Jara

2644 Victor Jara

2644 Victor Jara, provisional designation , is an asteroid from the inner regions of the asteroid belt, approximately in diameter. It was discovered on 22 September 1973, by Soviet-Russian astronomer Nikolai Chernykh at the Crimean Astrophysical Observatory in Nauchnij, on the Crimean peninsula. It was named after Chilean singer and composer Víctor Jara. Orbit and classification Victor Jara is a non-family asteroid of the main belt's background population. It orbits the Sun in the inner main-belt at a distance of 1.8–2.5 AU once every 3 years and 2 months (1,168 days; semi-major axis of 2.17 AU). Its orbit has an eccentricity of 0.17 and an inclination of 3° with respect to the ecliptic. The body's observation arc begins with a precovery taken at the Palomar Observatory in April 1954, or nearly 20 years prior to its official discovery observation. Physical characteristics Diameter and albedo According to the survey carried out by the NEOWISE mission of NASA's Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer, Victor Jara measures 5.914 kilometers in diameter and its surface has an albedo of 0.153. Rotation period As of 2018, no rotational lightcurve of Victor Jara has been obtained from photometric observations. The body's rotation period, pole and shape remain unknown. Naming This minor planet was named by the discoverer after Chilean folk singer and activist Víctor Jara, who was assassinated on 16 September 1973, just six days prior to the planet's discovery. The official naming citation was published by the Minor Planet Center on 15 May 1984 (). Víctor Jara, a prominent communist political activist in Chile, toured the Soviet Union in the 1960s and praised its culture, its scientific achievements and the friendliness of its working people. He was tortured and murdered shortly after the 1973 Chilean coup d'état led by Army Commander-in-Chief Augusto Pinochet, that ended the government of the socialist Salvador Allende. References External links Asteroid Lightcurve Database (LCDB), query form (info ) Dictionary of Minor Planet Names, Google books Asteroids and comets rotation curves, CdR – Observatoire de Genève, Raoul Behrend Discovery Circumstances: Numbered Minor Planets (1)-(5000) – Minor Planet Center 002644 Discoveries by Nikolai Chernykh Named minor planets 19730922

5333892

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/In%20situ%20resource%20utilization

In situ resource utilization

In space exploration, in situ resource utilization (ISRU) is the practice of collection, processing, storing and use of materials found or manufactured on other astronomical objects (the Moon, Mars, asteroids, etc.) that replace materials that would otherwise be brought from Earth. ISRU could provide materials for life support, propellants, construction materials, and energy to a spacecraft payloads or space exploration crews. It is now very common for spacecraft and robotic planetary surface mission to harness the solar radiation found in situ in the form of solar panels. The use of ISRU for material production has not yet been implemented in a space mission, though several field tests in the late 2000s demonstrated various lunar ISRU techniques in a relevant environment. ISRU has long been considered as a possible avenue for reducing the mass and cost of space exploration architectures, in that it may be a way to drastically reduce the amount of payload that must be launched from Earth in order to explore a given planetary body. According to NASA, "in-situ resource utilization will enable the affordable establishment of extraterrestrial exploration and operations by minimizing the materials carried from Earth." Uses Water In the context of ISRU water is most often sought directly as fuel or as feedstock for fuel production. Applications include its use in life support either directly by drinking, for growing food, producing oxygen, or numerous other industrial processes, all of which require a ready supply of water in the environment and the equipment to extract it. Such extraterrestrial water has been discovered in a variety of forms throughout the solar system, and a number of potential water extraction technologies have been investigated. For water that is chemically bound to regolith, solid ice, or some manner of permafrost, sufficient heating can recover the water. However this is not as easy as it appears because ice and permafrost can often be harder than plain rock, necessitating laborious mining operations. Where there is some level of atmosphere, such as on Mars, water can be extracted directly from the air using a simple process such as WAVAR. Another possible source of water is deep aquifers kept warm by Mars's latent geological heat, which can be tapped to provide both water and geothermal power. Rocket propellant Rocket propellant production has been proposed from the Moon's surface by processing water ice detected at the poles. The likely difficulties include working at extremely low temperatures and extraction from the regolith. Most schemes electrolyse the water to produce hydrogen and oxygen and cryogenically store them as liquids. This requires large amounts of equipment and power to achieve. Alternatively, it may be possible to heat water in a nuclear or solar thermal rocket, which may be able to deliver a large mass from the Moon to low Earth orbit (LEO) in spite of the much lower specific impulse, for a given amount of equipment. The monopropellant hydrogen peroxide (H2O2) can be made from water on Mars and the Moon. Aluminum as well as other metals has been proposed for use as rocket propellant made using lunar resources, and proposals include reacting the aluminum with water. For Mars, methane propellant can be manufactured via the Sabatier process. SpaceX has suggested building a propellant plant on Mars that would use this process to produce methane () and liquid oxygen (O2) from sub-surface water ice and atmospheric . Solar cell production It has long been suggested that solar cells could be produced from the materials present in lunar soil. Silicon, aluminium, and glass, three of the primary materials required for solar cell production, are found in high concentrations in lunar soil and can be utilised to produce solar cells. In fact, the native vacuum on the lunar surface provides an excellent environment for direct vacuum deposition of thin-film materials for solar cells. Solar arrays produced on the lunar surface can be used to support lunar surface operations as well as satellites off the lunar surface. Solar arrays produced on the lunar surface may prove more cost effective than solar arrays produced and shipped from Earth, but this trade depends heavily on the location of the particular application in question. Another potential application of lunar-derived solar arrays is providing power to Earth. In its original form, known as the solar power satellite, the proposal was intended as an alternate power source for Earth. Solar cells would be launched into Earth orbit and assembled, with the resultant generated power being transmitted down to Earth via microwave beams. Despite much work on the cost of such a venture, the uncertainty lay in the cost and complexity of fabrication procedures on the lunar surface. Building materials The colonization of planets or moons will require obtaining local building materials, such as regolith. For example, studies employing artificial Mars soil mixed with epoxy resin and tetraethoxysilane, produce high enough values of strength, resistance, and flexibility parameters. Asteroid mining could also involve extraction of metals for construction material in space, which may be more cost-effective than bringing such material up out of Earth's deep gravity well, or that of any other large body like the Moon or Mars. Metallic asteroids contain huge amounts of siderophilic metals, including precious metals. Locations Mars ISRU research for Mars is focused primarily on providing rocket propellant for a return trip to Earth — either for a crewed or a sample return mission — or for use as fuel on Mars. Many of the proposed techniques utilise the well-characterised atmosphere of Mars as feedstock. Since this can be easily simulated on Earth, these proposals are relatively simple to implement, though it is by no means certain that NASA or the ESA will favour this approach over a more conventional direct mission. A typical proposal for ISRU is the use of a Sabatier reaction, , in order to produce methane on the Martian surface, to be used as a propellant. Oxygen is liberated from the water by electrolysis, and the hydrogen recycled back into the Sabatier reaction. The usefulness of this reaction is that—, when the availability of water on Mars was less scientifically demonstrated—only the hydrogen (which is light) was thought to need to be brought from Earth. , SpaceX is developing the technology for a Mars propellant plant that will use a variation on what is described in the previous paragraph. Rather than transporting hydrogen from Earth to use in making the methane and oxygen, they intend to mine the requisite water from subsurface water ice that is now known to be abundant across much of the Martian surface, produce and then store the post-Sabatier reactants, and then use it as propellant for return flights of their Starship no earlier than 2023. A similar reaction proposed for Mars is the reverse water gas shift reaction, . This reaction takes place rapidly in the presence of an iron-chrome catalyst at 400 °C, and has been implemented in an Earth-based testbed by NASA. Again, hydrogen is recycled from the water by electrolysis, and the reaction only needs a small amount of hydrogen from Earth. The net result of this reaction is the production of oxygen, to be used as the oxidizer component of rocket fuel. Another reaction proposed for the production of oxygen and fuel is the electrolysis of the atmospheric carbon dioxide, \overset{atmospheric \atop {carbon\ dioxide}}{2CO2} ->[\text{energy}] {2CO} + O2 It has also been proposed the in situ production of oxygen, hydrogen and CO from the Martian hematite deposits via a two-step thermochemical /H2O splitting process, and specifically in the magnetite/wustite redox cycle. Although thermolysis is the most direct, one-step process for splitting molecules, it is neither practical nor efficient in the case of either H2O or CO2. This is because the process requires a very high temperature (> 2,500 °C) to achieve a useful dissociation fraction. This poses problems in finding suitable reactor materials, losses due to vigorous product recombination, and excessive aperture radiation losses when concentrated solar heat is used. The magnetite/wustite redox cycle was first proposed for solar application on earth by Nakamura, and was one of the first used for solar-driven two-step water splitting. In this cycle, water reacts with wustite (FeO) to form magnetite (Fe3O4) and hydrogen. The summarised reactions in this two-step splitting process are as follows: Fe3O4 ->[\text{energy}] {3FeO} + \overbrace{1/2O2}^{\underset{(\operatorname{by-product})}{oxygen}} and the obtained FeO is used for the thermal splitting of water or CO2 : This process is repeated cyclically. The above process results in a substantial reduction in the thermal input of energy if compared with the most direct, one-step process for splitting molecules. However, the process needs wustite (FeO) to start the cycle, but on Mars there is no wustite or at least not in significant amounts. Nevertheless, wustite can be easily obtained by reduction of hematite (Fe2O3) which is an abundant material on Mars, being specially conspicuous the strong hematite deposits located at Terra Meridiani. The use of wustite from the hematite, abundantly available on Mars, is an industrial process well known on Earth, and is performed by the following two main reduction reactions: The proposed 2001 Mars Surveyor lander was to demonstrate manufacture of oxygen from the atmosphere of Mars, and test solar cell technologies and methods of mitigating the effect of Martian dust on the power systems, but the project was cancelled. The Mars 2020 rover mission includes a ISRU technology demonstrator (the Mars Oxygen ISRU Experiment) that will extract CO2 from the atmosphere and produce O2. It has been suggested that buildings on Mars could be made from basalt as it has good insulating properties. An underground structure of this type would be able to protect life forms against radiation exposure. All of the resources required to make plastics exist on Mars. Many of these complex reactions are able to be completed from the gases harvested from the martian atmosphere. Traces of free oxygen, carbon monoxide, water and methane are all known to exist. Hydrogen and oxygen can be made by the electrolysis of water, carbon monoxide and oxygen by the electrolysis of carbon dioxide and methane by the Sabatier reaction of carbon dioxide and hydrogen. These basic reactions provide the building blocks for more complex reaction series which are able to make plastics. Ethylene is used to make plastics such as polyethylene and polypropylene and can be made from carbon monoxide and hydrogen: . Moon The Moon possesses abundant raw materials that are potentially relevant to a hierarchy of future applications, beginning with the use of lunar materials to facilitate human activities on the Moon itself and progressing to the use of lunar resources to underpin a future industrial capability within the Earth-Moon system. Natural resources include solar power, oxygen, water, hydrogen, and metals. The lunar highland material anorthite can be used as aluminium ore. Smelters can produce pure aluminium, calcium metal, oxygen and silica glass from anorthite. Raw anorthite is also good for making fiberglass and other glass and ceramic products. One particular processing technique is to use fluorine brought from Earth as potassium fluoride to separate the raw materials from the lunar rocks. Over twenty different methods have been proposed for oxygen extraction from the lunar regolith. Oxygen is often found in iron-rich lunar minerals and glasses as iron oxide. The oxygen can be extracted by heating the material to temperatures above 900 °C and exposing it to hydrogen gas. The basic equation is: FeO + H2 → Fe + H2O. This process has recently been made much more practical by the discovery of significant amounts of hydrogen-containing regolith near the Moon's poles by the Clementine spacecraft. Lunar materials may also be used as a general construction material, through processing techniques such as sintering, hot-pressing, liquification, and the cast basalt method. Cast basalt is used on Earth for construction of, for example, pipes where a high resistance to abrasion is required. Glass and glass fiber are straightforward to process on the Moon and Mars. Basalt fibre has also been made from lunar regolith simulators. Successful tests have been performed on Earth using two lunar regolith simulants MLS-1 and MLS-2. In August 2005, NASA contracted for the production of 16 tonnes of simulated lunar soil, or lunar regolith simulant material for research on how lunar soil could be utilized in situ. Martian moons, Ceres, asteroids Other proposals are based on Phobos and Deimos. These moons are in reasonably high orbits above Mars, have very low escape velocities, and unlike Mars have return delta-v's from their surfaces to LEO which are less than the return from the Moon. Ceres is further out than Mars, with a higher delta-v, but launch windows and travel times are better, and the surface gravity is just 0.028 g, with a very low escape velocity of 510 m/s. Researchers have speculated that the interior configuration of Ceres includes a water-ice-rich mantle over a rocky core. Near Earth Asteroids and bodies in the asteroid belt could also be sources of raw materials for ISRU. Planetary atmospheres Proposals have been made for "mining" for rocket propulsion, using what is called a Propulsive Fluid Accumulator. Atmospheric gases like oxygen and argon could be extracted from the atmosphere of planets like the Earth, Mars, and the outer Gas Giants by Propulsive Fluid Accumulator satellites in low orbit. ISRU capability classification (NASA) In October 2004, NASA's Advanced Planning and Integration Office commissioned an ISRU capability roadmap team. The team's report, along with those of 14 other capability roadmap teams, were published 22 May 2005. The report identifies seven ISRU capabilities: resource extraction, material handling and transport, resource processing, surface manufacturing with in situ resources, surface construction, surface ISRU product and consumable storage and distribution, and ISRU unique development and certification capabilities. The report focuses on lunar and martian environments. It offers a detailed timeline and capability roadmap to 2040 but it assumes lunar landers in 2010 and 2012. ISRU technology demonstrators and prototypes The Mars Surveyor 2001 Lander was intended to carry to Mars a test payload, MIP (Mars ISPP Precursor), that was to demonstrate manufacture of oxygen from the atmosphere of Mars, but the mission was cancelled. The Mars Oxygen ISRU Experiment (MOXIE) is a 1% scale prototype model aboard the Mars 2020 rover Perseverance that produces oxygen from Martian atmospheric carbon dioxide (CO2) in a process called solid oxide electrolysis. The experiment produced its first 5.37 grams of oxygen on 20 April 2021. The lunar Resource Prospector rover was designed to scout for resources on a polar region of the Moon, and it was proposed to be launched in 2022. The mission concept was still in its pre-formulation stage, and a prototype rover was being tested when it was scrapped in April 2018. Its science instruments will be flown instead on several commercial lander missions contracted by NASA's new Commercial Lunar Payload Services (CLSP) program, that aims to focus on testing various lunar ISRU processes by landing several payloads on multiple commercial landers and rovers. The first formal solicitation is expected sometime in 2019. See also References Further reading Resource Utilization Concepts for MoonMars; ByIris Fleischer, Olivia Haider, Morten W. Hansen, Robert Peckyno, Daniel Rosenberg and Robert E. Guinness; 30 September 2003; IAC Bremen, 2003 (29 Sept – 3 Oct 2003) and MoonMars Workshop (26–28 Sept 2003, Bremen). Accessed on 18 January 2010 External links UW AA Dept. ISRU Research Lab ISRU solar cell manufacture ISRU on the Moon Moon Ice For LEO to GEO Transfers Orders of magnitude lower cost for rocket propellant if lunar ice is present Homesteading the Planets with Local Materials In-Situ Resource Utilization (ISRU) Capabilities nasa.gov Missions to Mars Space colonization Exploration of the Moon Self-sustainability Space manufacturing Natural resources

5333925

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zam

Zam

Zam () is the Avestan language term for the Zoroastrian concept of "earth", in both the sense of land and soil and in the sense of the world. The earth is viewed as a primordial element in Zoroastrian tradition, and represented by a minor divinity, Zam, who is the hypostasis of the "earth". The word itself, changed to Zamin in Modern Persian, is cognate to the Baltic Zemes, Slavic Zem, Greco-Thracian Semele, meaning the planet Earth, as well as soil. The element zam exists with the same meaning in Middle Persian, which is the language of the texts of Zoroastrian tradition. The divinity Zam, however, appears in the later language as Zamyad, which is a contraction of Zam Yazad, i.e. the yazata Zam. Zam of the earth is not related to the Zam of the Shahnameh. That Zam—Zahhak-e-Maar-Doosh (Aži Dahāka in Avestan, Azhdshak in Middle Persian)—is the king of dragons, who slew Jamshid. In scripture The element zam is the domain of the Armaiti, the Amesha Spenta of the earth and one of the Ahura Mazda's primordial 'divine sparks' from whom all other creation originates. It is through the earth that Armaiti is immanent. This close identification of the element zam with Armaiti also causes the divinity Zam to paired with Armaiti, to the extent that in some verses Armaiti appears where "earth" is expected. The rare dvandvah expression Zam-Armaiti occurs in Yasht 1.16, 16.6 and 42.3. The Zamyad Yasht, the Avesta's hymn nominally devoted to Zam, has little to do with "earth": The first eight chapters of that hymn simply enumerate geographical landmarks, while the rest of the hymn is in praise of those who possess kavaem khareno "royal glory". These remaining verses begin with the creation of the earth, that is with a verse to Ahura Mazda (chapter 10), and closes with a verse to the Saoshyant (89). In between, it contains verses invoking the Amesha Spenta (15), Mithra (35). Mortals invoked include Yima (31), Thraetaona (36), the Kayanian dynasts (66-72), Zarathushtra (79) and Vishtaspa (84). According to Darmesteter, "this Yasht would serve as a short history of the Iranian monarchy, an abridged [Shahnameh]." The Zamyad Yasht has been considered to be an example of a simple concept being elevated to the rank of an angel. For Zam, this probably occurred as a linguistic conciliation between Zam and Armaiti. But notwithstanding the dedication of the 28th day of the month and the manifestation as one of the primordial elements, Zam is not a particularly significant divinity. Dhalla goes so far as to say "her personality is very insipid as compared with Armaiti, who, as we have seen, has the earth under her care and is, in fact, a more active guardian genius." In tradition The principal source of information on the Zoroastrian notions of the earth (and accordingly of its divinity) is the Bundahishn, an account of the religion's cosmogony and cosmology completed in about the 12th century. According to that text, the earth was the third of the primordial creations, following that of the sky and the waters, and before that of plants and fire. The creation of the earth is described in three stages: At first, the surface of the earth was a round, flat disk, floating in the center of the waters that filled the lower half of the "sky". Then, from its surface grew up the mountains, the tallest of these being Hara Berezaiti whose outlying ranges encircled the earth and beyond which lay the world river Aredvi Sura. Finally, during the time of the fourth creation (plants), the primordial tree grew up, and was the prototype of all plants (this tree is already alluded to in scripture as the Saena tree; in Yasht 12.17 it is further described as the "Tree of All Remedies" because it bears the seeds of all healing herbs). The fifth creation is that of the primordial bovine Gavaevodata from whose seed, marrow, organs and soul the earth is populated with animal life and the progenitors of the human race. In the Shayest na-Shayest ("[what is] Proper and Improper"), an enumeration of the qualities that each divinity epitomizes associates Zam with "conclusiveness". In contrast, Armaiti is identified with "fruitfulness". In the Counsels of Adarbad Mahraspandan the author advises his readership not to take medicine on the day of the month dedicated to Zam. In the Pazend Afrin-i haft Amshespand ("Blessings of the seven Amesha Spenta"), Zam is joined by Amardad, Rashn and Ashtad (Ameretat, Rashnu and Arshtat) in withstanding the demons of hunger and thirst. The last hymn recited in the procedure for the establishment of a Fire temple is the Zamyad Yasht. This is done because the required 91 recitals in honor of the Yazatas would in principle require each of the 30 hymns associated with the divinities of the 30 days to be recited thrice with one additional one. However, the first three recited are dedicated to Ahura Mazda, leaving 88, and 88 modulo 30 is 28, the day-number dedication of Zam. From among the flowers associated with the yazatas, Zam's is the Basil (Bundahishn 27). According to Xenophon (Cyropaedia, 8.24), Cyrus sacrificed animals to the earth as the Magians directed. References and bibliography See also Mat Zemlya Full texts Darmesteter's translation (1898 edition) of the Zamyad Yasht Yazatas Earth deities

5334319

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Orroral%20Valley%20Tracking%20Station

Orroral Valley Tracking Station

The Orroral Valley tracking station was an Earth station in Australia, supported Earth-orbiting satellites, as part of NASA's Spacecraft Tracking and Data Acquisition Network (STADAN). It was located approximately 50 km south of Canberra, Australian Capital Territory (ACT), and was one of three tracking stations in the ACT, and seven in Australia. Construction of the site commenced shortly after site selection in 1963 and was completed in May 1965. It was home to a 26 m antenna and several smaller VHF and microwave frequency antennas. The main requirement of the station, as distinct from the long-range communication tasks of Tidbinbilla and Honeysuckle Creek, was to be able to quickly switch from supporting one satellite to another. The signal received from satellites in Earth orbit are relatively strong but view periods are short, a few minutes being typical. Many of the supported satellites used different systems for transmitting data, or for receiving commands so the station had to cope with a variety of equipment for support of the individual satellites. Data from the satellites were recorded on magnetic tape and air-freighted to the United States for study. The station supported the joint Apollo-Soyuz project in 1975, which saw American astronauts and Soviet cosmonauts link in Earth orbit and conduct joint experiments in space. In April 1981, Orroral tracking station supported the Space Shuttle Columbia. It provided telecommunication support to Space Shuttle missions until its closure in 1985. The 26 m telescope was moved in 1985 to Tasmania, Australia, and now forms the core of the Mount Pleasant Radio Observatory run by the School of Mathematics and Physics, University of Tasmania. In 2018, Orroral Valley Tracking Station was the endpoint for the annual ANU Inward Bound. In 2019, a paraglider landed at the Orroral Valley Tracking Station and was promptly attacked by a wild kangaroo. The pilot suffered no injuries from the attack. See also Spacecraft Tracking and Data Acquisition Network Canberra Deep Space Communication Complex Carnarvon Tracking Station Honeysuckle Creek Tracking Station References Apollo program facilities Space Shuttle facilities NASA facilities in Australia NASA radio communications and spacecraft tracking facilities Earth stations in the Australian Capital Territory 1965 establishments in Australia 1985 disestablishments in Australia

5334483

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Windward%20Coast

Windward Coast

The Windward Coast was used to describe an area of West Africa located on the coast between Cape Mount and Assini, i.e. the coastlines of the modern states of Sierra Leone, Liberia and Ivory Coast, to the west of what was called the Gold Coast. A related region was called the Pepper Coast or Grain Coast. Culture The people of the Windward Coast were renowned for the rice and indigo cultivation. The trans-Atlantic slave trade Coasts References Geography of Ghana Geography of Ivory Coast Geography of Liberia Regions of West Africa

5334596

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Half-foot

Half-foot

Half-foot (, ) was a kind of land tenure peculiar to northern and western Scotland. The possessor, generally impoverished, or without facilities for working the land, often furnished the land and seed corn, and the tenant cultivated it, the produce being equally divided between them. There have been instances of it in the 20th century. Other uses: A certain stage in the drying of peats. Part of a hand line See also Crofting Township (Scotland) Aoghairean References leth-chois, leth-chas Clan Donald, iii Agriculture in Scotland Scots law Real property law Land tenure

5334607

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Africa

Africa

Africa is the world's second-largest and second-most populous continent, after Asia in both aspects. At about 30.3 million km2 (11.7 million square miles) including adjacent islands, it covers 20% of Earth's land area and 6% of its total surface area. With billion people as of , it accounts for about of the world's human population. Africa's population is the youngest amongst all the continents; the median age in 2012 was 19.7, when the worldwide median age was 30.4. Despite a wide range of natural resources, Africa is the least wealthy continent per capita and second-least wealthy by total wealth, ahead of Oceania. Scholars have attributed this to different factors including geography, climate, tribalism, colonialism, the Cold War, neocolonialism, lack of democracy, and corruption. Despite this low concentration of wealth, recent economic expansion and the large and young population make Africa an important economic market in the broader global context. The continent is surrounded by the Mediterranean Sea to the north, the Isthmus of Suez and the Red Sea to the northeast, the Indian Ocean to the southeast and the Atlantic Ocean to the west. The continent includes Madagascar and various archipelagos. It contains 54 fully recognised sovereign states, eight cities and islands that are part of non-African states, and two de facto independent states with limited or no recognition. This count does not include Malta and Sicily, which are geologically part of the African continent. Algeria is Africa's largest country by area, and Nigeria is its largest by population. African nations cooperate through the establishment of the African Union, which is headquartered in Addis Ababa. Africa straddles the equator and the prime meridian. It is the only continent to stretch from the northern temperate to the southern temperate zones. The majority of the continent and its countries are in the Northern Hemisphere, with a substantial portion and a number of countries in the Southern Hemisphere. Most of the continent lies in the tropics, except for a large part of Western Sahara, Algeria, Libya and Egypt, the northern tip of Mauritania, and the entire territories of Morocco, Ceuta, Melilla, and Tunisia which in turn are located above the tropic of Cancer, in the northern temperate zone. In the other extreme of the continent, southern Namibia, southern Botswana, great parts of South Africa, the entire territories of Lesotho and Eswatini and the southern tips of Mozambique and Madagascar are located below the tropic of Capricorn, in the southern temperate zone. Africa is highly biodiverse; it is the continent with the largest number of megafauna species, as it was least affected by the extinction of the Pleistocene megafauna. However, Africa also is heavily affected by a wide range of environmental issues, including desertification, deforestation, water scarcity and pollution. These entrenched environmental concerns are expected to worsen as climate change impacts Africa. The UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change has identified Africa as the continent most vulnerable to climate change. The history of Africa is long, complex, and has often been under-appreciated by the global historical community. Africa, particularly Eastern Africa, is widely accepted as the place of origin of humans and the Hominidae clade (great apes). The earliest hominids and their ancestors have been dated to around 7 million years ago, including Sahelanthropus tchadensis, Australopithecus africanus, A. afarensis, Homo erectus, H. habilis and H. ergaster—the earliest Homo sapiens (modern human) remains, found in Ethiopia, South Africa, and Morocco, date to circa 233,000, 259,000, and 300,000 years ago, respectively, and Homo sapiens is believed to have originated in Africa around 350,000–260,000 years ago. Africa is also considered by anthropologists to be the most genetically diverse continent as a result of being the longest inhabited. Early human civilizations, such as Ancient Egypt and Carthage emerged in North Africa. Following a subsequent long and complex history of civilizations, migration and trade, Africa hosts a large diversity of ethnicities, cultures and languages. The last 400 years have witnessed an increasing European influence on the continent. Starting in the 16th century, this was driven by trade, including the Trans-Atlantic slave trade, which created large African diaspora populations in the Americas. From the late 19th century to the early 20th century, European nations colonized almost all of Africa, reaching a point when only Ethiopia and Liberia were independent polities. Most present states in Africa emerged from a process of decolonisation following World War II. Etymology Afri was a Latin name used to refer to the inhabitants of then-known northern Africa to the west of the Nile river, and in its widest sense referred to all lands south of the Mediterranean (Ancient Libya). This name seems to have originally referred to a native Libyan tribe, an ancestor of modern Berbers; see Terence for discussion. The name had usually been connected with the Phoenician word meaning "dust", but a 1981 hypothesis has asserted that it stems from the Berber word ifri (plural ifran) meaning "cave", in reference to cave dwellers. The same word may be found in the name of the Banu Ifran from Algeria and Tripolitania, a Berber tribe originally from Yafran (also known as Ifrane) in northwestern Libya, as well as the city of Ifrane in Morocco. Under Roman rule, Carthage became the capital of the province it then named Africa Proconsularis, following its defeat of the Carthaginians in the Third Punic War in 146 BC, which also included the coastal part of modern Libya. The Latin suffix -ica can sometimes be used to denote a land (e.g., in Celtica from Celtae, as used by Julius Caesar). The later Muslim region of Ifriqiya, following its conquest of the Byzantine (Eastern Roman) Empire's Exarchatus Africae, also preserved a form of the name. According to the Romans, Africa lies to the west of Egypt, while "Asia" was used to refer to Anatolia and lands to the east. A definite line was drawn between the two continents by the geographer Ptolemy (85–165 CE), indicating Alexandria along the Prime Meridian and making the isthmus of Suez and the Red Sea the boundary between Asia and Africa. As Europeans came to understand the real extent of the continent, the idea of "Africa" expanded with their knowledge. Other etymological hypotheses have been postulated for the ancient name "Africa": The 1st-century Jewish historian Flavius Josephus (Ant. 1.15) asserted that it was named for Epher, grandson of Abraham according to Gen. 25:4, whose descendants, he claimed, had invaded Libya. Isidore of Seville in his 7th-century Etymologiae XIV.5.2. suggests "Africa comes from the Latin aprica, meaning "sunny". Massey, in 1881, stated that Africa is derived from the Egyptian af-rui-ka, meaning "to turn toward the opening of the Ka." The Ka is the energetic double of every person and the "opening of the Ka" refers to a womb or birthplace. Africa would be, for the Egyptians, "the birthplace." Michèle Fruyt in 1976 proposed linking the Latin word with africus "south wind", which would be of Umbrian origin and mean originally "rainy wind". Robert R. Stieglitz of Rutgers University in 1984 proposed: "The name Africa, derived from the Latin *Aphir-ic-a, is cognate to Hebrew Ophir ['rich']." Ibn Khallikan and some other historians claim that the name of Africa came from a Himyarite king called Afrikin ibn Kais ibn Saifi also called "Afrikus son of Abraham" who subdued Ifriqiya. Arabic afrīqā (feminine noun) and ifrīqiyā, now usually pronounced afrīqiyā (feminine) 'Africa', from ‘afara [‘ = ‘ain, not ’alif] 'to be dusty' from ‘afar 'dust, powder' and ‘afir 'dried, dried up by the sun, withered' and ‘affara 'to dry in the sun on hot sand' or 'to sprinkle with dust'. Possibly Phoenician faraqa in the sense of 'colony, separation'. History Prehistory Africa is considered by most paleoanthropologists to be the oldest inhabited territory on Earth, with the Human species originating from the continent. During the mid-20th century, anthropologists discovered many fossils and evidence of human occupation perhaps as early as 7 million years ago (Before present, BP). Fossil remains of several species of early apelike humans thought to have evolved into modern man, such as Australopithecus afarensis radiometrically dated to approximately 3.9–3.0 million years BP, Paranthropus boisei (c. 2.3–1.4 million years BP) and Homo ergaster (c. 1.9 million–600,000 years BP) have been discovered. After the evolution of Homo sapiens approximately 350,000 to 260,000 years BP in Africa, the continent was mainly populated by groups of hunter-gatherers. These first modern humans left Africa and populated the rest of the globe during the Out of Africa II migration dated to approximately 50,000 years BP, exiting the continent either across Bab-el-Mandeb over the Red Sea, the Strait of Gibraltar in Morocco, or the Isthmus of Suez in Egypt. Other migrations of modern humans within the African continent have been dated to that time, with evidence of early human settlement found in Southern Africa, Southeast Africa, North Africa, and the Sahara. Emergence of civilization The size of the Sahara has historically been extremely variable, with its area rapidly fluctuating and at times disappearing depending on global climatic conditions. At the end of the Ice ages, estimated to have been around 10,500 BCE, the Sahara had again become a green fertile valley, and its African populations returned from the interior and coastal highlands in sub-Saharan Africa, with rock art paintings depicting a fertile Sahara and large populations discovered in Tassili n'Ajjer dating back perhaps 10 millennia. However, the warming and drying climate meant that by 5000 BC, the Sahara region was becoming increasingly dry and hostile. Around 3500 BC, due to a tilt in the Earth's orbit, the Sahara experienced a period of rapid desertification. The population trekked out of the Sahara region towards the Nile Valley below the Second Cataract where they made permanent or semi-permanent settlements. A major climatic recession occurred, lessening the heavy and persistent rains in Central and Eastern Africa. Since this time, dry conditions have prevailed in Eastern Africa and, increasingly during the last 200 years, in Ethiopia. The domestication of cattle in Africa preceded agriculture and seems to have existed alongside hunter-gatherer cultures. It is speculated that by 6000 BC, cattle were domesticated in North Africa. In the Sahara-Nile complex, people domesticated many animals, including the donkey and a small screw-horned goat which was common from Algeria to Nubia. Between 10,000 and 9,000 BC, pottery was independently invented in the region of Mali in the savannah of West Africa. In the steppes and savannahs of the Sahara and Sahel in Northern West Africa, people possibly ancestral to modern Nilo-Saharan and Mandé cultures started to collect wild millet, around 8000 to 6000 BCE. Later, gourds, watermelons, castor beans, and cotton were also collected. Sorghum was first domesticated in Eastern Sudan around 4000 BC, in one of the earliest instances of agriculture in human history. Its cultivation would gradually spread across Africa, before spreading to India around 2000 BC. People around modern-day Mauritania started making pottery and built stone settlements (e.g., Tichitt, Oualata). Fishing, using bone-tipped harpoons, became a major activity in the numerous streams and lakes formed from the increased rains. In West Africa, the wet phase ushered in an expanding rainforest and wooded savanna from Senegal to Cameroon. Between 9,000 and 5,000 BC, Niger–Congo speakers domesticated the oil palm and raffia palm. Black-eyed peas and voandzeia (African groundnuts), were domesticated, followed by okra and kola nuts. Since most of the plants grew in the forest, the Niger–Congo speakers invented polished stone axes for clearing forest. Around 4000 BC, the Saharan climate started to become drier at an exceedingly fast pace. This climate change caused lakes and rivers to shrink significantly and caused increasing desertification. This, in turn, decreased the amount of land conducive to settlements and encouraged migrations of farming communities to the more tropical climate of West Africa. During the first millennium BC, a reduction in wild grain populations related to changing climate conditions facilitated the expansion of farming communities and the rapid adoption of rice cultivation around the Niger River. By the first millennium BC, ironworking had been introduced in Northern Africa. Around that time it also became established in parts of sub-Saharan Africa, either through independent invention there or diffusion from the north and vanished under unknown circumstances around 500 AD, having lasted approximately 2,000 years, and by 500 BC, metalworking began to become commonplace in West Africa. Ironworking was fully established by roughly 500 BC in many areas of East and West Africa, although other regions did not begin ironworking until the early centuries CE. Copper objects from Egypt, North Africa, Nubia, and Ethiopia dating from around 500 BC have been excavated in West Africa, suggesting that Trans-Saharan trade networks had been established by this date. Early civilizations At about 3300 BC, the historical record opens in Northern Africa with the rise of literacy in the Pharaonic civilization of ancient Egypt. One of the world's earliest and longest-lasting civilizations, the Egyptian state continued, with varying levels of influence over other areas, until 343 BC. Egyptian influence reached deep into modern-day Libya and Nubia, and, according to Martin Bernal, as far north as Crete. An independent centre of civilization with trading links to Phoenicia was established by Phoenicians from Tyre on the north-west African coast at Carthage. European exploration of Africa began with the ancient Greeks and Romans. In 332 BC, Alexander the Great was welcomed as a liberator in Persian-occupied Egypt. He founded Alexandria in Egypt, which would become the prosperous capital of the Ptolemaic dynasty after his death. Following the conquest of North Africa's Mediterranean coastline by the Roman Empire, the area was integrated economically and culturally into the Roman system. Roman settlement occurred in modern Tunisia and elsewhere along the coast. The first Roman emperor native to North Africa was Septimius Severus, born in Leptis Magna in present-day Libyahis mother was Italian Roman and his father was Punic. Christianity spread across these areas at an early date, from Judaea via Egypt and beyond the borders of the Roman world into Nubia; by 340 AD at the latest, it had become the state religion of the Aksumite Empire. Syro-Greek missionaries, who arrived by way of the Red Sea, were responsible for this theological development. In the early 7th century, the newly formed Arabian Islamic Caliphate expanded into Egypt, and then into North Africa. In a short while, the local Berber elite had been integrated into Muslim Arab tribes. When the Umayyad capital Damascus fell in the 8th century, the Islamic centre of the Mediterranean shifted from Syria to Qayrawan in North Africa. Islamic North Africa had become diverse, and a hub for mystics, scholars, jurists, and philosophers. During the above-mentioned period, Islam spread to sub-Saharan Africa, mainly through trade routes and migration. In West Africa, Dhar Tichitt and Oualata in present-day Mauritania figure prominently among the early urban centers, dated to 2,000 BC. About 500 stone settlements litter the region in the former savannah of the Sahara. Its inhabitants fished and grew millet. It has been found by Augustin Holl that the Soninke of the Mandé peoples were likely responsible for constructing such settlements. Around 300 BCE, the region became more desiccated and the settlements began to decline, most likely relocating to Koumbi Saleh. Architectural evidence and the comparison of pottery styles suggest that Dhar Tichitt was related to the subsequent Ghana Empire. Djenné-Djenno (in present-day Mali) was settled around 300 BC, and the town grew to house a sizable Iron Age population, as evidenced by crowded cemeteries. Living structures were made of sun-dried mud. By 250 BCE, Djenné-Djenno had become a large, thriving market town. Further south, in central Nigeria, around 1,500 BC, the Nok culture developed on the Jos Plateau. It was a highly centralized community. The Nok people produced lifelike representations in terracotta, including human heads and human figures, elephants, and other animals. By 500 BC, and possibly earlier, they were smelting iron. By 200 AD, the Nok culture had vanished. and vanished under unknown circumstances around 500 AD, having lasted approximately 2,000 years. Based on stylistic similarities with the Nok terracottas, the bronze figurines of the Yoruba kingdom of Ife and those of the Bini kingdom of Benin are suggested to be continuations of the traditions of the earlier Nok culture. Ninth to eighteenth centuries Pre-colonial Africa possessed perhaps as many as 10,000 different states and polities characterized by many different sorts of political organization and rule. These included small family groups of hunter-gatherers such as the San people of southern Africa; larger, more structured groups such as the family clan groupings of the Bantu-speaking peoples of central, southern, and eastern Africa; heavily structured clan groups in the Horn of Africa; the large Sahelian kingdoms; and autonomous city-states and kingdoms such as those of the Akan; Edo, Yoruba, and Igbo people in West Africa; and the Swahili coastal trading towns of Southeast Africa. By the ninth century AD, a string of dynastic states, including the earliest Hausa states, stretched across the sub-Saharan savannah from the western regions to central Sudan. The most powerful of these states were Ghana, Gao, and the Kanem-Bornu Empire. Ghana declined in the eleventh century, but was succeeded by the Mali Empire which consolidated much of western Sudan in the thirteenth century. Kanem accepted Islam in the eleventh century. In the forested regions of the West African coast, independent kingdoms grew with little influence from the Muslim north. The Kingdom of Nri was established around the ninth century and was one of the first. It is also one of the oldest kingdoms in present-day Nigeria and was ruled by the Eze Nri. The Nri kingdom is famous for its elaborate bronzes, found at the town of Igbo-Ukwu. The bronzes have been dated from as far back as the ninth century. The Kingdom of Ife, historically the first of these Yoruba city-states or kingdoms, established government under a priestly oba ('king' or 'ruler' in the Yoruba language), called the Ooni of Ife. Ife was noted as a major religious and cultural centre in West Africa, and for its unique naturalistic tradition of bronze sculpture. The Ife model of government was adapted at the Oyo Empire, where its obas or kings, called the Alaafins of Oyo, once controlled a large number of other Yoruba and non-Yoruba city-states and kingdoms; the Fon Kingdom of Dahomey was one of the non-Yoruba domains under Oyo control. The Almoravids were a Berber dynasty from the Sahara that spread over a wide area of northwestern Africa and the Iberian peninsula during the eleventh century. The Banu Hilal and Banu Ma'qil were a collection of Arab Bedouin tribes from the Arabian Peninsula who migrated westwards via Egypt between the eleventh and thirteenth centuries. Their migration resulted in the fusion of the Arabs and Berbers, where the locals were Arabized, and Arab culture absorbed elements of the local culture, under the unifying framework of Islam. Following the breakup of Mali, a local leader named Sonni Ali (1464–1492) founded the Songhai Empire in the region of middle Niger and the western Sudan and took control of the trans-Saharan trade. Sonni Ali seized Timbuktu in 1468 and Jenne in 1473, building his regime on trade revenues and the cooperation of Muslim merchants. His successor Askia Mohammad I (1493–1528) made Islam the official religion, built mosques, and brought to Gao Muslim scholars, including al-Maghili (d.1504), the founder of an important tradition of Sudanic African Muslim scholarship. By the eleventh century, some Hausa states – such as Kano, jigawa, Katsina, and Gobir – had developed into walled towns engaging in trade, servicing caravans, and the manufacture of goods. Until the fifteenth century, these small states were on the periphery of the major Sudanic empires of the era, paying tribute to Songhai to the west and Kanem-Borno to the east. Height of the slave trade Slavery had long been practiced in Africa. Between the 15th and the 19th centuries, the Atlantic slave trade took an estimated 7–12 million slaves to the New World. In addition, more than 1 million Europeans were captured by Barbary pirates and sold as slaves in North Africa between the 16th and 19th centuries. In West Africa, the decline of the Atlantic slave trade in the 1820s caused dramatic economic shifts in local polities. The gradual decline of slave-trading, prompted by a lack of demand for slaves in the New World, increasing anti-slavery legislation in Europe and America, and the British Royal Navy's increasing presence off the West African coast, obliged African states to adopt new economies. Between 1808 and 1860, the British West Africa Squadron seized approximately 1,600 slave ships and freed 150,000 Africans who were aboard. Action was also taken against African leaders who refused to agree to British treaties to outlaw the trade, for example against "the usurping King of Lagos", deposed in 1851. Anti-slavery treaties were signed with over 50 African rulers. The largest powers of West Africa (the Asante Confederacy, the Kingdom of Dahomey, and the Oyo Empire) adopted different ways of adapting to the shift. Asante and Dahomey concentrated on the development of "legitimate commerce" in the form of palm oil, cocoa, timber and gold, forming the bedrock of West Africa's modern export trade. The Oyo Empire, unable to adapt, collapsed into civil wars. Colonialism Independence struggles Imperial rule by Europeans would continue until after the conclusion of World War II, when almost all remaining colonial territories gradually obtained formal independence. Independence movements in Africa gained momentum following World War II, which left the major European powers weakened. In 1951, Libya, a former Italian colony, gained independence. In 1956, Tunisia and Morocco won their independence from France. Ghana followed suit the next year (March 1957), becoming the first of the sub-Saharan colonies to be granted independence. Most of the rest of the continent became independent over the next decade. Portugal's overseas presence in sub-Saharan Africa (most notably in Angola, Cape Verde, Mozambique, Guinea-Bissau, and São Tomé and Príncipe) lasted from the 16th century to 1975, after the Estado Novo regime was overthrown in a military coup in Lisbon. Rhodesia unilaterally declared independence from the United Kingdom in 1965, under the white minority government of Ian Smith, but was not internationally recognized as an independent state (as Zimbabwe) until 1980, when black nationalists gained power after a bitter guerrilla war. Although South Africa was one of the first African countries to gain independence, the state remained under the control of the country's white minority through a system of racial segregation known as apartheid until 1994. Post-colonial Africa Today, Africa contains 54 sovereign countries, most of which have borders that were drawn during the era of European colonialism. Since independence, African states have frequently been hampered by instability, corruption, violence, and authoritarianism. The vast majority of African states are republics that operate under some form of the presidential system of rule. However, few of them have been able to sustain democratic governments on a permanent basisper the criteria laid out by Lührmann et al. (2018), only Botswana and Mauritius have been consistently democratic for the entirety of their post-colonial history. Most African countries have experienced several coups or periods of military dictatorship. Between 1990 and 2018, though, the continent as a whole has trended towards more democratic governance. Upon independence an overwhelming majority of Africans lived in extreme poverty. The continent suffered from the lack of infrastructural or industrial development under colonial rule, along with political instability. With limited financial resources or access to global markets, relatively stable countries such as Kenya still experienced only very slow economic development. Only a handful of African countries succeeded in obtaining rapid economic growth prior to 1990. Exceptions include Libya and Equatorial Guinea, both of which possess large oil reserves. Instability throughout the continent after decolonization resulted primarily from marginalization of ethnic groups, and corruption. In pursuit of personal political gain, many leaders deliberately promoted ethnic conflicts, some of which had originated during the colonial period, such as from the grouping of multiple unrelated ethnic groups into a single colony, the splitting of a distinct ethnic group between multiple colonies, or existing conflicts being exacerbated by colonial rule (for instance, the preferential treatment given to ethnic Hutus over Tutsis in Rwanda during German and Belgian rule). Faced with increasingly frequent and severe violence, military rule was widely accepted by the population of many countries as means to maintain order, and during the 1970s and 1980s a majority of African countries were controlled by military dictatorships. Territorial disputes between nations and rebellions by groups seeking independence were also common in independent African states. The most devastating of these was the Nigerian Civil War, fought between government forces and an Igbo separatist republic, which resulted in a famine that killed 1–2 million people. Two civil wars in Sudan, the first lasting from 1955 to 1972 and the second from 1983 to 2005, collectively killed around 3 million. Both were fought primarily on ethnic and religious lines. Cold War conflicts between the United States and the Soviet Union also contributed to instability. Both the Soviet Union and the United States offered considerable incentives to African political and military leaders who aligned themselves with the superpowers' foreign policy. As an example, during the Angolan Civil War, the Soviet and Cuban aligned MPLA and the American aligned UNITA received the vast majority of their military and political support from these countries. Many African countries became highly dependent on foreign aid. The sudden loss of both Soviet and American aid at the end of the Cold War and fall of the USSR resulted in severe economic and political turmoil in the countries most dependent on foreign support. There was a major famine in Ethiopia between 1983 and 1985, killing up to 1.2 million people, which most historians attribute primarily to the forced relocation of farmworkers and seizure of grain by communist Derg government, further exacerbated by the civil war. In 1994 a genocide in Rwanda resulted in up to 800,000 deaths, added to a severe refugee crisis and fueled the rise of militia groups in neighboring countries. This contributed to the outbreak of the first and second Congo Wars, which were the most devastating military conflicts in modern Africa, with up to 5.5 million deaths, making it by far the deadliest conflict in modern African history and one of the costliest wars in human history. Various conflicts between various insurgent groups and governments continue. Since 2003 there has been an ongoing conflict in Darfur (Sudan) which peaked in intensity from 2003 to 2005 with notable spikes in violence in 2007 and 2013–15, killing around 300,000 people total. The Boko Haram Insurgency primarily within Nigeria (with considerable fighting in Niger, Chad, and Cameroon as well) has killed around 350,000 people since 2009. Most African conflicts have been reduced to low-intensity conflicts as of 2022. However, the Tigray War which began in 2020 has killed an estimated 300,000–500,000 people, primarily due to famine. Overall though, violence across Africa has greatly declined in the 21st century, with the end of civil wars in Angola, Sierra Leone, and Algeria in 2002, Liberia in 2003, and Sudan and Burundi in 2005. The Second Congo War, which involved 9 countries and several insurgent groups, ended in 2003. This decline in violence coincided with many countries abandoning communist-style command economies and opening up for market reforms, which over the course of the 1990s and 2000s promoted the establishment of permanent, peaceful trade between neighboring countries (see Capitalist peace). Improved stability and economic reforms have led to a great increase in foreign investment into many African nations, mainly from China, which further spurred economic growth. Between 2000 and 2014, annual GDP growth in sub-Saharan Africa averaged 5.02%, doubling its total GDP from $811 Billion to $1.63 Trillion (Constant 2015 USD). North Africa experienced comparable growth rates. A significant part of this growth can also be attributed to the facilitated diffusion of information technologies and specifically the mobile telephone. While several individual countries have maintained high growth rates, since 2014 overall growth has considerably slowed, primarily as a result of falling commodity prices, continued lack of industrialization, and epidemics of Ebola and COVID-19. Geology, geography, ecology, and environment Africa is the largest of the three great southward projections from the largest landmass of the Earth. Separated from Europe by the Mediterranean Sea, it is joined to Asia at its northeast extremity by the Isthmus of Suez (transected by the Suez Canal), wide. (Geopolitically, Egypt's Sinai Peninsula east of the Suez Canal is often considered part of Africa, as well.) The coastline is long, and the absence of deep indentations of the shore is illustrated by the fact that Europe, which covers only – about a third of the surface of Africa – has a coastline of . From the most northerly point, Ras ben Sakka in Tunisia (37°21' N), to the most southerly point, Cape Agulhas in South Africa (34°51'15" S), is a distance of approximately . Cape Verde, 17°33'22" W, the westernmost point, is a distance of approximately to Ras Hafun, 51°27'52" E, the most easterly projection that neighbours Cape Guardafui, the tip of the Horn of Africa. Africa's largest country is Algeria, and its smallest country is Seychelles, an archipelago off the east coast. The smallest nation on the continental mainland is The Gambia. African plate Climate The climate of Africa ranges from tropical to subarctic on its highest peaks. Its northern half is primarily desert, or arid, while its central and southern areas contain both savanna plains and dense jungle (rainforest) regions. In between, there is a convergence, where vegetation patterns such as sahel and steppe dominate. Africa is the hottest continent on Earth and 60% of the entire land surface consists of drylands and deserts. The record for the highest-ever recorded temperature, in Libya in 1922 (), was discredited in 2013. Ecology and biodiversity Africa has over 3,000 protected areas, with 198 marine protected areas, 50 biosphere reserves, and 80 wetlands reserves. Significant habitat destruction, increases in human population and poaching are reducing Africa's biological diversity and arable land. Human encroachment, civil unrest and the introduction of non-native species threaten biodiversity in Africa. This has been exacerbated by administrative problems, inadequate personnel and funding problems. Deforestation is affecting Africa at twice the world rate, according to the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP). According to the University of Pennsylvania African Studies Center, 31% of Africa's pasture lands and 19% of its forests and woodlands are classified as degraded, and Africa is losing over four million hectares of forest per year, which is twice the average deforestation rate for the rest of the world. Some sources claim that approximately 90% of the original, virgin forests in West Africa have been destroyed. Over 90% of Madagascar's original forests have been destroyed since the arrival of humans 2000 years ago. About 65% of Africa's agricultural land suffers from soil degradation. Environmental issues Water resources Water development and management are complex in Africa due to the multiplicity of trans-boundary water resources (rivers, lakes and aquifers). Around 75% of sub-Saharan Africa falls within 53 international river basin catchments that traverse multiple borders. This particular constraint can also be converted into an opportunity if the potential for trans-boundary cooperation is harnessed in the development of the area's water resources. A multi-sectoral analysis of the Zambezi River, for example, shows that riparian cooperation could lead to a 23% increase in firm energy production without any additional investments. A number of institutional and legal frameworks for transboundary cooperation exist, such as the Zambezi River Authority, the Southern African Development Community (SADC) Protocol, Volta River Authority and the Nile Basin Commission. However, additional efforts are required to further develop political will, as well as the financial capacities and institutional frameworks needed for win-win multilateral cooperative actions and optimal solutions for all riparians. Climate change Fauna Africa boasts perhaps the world's largest combination of density and "range of freedom" of wild animal populations and diversity, with wild populations of large carnivores (such as lions, hyenas, and cheetahs) and herbivores (such as buffalo, elephants, camels, and giraffes) ranging freely on primarily open non-private plains. It is also home to a variety of "jungle" animals including snakes and primates and aquatic life such as crocodiles and amphibians. In addition, Africa has the largest number of megafauna species, as it was least affected by the extinction of the Pleistocene megafauna. Politics African Union The African Union (AU) is a continental union consisting of 55 member states. The union was formed, with Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, as its headquarters, on 26 June 2001. The union was officially established on 9 July 2002 as a successor to the Organisation of African Unity (OAU). In July 2004, the African Union's Pan-African Parliament (PAP) was relocated to Midrand, in South Africa, but the African Commission on Human and Peoples' Rights remained in Addis Ababa. The African Union, not to be confused with the AU Commission, is formed by the Constitutive Act of the African Union, which aims to transform the African Economic Community, a federated commonwealth, into a state under established international conventions. The African Union has a parliamentary government, known as the African Union Government, consisting of legislative, judicial and executive organs. It is led by the African Union President and Head of State, who is also the President of the Pan-African Parliament. A person becomes AU President by being elected to the PAP, and subsequently gaining majority support in the PAP. The powers and authority of the President of the African Parliament derive from the Constitutive Act and the Protocol of the Pan-African Parliament, as well as the inheritance of presidential authority stipulated by African treaties and by international treaties, including those subordinating the Secretary General of the OAU Secretariat (AU Commission) to the PAP. The government of the AU consists of all-union, regional, state, and municipal authorities, as well as hundreds of institutions, that together manage the day-to-day affairs of the institution. Extensive human rights abuses still occur in several parts of Africa, often under the oversight of the state. Most of such violations occur for political reasons, often as a side effect of civil war. Countries where major human rights violations have been reported in recent times include the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Sierra Leone, Liberia, Sudan, Zimbabwe, and Ivory Coast. Boundary conflicts Economy Although it has abundant natural resources, Africa remains the world's poorest and least-developed continent (other than Antarctica), the result of a variety of causes that may include corrupt governments that have often committed serious human rights violations, failed central planning, high levels of illiteracy, low self-esteem, lack of access to foreign capital, legacies of colonialism, the slave trade, and the Cold War, and frequent tribal and military conflict (ranging from guerrilla warfare to genocide). Its total nominal GDP remains behind that of the United States, China, Japan, Germany, the United Kingdom, India and France. According to the United Nations' Human Development Report in 2003, the bottom 24 ranked nations (151st to 175th) were all African. Poverty, illiteracy, malnutrition and inadequate water supply and sanitation, as well as poor health, affect a large proportion of the people who reside in the African continent. In August 2008, the World Bank announced revised global poverty estimates based on a new international poverty line of $1.25 per day (versus the previous measure of $1.00). Eighty-one percent of the sub-Saharan African population was living on less than $2.50 (PPP) per day in 2005, compared with 86% for India. Sub-Saharan Africa is the least successful region of the world in reducing poverty ($1.25 per day); some 50% of the population living in poverty in 1981 (200 million people), a figure that rose to 58% in 1996 before dropping to 50% in 2005 (380 million people). The average poor person in sub-Saharan Africa is estimated to live on only 70 cents per day, and was poorer in 2003 than in 1973, indicating increasing poverty in some areas. Some of it is attributed to unsuccessful economic liberalization programmes spearheaded by foreign companies and governments, but other studies have cited bad domestic government policies more than external factors. Africa is now at risk of being in debt once again, particularly in sub-Saharan African countries. The last debt crisis in 2005 was resolved with help from the heavily indebted poor countries scheme (HIPC). The HIPC resulted in some positive and negative effects on the economy in Africa. About ten years after the 2005 debt crisis in sub-Saharan Africa was resolved, Zambia fell back into debt. A small reason was due to the fall in copper prices in 2011, but the bigger reason was that a large amount of the money Zambia borrowed was wasted or pocketed by the elite. From 1995 to 2005, Africa's rate of economic growth increased, averaging 5% in 2005. Some countries experienced still higher growth rates, notably Angola, Sudan and Equatorial Guinea, all of which had recently begun extracting their petroleum reserves or had expanded their oil extraction capacity. In a recently published analysis based on World Values Survey data, the Austrian political scientist Arno Tausch maintained that several African countries, most notably Ghana, perform quite well on scales of mass support for democracy and the market economy. Tausch's global value comparison based on the World Values Survey derived the following factor analytical scales: 1. The non-violent and law-abiding society 2. Democracy movement 3. Climate of personal non-violence 4. Trust in institutions 5. Happiness, good health 6. No redistributive religious fundamentalism 7. Accepting the market 8. Feminism 9. Involvement in politics 10. Optimism and engagement 11. No welfare mentality, acceptancy of the Calvinist work ethics. The spread in the performance of African countries with complete data, Tausch concluded "is really amazing". While one should be especially hopeful about the development of future democracy and the market economy in Ghana, the article suggests pessimistic tendencies for Egypt and Algeria, and especially for Africa's leading economy, South Africa. High Human Inequality, as measured by the UNDP's Human Development Report's Index of Human Inequality, further impairs the development of human security. Tausch also maintains that the certain recent optimism, corresponding to economic and human rights data, emerging from Africa, is reflected in the development of a civil society. The continent is believed to hold 90% of the world's cobalt, 90% of its platinum, 50% of its gold, 98% of its chromium, 70% of its tantalite, 64% of its manganese and one-third of its uranium. The Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) has 70% of the world's coltan, a mineral used in the production of tantalum capacitors for electronic devices such as cell phones. The DRC also has more than 30% of the world's diamond reserves. Guinea is the world's largest exporter of bauxite. As the growth in Africa has been driven mainly by services and not manufacturing or agriculture, it has been growth without jobs and without reduction in poverty levels. In fact, the food security crisis of 2008 which took place on the heels of the global financial crisis pushed 100 million people into food insecurity. In recent years, the People's Republic of China has built increasingly stronger ties with African nations and is Africa's largest trading partner. In 2007, Chinese companies invested a total of US$1 billion in Africa. A Harvard University study led by professor Calestous Juma showed that Africa could feed itself by making the transition from importer to self-sufficiency. "African agriculture is at the crossroads; we have come to the end of a century of policies that favoured Africa's export of raw materials and importation of food. Africa is starting to focus on agricultural innovation as its new engine for regional trade and prosperity." Electricity generation The main source of electricity is hydropower, which contributes significantly to the current installed capacity for energy. The Kainji Dam is a typical hydropower resource generating electricity for all the large cities in Nigeria as well as their neighbouring country, Niger. Hence, the continuous investment in the last decade, which has increased the amount of power generated. Demographics Africa's population has rapidly increased over the last 40 years, and is consequently relatively young. In some African states, more than half the population is under 25 years of age. The total number of people in Africa increased from 229 million in 1950 to 630 million in 1990. As of , the population of Africa is estimated at billion . Africa's total population surpassing other continents is fairly recent; African population surpassed Europe in the 1990s, while the Americas was overtaken sometime around the year 2000; Africa's rapid population growth is expected to overtake the only two nations currently larger than its population, at roughly the same time – India and China's 1.4 billion people each will swap ranking around the year 2022. This increase in number of babies born in Africa compared to the rest of the world is expected to reach approximately 37% in the year 2050; while in 1990 sub-Saharan Africa accounted for only 16% of the world's births. The total fertility rate (children per woman) for Sub-Saharan Africa is 4.7 as of 2018, the highest in the world. All countries in sub-Saharan Africa had TFRs (average number of children) above replacement level in 2019 and accounted for 27.1% of global livebirths. In 2021, sub-Saharan Africa accounted for 29% of global births. Speakers of Bantu languages (part of the Niger–Congo family) are the majority in southern, central and southeast Africa. The Bantu-speaking peoples from the Sahel progressively expanded over most of sub-Saharan Africa. But there are also several Nilotic groups in South Sudan and East Africa, the mixed Swahili people on the Swahili Coast, and a few remaining indigenous Khoisan ("San" or "Bushmen") and Pygmy peoples in Southern and Central Africa, respectively. Bantu-speaking Africans also predominate in Gabon and Equatorial Guinea, and are found in parts of southern Cameroon. In the Kalahari Desert of Southern Africa, the distinct people known as the Bushmen (also "San", closely related to, but distinct from "Hottentots") have long been present. The San are physically distinct from other Africans and are the indigenous people of southern Africa. Pygmies are the pre-Bantu indigenous peoples of central Africa. The peoples of West Africa primarily speak Niger–Congo languages, belonging mostly to its non-Bantu branches, though some Nilo-Saharan and Afro-Asiatic speaking groups are also found. The Niger–Congo-speaking Yoruba, Igbo, Fulani, Akan, and Wolof ethnic groups are the largest and most influential. In the central Sahara, Mandinka or Mande groups are most significant. Chadic-speaking groups, including the Hausa, are found in more northerly parts of the region nearest to the Sahara, and Nilo-Saharan communities, such as the Songhai, Kanuri and Zarma, are found in the eastern parts of West Africa bordering Central Africa. The peoples of North Africa consist of three main indigenous groups: Berbers in the northwest, Egyptians in the northeast, and Nilo-Saharan-speaking peoples in the east. The Arabs who arrived in the 7th century CE introduced the Arabic language and Islam to North Africa. The Semitic Phoenicians (who founded Carthage) and Hyksos, the Indo-Iranian Alans, the Indo- European Greeks, Romans, and Vandals settled in North Africa as well. Significant Berber communities remain within Morocco and Algeria in the 21st century, while, to a lesser extent, Berber speakers are also present in some regions of Tunisia and Libya. The Berber-speaking Tuareg and other often-nomadic peoples are the principal inhabitants of the Saharan interior of North Africa. In Mauritania, there is a small but near-extinct Berber community in the north and Niger–Congo-speaking peoples in the south, though in both regions Arabic and Arab culture predominates. In Sudan, although Arabic and Arab culture predominate, it is mostly inhabited by groups that originally spoke Nilo-Saharan, such as the Nubians, Fur, Masalit and Zaghawa, who, over the centuries, have variously intermixed with migrants from the Arabian peninsula. Small communities of Afro-Asiatic-speaking Beja nomads can also be found in Egypt and Sudan. In the Horn of Africa, some Ethiopian and Eritrean groups (like the Amhara and Tigrayans, collectively known as Habesha) speak languages from the Semitic branch of the Afro-Asiatic language family, while the Oromo and Somali speak languages from the Cushitic branch of Afro-Asiatic. Prior to the decolonization movements of the post-World War II era, Europeans were represented in every part of Africa. Decolonization during the 1960s and 1970s often resulted in the mass emigration of white settlers – especially from Algeria and Morocco (1.6 million pieds-noirs in North Africa), Kenya, Congo, Rhodesia, Mozambique and Angola. Between 1975 and 1977, over a million colonials returned to Portugal alone. Nevertheless, white Africans remain an important minority in many African states, particularly Zimbabwe, Namibia, Réunion, and South Africa. The country with the largest white African population is South Africa. Dutch and British diasporas represent the largest communities of European ancestry on the continent today. European colonization also brought sizable groups of Asians, particularly from the Indian subcontinent, to British colonies. Large Indian communities are found in South Africa, and smaller ones are present in Kenya, Tanzania, and some other southern and southeast African countries. The large Indian community in Uganda was expelled by the dictator Idi Amin in 1972, though many have since returned. The islands in the Indian Ocean are also populated primarily by people of Asian origin, often mixed with Africans and Europeans. The Malagasy people of Madagascar are an Austronesian people, but those along the coast are generally mixed with Bantu, Arab, Indian and European origins. Malay and Indian ancestries are also important components in the group of people known in South Africa as Cape Coloureds (people with origins in two or more races and continents). During the 20th century, small but economically important communities of Lebanese and Chinese have also developed in the larger coastal cities of West and East Africa, respectively. Alternative Estimates of African Population, 0–2018 AD (in thousands) Source: Maddison and others. (University of Groningen). Shares of Africa and World Population, 0–2020 AD (% of world total) Source: Maddison and others (University of Groningen). Religion While Africans profess a wide variety of religious beliefs, the majority of the people respect African religions or parts of them. However, in formal surveys or census, most people will identify with major religions that came from outside the continent, mainly through colonisation. There are several reasons for this, the main one being the colonial idea that African religious beliefs and practices are not good enough. Religious beliefs and statistics on religious affiliation are difficult to come by since they are often a sensitive topic for governments with mixed religious populations. According to the World Book Encyclopedia, Islam and Christianity are the two largest religions in Africa. According to Encyclopædia Britannica, 45% of the population are Christians, 40% are Muslims, and 10% follow traditional religions. A small number of Africans are Hindu, Buddhist, Confucianist, Baháʼí, or Jewish. There is also a minority of people in Africa who are irreligious. Languages By most estimates, well over a thousand languages (UNESCO has estimated around two thousand) are spoken in Africa. Most are of African origin, though some are of European or Asian origin. Africa is the most multilingual continent in the world, and it is not rare for individuals to fluently speak not only multiple African languages, but one or more European ones as well. There are four major groups indigenous to Africa: The Afroasiatic languages are a language family of about 240 languages and 285 million people widespread throughout the Horn of Africa, North Africa, the Sahel, and Southwest Asia. The Nilo-Saharan languages consist of a group of several possibly related families, spoken by 30 million people between 100 languages. Nilo-Saharan languages are spoken by ethnic groups in Chad, Ethiopia, Kenya, Nigeria, Sudan, South Sudan, Uganda, and northern Tanzania. The Niger-Congo language family covers much of sub-Saharan Africa. In terms of number of languages, it is the largest language family in Africa and perhaps one of the largest in the world. The Khoisan languages form a group of three unrelated families and two isolates and number about fifty in total. They are mainly spoken in Southern Africa by approximately 400,000 people. Many of the Khoisan languages are endangered. The Khoi and San peoples are considered the original inhabitants of this part of Africa. Following the end of colonialism, nearly all African countries adopted official languages that originated outside the continent, although several countries also granted legal recognition to indigenous languages (such as Swahili, Yoruba, Igbo and Hausa). In numerous countries, English and French (see African French) are used for communication in the public sphere such as government, commerce, education and the media. Arabic, Portuguese, Afrikaans and Spanish are examples of languages that trace their origin to outside of Africa, and that are used by millions of Africans today, both in the public and private spheres. Italian is spoken by some in former Italian colonies in Africa. German is spoken in Namibia, as it was a former German protectorate. In total, at least a fifth of Africans speak the former colonial languages. Health More than 85% of individuals in Africa use traditional medicine as an alternative to often expensive allopathic medical health care and costly pharmaceutical products. The Organization of African Unity (OAU) Heads of State and Government declared the 2000s decade as the African Decade on African traditional medicine in an effort to promote The WHO African Region's adopted resolution for institutionalizing traditional medicine in health care systems across the continent. Public policy makers in the region are challenged with consideration of the importance of traditional/indigenous health systems and whether their coexistence with the modern medical and health sub-sector would improve the equitability and accessibility of health care distribution, the health status of populations, and the social-economic development of nations within sub-Saharan Africa. AIDS in post-colonial Africa is a prevalent issue. Although the continent is home to about 15.2 percent of the world's population, more than two-thirds of the total infected worldwide – some 35 million people – were Africans, of whom 15 million have already died. Sub-Saharan Africa alone accounted for an estimated 69 percent of all people living with HIV and 70 percent of all AIDS deaths in 2011. In the countries of sub-Saharan Africa most affected, AIDS has raised death rates and lowered life expectancy among adults between the ages of 20 and 49 by about twenty years. Furthermore, the life expectancy in many parts of Africa has declined, largely as a result of the HIV/AIDS epidemic with life-expectancy in some countries reaching as low as thirty-four years. Culture Some aspects of traditional African cultures have become less practised in recent years as a result of neglect and suppression by colonial and post-colonial regimes. For example, African customs were discouraged, and African languages were prohibited in mission schools. Leopold II of Belgium attempted to "civilize" Africans by discouraging polygamy and witchcraft. Obidoh Freeborn posits that colonialism is one element that has created the character of modern African art. According to authors Douglas Fraser and Herbert M. Cole, "The precipitous alterations in the power structure wrought by colonialism were quickly followed by drastic iconographic changes in the art." Fraser and Cole assert that, in Igboland, some art objects "lack the vigor and careful craftsmanship of the earlier art objects that served traditional functions. Author Chika Okeke-Agulu states that "the racist infrastructure of British imperial enterprise forced upon the political and cultural guardians of empire a denial and suppression of an emergent sovereign Africa and modernist art." Editors F. Abiola Irele and Simon Gikandi comment that the current identity of African literature had its genesis in the "traumatic encounter between Africa and Europe." On the other hand, Mhoze Chikowero believes that Africans deployed music, dance, spirituality, and other performative cultures to (re)assert themselves as active agents and indigenous intellectuals, to unmake their colonial marginalization and reshape their own destinies." There is now a resurgence in the attempts to rediscover and revalue African traditional cultures, under such movements as the African Renaissance, led by Thabo Mbeki, Afrocentrism, led by a group of scholars, including Molefi Asante, as well as the increasing recognition of traditional spiritualism through decriminalization of Vodou and other forms of spirituality. As of March 2023, 98 African properties are listed by UNESCO as World Heritage Sites. Among these proprieties, 54 are cultural sites, 39 are natural sites and 5 are mixed sites. The List Of World Heritage in Danger includes 15 African sites. Visual art Architecture Cinema Music Dance Sports Fifty-four African countries have football teams in the Confederation of African Football. Egypt has won the African Cup seven times, and a record-making three times in a row. Cameroon, Nigeria, Morocco, Senegal, Ghana, and Algeria have advanced to the knockout stage of recent FIFA World Cups. Morocco made history at the 2022 World Cup in Qatar as the first African nation to reach the semi-finals of the FIFA Men's World Cup. South Africa hosted the 2010 World Cup tournament, becoming the first African country to do so. The top clubs in each African football league play the CAF Champions League, while lower-ranked clubs compete in CAF Confederation Cup. In recent years, the continent has made major progress in terms of state-of-the-art basketball facilities which have been built in cites as diverse as Cairo, Dakar, Johannesburg, Kigali, Luanda and Rades. The number of African basketball players who drafted into the NBA has experienced major growth in the 2010s. Cricket is popular in some African nations. South Africa and Zimbabwe have Test status, while Kenya is the leading non-test team and previously had One-Day International cricket (ODI) status (from 10 October 1997, until 30 January 2014). The three countries jointly hosted the 2003 Cricket World Cup. Namibia is the other African country to have played in a World Cup. Morocco in northern Africa has also hosted the 2002 Morocco Cup, but the national team has never qualified for a major tournament. Rugby is popular in several southern African nations. Namibia and Zimbabwe both have appeared on multiple occasions at the Rugby World Cup, while South Africa is the joint-most successful national team (alongside New Zealand) at the Rugby World Cup, having won the tournament on 3 occasions, in 1995, 2007, and 2019. Territories and regions The countries in this table are categorized according to the scheme for geographic subregions used by the United Nations, and data included are per sources in cross-referenced articles. Where they differ, provisos are clearly indicated. See also Index of Africa-related articles African historiography Outline of Africa Notes References Bibliography Further reading Moore, Clark D., and Ann Dunbar (1968). Africa Yesterday and Today, in series, The George School Readings on Developing Lands. New York: Praeger Publishers. Naipaul, V.S. The Masque of Africa: Glimpses of African Belief. Picador, 2010. External links General information Africa: Human Geography at the National Geographic Society African & Middle Eastern Reading Room from the United States Library of Congress Africa South of the Sahara from Stanford University Aluka, digital library of scholarly resources from and about Africa Africa Interactive Map from the United States Army Africa History The Story of Africa from BBC World Service Africa Policy Information Center (APIC) Hungarian military forces in Africa News media allAfrica.com current news, events and statistics Focus on Africa magazine from BBC World Service Continents

5336226

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lower%20Mainland%20Ecoregion

Lower Mainland Ecoregion

The Lower Mainland Ecoregion is the biogeoclimatic region that surrounds Vancouver, British Columbia, comprising the eastern edge of the Georgia Depression and extending from Powell River, British Columbia on the Sunshine Coast to Hope at the eastern end of the Fraser Valley. It thus corresponds, for the most part, with the popular usage of the term "Lower Mainland." The Lower Mainland Ecoregion is a part of the Pacific Maritime Ecozone. The ecoregion is bounded by the Coast and Cascade Mountains and traversed by the Fraser River. It has a unique climate, flora and fauna, geology and land use. The following description is adapted from Environment Canada's Ecological Framework of Canada. Description The ecoregion extends west from the Skagit Range of the Cascade Mountains at Chilliwack to the Fraser river delta at Richmond and north to include a portion of the Georgia Lowland along the Sunshine Coast. Climate The mean annual temperature in the Lower Mainland is 9 °C with a summer mean of 15 °C and a winter mean of 3.5 °C. Annual precipitation ranges from an annual mean of 850 mm in the west end to 2000 mm in the eastern end of the Fraser Valley and at higher elevations. Maximum precipitation occurs as rain in winter. Less than ten percent falls as snow at sea level but the amount of snowfall increases significantly with elevation. Flora and fauna Forests of Coast Douglas-fir, with an understory of salal, Oregon-grape and moss, are typical of the mature native vegetation found throughout the ecoregion. Mixed stands of Coast Douglas-fir and Western Hemlock are common, with some dogwood and arbutus occurring on drier sites. Red alder is a common pioneer species where sites have been disturbed. Wet sites support Coast Douglas-fir, Western Hemlock, and Western Redcedar. Wildlife includes black-tailed deer, coyote, raccoon, shorebirds, and waterfowl. Geology The ecoregion is underlain by unconsolidated glaciofluvial deposits, silty alluvium, silty and clayey marine sediments and glacial till. Bedrock outcrops of Mesozoic and Palaeozoic origin form rolling hills up to about 310 metres above sea level. The Fraser River dominates this lowland. Gleysols, Mesisols, and Humisols are the dominant wetland soils in the region, while Eutric and Dystric Brunisols and some Podzols have developed on sandy to loamy outwash and glacial till in the uplands. Land use The region includes a mix of urban settlement and agricultural land, comprising both the largest population centre and some of the most fertile farmland in British Columbia. Intensive agriculture occurs on the rich bottomland of the Fraser Valley where it competes with urban development. Forestry takes place on the slopes of the mountains. Coastal salt marshes provide important wildlife habitat in the Fraser delta and Boundary Bay. There are about 870 square kilometres of productive farmland in the ecoregion. There is rapid urban and suburban growth in the Vancouver area and communities in the Fraser Valley and Sunshine Coast. The main population centre in this ecoregion is Greater Vancouver. Other centres include North Vancouver (city and district), Chilliwack, Abbotsford, and Mission. Profile of land use Agricultural land area remained relatively stable between 1971 and 2006, declining by less than 3%. While the number of cattle declined by 12% during this period, poultry inventories increased significantly, rising by 129%. The region accounted for 13% of Canada's poultry production in 2006. The ecoregion's population increased 102% between 1971 and 2006 as compared to Canada's population growth of 47%. With 473 persons per square kilometre in 2006, the ecoregion was Canada's most densely populated. The population of the ecoregion in 2006 was approximately 2.4 million people, which represents 7.6% of Canada's population. Notes References Temperate coniferous forests Ecozones and ecoregions of British Columbia Forests of British Columbia Lower Mainland Sunshine Coast (British Columbia) Nearctic ecoregions

5347291

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nimerigar

Nimerigar

The Nimerigar are a legendary race of little people found in the folklore of the Shoshone people of North America's Rocky Mountains. According to Shoshone tales, the Nimerigar were an aggressive people who would shoot poisoned arrows from tiny bows. Nimerigar roughly translated from Shoshone and Paiute languages means "people eaters". They were believed to kill their own people with a blow to the head if they became too ill to be a participating member of their society. Although thought to be mythical, the reality of Nimerigar tales was called into question in 1932 with the discovery of the San Pedro Mountains Mummy, a -tall mummy ( seated) found in a cave 60 miles south of Casper, Wyoming. Extensive tests were carried out on the mummy, with the initial belief that it was a hoax. Tests performed by the American Museum of Natural History and certified genuine by the Anthropology Department at Harvard stated that the mummy was estimated to be the body of a full grown adult, approximately 65 years old. The mummy's damaged spine, broken collarbone, and smashed in skull (exposing brain tissue and congealed blood) suggested that it had been violently killed. Adding to its strangeness, the mummy had a full set of canine teeth, all of which were overly pointed. When examined by the University of Wyoming, the body was found to be that of a deceased anencephalic infant "whose cranial deformity gave it the appearance of a miniature adult." A second mummy examined by University of Wyoming anthropologist George Gill and the Denver Children's Hospital in the 1990s was also shown to be an anencephalic infant. DNA testing showed it to be Native American and radiocarbon dating dated it to about 1700. Historical accounts from the missionary Zeisberger in 1778 also point to the possible existence of Nimerigar or other little peoples in North America. Near Coshocton, Ohio, Zeisberger wrote of a burial ground that reportedly had numerous remains of a pygmy race, approximately in height. "The long rows of graves of the pygmy race at Coshocton were regularly arranged with heads to the west, a circumstance which has given rise to the theory that these people were sun-worshippers, facing the daily approach of the sun god over the eastern hills. Acceptance of the sun-worship surmise does not necessarily imply a deduction that this pygmy race may have descended from the river-people of Hindostan or Egypt. Primeval man, wherever found, seems to have been a sun-worshipper". These burial grounds are no longer in existence as a result of extensive farming and modern inhabitation of the land. However, acceding to the missionary observations, these primitive people understood the use of the stone ax, the making of good pottery, and the division of land areas into squares. Other than this small amount of information, the story of this strange race remains untold. See also Koro-pok-guru, small people in Ainu folklore Dwarfs and pygmies in ancient Egypt Caroline Crachami, a person about tall Pygmy peoples References External links http://www.legendsofamerica.com/WY-LittlePeople.html Colorado folklore Dwarves (folklore) History of the Rocky Mountains Legendary creatures of the indigenous peoples of North America Mythic humanoids Shoshone

5350525

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manhattanhenge

Manhattanhenge

Manhattanhenge, also called the Manhattan Solstice, is an event during which the setting sun or the rising sun is aligned with the east–west streets of the main street grid of Manhattan, New York City. The astrophysicist Neil deGrasse Tyson claims to have coined the term, by analogy with Stonehenge. The sunsets and sunrises each align twice a year, on dates evenly spaced around the summer solstice and winter solstice. The sunset alignments occur around May 28 and July 13. The sunrise alignments occur around December 5 and January 8. Manhattan is a phenomenon of this kind, due to its extensive urban canyons and its rectilinear street grid that is rotated 29° clockwise from true east–west. Many streets align with the view of the Manhattanhenge including 14th, 23rd, 34th, 42nd, and 57th Streets. Explanation and details The term Manhattanhenge is a reference to Stonehenge, a prehistoric monument located in Wiltshire, England, which was constructed so that the rising sun, seen from the center of the monument at the time of the summer solstice, aligns with the outer "Heel Stone". The phenomenon (but not the term "Manhattanhenge") was described by Neil deGrasse Tyson, an astrophysicist at the American Museum of Natural History and a native New Yorker in 1997 in the magazine Natural History. In a later interview, Tyson stated that he coined the term, and that it was inspired by a childhood visit to Stonehenge on an expedition headed by Gerald Hawkins, an astronomer who was the first to propose Stonehenge's purpose as an ancient astronomical observatory used to predict movements of sun and stars, as outlined in his 1965 book Stonehenge Decoded. According to Tyson, In accordance with the Commissioners' Plan of 1811, the street grid for most of Manhattan is rotated 29° clockwise from true east-west. Thus, when the azimuth for sunset is 299° (i.e., 29° north of due West), the sunset aligns with the streets on that grid. This rectilinear grid design runs from north of Houston Street in Lower Manhattan to south of 155th Street (Manhattan) in Upper Manhattan. A more impressive visual spectacle, and the one commonly referred to as Manhattanhenge, occurs a couple of days after the first such date of the year, and a couple of days before the second date, when a pedestrian looking down the center line of the street westward toward New Jersey can see the full solar disk slightly above the horizon and in between the profiles of the buildings. The date shifts are due to the sunset time being when the last of the sun just disappears below the horizon. The precise dates of Manhattanhenge depend on the date of the summer solstice, which varies from year to year, but remains close to June 21. In 2014, the "full sun" Manhattanhenge occurred on May 30 at 8:18 p.m., and on July 11 at 8:24 p.m. The event has attracted increasing attention in recent years. The dates on which sunrise aligns with the streets on the Manhattan grid are evenly spaced around the winter solstice and correspond approximately to December 5 and January 8. Occurrences In the following table, "full sun" refers to occurrences of the full solar disk just above the horizon, while "half sun" refers to occurrences of the solar disk partially hidden below the horizon. Related phenomena in other cities The same phenomenon happens in other cities with a uniform street grid and an unobstructed view of the horizon. If the streets on the grid were rigorously north-south and east-west, then both sunrise and sunset would be aligned on the days of the vernal and autumnal equinoxes (which occur around March 20 and September 23 respectively). In Baltimore, for instance, sunrise aligns on March 25 and September 18 and sunset on March 12 and September 29. In Chicago, the setting sun lines up with the grid system on March 20 and September 25, a phenomenon dubbed Chicagohenge. In Toronto, the setting sun lines up with the east–west streets on February 16 and October 25, a phenomenon now known locally as Torontohenge. In Montreal, there is a Montrealhenge each year around June 12. When the architects designing the city centre of Milton Keynes, in the United Kingdom, discovered that its main street almost framed the rising sun on Midsummer Day and the setting sun on Midwinter Day, they consulted Greenwich Observatory to obtain the exact angle required at their latitude, and persuaded their engineers to shift the grid of roads a few degrees. In Cambridge, Massachusetts, MIThenge occurs about January 29 and November 11, when the setting sun may be seen across the length of the "Infinite Corridor" at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. In Strasbourg, the Strasbourghenge occurs in October where the rising sun seen from the A351 motorway lines up with the spire of the cathedral. In San Francisco, the sunrise lines up and falls perfectly above the San Francisco - Bay Bridge between California and Gough Street in San Francisco, twice a year (Spring and Fall). This has been called "California Henge" at times. Also in San Francisco there is a “Crack of light” between two very close buildings on the Summer Solstice at 1698 Sanchez Street every year. Variously over the years there has been a white or yellow line painted on the sidewalk to mark the place where the light shines through the crack on the Solstice. See also Stonehenge replicas and derivatives Urban canyon References External links Media Flickr photos tagged with Manhattanhenge Video interpretation of Manhattanhenge Video on Science Friday website Manhattanhenge, NOVA scienceNOW, first broadcast September 14, 2006 Discussion Hayden Planetarium discussion Images and maps Manhattanhenge images on Yahoo! news July 12, 2011 Interactive map showing Manhattanhenge visibility by time of year Astronomical events of the Solar System Culture of Manhattan 2000s neologisms May events July events Geography of Manhattan Neil deGrasse Tyson Solar alignment Solar phenomena Summer solstice Winter solstice

5353379

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sonchus%20asper

Sonchus asper

Sonchus asper, the prickly sow-thistle, rough milk thistle, spiny sowthistle, sharp-fringed sow thistle, or spiny-leaved sow thistle, is a widespread flowering plant in the tribe Cichorieae within the family Asteraceae. Description Sonchus asper is an annual or biennial herb sometimes reaching a height of with spiny leaves and yellow flowers resembling those of the dandelion. The leaves are bluish-green, simple, lanceolate, with wavy and sometimes lobed margins, covered in spines on both the margins and beneath. The base of the leaf surrounds the stem. The leaves and stems emit a milky sap when cut. One plant will produce several flat-topped arrays of flower heads, each head containing numerous yellow ray flowers but no disc flowers. Distribution Sonchus asper is native to Europe, North Africa, and western Asia. It has also become naturalized on other continents and is regarded as a noxious, invasive weed in many places. Its edible leaves make a palatable and nutritious leaf vegetable. It is found in cultivated soil, pastures, roadsides, edges of yards, vacant lots, construction sites, waste areas and in grasslands. References External links Spiny Sowthistle in Virginia Tech Weed Identification Guide WeedAlert.com's article on the Spiny Sowthistle photo of herbarium specimen at Missouri Botanical Garden, collected in Madagascar in 1932 asper Flora of Europe Flora of Western Asia Flora of North Africa Leaf vegetables Cosmopolitan species Flora of Syria

5354120

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apollonian%20and%20Dionysian

Apollonian and Dionysian

The Apollonian and the Dionysian are philosophical and literary concepts represented by a duality between the figures of Apollo and Dionysus from Greek mythology. Its popularization is widely attributed to the work The Birth of Tragedy by Friedrich Nietzsche, though the terms had already been in use prior to this, such as in the writings of poet Friedrich Hölderlin, historian Johann Joachim Winckelmann, and others. The word Dionysian occurs as early as 1608 in Edward Topsell's zoological treatise The History of Serpents. The concept has since been widely invoked and discussed within Western philosophy and literature. In Greek mythology, Apollo and Dionysus are both sons of Zeus. Apollo, son of Leto, is the god of the sun, art, music, poetry, plague and disease, of rational thinking and order, and appeals to logic, prudence and purity and stands for reason. Dionysus, son of Semele, is the god of wine, dance and pleasure, of irrationality and chaos, representing passion, emotions and instincts. The ancient Greeks did not consider the two gods to be opposites or rivals, although they were often entwined by nature. Nietzschean usage Later usages Continental philosophy Nietzsche's idea has been interpreted as an expression of fragmented consciousness or existential instability by a variety of modern and post-modern writers, especially Martin Heidegger, Michel Foucault and Gilles Deleuze. According to Peter Sloterdijk, the Dionysian and the Apollonian form a dialectic; they are contrasting, but Nietzsche does not mean one to be valued more than the other. Truth being primordial pain, our existential being is determined by the Dionysian/Apollonian dialectic. Extending the use of the Apollonian and Dionysian onto an argument on interaction between the mind and physical environment, Abraham Akkerman has pointed to masculine and feminine features of city form. Ruth Benedict Anthropologist Ruth Benedict used the terms to characterize cultures that value restraint and modesty (Apollonian) and ostentatiousness and excess (Dionysian). An example of an Apollonian culture in Benedict's analysis was the Zuñi people as opposed to the Dionysian Kwakiutl people. The theme was developed by Benedict in her main work Patterns of Culture. Albert Szent-Györgyi Albert Szent-Györgyi, who wrote that "a discovery must be, by definition, at variance with existing knowledge", divided scientists into two categories: the Apollonians and the Dionysians. He called scientific dissenters, who explored "the fringes of knowledge", Dionysians. He wrote, "In science the Apollonian tends to develop established lines to perfection, while the Dionysian rather relies on intuition and is more likely to open new, unexpected alleys for research...The future of mankind depends on the progress of science, and the progress of science depends on the support it can find. Support mostly takes the form of grants, and the present methods of distributing grants unduly favor the Apollonian". Camille Paglia American humanities scholar Camille Paglia writes about the Apollonian and Dionysian in her 1990 bestseller Sexual Personae. The broad outline of her concept has roots in Nietzschean discourse, an admitted influence, although Paglia's ideas diverge significantly. The Apollonian and Dionysian concepts comprise a dichotomy that serves as the basis of Paglia's theory of art and culture. For Paglia, the Apollonian is light and structured while the Dionysian is dark and chthonic (she prefers Chthonic to Dionysian throughout the book, arguing that the latter concept has become all but synonymous with hedonism and is inadequate for her purposes, declaring that "the Dionysian is no picnic"). The Chthonic is associated with females, wild/chaotic nature, and unconstrained sex/procreation. In contrast, the Apollonian is associated with males, clarity, celibacy and/or homosexuality, rationality/reason, and solidity, along with the goal of oriented progress: "Everything great in western civilization comes from struggle against our origins". She argues that there is a biological basis to the Apollonian/Dionysian dichotomy, writing: "The quarrel between Apollo and Dionysus is the quarrel between the higher cortex and the older limbic and reptilian brains". Moreover, Paglia attributes all the progress of human civilization to masculinity revolting against the Chthonic forces of nature, and turning instead to the Apollonian trait of ordered creation. The Dionysian is a force of chaos and destruction, which is the overpowering and alluring chaotic state of wild nature. Rejection of—or combat with—Chthonianism by socially constructed Apollonian virtues accounts for the historical dominance of men (including asexual and homosexual men; and childless and/or lesbian-leaning women) in science, literature, arts, technology and politics. As an example, Paglia states: "The male orientation of classical Athens was inseparable from its genius. Athens became great not despite but because of its misogyny". See also "Cygnus X-1 Book II: Hemispheres", a song by Canadian rock band Rush based in part on the concept. Logocentrism Phallogocentrism Light side (Apollonian) and dark side (Dionysian) of the force Faust The Decline of the West References Ancient Greece studies Apollo Concepts in aesthetics Conceptual distinctions Dionysus Existentialist concepts Greek mythology studies History of literature Jungian archetypes Literary concepts Philosophy of Friedrich Nietzsche

5355609

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ashen%20light

Ashen light

Ashen light is a hypothesised subtle glow that has been claimed to be seen on the night side of the planet Venus. The phenomenon has not been scientifically confirmed, and theories as to the observed phenomenon's cause are numerous, such as emission of light by Venus, or optical phenomena within the observing telescope itself. A modern hypothesis as to the source of light on Venus suggests it to be associated with lightning, for which there is some evidence on Venus. This theory has fallen out of favour, however, as there is not enough light generated by this lightning so as to be observed. A more recent hypothesis is that it is a form of transient aurorae or airglow caused by unusually high solar activity interacting with the upper Venusian atmosphere. History of observations While the discovery of the ashen light is often attributed to Italian astronomer Giovanni Battista Riccioli, recent evidence finds that German priest Athanasius Kircher might have been the first to observe the ashen light during his one and only trip to Palermo, Sicily in the spring of 1638. However, the first distinct and detailed record of the ashen light was produced by Riccioli on 9 January 1643, who ascribed it to the refraction of light within the telescope itself: "The colors arise from the various refraction of light in the glass, as it happens with trigonal glasses." This is likely a description of a phenomenon now known as chromatic aberration. Subsequent claims have been made by various observers ever since, including Sir William Herschel, Sir Patrick Moore, Dale P. Cruikshank, and William K. Hartmann. The ashen light has often been sighted when Venus is in the evening sky, when the evening terminator of the planet is toward the Earth. Observation attempts were made on 17 July 2001, when a 67% illuminated Venus reappeared from behind a 13% illuminated moon. None of the observers of this occurrence (including some using 'Super RADOTS' telescopes) reported seeing the ashen light. Video from the event was captured, but the camera was too insensitive to detect even the earthshine. A particularly favourable viewing opportunity occurred on 8 October 2015, with a 40% illuminated Venus reappearing from behind the unlit limb of a 15% sunlit Moon. The event was visible in dark skies throughout Central Australia and was recorded by David and Joan Dunham (of the International Occultation Timing Association) using a 10" f/4 Newton telescope with a Watec 120N+ video camera from a location just north of Alice Springs. They also observed the event visually with an 8" Schmidt–Cassegrain telescope. Neither the real-time visual observation nor close visual inspection of the video recording showed any sign of the dark side of Venus. Light source theories The Keck telescope on Hawaii reported seeing a subtle green glow and suggested it could be produced as ultraviolet light from the Sun splits molecules of carbon dioxide (), known to be common in Venus' atmosphere, into carbon monoxide () and oxygen (). However, the green light emitted as oxygen recombines to form is thought too faint to explain the effect, and it is too faint to have been observed with amateur telescopes. In 1967, Venera 4 found the Venusian magnetic field to be much weaker than that of Earth. This magnetic field is induced by an interaction between the ionosphere and the solar wind, rather than by an internal dynamo in the core like the one inside Earth. Venus's small induced magnetosphere provides negligible protection to the atmosphere against cosmic radiation. This radiation may result in cloud-to-cloud lightning discharges. It was hypothesized in 1957 by Urey and Brewer that CO+, CO and O ions produced by the ultraviolet radiation from the Sun were the cause of the glow. In 1969, it was hypothesized that the Ashen light is an auroral phenomena due to solar particle bombardment on the dark side of Venus. Throughout the 1980s, it was thought that the cause of the glow was lightning on Venus. The Soviet Venera 9 and 10 orbital probes obtained optical and electromagnetic evidence of lightning on Venus. Also, the Pioneer Venus Orbiter recorded visible airglow at Venus in 1978 strong enough to saturate its star sensor. In 1990, Christopher T. Russell and J. L. Phillips gave further support to the lightning hypothesis, stating that if there are several strikes on the night side of the planet, in a sufficiently short period of time, the sequence may give off an overall glow in the skies of Venus. The European Space Agency's Venus Express in 2007 detected whistler waves, providing further evidence for lightning on Venus. The Akatsuki spacecraft, by Japan's space agency JAXA, entered orbit around Venus on 7 December 2015. Part of its scientific payload includes the Lightning and Airglow Camera (LAC) which is looking for lightning in the visible spectrum (552-777 nm). To image lightning, the orbiter has sight of the dark side of Venus for about 30 minutes every 10 days. No lightning has been detected in 16.8 hours of night-side observation (July 2019). Simulations indicate that the lightning hypothesis as the cause of the glow is incorrect, as not enough light could be transmitted through the atmosphere to be seen from Earth. Observers have speculated it may be illusory, resulting from the physiological effect of observing a bright, crescent-shaped object. Spacecraft looking for it have not been able to spot it — leading some astronomers to believe that it is just an enduring myth. A more recent hypothesis is that unusually high solar activity could induce auroral or airglow-like effects on the dark side of Venus. It has been observed that after major solar storms, an emission of light with a wavelength of 557.7 nm (the oxygen green line) occurs across the entire upper atmosphere of Venus. This is the same phenomenon which gives some aurorae on Earth their greenish appearance. Generally, this emission does not occur except for during major solar events such as coronal mass ejections (CMEs) or solar flares. However, dim emissions have been detected twice outside of solar storms, on December 27, 2010, and December 12, 2013 respectively. Both of these detections coincided with the passage of a “Stream Interaction Region”, a denser than average solar wind. In July 2012, a CME struck Venus producing a very bright green line emission. It is notable that after every CME impact on Venus, this emission is detected, but not after every flare. This is taken to indicate charged particles are what is responsible for the green line emission, similar to Earth's aurora. See also Atmosphere of Venus References Planetary science Venus Light sources Unexplained phenomena

5358350

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geographic%20Locator%20Codes

Geographic Locator Codes

Worldwide Geographic Location Codes (GLCs) list the number and letter codes federal agencies should use in designating geographic locations anywhere in the United States or abroad in computer programs. Use of standard codes facilitates the interchange of machine-readable data from agency to agency within the federal community and between federal offices and state and local groups. These codes are also used by some companies as a coding standard as well, especially those that must deal with federal, state and local governments for such things as taxes. The GLCs are administered by the U.S. General Services Administration (GSA). External links US General Services Administration site General Services Administration Geocodes