Enlarge / Artist’s rendering of two merging black holes, producing telltale gravitational wave signatures that were picked up by the LIGO/VIRGO detectors.. (credit: Aurore Simonnet/LIGO-Virgo Collaboration/Sonoma State University) At a weekend workshop in Maryland, physicists from the LIGO and Virgo collaboration reported four previously unannounced detections of gravitational waves from merging black holes, including the biggest-known […]
Enlarge / US President Donald Trump speaks during a post-election press conference on November 7, 2018. (credit: Jim Watson/AFP/Getty Images) Late last week, as the country was focusing on antacids and shopping, the Trump administration released a report on climate change prepared by its own scientific agencies. The hope was that the report and its […]
Enlarge / US Rep. John Culberson (R-Tex.) walks toward the Rummel Creek Elementary polling place on Election Day 2018. He lost his seat, which may have ripple effects well beyond Earth. (credit: Loren Elliott/Getty Images) LA CAÑADA FLINTRIDGE, Calif.—The political attack ad lunged straight for the jugular. In seeking to unseat Republican incumbent John Culberson […]
SpaceX Monday p.m. Update: At the top of its launch window, SpaceX’s Falcon 9 rocket soared into space on Monday from a launch site in California, sending 64 smallsats on their intended path toward a Sun synchronous orbit. Shortly thereafter the first stage descended to a drone ship in the Pacific Ocean and landed safely. […]
Enlarge / Russia’s Soyuz rocket and crew capsule are back in business after a launch Monday. (credit: NASA) Less than two months after a booster separation issue with a Soyuz rocket caused a dramatic, high-gravity landing, the Russian vehicle soared back into space on Monday at 6:31 ET (11:31 UTC). The launch from Kazakhstan, under […]
The Wizard of Oz tops the list. The rankings are based on an „influence score“ determined by how many times each film has been referenced in subsequent films.’> Enlarge / The Wizard of Oz tops the list. The rankings are based on an „influence score“ determined by how many times each film has been referenced […]
Enlarge / Humpback whales (credit: NOAA) On Friday, the National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS) approved a plan to make it legal for five companies to conduct seismic testing off the Atlantic coast, in an area stretching from Delaware to Florida. The seismic testing is an initial step toward leasing federal offshore waters to oil companies that […]
Fractals are a source of endless fascination to me. Life itself relies on many of the concepts of fractals: trees are fractal, as are feathers, coast lines, and many other things in nature. Indeed, it was the realization that landscapes are fractal that made modern animated films possible. But, what about fractional dimensions in quantum […]
Enlarge / From left to right: the iPhone 8, the iPhone XS, the iPhone XR, and the iPhone XS Max. (credit: Samuel Axon) Apple will not introduce an iPhone capable of taking advantage of faster 5G cellular data networks in 2019, a report from Bloomberg says. Citing people familiar with Apple’s plans, the report specifies […]
Enlarge (credit: Frank Lindecke / Flickr) Brace yourself for yet another massive data breach. Quora.com, a site where people ask and answer questions on a range of topics, said hackers breached its computer network and accessed a variety of potentially sensitive personal data for about 100 million users. Compromised information includes cryptographically protected passwords, full […]
