LET IT SNOW...IN 3D

There’s an old saying that no two snowflakes are alike. Apparently our best proof of that until now was a study from the 1970’s that captured snowflakes and put them between glass layers on microscope slides—a few thousand of them. Talk about an exercise in patience!

Now the science of snowflake research has taken a big leap forward with a specially-developed rig that uses three high-speed cameras and infrared sensors to take thousands of 3D pictures of falling snowflakes in a single night. It’s called the Multi Angle Snowflake Camera and the University of Utah researchers who developed it have already created a spin-off company to manufacture the things.

Why should we care? (Other than the fact that the pictures are really pretty, as you can see.) It turns out that snowflakes can be so different under various conditions that weather forecasters’ computer models (based on those 1970’s snowflakes) can’t accurately predict what they’ll do, which helps explains why forecasts of snowfall amounts can be so wrong. These new cameras might make a big difference. Just for fun, you can even watch a live feed of falling snow at the Alta Ski Area where the research was done (when it’s snowing).

Maybe soon this technology will be able to warn us when we’re going to have to come up with a major bribe for our neighbour with the snowblower.



MISSED US BY THAT MUCH

Astronomers had some good news for us this week. An asteroid called Apophis passed by in its orbit about fourteen million kilometers away from us. But if the name sounds familiar (beyond references in the Stargate TV series) it’s because in 2004 there were alarming predictions that Apophis could strike the Earth. It didn’t then, but scientists calculated that it would come close in 2029, and had a 1 in 250,000 chance of impacting our planet in 2036. Now, Apophis isn’t huge but it’s moving at tremendous speed, so it would cause a lot of local damage if it were to hit us (though not planet-wide extinctions).

This week’s pass gave astronomers a much better look at Apophis. The bad news is that it’s actually bigger than they’d earlier thought—about 325 meters in diameter. But the good news is that the chance of it hitting Earth in 3036 has been downgraded to 1 in more than 7 million.

You might be breathing a sigh of relief (or you might say, “Hey, I still buy lottery tickets.”)

In any case, if you really want an excuse to cry that the sky is falling, there is one asteroid that will actually pass by the Earth closer than the orbit of some satellites this coming February 15^th. It’s called 2012DA14 and it’s about 45 meters across—say, a large building lot.

Checking your home insurance policy fine print for asteroids?

People are already saying we need to wake up and prepare defenses against this kind of hazard, and there are projects in the brainstorming stages, but it will be years before any of them are ready.

For now, we call these objects “near-Earth asteroids”. Maybe one day we’ll call them “target practice”.

MARS, HERE WE COME

It was announced this week that the hunt is now on for colonists for Mars. No, not by NASA (who really believed George W. Bush when he announced plans to go to the Moon and Mars back in 2004, and what’s really been done since then other than some paperwork?) No, I’m talking about a private initiative based in the Netherlands called Mars One which hopes to raise a ton of private money and put human colonists on the Red Planet by 2023. Recruitment will begin over the next few months, and training for the…(dare I call them Martianauts?) will take about eight years.

Chief Medical Director for Mars One, Norbert Kraft, a former Sr. Research Associate at NASA states, “In my former work with NASA we established strict criteria for the selection and training of astronauts on long duration space flights. Gone are the days when bravery and the number of hours flying a supersonic jet were the top criteria. Now, we are more concerned with how well each astronaut works and lives with the others, in the long journey from Earth to Mars and for a lifetime of challenges ahead. Psychological stability, the ability to be at your best when things are at their worst is what Mars One is looking for. If you are the kind of person that everyone chooses to have on their island, then we want you to apply too.”

You need to be 18 or older, and have lots of other qualifications, but you can read all about it here.

The catch? Well, they have a chance of coming up with a way to get you to Mars, but there won’t be any way to get you back. It’s a one-way trip, and you’ll be alone on a whole planet with the rest of your team for two additional years, until the next group of colonists is expected to arrive.

Do you really feel like getting away from it all? How do prepare yourself mentally for something like that? Watch all the reruns of Gilligan’s Island?

Or maybe just haul out all of those lists that end “...would you take with you to a desert island?”