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(Image: The Horsehead nebula can be seen in this portion of the “first light” image from ZTF.)A new surveying telescope at Caltech will take high definition photos of the northern sky every night, night after night, discovering violent cosmic events as they happen. The Zwicky Transient Facility (ZTF) just saw first light today at Mount Palomar in California. The robotic camera has a 24,000 by 24,000 pixel resolution, building an astounding picture throughout the night and covering all of the night sky that’s visible from its location in California....

Media Platforms Design TeamWhen you rub your hair with a balloon, your hair sticks to it. However, the common explanation behind this elementary school science demonstration may not be correct. A new study proposes a different story that goes against the common wisdom on static electricity that has prevailed for centuries. The traditional explanation for the balloon experiment goes like this: Friction causes the balloon and hair to transfer electrons, leaving each item with a uniform opposite charge....

Artificial intelligence is getting better and better at creating generative images, and now scientists are working at generative video. The idea is that simply by typing out a phrase, artificial intelligence could create a video of that scene. Scientists at Duke and Princeton have created a working model.’Sailing on snow,’ enlarged for greater visibilityUniversity of Toronto"Video generation is intimately related to video prediction," the authors say in their new paper. Video prediction, in which A....

Media Platforms Design TeamThe green pope has added an electric car to his garage. Last week the French carmaker Renault presented Benedict XVI with a custom Kangoo EV based on the Maxi Z.E. released last fall. Renault and Nissan together have invested $5.16 billion in developing eight electric vehicles over the next several years, the first of which was the Nissan Leaf. Powered by a 60-hp electric motor and lithium-ion battery pack, the van has a range of 105 miles on a charge....

There are a lot of misconceptions around how to treat a rattlesnake bite. If you’ve seen True Grit (either version) you know the X-shaped-incision-and-poison-sucking. This is an instructive example of how not to treat a rattlesnake bite. Here are some less cinematic but more effective guidelines about how to avoid rattlesnakes and what to do if bitten, so you can trek more confidently in nature. Where You Will Find Rattlesnakes and How to Identify ThemRattlesnakes are one of four types of snakes in America whose venomous bite can kill you....

Researchers have found that the average body temperature in the U.S. has fallen nearly a full degree since the early 1800s.In the era of nano-medicine on the cellular level, accurate standards are more important than ever. This study concludes that everyday inflammation in the past likely explains the difference.Interesting Engineering reports the average human body temperature has fallen gradually over time. Using hundreds of thousands of reported temperatures from the last 150 years, scientists made a linear plot that shows our temperature has dropped 1/20th of a degree Fahrenheit per decade....

The nickname of the DF-26 ballistic missile is designed to grab attention. Chinese media wonks and military experts call it the “Guam killer” because it can bring conventional explosives and nuclear warheads into the U.S. airbase on that small Pacific island—from 4,000 kilometers away.Chinese military officials declared the intermediate ballistic missile operational earlier this year, and it looks like the Pentagon is doing more than just taking notice. They are preparing for stealth strike operations without using Guam as a hub....

Media Platforms Design TeamA game court can be a landscaping asset. This Pennsylvania home’s horseshoe pit has lighting, plantings and a place to set down drinks. (Photograph by Andrew Hetherington)Vince and Beth Campagna don’t get out much anymore. Ever since the Holland, Pa., couple converted an unused strip of their backyard into a manicured horseshoe pit, the good times are found right at home. “I should charge a cover to all of the people who want to come play in my backyard,” Beth says....

It’s not often a probe gets a new lease on life, but Japan’s Venus probe Akatsuki managed to enter orbit five years to the day after it failed an orbital insertion and drifted off into space. It was a rare second act for a spacecraft, and Akatsuki’s success was owed to some precise thruster firings that gave it a chance to re-encounter Venus five years later. It was still a tense day for the Japanese space agency, JAXA, as everything had to go just right for the probe to enter an elliptical orbit that would take it as near as 186 miles above the surface and as far away as 50,000 miles, far from its original intended orbit....

The search for the missing Malaysia Airlines Flight 370, now in its ninth day, widened dramatically over the weekend to an area larger than the continental U.S., as reports supported the likelihood that the 777-200 could have flown for more than five hours after its last contact with civilian air traffic control. Foul play moved to the top of the list of possible explanations for the disappearance. The Malaysian government said it is now treating the matter as a criminal investigation, calling it a “deliberate” diversion of the aircraft....

UPDATE 9/9/2015 4:55PM: Seemingly out of nowhere, NASA has officially released the full PDF of the 1976 Danne & Blackburn design manual. While it doesn’t mention the high-quality hardcover from Reed and Smyth that’s raising money on Kickstarter, the release of the PDF comes at a time that’s rather suspicious considering the campaign.The manual is a veritable treasure trove of reproduction art as well as logo and patch designs, all featuring the worm logo....

View full post on YoutubeWith the 2060s less than a half-century away, maybe the time is right for a new Jetsons movie. One might be in the works, and it’ll be animated to boot.Matt Lieberman has been hired to write the script. His IMDB page makes it clear that he’s no stranger to reboots—he worked on a direct-to-video Dr. Doolittle feature and is writing a Short Circuit remake as well as an animated Scooby-Doo movie, according to Deadline....

LAS VEGAS—Yesterday afternoon at CES we got a bus-tour demo of Samsung’s new A-VSB television technology (the letters stand for the awkward mouthful of Advanced Vestigial Sideband television service) a system that is designed to enable mobile broadcast television using the existing broadcast TV bandwidth. It’s not surprising that many of the mobile television technologies we’re seeing at the show come from Korean companies such as LG and Samsung, since in Korea, watching TV on your phone is big business....

Media Platforms Design TeamAre needles on the way out? Two new methods for administering drugs to the skin have been in the news within a day of each other. In a paper published today in Optics Letters a team from Seoul National University in South Korea demonstrates how to use a small laser assembly to force tiny jets of drugs into skin with less pain and more control than a needle....

Some distillers might talk about the limestone water that runs through their property, or the heirloom crops in their mash. But it would be hard to find a spirit more deeply rooted in its place than Massachusetts Craneberry Liqueur: classic New England rum infused with cranberries, indigenous to Massachusetts and still the state’s number-one agricultural crop. Harvested through mid-November, cranberries are a forever-American holiday tradition, and Craneberry, distilled by GrandTen Distilling in Boston, is a new way to experience a flavor most people associate with either turkey sauce or Ocean Spray juice....

A pedestrian in Tempe, AZ has died following a collision with an Uber self-driving car, the New York Times is reporting. The incident might be the first known pedestrian death caused by the technology. Uber has suspended all self-driving tests pending an investigation.According to Tempe police, the car was in autonomous mode with a human safety driver at the wheel when it struck the woman walking across the street but not within the sidewalk....

On Friday, SpaceX launched one of their reusable Falcon 9 rockets from Vandenberg Air Force Base on California’s Central Coast. The results were spectacular, and seen for hundreds of miles around, as far away as Arizona and Mexico.View full post on YoutubeTraveling across the early evening sky, the rocket’s trail looked like a luminous jellyfish, as the water from its boosters left trails of condensation that were hit by the sun....

Moltex Energy, a small British company, has raised millions of dollars through crowdfunding by pitching its new type of nuclear fission, which it calls a Stable Salt Reactor (SSR). Stable Salt Reactors would be safer than conventional plants, the company argues, because they ditch uranium fuel rods in favor of a type of molten salt that can’t react violently to any situation. This is one of several types of new nuclear energy being explored....

China is preparing to start bidding on a nuclear powered icebreaker, the first nuclear powered surface ship in the country’s history. An icebreaker powered by nuclear energy would give Beijing access to the Arctic and its resources. It would also pave the way toward nuclear-powered aircraft carriers, giving the People’s Liberation Army Navy unprecedented reach.On June 21, 2018 China National Nuclear Corporation, an arm of the Chinese government, opened up bids to shipbuilders for the country’s first nuclear powered icebreaker....

Don’t let appearances fool you. The moon may look rocky and lifeless, but it has a surprisingly complex history as revealed by the Yutu rover. China’s first lunar rover unearthed at least nine distinct layers under the surface of the moon, pointing to periods of intense geologic activity including active volcanism. Yutu lasted a little more than a month on the surface of the moon, from December 2013 to January 2014....