NASA’s Ares I-X test rocket lifted off at 11:30 a.m. EDT Wednesday from NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida.

All told, the flight test lasted about six minutes: the launch from the newly modified Launch Pad 39B, a two-minute powered flight, and then a splashdown of the rocket’s booster stage nearly 150 miles downrange. (more…)

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NASA’s  new Ares I-X  test rocket is on the launch pad at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida, in preparation for its debut launch scheduled for October 27.

The Ares I-X  is a prototype for the Ares 1 rocket NASA plans to use to launch its shuttle successor, the Orion spacecraft. The flight test will provide NASA with an opportunity to test and prove flight characteristics, hardware, facilities and ground operations associated with the Ares I.

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Want to see the Orionid meteor shower?

Here’s what you need to know: (more…)

The bizarre story of a Colorado family’s runaway balloon aircraft this afternoon got me to thinking:

How many helium-filled balloons are required to lift a human off the ground?

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Can a fan still cool you if it doesn’t have blades?

Apparently so, if it’s the new Dyson Air Multiplier ™ fan pictured above.

Dyson, a company well-known for advancing vacuum cleaner technology, has now developed a new generation of innovative bladeless fans. These fans use the simple principles of fluid dynamics –without the traditional fan blades –to multiply air flow 15 times, ultimately expelling some 119 gallons of air every second.
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Ever wonder if there is water on the moon?

NASA does.

In fact, NASA is so curious that it’s going to “bomb” the moon tomorrow morning in hopes of creating a debris cloud that can be analyzed for water content.

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Earlier today, the 2009 Nobel Prize in Chemistry was awarded to:

• Venkatraman Ramakrishnan, MRC Laboratory of Molecular Biology, Cambridge,United Kingdom
• Thomas A. Steitz, Yale University, New Haven, CT, USA
• Ada E. Yonath, Weizmann Institute of Science, Rehovot, Israel

“for studies of the structure and function of the ribosome.”

These scientists used a method called X-ray crystallography to map the position for each and every one of the hundreds of thousands of atoms that make up the ribosome.

But, what is a ribosome?

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This morning, the Nobel Prize in Physics for 2009 was awarded to three scientists for their achievements in the fields of optical and digital technology.

Nobel Prize in Physics for 2009 awarded for achievements in the fields of optical and digital technology

Specifically, the award was presented to:

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This morning, the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine 2009 was awarded to Elizabeth H. Blackburn, Carol W. Greider and Jack W. Szostak for the discovery of how chromosomes are protected by telomeres and the enzyme telomerase.

But, what is a telomere and why is this research important?

The Telomere (click to expand)

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New data shows that humpback whale populations have been growing steadily over recent decades, and as a result, the U.S. government may take the humpback whale off the endangered species list.

Last year, the National Marine Fisheries Service, an agency of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), received results from an extensive study showing that the north Pacific humpback whale population has been growing 4-7% a year over the past few decades.

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