flemster writes "Tsunami mapper is a new site which uses the googlemaps elevation service and the flood fill algorithm to predict which areas near a coast are likely to be affected by a tsunami. You can search for your local beach, set a wave heading and height and then double click the tsunami starting point off the coast, after which the tsunami range will be drawn. Naturally, predicting a tsunami is far more complicated than this and this application is a general guide and not a true predictor. However the simulations of the recent Japanese simulation are interesting. Compare the tsunami mapper simulation with this aerial photo of Ishinomaki after the March tsunami."
Dr. Art Trembanis CSHEL 109 Penny Hall Department of Geological Sciences The College of Earth, Ocean, and Environment University of Delaware Newark DE 19716 http://cshel.geology.udel.edu 302-831-2498
"Education is not the filling of a pot, but the lighting of a fire." -W. B. Yeats
Dr. Art Trembanis CSHEL 109 Penny Hall Department of Geological Sciences The College of Earth, Ocean, and Environment University of Delaware Newark DE 19716 http://cshel.geology.udel.edu 302-831-2498
"Education is not the filling of a pot, but the lighting of a fire." -W. B. Yeats
Dr. Art Trembanis CSHEL 109 Penny Hall Department of Geological Sciences The College of Earth, Ocean, and Environment University of Delaware Newark DE 19716 http://cshel.geology.udel.edu 302-831-2498
"Education is not the filling of a pot, but the lighting of a fire." -W. B. Yeats
Dr. Art Trembanis CSHEL 109 Penny Hall Department of Geological Sciences The College of Earth, Ocean, and Environment University of Delaware Newark DE 19716 http://cshel.geology.udel.edu 302-831-2498
"Education is not the filling of a pot, but the lighting of a fire." -W. B. Yeats
NOAA and partners conducted 11 ocean explorations in the Gulf of Mexico during the past ten years, providing a foundation of information against which to measure change to the region's ecosystems - changes that may relate to the Deepwater Horizon event that took place a year ago.
Phoghat writes "STS-134, the final flight of the space shuttle Endeavour – is set to carry several experiments of students from the middle school, high school and collegiate levels. Two of these payloads are sponsored by the NASA Florida. The first experiment is one that could provide some guidance on future long-duration space flight missions, it deals with seed germination. As missions take astronauts further and further away from Earth, they will need to be able to produce their own food. Learning everything possible about the effects of micro-gravity on seeds therefore is viewed as relevant and important research. Another experiment, one comprised of squid embryos is being spearheaded by the University of Florida and will research the physiological impact of the micro-gravity environment on the animal's growth and development."
jamie points out an opinion piece by Columbia professor Mark C. Taylor in Nature News decrying the state of PhD education in the US, calling it "broken and unsustainable." Quoting: "The necessary changes are both curricular and institutional. One reason that many doctoral programmes do not adequately serve students is that they are overly specialized, with curricula fragmented and increasingly irrelevant to the world beyond academia. Expertise, of course, is essential to the advancement of knowledge and to society. But in far too many cases, specialization has led to areas of research so narrow that they are of interest only to other people working in the same fields, subfields or sub-subfields. Many researchers struggle to talk to colleagues in the same department, and communication across departments and disciplines can be impossible. If doctoral education is to remain viable in the twenty-first century, universities must tear down the walls that separate fields, and establish programmes that nourish cross-disciplinary investigation and communication. They must design curricula that focus on solving practical problems, such as providing clean water to a growing population. Unfortunately, significant change is unlikely to come from faculty members, who all too often remain committed to traditional approaches."
Some time has passed since my last blog, but the research and work load as remained relatively constant. As the weeks passed it became one of my goals to better understand the geology on the Florida Reef tract, more specifically the Conch Reef. As referred by Art I began to read the Systematic Mapping of Bedrock and Habitats along the Florida Reef Tract. This resource gave me a better understanding of the over all geology of the Florida reef. Descriptive analyses of the dating methods, ecological preservation, scientific studies, and geological background are given in this reading. Having a better understanding of the different types of reef found along the reef tract not only helps with knowing what type of environments I would expect to be there, but also helps with my scientific analysis and tasks involved with categorizing different types of reef. After already going through the sidescan sonar to find individual targets and outlining their shape, I was able to see the minor differences between each of the coral outcrops. My next task involved combining data from real time google earth imaging, University of Delaware's sidescan sonar, and NOAA benthic habitats to make a precise classification of different types of reef formations and sand flats. By combining all of the different sets of available data I was able to create a more appropriate classification of the assigned area.
-- Lyle de la Rosa Coastal and Marine Geosciences College of Earth, Ocean, and Environment University of Delaware Club Water Polo Secretary (215)873-9014
Dr. Art Trembanis CSHEL 109 Penny Hall Department of Geological Sciences The College of Earth, Ocean, and Environment University of Delaware Newark DE 19716 http://cshel.geology.udel.edu 302-831-2498
"Education is not the filling of a pot, but the lighting of a fire." -W. B. Yeats
In this exclusive clip from National Geographic's new series Shark Men, the doctor explains how the keen underwater senses of a Great White shark enables it to detect even the slightest changes in the water, including the doctor's own heartbeat.
astroengine writes "NASA is looking at using the International Space Station as a testbed for a human mission to Mars, beginning with a planned week-long simulation to be staged next summer. Preliminary tests would involve working on systems that give astronauts more autonomy, perhaps culminating in a full mission analog, sealing a crew inside a separate module of the station with minimal interaction with the rest of the station and mission control. 'We want to use the space station as a way to get smarter about what a mission to Mars or a mission to an asteroid might look like,' space station flight controller Pete Hasbrook told Discovery News."
Dr. Art Trembanis CSHEL 109 Penny Hall Department of Geological Sciences The College of Earth, Ocean, and Environment University of Delaware Newark DE 19716 http://cshel.geology.udel.edu 302-831-2498
"Education is not the filling of a pot, but the lighting of a fire." -W. B. Yeats
Some interesting discussions about beach erosion, beach nourishment, and public v private ownership at the coast based on cases in NC...good fodder for class discussion next week.
Dr. Art Trembanis CSHEL 109 Penny Hall Department of Geological Sciences The College of Earth, Ocean, and Environment University of Delaware Newark DE 19716 http://cshel.geology.udel.edu 302-831-2498
"Education is not the filling of a pot, but the lighting of a fire." -W. B. Yeats
Dr. Art Trembanis CSHEL 109 Penny Hall Department of Geological Sciences The College of Earth, Ocean, and Environment University of Delaware Newark DE 19716 http://cshel.geology.udel.edu 302-831-2498
"Education is not the filling of a pot, but the lighting of a fire." -W. B. Yeats
Our friends at On Orbit posted a link to this NASA poster showing their milestones in creating more open source agency in their agency and providing more tools for citizen science.
As part of the NASA Open Government plan released on April 7,201 0, NASA announced more than 150 milestones related to integrating Open Government into the agencies programs and projects. To celebrate the one year anniversary of our plan, we've released a new infographic to communicate our first year of progress toward becoming more transparent, participatory, and collaborative. While we've set high goals, we're committed to incorporating open government into every facet of our mission. We have made great progress in some areas; others have taken longer than we anticipated and extra time is required to fully realize the goals. We hope this will clearly communicate our progress and keep you informed of new and exciting things within NASA. All of these goals are fluid – you'll see growth and movement as we work to determine the best path toward openness. If you have any questions or comments, we encourage you to visit our new NASA Open Government Initiative website at http://www.nasa.gov/open and share your ideas.
olsmeister writes "Titan, has been a particular focus of attention because of its dense, complex atmosphere, its weather and its lakes and oceans. Now it looks as if Titan is even stranger still. The evidence comes from careful observations of Titan's orbit and rotation. This indicates that Titan has an orbit similar to our Moon's: it always presents the same face towards Saturn and its axis of rotation tilts by about 0.3 degrees. Together, these data allow astronomers to work out Titan's moment of inertia and this throws up something interesting. The numbers indicate that Titan's moment of inertia can only be explained if it is a solid body that is denser near the surface than it is at its centre."
Dr. Art Trembanis CSHEL 109 Penny Hall Department of Geological Sciences The College of Earth, Ocean, and Environment University of Delaware Newark DE 19716 http://cshel.geology.udel.edu 302-831-2498
"Education is not the filling of a pot, but the lighting of a fire." -W. B. Yeats
I suddenly and for unknown reasons remembered having read this when studying the whole Sokal Hoax affair as part of studies I was doing on history of science and of humanities vs science back in college.
Dr. Art Trembanis CSHEL 109 Penny Hall Department of Geological Sciences The College of Earth, Ocean, and Environment University of Delaware Newark DE 19716 http://cshel.geology.udel.edu 302-831-2498
"Education is not the filling of a pot, but the lighting of a fire." -W. B. Yeats
Dr. Art Trembanis CSHEL 109 Penny Hall Department of Geological Sciences The College of Earth, Ocean, and Environment University of Delaware Newark DE 19716 http://cshel.geology.udel.edu 302-831-2498
"Education is not the filling of a pot, but the lighting of a fire." -W. B. Yeats
Today we saw a large amount of sea foam gathered on Whiskey Beach as much as half a meter thick and covering several hundred square meters of shoreline. I commented on the natural organic source of sea foam and hinted at how other human introduced chemicals could serve as surfactants but this article does a better job and links to stories of the big sea foam outbreaks in NSW a few years back.
Every year, you never know what wonders to expect at the Maker Faire Bay Area, taking place on May 21 and 22 at the San Mateo Fairgrounds. But there are a handful of makers who have been there since the very first Faire in 2006. One of these makers is John Collins, The Paper Airplane Guy. It's truly inspirational to chat with him and hear his perspective on the Faire over the years (and about making in general). One of my (many) favorite lines is: "The only thing anyone ever knows, in advance, about Maker Faire, is that there's no other energy like it on Earth. That's why people come back."
1. Tell us about The Paper Airplane Guy. What inspires you to bring paper airplanes to the masses? The Paper Airplane Guy started out to be the teacher guy. About halfway through achieving that, I fell into a television job and then a radio job at the same time. I've had very good luck with that career, which has lasted about 33 years to date. It's the teacher inside that drives me to reach out with paper airplanes. There's a moment in almost every presentation when someone's eyes light up. They get it; not just the fun but also the science. It's the art of taking something simple, pulling back the curtain to reveal the hidden complexity, and then reveling in that moment of discovery. Then closing the curtain again, but not without showing where the controls are.
The best teachers are very adept at showing the clues, allowing for discovery, and really making learning an organic experience. Paper airplanes have the scientific method built into them. Every throw is a hypothesis, an experiment, a data collection, and a result to be analyzed. Few think of it that way. In fact, paper airplanes have a rather nefarious edge to them. I lean on that a little in an effort to attract people who ordinarily don't think of themselves as scientists or even as liking science. It's one of the cheapest labs in the world, and most of the US throws the raw materials away by the ton. I briefly repurpose a few sheets. It's a short interruption of the life cycle of a piece of paper.
2. What are you planning for this year's Maker Faire Bay Area? I plan to let people throw a lot more planes. The contest idea was fun last year. People had a blast throwing at the target. Just when everyone was having a great time throwing, we'd stop them and move the throwing line back, all in the name of finding a winner. This year, I think I'll forget the competition part. Just show up, make your plane, and hit the target. Simple. Of course, I'll do demonstrations all through both days. I'll bring a few books along. My two crazy friends who help with all this for bridge toll will be there, Whitney and Sal. We're going all out every hour of both days to show off, and show what folded paper airplanes can do. We don't know how to do this event any other way.
3. You've participated in every Maker Faire Bay Area since 2006. Give us some insight into your perspective over the years and why you continue to come back. The first year, I was an accidental booth. They already had someone lined up to do paper airplanes. That person bailed just a couple of days before. One of the organizers had heard about me, somehow. This was a brand new concept, so there was really no official way one should "do" Maker Faire. It was really amazing that first year. It was a coming out of sorts for all these people cooking stuff up in their basements and garages. You could see the way people would be drawn to an exhibit and have these "aha" moments. The exhibits drew in people who immediately spoke the language. Deep programming conversations were within earshot of crocheting tips. One guy played the drums and knitted at the same time. It was, in a word, wonderful.
I have to laugh when I hear people talking about how commercial it's become, how it's not as raw or real as the first year. I completely disagree. I have to even wonder if they were there. To me, Maker Faire, like all art, continues to expand. Art never contracts, in spite of new edifices being invented at lightning speed. You don't ever get less art. You get different art. Maker Faire grows. Some of us have done every Bay Area show. There are new and amazing things every year. It's never the same. If you show up looking for a Maker Faire that has gone before, you'll be disappointed. Hey, we're making this up every year. Hence the name.
Who knows which building we'll be in, whether I'll do a main stage show, or whether there's even a main stage. The only thing anyone ever knows, in advance, about Maker Faire, is that there's no other energy like it on Earth. That's why people come back.
4. Tell us about yourself. How did you get started making things and who are your inspirations? My dad was a great inspiration. He could fix anything. He was a millwright for a sawmill in Humboldt County. Though he didn't have much in the way of formal education, he was very in tune with why things worked. With only a 6th graded education, he had figured out enough rudimentary trigonometry to plan and build any structure for a house or a sawmill. He had a great facility with numbers, again, in his own way. He had a real understanding of materials and their utility. He feared no heavy machinery. I, on the other hand, was scared to death when I followed around after him at the mill. Danger seemed to be everywhere, like the oil-blackened sawdust. Large blades, loud motors, and enormous metal machines: it all seemed uncontrollable. But he managed to keep this huge monstrosity running and chewing up giant logs.
I was lucky to have a great biology teacher in high school: Mr. James Welsh. I had a great speech and communications teacher who fostered a love of public speaking: Mrs. Marilyn Fletcher. I had a really cool civics teacher: Mr. Joe Edwards. He loved to engage students one on one and really treated us like adults, responsibility and all. I liked the way that felt. These teachers all made it look effortless. The masters always do. It took me a while to figure out exactly how much work all of that really was.
5. Is your project strictly a hobby or a business? Does it relate to your day job? Paper airplanes are a hobby that's become a small business. I sell books. I have a subscription website. I have an iPhone app. And, I'll never get rich making paper airplanes. That's just not going to happen. I use some of my experience at making TV to put together video for my website and YouTube. Sometimes I'll get a chance to be a guest on a TV show. But really, I've been making planes for 40 years. I've had a book out there for more than 20. If I was going to get rich quick, it would've already happened. That said, I've met people I never would've met, gone places I never would've gone, all because I kept folding paper airplanes. It has been one amazing ride. It's an inexpensive hobby to start with. I've monetized it a little. But if you add up all the hours of folding, drawing, testing, shooting, editing, and posting, I doubt it all adds up to half of minimum wage. It's a hobby I love. I do little better than defray expenses over the long haul.
6. What new idea (in or outside of your field) has excited you most recently? The duration record has just been broken by a really gifted paper airplane maker from Japan, Takuo Toda. That's really amazing. He may eventually crack 30 seconds. Get a stopwatch and throw a plane sometime. See what kind of effort a 10-second throw involves. Mr. Toda is a paper airplane god.
That Jeopardy-playing computer feels like more of a breakthrough than most people have reported. The nuance with which it handles the game amazes me. One expects a computer to be fast, but this is clearly something else.
A program I produce for KRON just featured a smog-eating roof material. Boral roofing makes a concrete tile that neutralizes nitrogen compounds before they can interact with VOCs. So, it really eats pre-smog. Either way, a 2,000-square-foot roof can prevent about the amount of smog you make driving a small car for a year (round numbers based on averages). That's a step in the right direction.
7. What is your motto? I can't say that I have one besides the obvious one for this interview: MAKE!
8. What advice would you give to the young makers out there just getting started? If you have a passion for a particular field, go with that. It's impossible to know where that'll lead, and you shouldn't care — at least until you have to pay rent. If you're doing something because you think you should, but your mind keeps drifting back to what you want to do, drop everything and follow your heart. Here's the secret: if you're not doing what you love, you'll never be the best. Someone who really loves it will study it harder, work it longer, forgo sleep and food just to be doing it. You can't compete against that. You have to be that.
I've worked at making a book about paper airplanes, but I've never worked a single minute inventing a new plane. I've always envied musicians. They play for a living. It's not really play of course. They study and practice. They learn the artifice and the language. They eventually push past the mechanical and structural parts to express emotions and ideas. All that work to get to "play." In a small way, my planes are like that for me. It's not a living, but in the world of paper airplanes, I can play.
Thanks for your words of wisdom, John! Looking forward to seeing you at the Faire. For all the information you need about the Maker Faire Bay Area 2011, including how to get advanced tickets, check out the Maker Faire site.
Dr. Art Trembanis CSHEL 109 Penny Hall Department of Geological Sciences The College of Earth, Ocean, and Environment University of Delaware Newark DE 19716 http://cshel.geology.udel.edu 302-831-2498
"Education is not the filling of a pot, but the lighting of a fire." -W. B. Yeats
A team of biologists and computer scientists has come up with a unique barcode-like system for tracking zebras called Stripespotter. The system is able to automatically identify zebras from pictures with a much higher accuracy than traditional methods. Its creators say it can be modified to track any animal with unique coat patterns such as giraffes or tigers.
Dr. Art Trembanis CSHEL 109 Penny Hall Department of Geological Sciences The College of Earth, Ocean, and Environment University of Delaware Newark DE 19716 http://cshel.geology.udel.edu 302-831-2498
"Education is not the filling of a pot, but the lighting of a fire." -W. B. Yeats
mikejuk writes "You may have heard about the swashbuckling adventures to be undertaken by Virgin Oceanic -- visits to the bottom of the deepest parts of the oceans of the world. As Sir Richard Branson said at the launch of Virgin Oceanic, more men have been to the moon than have ventured further down than 20,000 feet. As long as everything goes according to plan, everyone should be able to experience a virtual trip to the bottom of the ocean, courtesy of Google Earth."
The BSA, in association with NASA, has a released a new merit badge for robotics, featuring one of the Mars rovers on the patch.
When people think of the Boy Scouts of America (BSA), they envision activities like camping, knot-tying, and canoeing, but soon, they'll need to add robot-building to that list. Scouts in 2011, through the introduction of the Robotics merit badge, now have the opportunity to design, build, and demonstrate a robot of their own creation.
The Robotics merit badge is part of the BSA's new curriculum emphasis on STEM: science, technology, engineering, and math. The BSA focus on STEM takes a fun, adventurous approach to helping Scouts develop critical skills that are relevant and needed in today's competitive world. The new merit badge is one of 31 STEM-related merit badges that Scouts can earn.
Dr. Art Trembanis CSHEL 109 Penny Hall Department of Geological Sciences The College of Earth, Ocean, and Environment University of Delaware Newark DE 19716 http://cshel.geology.udel.edu 302-831-2498
"Education is not the filling of a pot, but the lighting of a fire." -W. B. Yeats
Dr. Art Trembanis CSHEL 109 Penny Hall Department of Geological Sciences The College of Earth, Ocean, and Environment University of Delaware Newark DE 19716 http://cshel.geology.udel.edu 302-831-2498
"Education is not the filling of a pot, but the lighting of a fire." -W. B. Yeats
Dr. Art Trembanis CSHEL 109 Penny Hall Department of Geological Sciences The College of Earth, Ocean, and Environment University of Delaware Newark DE 19716 http://cshel.geology.udel.edu 302-831-2498
"Education is not the filling of a pot, but the lighting of a fire." -W. B. Yeats
Dr. Art Trembanis CSHEL 109 Penny Hall Department of Geological Sciences The College of Earth, Ocean, and Environment University of Delaware Newark DE 19716 http://cshel.geology.udel.edu 302-831-2498
"Education is not the filling of a pot, but the lighting of a fire." -W. B. Yeats
Dr. Art Trembanis CSHEL 109 Penny Hall Department of Geological Sciences The College of Earth, Ocean, and Environment University of Delaware Newark DE 19716 http://cshel.geology.udel.edu 302-831-2498
"Education is not the filling of a pot, but the lighting of a fire." -W. B. Yeats
Dr. Art Trembanis CSHEL 109 Penny Hall Department of Geological Sciences The College of Earth, Ocean, and Environment University of Delaware Newark DE 19716 http://cshel.geology.udel.edu 302-831-2498
"Education is not the filling of a pot, but the lighting of a fire." -W. B. Yeats
Dr. Art Trembanis CSHEL 109 Penny Hall Department of Geological Sciences The College of Earth, Ocean, and Environment University of Delaware Newark DE 19716 http://cshel.geology.udel.edu 302-831-2498
"Education is not the filling of a pot, but the lighting of a fire." -W. B. Yeats
Dr. Art Trembanis CSHEL 109 Penny Hall Department of Geological Sciences The College of Earth, Ocean, and Environment University of Delaware Newark DE 19716 http://cshel.geology.udel.edu 302-831-2498
"Education is not the filling of a pot, but the lighting of a fire." -W. B. Yeats
Dr. Art Trembanis CSHEL 109 Penny Hall Department of Geological Sciences The College of Earth, Ocean, and Environment University of Delaware Newark DE 19716 http://cshel.geology.udel.edu 302-831-2498
"Education is not the filling of a pot, but the lighting of a fire." -W. B. Yeats
Dr. Art Trembanis CSHEL 109 Penny Hall Department of Geological Sciences The College of Earth, Ocean, and Environment University of Delaware Newark DE 19716 http://cshel.geology.udel.edu 302-831-2498
"Education is not the filling of a pot, but the lighting of a fire." -W. B. Yeats
Dr. Art Trembanis CSHEL 109 Penny Hall Department of Geological Sciences The College of Earth, Ocean, and Environment University of Delaware Newark DE 19716 http://cshel.geology.udel.edu 302-831-2498
"Education is not the filling of a pot, but the lighting of a fire." -W. B. Yeats
Dr. Art Trembanis CSHEL 109 Penny Hall Department of Geological Sciences The College of Earth, Ocean, and Environment University of Delaware Newark DE 19716 http://cshel.geology.udel.edu 302-831-2498
"Education is not the filling of a pot, but the lighting of a fire." -W. B. Yeats
Dr. Art Trembanis CSHEL 109 Penny Hall Department of Geological Sciences The College of Earth, Ocean, and Environment University of Delaware Newark DE 19716 http://cshel.geology.udel.edu 302-831-2498
"Education is not the filling of a pot, but the lighting of a fire." -W. B. Yeats
Dr. Art Trembanis CSHEL 109 Penny Hall Department of Geological Sciences The College of Earth, Ocean, and Environment University of Delaware Newark DE 19716 http://cshel.geology.udel.edu 302-831-2498
"Education is not the filling of a pot, but the lighting of a fire." -W. B. Yeats
Dr. Art Trembanis CSHEL 109 Penny Hall Department of Geological Sciences The College of Earth, Ocean, and Environment University of Delaware Newark DE 19716 http://cshel.geology.udel.edu 302-831-2498
"Education is not the filling of a pot, but the lighting of a fire." -W. B. Yeats
Dr. Art Trembanis CSHEL 109 Penny Hall Department of Geological Sciences The College of Earth, Ocean, and Environment University of Delaware Newark DE 19716 http://cshel.geology.udel.edu 302-831-2498
"Education is not the filling of a pot, but the lighting of a fire." -W. B. Yeats
