The best theory I've come up with so far, after brushing up on von Daniken's "Chariots of the Gods," is that it's the Hex Nut of the Giants, affixed to the end of a massive bolt that's holding the planet together. I haven't worked out yet how a race of titanic engineers managed to insert the bolt at Saturn's south pole. Nor have I identified the location of their hardware store, but we need to start looking for it right away, because NASA's video shows that it's swirling counterclockwise dangerously near what looks to me like the end of the bolt. If this thing keeps unscrewing ...

This atmospheric feature, first spotted in 1980, turns out to be more than a transient gap in the clouds. Last year it was spotted again by the the Cassini spacecraft, whose infrared spectrometer captured the first full image of the entire hexagon. Here's NASA's summary of expert opinion:

"This is a very strange feature, lying in a precise geometric fashion with six nearly equally straight sides," said Kevin Baines, atmospheric expert and member of Cassini's visual and infrared mapping spectrometer team at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif. "We've never seen anything like this on any other planet. Indeed, Saturn's thick atmosphere where circularly-shaped waves and convective cells dominate is perhaps the last place you'd expect to see such a six-sided geometric figure, yet there it is."

The hexagon is similar to Earth's polar vortex, which has winds blowing in a circular pattern around the polar region. On Saturn, the vortex has a hexagonal rather than circular shape. The hexagon is nearly 25,000 kilometers (15,000 miles) across. Nearly four Earths could fit inside it.

The new images taken in thermal-infrared light show the hexagon extends much deeper down into the atmosphere than previously expected, some 100 kilometers (60 miles) below the cloud tops. A system of clouds lies within the hexagon. The clouds appear to be whipping around the hexagon like cars on a racetrack. "It's amazing to see such striking differences on opposite ends of Saturn’s poles," said Bob Brown, team leader of the Cassini visual and infrared mapping spectrometer, University of Arizona, Tucson. "At the south pole we have what appears to be a hurricane with a giant eye, and at the north pole of Saturn we have this geometric feature, which is completely different."

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More Evidence of Water on Mars

Images from the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter reveal more evidence of water on Mars. The ridges shown in the photo are evidence of erosion from water and give scientists valuable clues about Mars' past.

Ridges as Evidence of Fluid Alteration

Tectonic fractures within the Candor Chasma region of Valles Marineris, Mars, retain ridge-like shapes as the surrounding bedrock erodes away. This points to past episodes of fluid alteration along the fractures and reveals clues into past fluid flow and geochemical conditions below the surface.

This month the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter spacecraft will break the record for the most science data returned by any Mars spacecraft. Although NASA scientists are thrilled with the amount of data coming in, the engineers are still trying to figure out why two of instruments are not performing as they are supposed to. Let's hope they get that fixed somehow.

Photo source: NASA/JPL/University of Arizona

Posted on February 21, 2007
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King Tut and the Alien Gemstone

The BBC has an interesting article about King Tutankhamun's amazing gemstone: apparently it's not from planet Earth.

In 1996 in the Egyptian Museum in Cairo, Italian mineralogist Vincenzo de Michele spotted an unusual yellow-green gem in the middle of one of Tutankhamun's necklaces. The jewel was tested and found to be glass, but intriguingly it is older than the earliest Egyptian civilisation.

Working with Egyptian geologist Aly Barakat, they traced its origins to unexplained chunks of glass found scattered in the sand in a remote region of the Sahara Desert. But the glass is itself a scientific enigma. How did it get to be there and who or what made it? The BBC Horizon programme has reported an extraordinary new theory linking Tutankhamun's gem with a meteor.

An Austrian astrochemist Christian Koeberl had established that the glass had been formed at a temperature so hot that there could be only one known cause: a meteorite impacting with Earth. And yet there were no signs of a suitable impact crater, even in satellite images. American geophysicist John Wasson is another scientist interested in the origins of the glass. He suggested a solution that came directly from the forests of Siberia. "When the thought came to me that it required a hot sky, I thought immediately of the Tunguska event," he told Horizon. In 1908, a massive explosion flattened 80 million trees in Tunguska, Siberia.

Although there was no sign of a meteorite impact, scientists now think an extraterrestrial object of some kind must have exploded above Tunguska. Wasson wondered if a similar aerial burst could have produced enough heat to turn the ground to glass in the Egyptian desert.

Pictured above Pharoah Tutankhamun's Pectoral with desert glass scarab. Well, wherever it came from, it's stunning.

Posted on July 28, 2006
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Jeff Bezos and the Spaceship

Space.com reports on Amazon founder Jeff Bezos investment in the booming space tourism industry.

The public space travel business is picking up suborbital speed thanks to a variety of private rocket groups and their dream machines. Joining the mix is Blue Origin's New Shepard Reusable Launch System. It is financially fueled by an outflow of dollars from the deep pockets of billionaire Jeff Bezos, founder of Amazon.com.

The Bezos-backed Blue Origin, LLC commercial space outfit has recently turned in a draft environmental assessment (EA) for their West Texas launch site to the Federal Aviation Administration's (FAA) Associate Administrator for Commercial Space Transportation (AST) in Washington, D.C. The document is the best glimpse yet of what Blue Origin is scoping out to develop "safe, inexpensive and reliable human access to space."

The more than 200-page draft EA is a necessary step required by the FAA/AST for Blue Origin to get the needed permits and/or licenses to fly their rocket hardware. Blue Origin proposes to launch its reusable launch vehicles (RLVs) on suborbital, ballistic trajectories to altitudes in excess of 325,000 feet (99,060 meters) from a privately-owned space launch site in Culberson County, Texas. As outlined in the EA, the Blue Origin launch site would be approximately 25 miles (40.2 kilometers) north of Van Horn, Texas. It lies within a larger, privately-owned property known as the Corn Ranch. Access to the proposed launch site is from Texas Highway 54, which is approximately five miles (8 kilometers) west of the proposed project's center of operations.

Also on the group's to do list at the site is putting in place a vehicle processing facility, a launch complex and vehicle landing and recovery area, as well as an astronaut training facility, and other minor support amenities [Map].

We're all for space tourism. Although we don't neccesarily want to be on version 1.0 of the first space tourist flight. We'll wait for version 2.0, after they work out all the kinks. Which will give us time to save up the $1 million or so it will take to get a seat in first class.

Posted on July 5, 2006
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Stephen Hawking: Humans Must Colonize Space Or Risk Extinction

Astrophysicist Stephen Hawking says that the future of the human race depends on our going out into space.

The survival of the human race depends on its ability to find new homes elsewhere in the universe because there's an increasing risk that a disaster will destroy the Earth, world-renowned astrophysicist Stephen Hawking said Tuesday. Humans could have a permanent base on the moon in 20 years and a colony on Mars in the next 40 years, the British scientist told a news conference.

"We won't find anywhere as nice as Earth unless we go to another star system," added Hawking, who arrived in Hong Kong to a rock star's welcome Monday. Tickets for his lecture planned for Wednesday were sold out. He added that if humans can avoid killing themselves in the next 100 years, they should have space settlements that can continue without support from Earth. "It is important for the human race to spread out into space for the survival of the species," Hawking said. "Life on Earth is at the ever-increasing risk of being wiped out by a disaster, such as sudden global warming, nuclear war, a genetically engineered virus or other dangers we have not yet thought of."

The 64-year-old scientist -- author of the global best seller A Brief History of Time -- is wheelchair-bound and communicates with the help of a computer because he suffers from a neurological disorder called amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, or ALS.

When someone as brilliant as Stephen Hawking says we need to go into space, we believe him. Too bad that NASA's funding has been cut so deeply that we'd be lucky to get a bottle rocket safely off the ground any time soon.

Posted on June 14, 2006
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Harvard Telescope To Look For Extraterrestrials

Harvard University has embarked on a very interesting project: looking for aliens. A powerful new telescope was designed to capture possible light signals transmitted to Earth by extraterrestrials.

The telescope is the first to be developed solely to search the skies for light pulses from aliens and will be able to cover 100,000 times the amount of sky covered by current equipment, its developers said. "The opening of this telescope represents one of those rare moments in a field of scientific endeavor when a great leap forward is enabled," said Bruce Betts, project director at The Planetary Society, a group in Pasadena, California, that advocates space exploration and funded the telescope's development.

"Sending laser signals across the cosmos would be a very logical way for E.T. to reach out, but until now, we have been ill-equipped to receive any such signal," he said. Researchers say alien civilizations may be as likely to use light signals to communicate as radio transmissions. Visible light can form tight beams and could potentially convey information more efficiently, Betts said.

The telescope was built at Harvard University's Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics' Oak Ridge Observatory, where the nonprofit Planetary Society has searched the depth of space for alien life using an 84-foot radio telescope. The new telescope, located at the observatory at Harvard, Massachusetts, a town about 30 miles northwest of Boston, will vastly enhance the scope of the search for artificial light pulses, Betts said. The telescope can process the equivalent of all books in print every second. As it scans the sky it uses a type of camera that can detect a billionth-of-a-second flash of light. "We are going from looking at a few stars a night to an all-sky survey where over a year we will search the entire northern hemisphere," Betts said.

The telescope cost about $400,000 to build, much cheaper than a typical research-quality telescope. Betts said that was partly because the telescope does not need to be as sensitive, and "they've done it on a shoestring budget by being clever."

But will they tell the public if they actually find something? Or will the Men in Black just hush it all up, as usual?

Posted on April 18, 2006
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Eva Longoria Visible From Space

Eva Longoria is now visible from space.

In honor of Maxim's 100th issue, which is on newsstands this week, the men's magazine has created a 75-by-110-foot vinyl mesh replica of its January 2005 cover image of Eva Longoria in the desert outside Las Vegas. Nine workers took more than 15 hours to build the cover, which is so big that satellites are able to photograph the image from space.

The stunt was made possible by the city of Las Vegas and Google Earth, which will display the image today (www.maximonline.com/maximusa). "Leave it to Maxim to do something so creative and so wild to celebrate their 100th issue," says Longoria, who topped Maxim's Hot 100 list last year. "I guess space is no longer the final frontier. I am flattered, to say the least, to be TV's Sexiest Earthling."

Maxim's centennial issue celebration continues this weekend with stars, such as Taye Diggs and Cuba Gooding Jr., and past cover models taking part in poker and golf tournaments and a party poolside at the Wynn Las Vegas Resort and Country Club.

We hope the aliens are paying attention. Although, if we were Eva Longoria we might be a little worried. What good are human bodyguards against a kidnapping team from the Planet Orion?

Posted on April 7, 2006
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Instant Ramen Inventor Achieves Lifelong Dream: Space Noodles

Momofuku Ando, the inventor of the popular instant ramen noodles and founder of Nissin Food, achieved his lifelong dream earlier this week when the Discovery space shuttle successfully blasted into space carrying some high-tech space noodles. The special space noodles, called Space Ram, went with Japanese astronaut Soichi Noguchi, who took part in the Discovery mission. Red Nova has more about the noodles.

Nissin Food Products Co. showcased on Wednesday a vacuum packed instant noodle specially designed for Japanese astronaut Soichi Noguchi to eat during the U.S. space shuttle Discovery's current mission.

"This tastes good," Nissin Food founder and Chairman Momofuku Ando said on eating the "Space Ram" noodles in front of reporters.

"I'm happy I've realized my dream that noodles can go into space," he said.

The company said it has no plan to commercialize the product.

Nissin Food sells ramen noodles here in the U.S. under the Top Ramen and Cup Noodles brands. According to Nissin Foods, Japanese consumers eat approximately 45 portions of ramen, bags and cups combined, each year. In addition, Nissin estimates that U.S. consumers eat 9 portions of ramen each year. The Space Ram noodles were designed specifically for zero gravity according to a Space Daily news report.

Noguchi helped test the early stages of the astro ramen, which astronauts can open and eat normally rather than suck through a tube like other space meals.

The soup is thick enough to prevent spilling, Nissin said, while the noodle balls retain their shape after being re-heated.

Boiling water is not used in space so Space Ram can be heated with water of 70 degrees Celsius (160 Fahrenheit), thanks to a unique blend of flour and starch, it said.

News reports did not indicate whether Soichi Noguchi would share the Space Ram noodles with his fellow astronauts.

Posted on July 30, 2005
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Neil Armstrong and the Stolen Lock of Hair

The Smoking Gun reports on the heinous crime committed by former Apollo 11 Commander Neil Armstrong's barber. Apparently, Armstrong went in for a haircut one day and the devious barber stole a lock of his hair, which he sold for $3,000.00. Now, Armstrong wants his hair back.

Former Apollo astronaut Neil Armstrong is threatening to sue an Ohio barber who once cut his hair and then sold the locks to a collector. Armstrong, the first man to walk on the moon, is steamed at Marx Sizemore, who peddled the shorn hair for $3000 last May. Now, according to the below May 17 letter from Armstrong's attorney, the ex-astronaut wants Sizemore to retrieve the hair or contribute his proceeds from the sale to charity (Armstrong also wants to be reimbursed for his legal expenses). Ross Wales, Armstrong's lawyer, contends that the 35-year-old Sizemore's tonsorial hijinks violated a state law protecting the "persona rights" of famous Ohioans. Sizemore, who used to cut Armstrong's hair monthly at his Lebanon shop, told TSG that he did not initiate the hair sale, but rather was approached by Todd Mueller, a Colorado memorabilia dealer.

The barber is an idiot. This is Neil Armstrong, for Pete's Sake! He has The Right Stuff. He commanded Apollo 11. He was the first human to walk on the Moon! Clearly, the DNA extracted from his hair sample could have been sold for much more than $3,000. We don't know what this country is coming to -- clearly, our educational system is sorely lacking in the sciences....oh yeah, in ethics, too.

Posted on June 1, 2005
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U.S.: Just Say No to Space Billboards

Reuters reports that the United States government has wisely taken a "Just Say No" policy when it comes to giant billboards in space.

For instance, outsized billboards deployed by a space company into low Earth orbit could appear as large as the moon and be seen without a telescope, the FAA said. Big and bright advertisements might hinder astronomers.

Just imagine a giant billboard in space containing an enormous Paris Hilton eating a moon-sized Carl's Jr. hamburger. Like this advertisement but much, much larger and in space. Of course, the United States does not own space so there is nothing to stop another country from selling Carl's Jr. a giant billboard in space.

Posted on May 22, 2005
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