Back in the old days, finding out your location on Earth was a pretty involved endeavor. You had to look at stars, use fancy gimballed equipment to track your motion, or simply be able to track your steps really really well. Eventually, GPS would come along and make all that a bit redundant for a lot of use cases. That was all well and good, until it started getting jammed all over the place to frustrate militaries using super-accurate satellite-guided weapons.
Today, there’s a great desire for more accurate navigational methods that don’t require outside communications that can easily be jammed. High-tech gyroscopes have long been a big part of that effort, allowing the construction of inertial navigation systems with greater accuracy than ever before.
Imagine trying to read a 2000-year old scroll from an ancient civilization. Now imagine that scroll is rolled up, and in a delicate, charred, carbonized form, having been engulfed by the fiery eruption of a volcano. The task would seem virtually impossible, and the information in the scroll lost forever. Right?|
Julia Eckert, biophysicist at the University of Queensland, recently uncovered nested forms of symmetry in mammalian tissues. This work is bringing the powerful math of fluid dynamics to the messy world of biology.
After identifying interlocking symmetries in mammalian cells, scientists can describe some tissues as liquid crystals — an observation that lays the groundwork for a fluid-dynamic theory of how tissues move.
Dr. Isaac Asimov was a prolific science fiction author, biochemist, and professor. He was best known for his works of science fiction and for his popular science essays. Born in Russia in 1920 and brought to the United States by his family as a young child, he went on to become one of the most influential figures in the world of speculative fiction. He wrote hundreds of books on a variety of topics, but he’s especially remembered for series like the “Foundation” series and the “Robot” series. Asimov’s science fiction often dealt with themes and ideas that pertained to the future of humanity.
The “Foundation” series for example, introduced the idea of “psychohistory” – a mathematical way of predicting the future based on large population behaviors. While we don’t have psychohistory as described by Asimov, his works did reflect the belief that societies operate on understandable and potentially predictable principles.
Asimov’s “Robot” series introduced the world to the Three Laws of Robotics, which are: A robot may not injure a human being or, through inaction, allow a human being to come to harm. A robot must obey the orders given it by human beings, except where such orders would conflict with the First Law. A robot must protect its own existence as long as such protection does not conflict with the First or Second Law. These laws have been influential in discussions about robot ethics and the future of AI, even though they are fictional constructs.
Like many futurists and speculative authors, Asimov’s predictions were a mix of hits and misses.
Imagine embarking on a journey aboard a spaceship, heading in one direction as far as possible from Earth. Now, imagine that the spaceship can constantly accelerate up to the speed of light, and you have an infinite lifespan. How long would it take you to reach the edge of the Universe? What would it look like? How would you cross it? And if you were to cross it, what would be beyond? Does the Universe have an edge, or is it infinite? And what shape does our Universe have? In this video, you’ll find out the answers to these exciting questions about the boundaries and shape of our mysterious Universe! What lies beyond the edge of the Universe? #universe #reyouniverse #ryv_space
