Vancouver Moose

Brazil crackdown on sat-hackers bouncing ham signals off US military satellites:

“Brazilian radio-cops are handing out $20,000 fines to satellite hackers who bounce their ham signals off FLTSATCOM — an array of disused US military satellites — using them as range-extenders for purposes as diverse as trucker-chatter to avoiding the logging cops in illegal Amazon logging operations:”

20 Things You Didn’t Know About Living In Space:

“Exploding boobs, toilet target practice, the second birth…”

10 things you don’t know about black holes:

“Ah, black holes. The ultimate shiver-inducer of the cosmos, out-jawing sharks, out-ooking spiders, out-scaring… um, something scary. But we’re fascinated by ‘em, have no doubt – even if we don’t understand a whole lot about them”.

10 things you don’t know about the Milky Way Galaxy:

So you’ve lived here all your life – in fact, everyone has – but what do you really know about the Milky Way galaxy? Sure, you know it’s a spiral, and it’s 100,000 light years across. And of course, BABloggees are smarter, more well-read, and better looking than the average population, but be honest: do you know all ten of these things? Really?

Liar.

Democracy be Damned: NASA Nixed “Colbert” ISS Node:

Colbert, we have a problem

“NASA has bucked the will of the people and named the International Space Station’s next module “Tranquility” instead of the rightful winner of the online voting contest, ‘Colbert’ (after the comedian Stephen Colbert)”.

But Colbert didn’t walk away empty handed.

Astronaut Sunita Williams, who ran the first marathon in space two years ago, announced on his show on Tuesday that Colbert would get something in the new node named for him – and it’s not the toilet, as had been rumoured. Williams said his name would grace the node’s treadmill, due to launch in August. The exercise equipment will be called the Combined Operational Load Bearing External Resistance Treadmill.

NASA Nanosatellite To Study Antifungal Drug Effectiveness In Space:

PharmaSat weighs approximately 10 pounds. It contains a controlled environment micro-laboratory packed with sensors and optical systems that can detect the growth, density and health of yeast cells and transmit that data to scientists for analysis on Earth. PharmaSat also will monitor the levels of pressure, temperature and acceleration the yeast and the satellite experience while circling Earth at 17,000 miles per hour. Scientists will study how the yeast responds during and after an antifungal treatment is administered at three distinct dosage levels to learn more about drug action in space, the satellite’s primary goal.

Toronto student’s space colony design wins NASA contest:

Yam’s description of the settlement runs 92 pages and includes detailed drawings using the free downloadable software Google SketchUp.

And it leaves no stone unturned, covering everything from emergency procedures to which foods will be grown on the station, based on their nutrient content.

Yam’s plan calls for 15 years of planning followed by 12 years of construction and another three years to make the settlement habitable. His estimated cost to build the station is $563 billion US.

The project even delves into how the society on the station would work and borrows heavily from Canadian policies, including adopting a tax regime based on the Canadian income tax system and deciding who lives on the station based a point system modeled on Canada’s immigration policy.

Previous Tech Talk:

• Twittering using MIND CONTROL, Chip speed breakthrough, Conficker eye chart, hacking Macs, keyboard shortcut database, and what to do with a mini-server
• Robot Children, Robot Researchers, Robot Pirate Deterrent, Robot Mind Readers!
• Thirty Meter Telescope, Cyberspies, UN Digital Library, New Vehicle from Segway, and The Onion previews a new Video Game