On July 12th, NASA shared the debut images from its fully operational James Webb Space Telescope. The most powerful space observatory ever built, the JWST provided impossibly detailed images of shimmering stars, warped light trails, and thousands upon thousands of gem-like galaxies twinkling against the vast black of space. Now, I could go into why this is an incredible leap for science and how the JWST is far and away better than telescopes that are its predecessors, but...why would I ...
My good friend Jim (RedneckDude) found out today that he has been diagnosed with an Aortic Aneurysm. Please send him love and prayers in this post, he definitely has mine!
It's a widely known fact that we love an array of animals here at Stardock, and frogs are certainly among them. Our CEO Brad in particular is especially fond of the amphibians, even going so far as to sport the name Frogboy on our forums and in other places. So, when I saw this video of a tiny, barely dime-sized frog called the Pumpkin Toadlet, trying to land a jump and failing spectacularly, I felt compelled to share it so that everyone might also have the same opportunity for a belly...
Who doesn't love dinosaurs? ...If you've got your hand up, put it down and run away - this isn't the article for you. I love dinosaurs and all things adjacent to them, so when I came across an article yesterday that detailed the life and death of a male mastodon from about 13,200 years ago I had to pause to give it a read. Researchers studied the chemical composition of its tusks and were able to determine that the mastodon grew up in the Great Lakes area and made annual trips to a mating gro...
More than 20 types of amino acids were detected in samples of an asteroid brought to Earth in December of 2020, according to Japan's education ministry. The Japan Times reported that this detection is the first evidence that amino acids exist on asteroids in space and could hold the key to understanding how such vital organic molecules arrived on Earth. The Hayabusa2 spacecraft collected the samples from an asteroid called Ryugu. JAXA (Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency) landed a probe on Ryu...
Two torsos, nicknamed Helga and Zohar, are bound for the Moon aboard the Orion capsule in order to measure radiation risks for female astronauts for the first time.The mannequins are modeled after the body of an adult woman and one of them is outfitted with a newly developed radiation vest. For the Artemis 1 mission, the un-crewed Orion capsule will travel to the Moon and back in order to test radiation safety and collect data about flight accelerations and vibrations. Artemis 1 is scheduled to ...
One of my favorite things to do (although it baffles me on a regular basis) is to witness concepts and technologies emerge that humans only dreamed about 40 or 50 years ago. Sometime last year, a company called Space Perspective announced their plans for a state-of-the-art luxury "space balloon" that would take people on a calm ascent into space. Last year, the Florida-based company began taking reservations for the coveted trips, which last 6 hours and come with a price tag of $125...
I rarely post about new pharmaceutical technology...but this is nothing less than miraculous. Read the article linked above. This new technology enables researchers to synthesize and analyze 40,000 molecules in a bubble smaller than the head of a pin. This will accelerate vaccine and pharmaceutical development by a factor of one million. This should also make the R&D cheaper, and far less wasteful of energy, materials, time and labor and therefore the cost of medicines should dro...
An eventful weekend at Kennedy Space Center in Florida delayed tests for the wet dress rehearsal of NASA's Space Launch System. In addition to dealing with multiple lightning strikes and malfunctioning ventilation fans, mission managers also found a problem with the gaseous nitrogen system. At dawn on Monday, the decision to resume the tests was made. NASA Ground Systems said that the launch director would soon give the "go" for tanking and that the weather would not be a problem. The 322-foo...
Sony announced new versions of its PlayStation Plus subscriptions yesterday. This is, apparently, a response to the Xbox Game Pass, and I would suppose many other subscription services for games out there. The PlayStation Plus sub plan is a combination of Sony's two current subscription services, PlayStation Plus and PlayStation Now. Two new options will now include access to multiplayer gaming alongside a catalog of select PlayStation games to install or stream. Now, first and foremost, ...
Great video, I will continue to help sing the virtues of nuclear power.
As time goes on and technology brings new game consoles to the scene, we are often left to watch our favorite games and systems fade into obscurity. In times before digital media started taking hold, games were physical and tangible additions to your console's collection, something you could hold onto and possess. I still have cartridges for my original NES console. Hell, I still have a LYNX system and all the games that my parents generously bestowed on me over the years as I grew up. ...
I have read countless Science-Fiction novels and grew up on cartoons like The Jetsons and Star Trek: Enterprise. All of the technology I witnessed within those things seemed like something that would be unattainable in my lifetime, and yet here we are with progress marching ever forward. While we aren't quite at Enterprise holo-deck level yet, the mere idea that a car is going to offer an integrated Virtual Reality (VR) experience just blows my mind. Audi's holor...
A lot of new shows and movies were showcased this past Sunday during the Super Bowl. From Amazon Prime's upcoming The Lord of the Rings series to Marvel's Doctor Strange and the Multiverse of Madness, I almost gave myself whiplash when I was catching up on everything I'd missed! I'm not much of a sports fan and I don't have cable, so I opted to have dinner and play board games with friends instead of tuning in - but hey, that's what YouTube is for, right? Here's a ...
I first learned about Wordle on Facebook when I started seeing all these strange-patterned images show up on my feed. You would think that, with me being a word person, I'm inherently good at games like this, but the truth is...I'm not. I am routinely trounced in Scrabble. I may have an absolute lexicon of words floating around in this head of mine, but ask me to scramble limited letters around to make one and I come up dry, apparently! If you're unfamiliar with the game, it's a daily word pu...