Colonizing the Planet Mars

1. Our life when we colonize on Mars

Colonizing Mars. With the release of Ridley Scott’s movie The Martian on 2nd oct. it is acclaimed that it is one of the most realistic portrayals of human space exploration ever filmed. Based on the 2011 science fiction novel by Andy Weir the film stars Matt Damon as Mark Watney,a botanist turned astronaut marooned on Mars. He was accidently left behind by his crewmates. The Ares III manned mission to Mars is hit by intense storm Mark Watney is lost and presumed that he is dead. The mission commander Mellisa Leewis is forced to leave the planet as the rest crews lives were at stake.

2. An Artists view of Mars Colony

As NASA workers struggle to launch a mission to bring him back home, Watney improvises one ingenious scheme after another to stay alive. He turns his habitat into a chemistry lab and a greenhouse, extracting potable water from rocket fuel and growing potatoes in nutrient-poor Martian soil fertilized with his own feces.

3. An Artists concept of Colonized Mars

Coming to the fact and not fiction, NASA has plans to send men on Mars in 2030. “Journey to Mars Programme.” Its facing quite big other problems inspite of the advanced Technology and accuracy they have developed.

4. Terraforming

The recent discovery of water on Mars has developed hopes of colonizing humans on Mars. Terraforming .. Mars is more suitable for human inhabitation than any other planet or our moon. NASA’s robotic mission, the ‘Mars Exploration Rovers’ has sent unmanned rovers, ‘Spirit’ and ‘Opportunity’ and Curiosity.

5. Marsone astronaut

There are Many similarities between Mars and Earth that make viable options for colonization . for eg, Nearly similar lengths of days….Axial tilt is similar therefore basic seasonal patterns as Earth (albeit for longer periods of time). Mars is in Suns habitable zone Goldilock zone. But Mars has 95% carbon dioxide . Mars has no global magnetic field , to protect from radiations pouring in its thin atmosphere. It will be a herculean task to create oxygen for breathing and growing crops for surviving on Mars.

6. ELON MUSK

Advocating Colonization of Mars ‘Mars Society’, an organization founded by Robert Zubrin, promotes and advocates the colonization of Mars. It was established in 1998 and does the work of educating people and governments about benefits of space exploration and colonization of Mars.

7. PLANET MARS

‘Mars Drive’ is another group that supports space exploration and colonization of Mars. Founded in 2005, this group has spread out in Europe, North America and Australia. ELON Musk stated that the goal of Space x is to help humans to get to Mars . They are designing rockets landers and equipment to support this. Musk would like to build a Mars colony with 80,000 people second most habitable place in the solar system. Let us hope that humans make another (second giant)leap for the Mankind by Colonizing Mars.

Universe Today Buzzle.com Images from Net NASA

What Is Pluto?

yes

What Is Pluto?

yes

THE ENCOUNTER!

THE ENCOUNTER

June 27, 2015 by dighe31 | Edit

THE ENCOUNTER

(Its a true story of my Father in Law)

A six year old boy was playing in the backyard of his house. There stood an iron pole inserted vertically.  The children used to climb up and then slide down.  The elder ones performed all sorts of exercises.

But that day he was all alone.  He found a leather belt.  He held it tightly in his little hand and started whipping the pole relentlessly..  His mother stood at the doorstep watching him.  He whipped the pole again and again murmuring “why did you kill my father.”  He was red with rage.  Not knowing the child’s sudden behavior she rushed at him.  He screamed “why did you kill my father.”  The words deafened her ears and she consoled her young one took him in her arms.  She knew she could not bring back his father.  Her husband would never return! He was killed by the dacoit.

Her husband was an Inspector in the Police force.  He was posted at Badnaver, in Madhya Pradesh.  Everybody addressed him as Raosaheb.

Raosaheb was very handsome strongly built and a brave person.  He caught hold of dangerous thieves and vagabonds and put them behind the bars.

life went on.. he found a beautiful lady fell in love and eventually married her.  They were blessed with five children.  As soon as he returned home from his tour, the children would cluster round him. He played with them. He would pick the young ones and swing them on his arms.  Their reverberating laughter and chuckles freshened him up.

Night was pleasant to be in parents arms. This bliss lasted for a very short period.  The darkness enveloped the twinkling stars which foretold a grievous future for the family.

That very night the Inspector spoke to his wife about his plans to catch the dacoit.    A pall of gloom spread over her.  She was dumbfounded as all her plans to desist him from venturing his arduous task.

Parting with his dear ones he strode away in the eerie jungles with his small coup—a handful of men and meager ammunition.  The dense forest near Badnawar in Madyapradesh was the dacoit’s hideout.  They drove in the deep forests in bullocarts – it was the only means to travel in those days.  The narrow lanes of the village, after village was traversed until one village was spotted for supplying huge amount of chicken meat and wines.  At ones the Inspector acumen directed his men towards that place. soon they confronted a  fierce looking person clad in military uniform with broad mustache.  No doubt that he was the famous dacoit Nathakanjar the most wanted by the police force.  He was surrounded by his men.. They were well equipped with ammunition.  He roared aloud to bring the Inspector before him.  After much interrogation the dacoit had insisted the Inspector to give up his Police uniform his belt and guns and surrender before them.  The brave Inspector preferred to fight with him unto his death.  It would be an insult to his profession to go back and cowardly submit to the dacoit’s demands. A fierce battle raged between the two troops. A sepoy who fled for his life had climbed a tree and saw the drama with his naked eye.  He was a sole survivor and later narrated the whole incident to the family members and the villagers all that had transpired between the two parties.  The fearless Inspector was none other than the little boy’s father.

The body of Raosaheb was brought home and laid for last darshan.

The small boy caught hold of his weeping mother’s hand, consoled her and promised to take care of her henceforth.

The heavens rumbled as the guns were fired..a mark of salutations for the Martyr. The last rights were performed..

Years later,

the promise he had made to his mother had been fulfilled when his mother breathed last.  A huge void left him, but this time he was not alone, his better half held him to share his grief

THE SHORES OF THE COSMIC OCEAN

THE SHORES OF COSMIC OCEAN

June 3, 2015 by dighe31 | Edit

The Shores of the Cosmic Ocean
“The surface of the Earth is the Shore of the Cosmic Ocean. Recently we have waded a little out to Sea, enough to dampen our toes or, at most,wet our ankles. The water seems inviting. The Ocean calls. Some part of beings knows this is from where we came. We long to return”….(Carl Sagan)

Welcome to this beautiful Planet Earth. It’s full of Life a place of blue nitrogen skies oceans of liquid water cool forests and soft meadows. In all our journeying through space and time this place is unique and rare. There must be many such worlds scattered through space but we have yet to find life elsewhere. With the accumulated knowledge from our ancestors over million years, we have begun our voyage to home from where we humans are born from stars and now inhabiting a world called Earth.
.Carl says
Something in us recognizes the Cosmos as home. We are made of stellar ash. Our origin and evolution have been tied to distant cosmic events. The exploration of Cosmos is a voyage of Self –discovery…..
Our History:
During third B.C. in Egyptian city of Alexandria, was flourished with scholars.
Eratosthenes was a one of them. He was a Greek astronomer historian geographer philosopher poet theatre critic and mathematician. He was the director of the the great ‘Library of Alexandria’. He deduced with experiment that our Earth is round(360 degrees) and not flat. He calculated its circumference very correctly. ..40,000kms. Its very interesting about his discovery… He had read in one of the papyrus book from the Library that at southern frontiers outpost of Syene at noon on June 21 vertical sticks casts ‘no’ shadows. He observed that in Alexandria that the vertical sticks did cast shadows at noon on June 21. A very simple experiment with these sticks he calculated that the surface of Earth is curved and not flat which was presumed. The sun is far away its rays are parallel when they strike the Earths .Sticks placed at the different angle to the sun rays casts shows of different lengths .(see dia.1) For the observed differences of the shadow lengths, the distance between Alexandria and Syene had to be about seven degrees along the surface of the Earth. Seven degree is 1/50 of three hundred and sixty degrees Eratostheses quoted. How very correct his calculations were 2200 years ago. Really Amazing!
The city was founded by Alexander the Great. Alexander encouraged knowledge from all around the world. He respected their Gods and Culture. The greatest marvel during his rule was the Library of Alexandria. He invited great scholars from India China Japan etc.etc. The Greek kings of Egypt who succeeded Alexander supported research and entertained the best minds for centuries. The Alexandrian Library is where we humans first collected seriously and systematically the knowledge of the world.
Seven centuries after its founding a Greek female Scholar Hypatia a mathemation philosopher an astronomer surpassed the philosophers of her time. Around 400 AD she became the head of Platonist school of Alexandria and taught the knowledge of Plato and Aristotle. Egypt then was ruled by Romans. By contemporary sources it is said that she was brutally murdered. The Library of Alexandria was destroyed…
Hypatia was the last light of the Library.
Socrates has written about her in his Ecclesiastical History.
We shall see more about these Scientist and Philosphers in coming
blogs..

“Death of the philosopher Hypatia, in Alexandria” from Vies des savants illustres, depuis l’antiquité jusqu’au dix-neuvième siècle, 1866, by Louis Figuier.
source: Cosmos by Carl Sagan images from web and wikipedia.

Quantum Physics And How We Affect Reality! (Powerful!)

Quantum Physics And How We Affect Reality! (Powerful!)

Quantum Physics And How We Affect Reality! (Powerful!)

Quantum Physics And How We Affect Reality! (Powerful!)

Quantum Physics And How We Affect Reality! (Powerful!)

Quantum Physics And How We Affect Reality! (Powerful!)

WHAT IS GRAVITY?

May 3, 2015 

What is GRAVITY?
In the year 2013 a Science fiction movie GRAVITY was awarded with OSCAR My daughter persuaded us to see this movie on big screen in Cinema Hall to get the 3D effect. It was amazing to see a Medical Engineer Astronaut Dr. Ryan Stone (Actress Sandra Bullock) and a veteran Astronaut Matt Kowalsky (Actor George Clooney) on a space shuttle to repair the damaged Hubble Telescope. During their space walk , disaster strikes their shuttle and other crew members gets destroyed leaving the two astronauts stranded in Space. No link with the Earth, the terrifying expanse of space how they make to International Space Stations and another Chinese Space station close by…
and board a Soyuz model and return home (Earth).A unique grand movie
Everything floats in Space as there is no Gravity there.
Due to this gravity we have a firm foothold on Earth. What will be Life without this force?
I kept pondering…
Had learnt about Newton’s Laws of Gravitation in School…
Sir Isaac Newton (25 December1642-20 March 1726) was an English Physicist and Mathematician one of the most influential scientist of all times.

What is Gravity?
Gravity is an invisible force that pulls/attracts all matter towards itself. But this force is very very weak that is why the matter does not get pulled with other objects. The fundamental forces of the universe include the electromagnetic, strong nuclear, weak nuclear and gravitational forces. Gravity is the weakest of all but in cases where matter is involved in massive quantities (for example: a black hole), it is the strongest and most dominant one. Gravity is the reason everything gets attracted towards the Earth’s surface, and also for the formation and movement of all the planets and other heavenly bodies.

(Gravity keeps the moon where it’s supposed to be — in orbit.
Photo courtesy of NASA)
Gravity also is important on a larger scale. It is the Sun’s gravity that keeps the Earth in orbit around the Sun; otherwise Earth would fling drifting in space. Life on Earth needs the Sun’s light and warmth to survive. Gravity helps the Earth to stay just the right distance from the Sun, so it’s not too hot or too cold. It’s the Earth’s gravity that keeps the moon in orbit around the Earth.

.
Isaac Newton discovered Gravitational Force
Newton’s law of universal gravitation, which postulates that the gravitational force of two bodies of mass is directly proportional to the product of their masses and inversely proportional to the square of the distance between them. He also postulated the Law of Motion.
Gravitational Force = G* ___(M1*M2) ______________
                                                   (d2)
where ‘G’ is the gravitational constant, ‘m1′ and ‘m2′ are the masses of the two objects, for which the force has to be calculated, and ‘d’ is the distance between the centers of gravity of both masses.
Albert Einstein:
In modern physics, gravity is most accurately described by the general theory of relativity (proposed by Einstein) which describes gravity as a consequence of the curvature of spacetime. (Albert Einstein called gravity a distortion in the shape of space-time. Photo by keystone/getty images)
In 1806, a British physiologist called A. Knight demonstrated through an experiment, the control of gravity on the direction of a plant’s root growth. The term geotropism was first coined by A. B. Franck in 1868. It is a growth movement by a plant in response to gravity.

If you were to put a plant on its side you would notice that after a while the roots start growing downward while the stem grows upward. This response to gravity is called geotropism, or gravitropism. The roots are exhibiting positive geotropism (growing with gravity) and the stem is exhibiting negative geotropism (growing against gravity).

Fun facts about gravity:
Ocean tides are caused by the gravity of the moon.
Mars is smaller and has less mass than Earth. As a result it has less gravity. If you weigh 100 pounds on Earth, you would weigh 38 pounds on Mars. Moon
SOURCE:Buzzle, howstuffworks images from NASA ,Net

TREMORS

The Nepal earthquake (also referred to as the Himalayan earthquake) was a magnitude 7.8 (Mw) earthquake that occurred at 11:56 NST (6:11:26 UTC) on Saturday 25 April 2015, with the epicenter approximately 34 km (21 mi) east-southeast of Lamjung, Nepal, and the hypocenter at a depth of approximately 15 km (9.3 mi). It is the most powerful earthquake to have hit Nepal since the 1934 Nepal–Bihar earthquake. Over 1,900 people are known to have died as a result of the earthquake with casualties reported in Nepal and adjoining areas of India, China, and Bangladesh. It was the deadliest day on Mount Everest, surpassing the death toll in the 2014 Mount Everest avalanche. Centuries-old buildings were destroyed in the UNESCO World Heritage sites in the Kathmandu Valley, including some at Kathmandu Durbar Square.(Wikipedia)

 

I remember an incident years back , we used to sleep on terrace in summer. It was a cool and starry night . Soon I was asleep. At midnight I was awakened by a rumbling noise, the vibrations penetrated my bones. I gasped for breath and wondered what it was. I felt the tremors on the floor and knew for sure that it was an earthquake. I woke everybody up. The vibrations had lasted for seconds only.. my family did not notice anything and they all went to sleep. It took quite sometime for me to get back to sleep. Next morning there were headlines in the newspapers that our city had experienced an earthquake. Many people experienced the tremors in different parts of the city.. No damage or loss of life was reported. I thanked the almighty!

 

Another incident i recall,of childhood when we were in Srinagar. We were playing outside on the playground. A sudden moms cry calling us all to come out of our houses . She witnessed the vessels and articles on the stand starting tumbling . We heard the rumbling sound, we could see our house and ground tilted to some degrees and back. People came out shrieking. God know what was the scale of the richter. We were too young to know what was it all about.

 

By Gods grace no tragic incident had occurred . It was indeed a memorable hair raising incident though. 

 

There were n number of questions in my mind. What caused the Earth to Tremor. The encyclopedia was referred. It said that sudden release of energy in the earths crust creates seismic waves.. Earthquakes are caused mostly by rupture of geological faults, huge amount of gas migration mainly methane deep within the earth, also by volcanic activity landslides mine blasts and Nuclear experiments. Remember the earthquake in Gujrat (26January 2001), nearly 20, thousand people were killed and many thousands rendered homeless.The Tsunami waves (26December 2004).. The earthquake in China on 12 of May 2008 left thousands of homes and families devastated! I felt the pangs of sorrow . I pondered we can know the impending disaster of climate etc. by the help of satellite .Isn’t there any way to know the impending earthquakes so that we could save the lives of people. 

 

A couple of years back:

The BBC News “Plan for Quake warning System” by Paul Rincon had caught my attention . I gave a sigh of hope and read it eargely. In the news they reported that NASA has achieved a breakthrough in forcasting earthquake. They have found a link between the electrical disturbances occurring at the edge of our atmosphere and the impending quakes on the ground below. Signals were spotted during devastation in China . Minoru Freund a physicist and director for advanced aerospace material and devices at NASA Ames Research Centre in California told BBC “I do believe that we will be able to establish a correlation between certain earthquakes and certain pre-earthquakes signals in the unbiased way”.

The Research is going on. Earthquaqe in Gujrat

 

A lot of devastation of Japan due to the recent earthquake and Tsunami waves has triggered new peril for the whole of mankind. The Nuclear Plants getting damaged by the earthquakes. The Fukushima Nuclear Plant is quake damaged . A Nuclear War not from the countries or Terrorrists but by natural calamities is going on. The fresh memories of Chernobyl disaster in 26th April 1986 in Ukraine when millions of people suffered the blast and the aftermaths. 

 

At Home:

India has 20 nuclear reactors in operation in total six nuclear plants. People are concerned and fear the nuclear explosions due to seismic or any other activity. 

 

What amount of security measures can we take for Natural disasters.? If Japan is prone for earthquakes why were it permitted for Nulear Development. Actually none of the countries should be permitted for Nuclear Armaments or Energy Source. Why are we not learning lessons from the recent disasters. 

 

Pt. Nikhil Banerjee & Swapan Chaudhuri - Raga Yaman 1975

Nikhil Banerjee Raga Piloo Live in Stockholm 1975

Michio Kaku "The Future of Civilization" [RARE Interview!]

ARE WE ALONE

SETI’s Alien Telescope Array (ATA) listens day and night for a signal from space (SETI)

ARE WE ALONE

Humanity is at the pinnacle of Life at this planet.  For roughly 30,000 years we human beings have struggled and fought our way for survival.  We created civisation .  Many civilizations rose and fell.  The most successful civilization was of the Egyptians lasted some 4500 years .  The Greeks lasted a thousand and the Romans civilization lasted some 1500 years miniscule as compared to the Stars.

SEARCH FOR EXTRA-TERRISTRIAL INTELLIGENCE (SETI)

Since the beginning of civilization mankind has wondered if we are Alone in this Universe or is there any Life elsewhere. Probes are sent to other planets (Mars,) of our Solar system, to investigate any other life exists there or not.

In the late twentieth century scientists converged upon the basic idea of scanning the sky and listening for non random pattern of electromagnetic waves (radio and TV waves) to determine the existence of another civilization in the universe. NASA joined in SETI efforts in 1960/70ties. By their mutual efforts more intensive Search was organized in 1995.  But their Government cancelled their programme within a year. It is now funded by private foundations. Scientist Carl Sagan was promoter and believer of the presence of life outside Earth. 

  Frank Drake   of SETI, a Scientist  has devoted his life to establish the presence of extra-terrestrial life. He derived an equation which is known as Drake Equation..The probability of life elsewhere. Frank Drake had conceived an approach to bind the terms involved in estimating the number of technological civilizations that may exist in our galaxy. The equation  is represented as

N = R* • fp • ne • fl • fi • fc • L, where

N = The number of civilizations in the Milky Way whose electromagnetic emissions are detectable.

R* = The rate of formation of stars suitable for the development of intelligent life.

fp = The fraction of those stars with planetary systems.

ne = The number of planets per solar system, with an environment suitable for life.

fl = The fraction of suitable planets on which life actually appears.

fi = The fraction of life-bearing planets on which intelligent life emerges.

fc = The fraction of civilizations that develop a technology that releases detectable signs of their existence into space.

L = The length of time such civilizations release detectable signals into space.

To scan the sky SETI needed equipments, very large computers .  But the largest fastest computer too was uable to scan decode  radio TV waves in the sky.  Therefore, they 

devised a project called SETI@home, which they distributed as free Screen Savers to public's personnel computers from their website://setiathome.berkley.edu which once installed routinely downloaded packets of information from the central server and analysez them.  Thousands of people have uploaded this free project showing their awareness and interest in the mission.  I and my daughter too have installed on our computers Seti@home since its inception in 1999.

Recent Debate:

There was a furious debate recently among the astronomers about whether we should send our signals to the Universe saying/we're here..Whether we should take the risk of letting all the Aliens know that we are here.

A scientist and science  fiction writer David Brin said,

"The arrogance of shouting into the cosmos without any proper risk assessment defies belief. It is a course that would put our grandchildren at risk." If we send them (aliens) messages they will come here and enslave us. Or just eat us.

Actually we have been sending our radio and TV singnals since many years (100 yrs), and by now they must have been received .  The nearest star is four light years away..Our signals fade away in just one light year…

This new debate is actually of active SETI.  We have been doing passive SETI listening for messages from civilization from other stars for more than forty years.

Ellan Stofan (NASA chief scientist) said I think we are going to have strong indications of Life beyond Earth within a decade, and i think we are going to have definitive evidence within 20 to 30 years.   WE know where to look, we know how to look.  We have the technology and we are on the path to implementing it.  And so I think we are definitely on the road."

Latest News from NASA that, Be ready to witness Alien Life by 2025 .It’s really becoming interesting isn’t it?

 

THE DARK UNIVERSE

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THE DARK UNIVERSE
Looking up in the sky we see stars shining the moon the sun and with the help of telescope we can see far far away stars and galaxies etc. The Universe is much more than the shining materials gases dust particle etc. Where light cannot penetrate how can we see such materials? Our Scientist Physicsts and




Astronomers have found that most of our Universe is Dark yet it is not empty. All the luminous matter in the Universe is only 4 to 5% rest is stark Dark.. known as Dark Matter and Dark Energy.
DARK MATTER:
At the moment of big bang dark matter was created and it played a critical role helping ordinary matter clump together and form stars and planets acted like scaffolding upon which ordinary matter could attach itself. dark matter was pulled together by gravity very slowly over time and actually form the scenes around which normal matter coalesced , like a cosmic web ,(a spiders web) where these strands of dark matter is the framework..
Astronomers have been able to take their theory one step further and create detailed 3d map of dark matter in the universe using gravitational lensing . Einstein said, the gravity affects everything just like gravity is caused by everything so one of the things that is affected by gravity is light itself .When light goes to the dark matter it bends just the way light bends when it goes thru the glass and light dosn’t discriminate ordinary matter and dark matter.
An overlay of an optical image of a cluster of galaxies
with an x-ray image of hot gas lying within the cluster
The missing mass in the galaxies during rotation speed of galaxies calculate by Fritz Zwhaky Jan Oort in 1930s and Vera Rubin in 1970s was termed as Dark Matter. Dark Matter hides in space…. acts as skeleton it is the backbone around which the visible material is clumping by…it is estimated dark martter makes up 24percent in the universe, well ordinary matter makes up only 4.6%. The final 71.4%percent of the universe Scientist were shocked to discover new mysterious dark energy was dominating space .It is driving the glaxies apart.
The prediction by the scientists that the Universe continues to grow in size..it will eventually slow expansion or perhaps even collapse on itself. But by measuring the expansion history of the Universe,Scientists were shocked to realize that the Universe was not slowing down it was speeding up…what mysterious force was acting for this vast speeding galaxies apart? ..The Dark Energy

An overlay of an optical image of a cluster of galaxies

with an x-ray image of hot gas lying within the cluster

The Dark Energy the mysterious force is created with the bursting of (white dwarf)dead star. … This Supernovae.or stellar explosion ,their brightness amounts to the Suns or a Stars radiation throughout its lifetime….
A lot of research is being done in particle physics on dark matter by the U.S. government. Projects like the Super Cryogenic Dark Matter Search (SuperCDMS), the LUX-ZEPLIN (LZ) Experiment, and the Axion Dark Matter Experiment Gen2 (ADMX-Gen2) have been initiated by the U.S. government for studying dark matter and its Weakly Interacting Massive Particles (WIMP)   

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