ScienceBits - A random walk in science

To the hebrew readers of sciencebits לקוראי העברית של סאינס-ביטס

shaviv — Sat, 26 Sep 2009 04:35:42 -0500

(On the hebrew translation of the "Chilling Stars")

ספר חדש על הנושא של השפעת הקרינה הקוסמית

Earth Day Blackout in Israel vs. Al Gore

shaviv — Tue, 05 May 2009 01:12:50 -0500

A week ago was Earth day, and just like the trend elsewhere, Israel joined with an hour long blackout. In principle, I am very much in favor of environmental awareness, and if it brings some, so be it. But if you ask me, overall, this event is a rather pointless gimmick. Why?

The oceans as a calorimeter

shaviv — Sun, 12 Apr 2009 12:48:49 -0500

I few months ago, I had a paper accepted in the Journal of Geophysical Research. Since its repercussions are particularly interesting for the general public, I decided to write about it. It's called, using the "Oceans as a Calorimeter to quantify the solar radiative forcing".

Touch and go - my worst landing ever

shaviv — Sat, 11 Apr 2009 11:47:35 -0500

I recently returned from Lijiang (in Yunnan, China). One of my legs was a flight from Chengdu to Beijing, and it is certainly a flight I will never forget.

Auroras in Lapland

shaviv — Thu, 26 Mar 2009 15:34:11 -0500

I recently attended the 3rd Space Climate Symposium which took place in Saariselkä, about 250 km north of the arctic circle in Finnish Lapland. Because of the prolonged solar minimum, my hopes were for a high auroral activity, but my expectations were not. Luckily, it was my hopes which were fulfilled!

Here is a summary of the northern lights I have seen.

Delinquent me.

shaviv — Mon, 23 Mar 2009 17:18:11 -0500

If you check the dates, you'll notice that I am utterly delinquent with respect to posting at this site. Unfortunately, it is because I have an administrative post - I am chairman of the faculty union at the Hebrew University. And it really takes up precious time, which otherwise, would have allowed me to write.

Welcome to ScienceBits

shaviv — Mon, 23 Mar 2009 07:16:24 -0500

The vitruvian man by Da Vinci. Just like Da Vinci, this website touches different aspects of science.

A random (and subjective) walk in science and physics in particular.

In the blog and bits sections, you'll find various interesting science related anecdotes you'll find nowhere else (e.g., an exhaled breath condensation calculator, or a snow probability calculator).

In the Research section, you'll find articles which are more directly related to my personal research in astrophysics, or on the role of cosmic rays behind climate variability. For example, you'll find articles on the Milky Way and Ice-Ages, or on the question of which mechanism is behind the 20th century global warming, is it Solar or Anthropogenic?

If there are any comments about the site you would like to post, feel free to post them here.

Enjoy your stay in !

Note, you're more than welcome to post comments, however due to some flooding by spam (mostly for v-pills), some precautions were placed. There are now two options to place comments:

Anonymous comments, using a captcha and moderation (i.e., after I verify and approve that the content is legit.)
Register/login using a captcha, and then comment without a captcha. If the comment appears legit., the next comments will not require any approval

Is the causal link between cosmic rays and cloud cover really dead??

shaviv — Fri, 11 Apr 2008 03:19:06 -0500

Just recently, Sloan and Wolfendale published a paper in Environmental Research Letters, called "Testing the proposed causal link between cosmic rays and cloud cover". In the Institute of Physics Press Release, it said, "New research has deal a blow to the skeptics who argue that climate change is all due to cosmic rays rather than man made greenhouse gases". Did it really?

More slurs from realclimate.org

shaviv — Wed, 12 Mar 2008 03:36:49 -0500

Realclimate.org continues with its same line of attack. Wishfulclimate.org writers try again and again to concoct what appears to be deep critiques against skeptic arguments, but end up doing a very shallow job. All in the name of saving the world. How gallant of them. This time it is an ill-founded attack by Jahnke and Benestad.

Open convection cells over the Negev?

shaviv — Mon, 04 Feb 2008 13:29:24 -0600

Jerusalem was under siege, again. Last time it was Bush. This time, it was snow because of which we had two snow days. So, I didn't have to teach and instead could build a snowman with my kids. I could also look at the rain radar, which appeared to exhibit a few interesting phenomena.

One of the phenomena appears to be that of open-cell convection, i.e., air rising (and precipitating) on the cell boundaries.