Beam Me Up - Science & Science Fiction news

Petman? Oh Come On!

2013-05-18T03:25:00.000-05:00

You tell me the first thing that came to mind when I saw this DARPA video. With the camo on the damn thing is all but indistinguishable from a human corps-man. The article says this about the...what...robot? Yeah I guess....anyway: The PETMAN robot was developed by Boston Dynamics with funding from the DoD CBD program. It is used to test the performance of protective clothing

Latest ISS Astronauts Return Safely

2013-05-15T17:36:00.000-05:00

Three astronauts returned to Earth, aboard a Soyuz capsule, safely after a marathon five-month mission. The crew-members landed Tuesday (5/14/13) on the steppes of Kazakhstan. Canadian astronaut Chris Hadfield, American Thomas Marshburn and Russian Roman Romanenko landed as planned without incident. Hadfield has managed to garner some notice in the entertainment industry as well

May 14th - Skylab Anniversary

2013-05-14T17:51:00.000-05:00

May 14 of this year 2013 marks the 40th anniversary of America's first space station. massing 169,950 pounds, Skylab was launched atop a modified Saturn V rocket. Skylab orbited the Earth from 1973 to 1979. Due to a constantly descending orbit, Skylab entered the atmosphere and crashed over parts of Australia. The space station almost didn't make it. During launch, a

Review: Lady Death - animated film

2013-05-14T15:57:00.000-05:00

Lady Death takes place for the most part in the 15th century Sweden. The story centers on the young daughter, Hope, of a skilled and ruthless mercenary called Matthias who in fact is in actuality a demon. Matthias is dispatched by villagers for him evil. Hope herself is accused of consorting with the Devil and is sentenced to burn at the stake. At the very last moment she is

Chris Hadfield Sings Major Tom in a most Unusual Way!

2013-05-14T14:04:00.000-05:00

You might think, just by listening, that you were experiencing David Bowie, singing an updated version of his timeless classic, Major Tom. If you thought that, you would be very very wrong. For here is astronaut Chris Hadfield singing his version of this topical tune while SERVING ABOARD the ISS! Plus to do it one better, Hadfield does it as a video that proves to be an amazing counterpoint to

Improptu Space Walk on the ISS, a First for NASA!

2013-05-12T15:10:00.001-05:00

Spurred by a recent Ammonia leak, astronauts aboard the ISS took the uncharacteristic action of instituting an EVA Saturday with the plan of finding the leak that if left unchecked, would leave the station without power in a few short hours. Astronauts Thomas Marshburn and Christopher Cassidy, prepped for the walk shortly after the discovered leak on Thursday and exited the station

BMU #365 now Online!

2013-05-12T01:40:00.000-05:00

Another hour that just flies by. I play the conclusion of David Scholes Trath: The Final intervention, just to make sure that I get in them in this week. Next from the blog and Kallimus: Trouble with the ISS coolant again, Ray Harryhousen has passed away at 92, Neil DeGrasse-Tyson has a web site that promotes his radio program Startalk and YouTube videos, there is a link on the

Weekly Rundown

2013-05-10T01:01:00.000-05:00

ISS LEAKING COOLANT – AGAIN The ISS is leaking coolant, and this isn't the first time it has happened. The station uses liquid ammonia for cooling the power systems on its 8 solar array panels. NASA is looking into the problem, but says it poses no immediate danger to the astronauts. Now here is where things get interesting. A minor leak was first discovered in 2007, and NASA has

Startalk Neil DeGrasse Tyson

2013-05-09T00:30:00.000-05:00

Hey, any of you out there Neil DeGrasse Tyson fans? Well, I will fess up and tell you that I really enjoy the way he brings a subject to life. Well It seems listener Kallamis is as well. Kall sent me a heads up for the Startalk web site that DeGrasse hosts. The site will give you links to video and radio programs among other very interesting items. As you might suspect the site is

Trailer: Ender's Game

2013-05-08T15:36:00.000-05:00

Unless you hate science fiction...(which begs the question, why would you read a science / science fiction blog..... but that is for another article) you know of or have read Orson Scott Card's Ender's and the follow on book for a remarkable series, very much in the vein of say Empire by Asimov. Well it has taken some time but the film is due for release November 1 of this year. If you

Bill Boards for Children Only....

2013-05-06T19:11:00.000-05:00

ANAR Foundation in Spain manages a special phone number to aid children and teenagers who may be at risk of abuse or are activly being abused. From the article: On this telephone number, only for minors, they can find the help they need in a totally anonymous and confidential way. But, how can we get our message to a child abuse victim, even when they are accompanied by their aggressor?

May 5th 1961 Alan B. Shepard - First Man From U.S. In Space

2013-05-06T16:00:00.000-05:00

Alan Shepard became the first American in space when the Freedom 7 spacecraft lifted off from Florida on May 5, 1961. Not to be one to set on his laurels, Shepard continued with the program and 12 years later, he become the fifth man to walk on the moon. Now for the nit pickers out there, yes I know - sub orbital and ballistic, but give it a rest! After all these years, give the man his due

Review: Death Note the Movie

2013-05-06T14:33:00.001-05:00

Death Note is a live-action Japanese film released in 2006. The movie is based on the Death Note manga and the later anime series. The film primarily center on a university student, Light Yagami, who finds a supernatural notebook that kills anyone whose name is written in it. Light begins a campaign to rid the world of evil with the help of the notebook but soon blurs the boundaries

2013-05-05T03:39:00.000-05:00

This week I start off with a new track from John Anealio called Zombinista which has a decidedly 50s or 60s zombie flick. Next I read Kallamis' weekly run down of weekly happenings. First it's Curiosity's return to operation. Next it is alien planets tidally locked planets orbiting red dwarf stars. In Sci-fi news the st-tng's bridge is being rebuilt. TMNT are NOT aliens it would

Weekly Rundown

2013-05-03T15:30:00.001-05:00

CURIOSITY’S BREAK IS OVER In other words, we are back in control again. The little girl had a break from us for a while, as Mars slipped behind the sun from our perspective. This is called the Mars Solar Conjunction, and can seriously disrupt radio communications. "Can you hear me now? Conjunction is over. I have a clear view of Earth & am back to work!" NASA officials wrote this on their

Rant against anti-science

2013-05-03T15:30:00.000-05:00

Okay, I realize this should have been on the Weekly, but it was just brought to my attention this morning. Oh yeah, lovely way to wake up, believe me. If you don't want to get really mad, really fast, I suggest you bypass this one. If you just got up, go eat, etc first. If not, you may not be able to eat breakfast. And if you are on your way to work, I suggest also you read this when

Close Call for NASA's Fermi Gamm-ray Space Telescope!!

2013-05-03T12:16:00.001-05:00

NASA's $690 million Fermi Space Telescope was nearly lost last year (4/3/2012) when a defunct one and a half ton Soviet era reconnaissance satellite (cosmos 1805) missed the space telescope by only 700 feet. A much worse scenario was avoided when engineers instructed Fermi to perform a maneuver that took the satellite barely out of harms way. To get an idea of just how close

A Boy And His Atom: The World's Smallest Movie

2013-05-02T17:38:00.000-05:00

Hey kiddies, here is something that will and should blow your mind. It is a short film made by IBM researchers working in the field of atomic memory. Here, IBM researchers used a scanning tunneling microscope to move thousands of carbon monoxide molecules, to make a movie so small it can be seen only when you magnify it 100 million times. This film, rightfully so, holds the Guinness World

Review: Redline an Anime Movie

2013-05-02T17:08:00.001-05:00

Redline is a 2010 anime film, running 102 minutes. Released by the studio Madhouse in Japanese with English subtitles. Redline is an auto racing movie. In the far distant future our main character JP qualifies for the REDLINE underground (against the law) auto race. As you can expect, the Redline race is a "no rules" competition with plenty of crashes, fires and other forms of

Google "Glass" Video

2013-05-02T16:43:00.001-05:00

By now I would hope that most have already heard about Google's head mounted (glasses type of device / format) computer called - Google Glass. Glass is a wearable computer with a head-mounted display that is being developed by Google in the Project Glass research and development project, with the mission of producing a mass-market ubiquitous computer. By ubiquitous they are striving for a

Guess what 424 Million will Get Ya....

2013-05-01T00:02:00.000-05:00

What WILL $424 million get you if you are NASA? Well this pretty chunk of change will get you, according to a recent AP article: training and transporting of six astronauts to and from the ISS in 2016 and the first half of 2017 in Russian Soyuz spacecraft. hummm something tells me that the Russians are not as desperate for Uncle Sam script as they once might have once been..... Oh

Virgin Galactic's SpaceShipTwo Ignites its Rocket

2013-04-30T01:09:00.000-05:00

For the first time, Virgin Galactic tested SpaceShipTwo's rocket motor, and doing so in mid-flight driving the ship super-sonic! SS-2 reached a speed of mach 1.2 and climbed apx to 56,000 feet. in altitude. This puts Virgin another step closer to commercial passenger flights into space. Girgin Galactic now hopes to make its' first passenger flight in 2014. Industry experts however say

Saturn tonight, (Sunday).

2013-04-28T17:06:00.005-05:00

Wanted to get this up quick. No major science or anything, but for those without telescopes, or who are covered in clouds and rain like me, here is where the live broadcast of Saturn will at tonight. The first link is to the article explaining that Earth will be between Saturn and Sol, and the second link is to the video page that will go live at 9:30 pm EDT. Nothing else

BMU #363 Now Online! pt. 1 No Great Magic - Fritz Leiber

2013-04-28T02:37:00.001-05:00

Wow does Beam Me Up episode 363 steam right along this week! It was really a case of not being able to get a word in sideways because of all the stuff I had planned! I start by well raving a bit about the new spaceport....but mediate it some with the closing song to season one's A Scientific Rail-gun called "Dear My Love" I know, but it is a toe tappin tune that makes for a cool piece. I

Weekly Rundown

2013-04-26T00:25:00.000-05:00

ANTARCTICA GRANTS METEORITE SURPRISE Well, two I guess is a bit more accurate. What we have are a pair of meteorites that have two surprising grains of sand. Now what gets interesting here is that it is speculated that they were formed in a single supernova that occurred billions of years ago. They may even be from the supernova that was the foundation for the formation of our own