Illustration of NASA's Glory Satellite

What is Glory going to do?

Glory’s mission is to study two things. One thing it will study is the energy output (also known as irradiance) of the Sun and how it changes over time. Our Sun, or any star for that matter, is not unchanging. Stars are very DYNAMIC with lots of activity on their surfaces. Things like sunspots, solar flares and the age of the star will change the energy that is emitted from it. This is very important for us, because our Sun is the ULTIMATE source of energy for all life on Earth.

The second thing Glory will do is collect data on how the particles (also known as aerosols) like soot, volcanic ash, etc. and clouds in the Earth’s atmosphere affect the amount of light that “falls” on it from the Sun. As you probably know, the temperature of the Earth is INCREASING. This is due to the amount of greenhouse gases in our atmosphere. Greenhouse gases trap heat in the atmosphere that would normally get emitted into space causing Earth’s temperature to go up. Some of it is produced naturally, for example, when dead planet and animals decompose, they give off carbon dioxide, which is a greenhouse gas. Other greenhouse gas emissions come from activities of humans. For example, cars produce greenhouse gas emissions when they burn fuel.

The amount of energy our Sun puts out combined with how much of that energy is reflected back into space without ever reaching the surface of the Earth is a huge FACTOR in how the temperature of the Earth will increase over the coming years. We are already starting to see the effects of the increase in Earth’s temperature, also known as global warming, in places like the Arctic where the home of the polar bears, ice, is melting away. Other, more subtle, changes include migration of plants and animals from places where they used to grow and live to new locations because their previous homes got too hot for them to survive.

Glory will help us understand how fast the Earth’s temperature is changing and, indirectly, how much time we have to find alternative sources of energy to replace those that cause global warming before even human existence becomes questionable.

Resources

• Submit your name for inclusion on the Glory Satellite.
• Glory mission’s kid’s page.
• About our Sun.
• Learn about global warming from NASA.
• Climate Change Education.
• YOU can make a difference in global warming.

Help scientists classify galaxies.

This is where you come in. Galaxy Zoo invites internet users to help scientists classify galaxies. Over 150,000 people are already participants and some have DISCOVERED never before seen objects like the Voorwerp, which was discovered by a school teacher who volunteered some of her free time to classifying galaxies.

A new object discovered by a Galaxy Zoo volunteer.

Well, what are you waiting for? Head over to Galaxy Zoo and get started. You might see YOUR name listed on a scientific paper along with professional scientists. That would be really COOL!

Kodu programming interface.

Do you Kodu?

I have talked about the joys of graphical programming before. This week there is a NEW entry in easy and fun to use graphical programming language designed to get kids into programming. Microsoft has release the technical preview download for KODU, which “a visual programming language made specifically for creating GAMES. It is designed to be accessible for children and enjoyable for anyone.” While this has been available for the Xbox 360 for sometime, now anyone with a decent PC can jump in and start making games EASILY. Kodu’s website has all that you will need to get started and the program comes with samples of what can be accomplished with it. The cool thing is you can edit those samples and add your own flavor to them. If you make a game that you wanna show-off, feel free to post a link to it in the comments.

Quantum computer makes quantum leap.

In science, quantum is the SMALLEST piece of an object. Therefore, it is weird to me when people say that they have made a “quantum leap” to indicate a giant progress.

Anyhoo, things at the quantum level do not behave like everyday objects. Strange things can and do happen. One STRANGE thing is an object can be in two states at the same. It would be like you being asleep and awake at the same time. Scientists have been for a long time trying to use this strange behavior to build POWERFUL computers. The basic idea is what with a quantum computer it would be possible to try out all the solutions to a problem at once and extract the correct answer instantaneously. You can easily imagine how hard that is. For example, consider a simple math problem, which only has one answer. Well, there are an INFINITY of numbers to pick from, how do you create something that can hold an infinity of anything?

But, just because something may seem hard does not mean we should not try. After all, that is what makes science fun!

It was reported this week, that scientists have built a quantum computer to model the hydrogen atom. Hydrogen is the simplest of the elements consisting only of one proton and one electron so it was a great way to demonstrate the computer since it can be easily checked against other methods. The question is, once they can build a quantum computer that can solve ANY mathematical problem, will we still have do to homework?

Resources

How quantum computers work.
A tale of two qubits: how quantum computers work – A more technical look at how quantum computers work.

Illustration of the Akatsui spacecraft around the planet Venus. Credit: Akihiro Ikeshita

The deadline for submissions is January 10, 2010. Sorry for the late notice but I just found out about it. I should add, although the slogan for this outreach program reads, “We will deliver your message to the bright star Venus,” Venus is actually a planet. But, you already knew that. Thanks to my friend Robert Sparks for the info.

“Mission: 10,000 Rockets is an educational project developed to inspire the passion for scientific discovery in young people.”

It is a drawing contest open to K-12 grade students in the United States. Please visit http://10000rockets.com/ to get all the details.

This contest is being sponsored by the Bing search engine.