News about PaperPanda, Open Access, and Research
The following essay is reprinted with permission from The Conversation, an online publication covering the latest research. As winter begins and the holidays are in full swing, the COVID-19 pandemic has entered another worrying phase. Emergence of the omicron variant, along with increasing rates of infections, have left many people unsure about their holiday plans. On Dec. … Read more
CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. — Record-setting NASA astronaut Christina Koch is continuing her mission to inspire the next generation of explorers. As part of a long-duration mission, Christina Koch spent 328 days in space, marking the longest single spaceflight by a woman, and the second-longest after fellow NASA astronaut, Scott Kelly. While aboard the International Space … Read more
Social media and photo sites were full of “shooting star” watchers overnight. The Geminid meteor shower reached its peak Monday (Dec. 13), sparking amateurs and professionals alike to catch a few images of the show. At its peak, there can be as many as 100 to 150 meteors an hour. This year, skywatchers had a … Read more
NASA’s next big space telescope just took another step toward its highly anticipated launch this month. On Saturday (Dec. 11), the $10 billion James Webb Space Telescope was secured atop the Arianespace Ariane 5 rocket that will send it into the final frontier from Europe’s Spaceport in French Guiana. “After its arrival in the final … Read more
On a dead still November morning in the Sierra Nevada, two researchers walk through a graveyard of giants. Below their feet: a layer of ash and coal. Above their heads: a charnel house of endangered trees. This is Alder Creek Grove, a once idyllic environment for a majestic and massive specimen: the giant sequoia. It … Read more
NASA has given the go-ahead to another private crewed mission to the International Space Station (ISS). The agency will work with Axiom Space to find a window for the Houston-based company’s second ISS mission, NASA officials said in an update Monday (Dec. 13). That flight, known as Ax-2, is currently scheduled to launch from NASA’s … Read more
By Leah Crane An illustration of NASA’s Parker Solar Probe NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center/Joy Ng NASA’s Parker Solar Probe has reached out to our star and touched its atmosphere. On 28 April, it became the first spacecraft to enter the upper atmosphere of the sun, called the corona. This milestone was announced on 14 … Read more
AI can write a story where each sentence flows from the next in a grammatically correct, statistically likely way, but often the plot will quickly descend into incoherence. Starting with a good ending and working backwards results in better stories Technology 15 December 2021 By Matthew Sparkes A still from the film Memento, which showcased … Read more
In an incredible historic first, a human-made spacecraft has swooped in and made contact with the Sun. On 28 April 2021, NASA’s Parker Solar Probe actually flew into and through the solar corona, the upper atmosphere of the Sun. Not only did it live to tell the tale – proving the efficacy of Parker’s high-tech … Read more
In the heart of the Milky Way, stars tread a complex measure. Bound by the gravitational field of the supermassive black hole in the galactic center, Sagittarius A*, a group of stars known as S-stars swoop on wild, years-long orbits. These orbits were recently studied to measure Sgr A*, a result that won the scientists … Read more