Getting spacy

Stories like this are delightful in that they expand the possibilities of our imaginations.

Local Color: Plants under Alien Suns Could Come in a Variety of Hues

Assessing how photosynthesis works on Earth helps scientists predict black plants and other exotic flora on alien worlds

Plants do not have to be green. To be sure, the vast majority of vascular plants on Earth are green because during photosynthesis (the conversion of photons of light into stored chemical energy) they absorb more of the red and blue wavelength light emitted by the sun. But in the murky depths of Earth's waters lurk photosynthetic bacteria that appear purple to the human eye, employing light in the infrared spectrum to store energy; more archaic plants—such as lichens and moss—utilize more of the blue spectrum in visible light. There are even red, shade-dwelling vascular plants. "We did a broad survey of organisms that perform photosynthesis in order to understand how light selects for photosynthesis pigments given different types of environments," says biometeorologist Nancy Kiang of NASA's Goddard Institute for Space Studies at Columbia University. "The photon flux spectrum peaks in the red, which is where chlorophyll has peak absorption."
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A fun quiz

I like getting challenged, especially in unexpected ways.

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* Truth in Surfing Statement: I ran across this while searching for the source of a video clip I saw on another site.

A peek at another world

I am fighting to hold my head above the rising cyber waters and I know at the same time others are snorkeling or playing water pool or lap swimming. This is a look at that 'deep end' of the pool.

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More than words

This comes from one of my word sources, just stumbling across it as I cleaned out the old year to make room for the new. You have to love the message.

the gift of time (n.)

Whenever I have to tell my daughter I'm too busy to play, she runs to her room and whips out her drawing paper and crayons. A few minutes later she has a gift ready for me. It reads:

Gift Certifikit
No Work. A whole day of play with me.

If I begin redeeming my gift certificates, I wouldn't need to work for the next week and a half. But that shows the best gifts often don't cost a thing, except time.

kith \KITH\ noun

: familiar friends, neighbors, or relatives

* I have heard 'kith' used before but only in the context of 'kith and kin', which seems to beg for classification as a redundancy.

afflatus \uh-FLAY-tus\ noun

: a divine imparting of knowledge or power : inspiration

Getting spacey

A Year of Spectacular Comets
Two spectacular comets graced Earth's skies during 2007. Both comets became bright enough to be seen by the unaided eye of the casual sky enthusiast. Early in 2007, Comet McNaught grew brighter than any comet in 40 years, displaying a beautiful dust tail that flowed across the sky. Comet McNaught (c/2006 P1) became known as the Great Comet of 2007, sported unusual striations in its expansive dust tail, and showed unexpectedly complex chemistry in its ion tail. Toward the year's end, normally docile and faint Comet Holmes brightened suddenly and unexpectedly to naked eye visibility. Remarkably, Comet 17P/Holmes stayed bright for weeks even though it lies beyond the orbit of Mars. No distant comet in recent history has remained so bright for so long. In this view, a white Comet Holmes was photographed in early December posing with the Heart and Soul Nebulas.

Idle Curiosity

Take a peek at some of these images. I really like the aircraft carrier.

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And more good news

What are you going to do with all that cheap solar power from Nanosolar panels? How about replacing the internal combustion vehicle.

200MPG For Reals! Aptera Unveiled at TED

We've been hearing about the Aptera, the ultrahighmileage supervehicle from Accelerated Composites (aka Aptera Motors) for more than a year now. Steve Fambro and his merry band of geniuses over at AC let the math do the talking when it came to the design so that the car would be as aerodynamic as possible. Pair that with a super-efficient diesel hybrid engine, and the result is 200mpg. It's only fair to note that they originally predicted 330mpg, but we're cool with 200. It's also supposed to be pretty affordable (around $20,000), thanks to some magical carbon fiber fabrication process that AC won't really talk about. The actual prototype was unveiled at TED this past weekend in Monterey, and it looks like Batman's girlfriend's car. We just hope this thing actually goes into production instead of winding up in some museum. More pictures after the jump.
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From the company:
The Aptera was designed from the ground up as an electric vehicle, and later as an extended range electric vehicle. After building the proof-of-concept Mk-0, we hired the automotive design firm, 'eleven', to help us further develop the concept vehicle. The 'eleven' team, led by Jason Hill and Nathan Armstrong, made great strides in the development of the Aptera's body styling, interior design, and structural engineering. Meanwhile, we refined the Aptera's shape to maximize efficiency using CFD (Computational Fluid Dynamics), developed and built advanced suspension and drivetrain components, and integrated a strong yet lightweight composite shell. Our entire process has been developed in-house exclusively by Aptera for the Aptera Typ-1. Our structural elements have undergone countless revisions of FEA (Finite Element Analysis) to be lightweight, robust, and manufacturable.
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