#research instruments for data collection

[marketxcel]

5 Methods of Data Collection for Quantitative Research

Discover five powerful techniques for gathering quantitative data in research, essential for uncovering trends, patterns, and correlations. Explore proven methodologies that empower researchers to collect and analyze data effectively.

[nasa]

Six Answers to Questions You’re Too Embarrassed to Ask about the Hottest Year on Record

You may have seen the news that 2023 was the hottest year in NASA’s record, continuing a trend of warming global temperatures. But have you ever wondered what in the world that actually means and how we know?

We talked to some of our climate scientists to get clarity on what a temperature record is, what happened in 2023, and what we can expect to happen in the future… so you don’t have to!

1. Why was 2023 the warmest year on record?

The short answer: Human activities. The release of greenhouse gases like carbon dioxide and methane into the atmosphere trap more heat near Earth’s surface, raising global temperatures. This is responsible for the decades-long warming trend we’re living through.

But this year’s record wasn’t just because of human activities. The last few years, we’ve been experiencing the cooler phase of a natural pattern of Pacific Ocean temperatures called the El Niño Southern Oscillation (ENSO). This phase, known as La Niña, tends to cool temperatures slightly around the world. In mid-2023, we started to shift into the warmer phase, known as El Niño. The shift ENSO brought, combined with overall human-driven warming and other factors we’re continuing to study, pushed 2023 to a new record high temperature.

2. So will every year be a record now?

Almost certainly not. Although the overall trend in annual temperatures is warmer, there’s some year-to-year variation, like ENSO we mentioned above.

Think about Texas and Minnesota. On the whole, Texas is warmer than Minnesota. But some days, stormy weather could bring cooler temperatures to Texas while Minnesota is suffering through a local heat wave. On those days, the weather in Minnesota could be warmer than the weather in Texas. That doesn’t mean Minnesota is warmer than Texas overall; we’re just experiencing a little short-term variation.

Something similar happens with global annual temperatures. The globe will naturally shift back to La Niña in the next few years, bringing a slight cooling effect. Because of human carbon emissions, current La Niña years will be warmer than La Niña years were in the past, but they’ll likely still be cooler than current El Niño years.

3. What do we mean by “on record”?

Technically, NASA’s global temperature record starts in 1880. NASA didn’t exist back then, but temperature data were being collected by sailing ships, weather stations, and scientists in enough places around the world to reconstruct a global average temperature. We use those data and our modern techniques to calculate the average.

We start in 1880, because that’s when thermometers and other instruments became technologically advanced and widespread enough to reliably measure and calculate a global average. Today, we make those calculations based on millions of measurements taken from weather stations and Antarctic research stations on land, and ships and ocean buoys at sea. So, we can confidently say 2023 is the warmest year in the last century and a half.

However, we actually have a really good idea of what global climate looked like for tens of thousands of years before 1880, relying on other, indirect ways of measuring temperature. We can look at tree rings or cores drilled from ice sheets to reconstruct Earth’s more ancient climate. These measurements affirm that current warming on Earth is happening at an unprecedented speed.

4. Why does a space agency keep a record of Earth’s temperature?

It’s literally our job! When NASA was formed in 1958, our original charter called for “the expansion of human knowledge of phenomena in the atmosphere and space.” Our very first space missions uncovered surprises about Earth, and we’ve been using the vantage point of space to study our home planet ever since. Right now, we have a fleet of more than 20 spacecraft monitoring Earth and its systems.

Why we created our specific surface temperature record – known as GISTEMP – actually starts about 25 million miles away on the planet Venus. In the 1960s and 70s, researchers discovered that a thick atmosphere of clouds and carbon dioxide was responsible for Venus’ scorchingly hot temperatures.

Dr. James Hansen was a scientist at the Goddard Institute for Space Studies in New York, studying Venus. He realized that the greenhouse effect cooking Venus’ surface could happen on Earth, too, especially as human activities were pumping carbon dioxide into our atmosphere.

He started creating computer models to see what would happen to Earth’s climate as more carbon dioxide entered the atmosphere. As he did, he needed a way to check his models – a record of temperatures at Earth’s surface over time, to see if the planet was indeed warming along with increased atmospheric carbon. It was, and is, and NASA’s temperature record was born.

5. If last year was record hot, why wasn’t it very hot where I live?

The temperature record is a global average, so not everywhere on Earth experienced record heat. Local differences in weather patterns can influence individual locations to be hotter or colder than the globe overall, but when we average it out, 2023 was the hottest year.

Just because you didn’t feel record heat this year, doesn’t mean you didn’t experience the effects of a warming climate. 2023 saw a busy Atlantic hurricane season, low Arctic sea ice, raging wildfires in Canada, heat waves in the U.S. and Australia, and more.

And these effects don’t stay in one place. For example, unusually hot and intense fires in Canada sent smoke swirling across the entire North American continent, triggering some of the worst air quality in decades in many American cities. Melting ice at Earth’s poles drives rising sea levels on coasts thousands of miles away.

6. Speaking of which, why is the Arctic – one of the coldest places on Earth – red on this temperature map?

Our global temperature record doesn’t actually track absolute temperatures. Instead, we track temperature anomalies, which are basically just deviations from the norm. Our baseline is an average of the temperatures from 1951-1980, and we compare how much Earth’s temperature has changed since then. 

Why focus on anomalies, rather than absolutes? Let’s say you want to track if apples these days are generally larger, smaller, or the same size as they were 20 years ago. In other words, you want to track the change over time.

Apples grown in Florida are generally larger than apples grown in Alaska. Like, in real life, how Floridian temperatures are generally much higher than Alaskan temperatures. So how do you track the change in apple sizes from apples grown all over the world while still accounting for their different baseline weights? 

By focusing on the difference within each area rather than the absolute weights. So in our map, the Arctic isn’t red because it’s hotter than Bermuda. It’s red because it’s gotten relatively much warmer than Bermuda has in the same time frame.

Want to learn more about climate change? Dig into the data at climate.nasa.gov.

Make sure to follow us on Tumblr for your regular dose of space!

[spaceexp]

NGC 2566 (MIRI image)

The galaxy filling the frame in this NASA/ESA/CSA James Webb Space Telescope Picture of the Month is NGC 2566, a spiral galaxy located in the constellation Puppis. In this image Webb’s Mid-InfraRed Instrument (MIRI) puts the thick clouds of interstellar dust that suffuse NGC 2566 on display, as well as the galaxy’s compact, bright core.

At 76 million light-years away, NGC 2566 is considered a nearby galaxy, making it an excellent target for studying fine details like star clusters and gas clouds. The new Webb images of NGC 2566 were collected as part of an observing programme (#3707) dedicated to understanding the connections between stars, gas and dust in nearby star-forming galaxies. NGC 2566 is just one of the 55 galaxies in the local Universe examined by Webb for this programme.

To gain a full understanding of the star-formation process in nearby galaxies, astronomers will combine Webb data with observations from other telescopes. At the long-wavelength end of the electromagnetic spectrum, the 66 radio dishes of the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA) provide a detailed view of the cold, turbulent clouds where stars are born. The NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope has also cast its gaze on NGC 2566, and a new Hubble image of this galaxy was released earlier this week. The Hubble data will help researchers take a census of the stars in nearby galaxies, especially the young stars that are bright at the ultraviolet and visible wavelengths to which Hubble is sensitive. Together, the Webb, Hubble and ALMA data provide a rich view of the cold gas, warm dust and brilliant stars in NGC 2566.

The Webb data are part of a Treasury programme, which means that the data may help answer multiple important questions about our Universe. Treasury data are available for use by scientists and the public without a waiting period, amplifying the scientific impact and allowing exploration to begin immediately.

[Image Description: A spiral galaxy, seen close-up. Its core is a round spot that glows intensely bright, crowned by eight long and spikes that extend across the galaxy, artefacts of the telescope’s structure. Its disc is an oval shape with edges made of very thick and cloudy arms of gas and dust, mostly blue but paler and brighter around patches of stars. Wisps of darker dust also fill the inner disc and swirl off the ends of the arms.]

Credits: ESA/Webb, NASA & CSA, A. Leroy;

[blueiscoool]

Research Discovers Ancient Egyptian Mummies Smell Nice

At first whiff, it sounds repulsive: sniff the essence of an ancient corpse.

But researchers who indulged their curiosity in the name of science found that well-preserved Egyptian mummies actually smell pretty good.

“In films and books, terrible things happen to those who smell mummified bodies,” said Cecilia Bembibre, director of research at University College London’s Institute for Sustainable Heritage. “We were surprised at the pleasantness of them.”

“Woody,” “spicy” and “sweet” were the leading descriptions from what sounded more like a wine tasting than a mummy sniffing exercise. Floral notes were also detected, which could be from pine and juniper resins used in embalming.

The study published Thursday in the Journal of the American Chemical Society used both chemical analysis and a panel of human sniffers to evaluate the odors from nine mummies as old as 5,000 years that had been either in storage or on display at the Egyptian Museum in Cairo.

The researchers wanted to systematically study the smell of mummies because it has long been a subject of fascination for the public and researchers alike, said Bembibre, one of the report’s authors. Archeologists, historians, conservators and even fiction writers have devoted pages of their work to the subject — for good reason.

Scent was an important consideration in the mummification process that used oils, waxes and balms to preserve the body and its spirit for the afterlife. The practice was largely reserved for pharaohs and nobility and pleasant smells were associated with purity and deities while bad odors were signs of corruption and decay.

Without sampling the mummies themselves, which would be invasive, researchers from UCL and the University of Ljubljana in Slovenia were able to measure whether aromas were coming from the archaeological item, pesticides or other products used to conserve the remains, or from deterioration due to mold, bacteria or microorganisms.

“We were quite worried that we might find notes or hints of decaying bodies, which wasn’t the case,” said Matija Strlič, a chemistry professor at the University of Ljubljana. “We were specifically worried that there might be indications of microbial degradation, but that was not the case, which means that the environment in this museum, is actually quite good in terms of preservation.”

Using technical instruments to measure and quantify air molecules emitted from sarcophagi to determine the state of preservation without touching the mummies was like the Holy Grail, Strlič said.

“It tells us potentially what social class a mummy was from and and therefore reveals a lot of information about the mummified body that is relevant not just to conservators, but to curators and archeologists as well,” he said. “We believe that this approach is potentially of huge interest to other types of museum collections.”

Barbara Huber, a postdoctoral researcher at Max Planck Institute of Geoanthropology in Germany who was not involved in the study, said the findings provide crucial data on compounds that could preserve or degrade mummified remains. The information could be used to better protect the ancient bodies for future generations.

“However, the research also underscores a key challenge: the smells detected today are not necessarily those from the time of mummification,” Huber said. “Over thousands of years, evaporation, oxidation, and even storage conditions have significantly altered the original scent profile.”

Huber authored a study two years ago that analyzed residue from a jar that had contained mummified organs of a noblewoman to identify embalming ingredients, their origins and what they revealed about trade routes. She then worked with a perfumer to create an interpretation of the embalming scent, known as “Scent of Eternity,” for an exhibition at the Moesgaard Museum in Denmark.

Researchers of the current study hope to do something similar, using their findings to develop “smellscapes” to artificially recreate the scents they detected and enhance the experience for future museumgoers.

“Museums have been called white cubes, where you are prompted to read, to see, to approach everything from a distance with your eyes,” Bembibre said. “Observing the mummified bodies through a glass case reduces the experience because we don’t get to smell them. We don’t get to know about the mummification process in an experiential way, which is one of the ways that we understand and engage with the world.”

[saywhat-politics]

Global sea temperatures reached an all-time high in 2024, according to a new study published Friday in the journal Advances in Atmospheric Sciences.

The 54 researchers from seven countries deployed thousands of instruments to collect ocean data both at the surface and up to 2,000 meters below the surface — the latter called ocean heat content — covering all the world’s oceans.

“The broken records in the ocean have become a broken record,” professor Lijing Cheng with the Institute of Atmospheric Physics at the Chinese Academy of Sciences, said in a press release.

The researchers found that all three major metrics they analyzed broke records this year: global sea surface temperature, average global sea surface temperature and the temperature of water up to 2,000 meters below the surface.

[thesilliestrovingalive]

Updated: June 9, 2025

Reworked Character #14: Doctor Amadeus

POTENTIAL TRIGGER WARNING: Viewer discretion is advised due to references to death, crime, unethical experiments, self-harm, and SA.

Real name: Ghyslaine Laëtitia Comtois (she legally changed her name to Manfrida Amadeus)

Alias: Angel in Carnage

Nicknames: Ghys and Hakase

Occupation: Governing scientist and founder of the Amadeus Syndicate

Special skills: Proficiency in AI development and the manufacturing of advanced machines, knowledge of biology, chemistry, and ancient technologies, technological prowess, performing surgeries, and blackmailing

Goddess abilities: She can influence mental states, inducing insanity and sensory overload through manipulating self-perception by creating distortions of bodily transformation and vivid visions of personal and loved ones' demise. With a single, hyper-detailed thought, she can materialise advanced weapons and complex mechanical contraptions. Her superhuman strength rivals that of two established armies combined. She's extremely durable against bullets, tank blasts, knives, rockets, and fire. She can summon bolts of blue lightning to strike her enemies, causing deadly paralysis and severely damaging their organs. She possesses ergokinesis, luminokinesis, nihilokinesis, pyrokinesis, geokinesis, and aerokinesis.

She can interact, communicate, and manipulate technology through electrical pulse sensing, physical contact, and sheer mental force. Her teleportation capabilities allow her to instantly transport herself to any location on Earth, while also enabling her to transport others within a specific radius of 50-90 ft (1524-2743.2 cm) from her position. She possesses telepathic abilities that enable her to communicate silently with sentient beings capable of speech without any hindrance. Additionally, she can exert total control over the minds of others, transforming them into unwitting instruments, by releasing spores from microscopic orifices on her neck. These spores, once inhaled, infect the brain's motor control, cognitive processing, and communication centres, granting her dominion over their thoughts and actions.

She can conjure an impenetrable barrier, comprising three layers: an illusion-causing smoke screen that disorients foes, parasitic vines that infect and transform victims into twisted mutants, and a core of solid adamant. This self-sustaining shield continually regenerates until she chooses to dissipate it. She has hyper-cognitive processing, allowing her to execute multiple calculations and thought processes simultaneously. Due to her superior photographic memory, she can retain and recall every thought, emotion, encounter, and experience with perfect clarity. Despite her incredible durability, a collective effort from powerful espers can inflict minute, albeit negligible, physical harm. However, full-blooded deities possess the capacity to effortlessly overwhelm and defeat her.

It's unknown if she possesses any other abilities upon achieving apotheosis, but everyone believes that she has yet to develop all of her godly powers.

Hobbies: Spending time delving into scientific research on the forces of the universe, collecting fossils, rare plant specimens, and books on a variety of intellectual topics, developing weapons for the Amadeus Syndicate and their alliances, taking care of White Baby, and pseudoscientific theorising

Likes: The satisfaction she feels after successfully conducting an experiment, challenging the limits of the mortal body and the moral boundaries of scientific research, laughing in the face of incompetence, classical and industrial music, and genetic engineering

Dislikes: The constraints of mortal physiology and current scientific understanding, having to kill trusted allies and employees to keep her secrets safe, running low on smoking essentials and sweet treats to snack on, losing valuable research data, and bright sunlight

Favourite food: Croque monsieur, beschuit with hagelslag, and homemade sweet snacks

Favourite drink: Pinot gris

Sexuality: Sex-indifferent, heteroflexible sapiosexual

Gender: Demigirl

Age: 54 (in 2022), 60 (in 2028), 62 (in 2030), 64 (in 2032), 66 (in 2034), 73 (in 2041), 75 (in 2043), 76 (in 2044), and 79 (in 2047)

Blood type: O-

Weight: 153 lbs. (69 kg)

Human design: She’s a 5’ 11” (180.34 cm) French ectomorph with a slender yet athletic build, sloping shoulders, small breasts, a well-defined waist, and curvaceous hips. She has limestone skin and heterochromatic eyes with visible bags underneath them: her right eye, a glass prosthetic replacement, is a light amber, while her left eye is grey-green with brown flecks. Ghyslaine has a few moles: one on the left side of her chin; one near the corner of her right eye; two above her right breast; one on the back of her left hand; and three slightly below her left knee. She has a silvery-pink birthmark on her left shoulder, almost shaped like a waning moon with five protruding spikes. Her waist-length raspberry red hair has messy, voluminous curls streaked with silver-grey, often pulled back into a low ponytail.

Thanks to experimental anti-aging drugs, she looks remarkably youthful, with her face showing subtle signs of aging limited to bunny lines, crow's feet, and faint tear troughs. Her right thigh features a tattoo of a statue of Prudentia made from griotte marble, depicted with a glass serpent wrapped around her neck. She cradles a Gallic rooster in her right arm, while her left arm holds a bouquet of red and blue poppies with a small purple mirror nestled at its centre. In contrast, her left hand and forearm are heavily scarred, evidence of severe burns and self-inflicted lacerations. Her upper right arm shows multiple injection sites, evidence of her experimentation with various substances. A healed scar on the centre of her forehead marks the site of her self-performed trepanation using a dental drill.

She wears a white lab coat, a silver ring with a red pearl on her right index finger, and a gold-plated monocle over her left eye. Her right lab coat pocket held a variety of items: a pack of cigarettes, her sweet snack of the day, Argentine blue neoprene gloves, a well-worn leather lilac journal full of scribbled notes, diagrams, and radical scientific hypotheses, and five experimental serum vials (mutant, zombie, mummy, simian creature, and mantid monster). Ghylaine’s left lab coat pocket contains the following: a box of cigars, a versatile multitool that's made of pliers, wire cutters, a screwdriver, and a knife, and a red crystal from Sol Dae Rokker that radiates a yellow glow when exposed to sunlight.

She wears a square-shaped silvery watch on her right wrist with a timepiece that boasts a gilt-brass dial, adorned with amethyst-coloured hands and white numbers from 1 to 12, interspersed with five delicate etchings. Additional features include a secondary display bar indicating AM/PM, while a reddish-black strap is securely fastened with a silver snap-on buckle.

Ghyslaine wears circular nazar charm earrings, outlined in gold, suspended from medium-sized silver hoop rings. She wears a right-side drop leg holster for a Colt Anaconda with a 6-inch barrel, accompanied by a greenish-black waist pack secured at the back of her belt that holds .44 Remington Magnum cartridges for the revolver. On the front left side of her belt, she has a secured holder for the same stun gun that Nadia wields. She wears teal trousers secured by a sage green belt with a silver buckle, paired with red-laced Prussian blue dress boots.

She wears a long-sleeved teal shirt with eight golden buttons running down the front and two breast pockets. The shirt features a turned collar that frames a velvet fern green cravat, patterned with horizontal goldenrod stripes and cardinal red triangles. It’s adorned with a 2x6 white-and-red chequered patch of 12 squares (six above, six below) above the left breast pocket. Her breast pockets carry a metallic red-green lighter, a black ink pen, and three highlighters in yellow, green, and pink. Underneath her dress shirt, she wears an E-Armour bulletproof vest, emblazoned with the insignia of the Amadeus Syndicate.

Goddess design: She’s a 13’ 6” (411.48 cm) nude entity with a flat chest, incredibly smooth malachite-hued skin, elfin ears, three pointed tongues, and two rows of carnivorous gold teeth. She retains her original hairstyle, now lengthened to reach down to her ankles, woven with streaks of dark brown, and adorned with red and blue poppies. Her face features six silver-outlined eyes with cardinal red slit pupils: the left three eyes in a dull amber and the right three in light cyan. Her chest bears the same Black Sun symbol on the palm of her greenish-black glove, placed directly in the centre. Her back is heavily scarred from severe burns, brutal cuts, and hacked-away flesh, revealing bronze-hued muscles. She has an identical tail to Schwarz Metzelei from Metal Slug Attack, but the tip is always open and it features a notable colour variation: the red accents are replaced with teal and the grey is substituted with a shimmering goldenrod hue.

She has horns similar to those of Drache Goldenes from Metal Slug Attack, but they appear to be made from a material resembling griotte marble. She possesses the lower half of Awakened Blume Metzelei from Metal Slug Attack, combined with the birthmark of her original self. Emerging from her upper back, she has two large bat wings with an amethyst-hued membrane, Prussian blue-colored forearms, wrists, thumbs, and fingers, and a reddish-black claw protrudes from each thumb. She has a partially exposed sapphire ribcage, revealing a rhythmic, tide-like pulse that synchronises with each heartbeat.

She has six arms protruding from her lower back and two more where her malformed kidneys are supposedly located. Each hand has pointed, clawless fingers and a Greek letter in the middle of their palm: for the lower torso arms, her right has β (beta) and her left has Ω (omega); for the first lower back arms, her right has ζ (zeta) and her left has Δ (delta); for the second pair, her right has λ (lambda) and her left has ξ (xi); and for the third pair, her right has φ (phi) and her left has Ψ (psi).

Character summary: She’s a composed and wise leader, boasting a genius-level intellect, who derives great satisfaction from pioneering new discoveries and pushing the boundaries of human potential, scientific innovation, and ethical standards. Driven by her insatiable curiosity, Ghyslaine fearlessly conducts self-experiments and utilises human and animal subjects in her controlled, scientific research. While she's a visionary thinker with grand ambitions and an obsessive attention to detail, she tempers her perfectionism with pragmatic decision-making when circumstances dictate it. She's a sadist with a strong aversion to willful ignorance, disregard for knowledge, experimental setbacks, and opposition that thwarts her plans.

She presents herself as polite, open-minded, and willingly generous, but beneath that facade is a ruthless manipulator, driven by arrogance and stubbornness to get her way, no matter the cost. She consistently prioritises her own self-interest, forming alliances and collaborating with others only when it advances her own agenda. To achieve her objectives, she employs manipulative tactics, such as exploiting others' vulnerabilities and showering them with insincere praise. She tends to delegate manual tasks to others whenever possible, but is willing to get involved and take charge when circumstances require it.

She's not particularly fond of the idea of immediate results because it primarily revolves around showcasing opulence and wealth, which she believes is less effective than long-term investment. She often feels uncertain about evacuation, fearing it would significantly set back her plans if she is forced to leave. However, she isn't above hesitantly accepting the need to flee when the situation becomes too dire to handle, much to her frustration. She's consistently displeased when incompetence disrupts her plans and damages her weapons and machines, yet she frequently displays a sense of intrigued admiration for the persistence and strength of her enemies. She's often amused by those who confront her about her heinous actions, carelessly brushing off their concerns, though she occasionally reveals a hint of fury. She also becomes maliciously amused when she's able to exploit the weaknesses of her enemies and break them down easily.

She's a cunning, calculating, and intuitive strategist, consistently outmaneuvering her competitors and adversaries while staying ahead of everyone by meticulously preparing for a wide range of situations. She’s a highly analytical and emotionally detached megalomaniac, adept at keeping secrets through her tight-lipped nature, strategic evasion, and expert use of vagueness and deflection. She's an optimistic nihilist who revels in her vast wealth, technological prowess, and recognition as the world's most brilliant scientist. Ghyslaine is a hypervigilant and seductive individual who believes in a collective consciousness and exhibits traits of psychopathy, including an uncaring temperament, boldness, and a strong desire for social dominance. She prioritises satisfying her scientific curiosity and rigorous work ethic over others' needs, and has no qualms about deliberately harming people to advance her own ambitions. She has zero tolerance for betrayal and is particularly sensitive to skepticism about her intellectual abilities. She finds it infuriating when others suggest she might be senile or ignorant, or question the validity of her ambitious plans.

She's surprisingly cynical and misanthropic towards humanity, viewing them as worthless, filthy parasites who don't appreciate knowledge or the beauty of reality. She believes that people are more inclined to prioritise basic survival, gratuitous violence, sexual gratification, the glorification of disturbing topics, and self-destruction over everything else. She's a staunch believer in the existence of unseen, authentic deities beyond mainstream human religions and mythologies, such as Sol Dae Rokker and the Avatar of Evil. In Ghyslaine’s view, the God revered in Western religions is a malevolent impostor, and she holds that a genuinely benevolent deity worthy of the name—transcending human understanding—lies beyond the cosmos. Her vision for the New World involves achieving apotheosis, triggering the Alator, merging with the Avatar of Evil, and ultimately becoming the omnipotent goddess of a rebooted timeline.

She treats White Baby as if it were her actual child, considering it her best AI masterpiece, rivaling that of MS-Alice. She has purposefully programmed White Baby to be partially sentient to make their mother-child relationship feel more tangible. Despite White Baby's inability to speak and reliance on code and text messages for communication, she has a deep understanding of the emotions displayed by the virus and the actions it performs. In turn, White Baby regards her as a mother deserving of love and is incredibly obedient to her commands, even during a rogue state. White Baby is programmed to never harm Ghyslaine and do everything possible to keep her safe and ensure her goals remain intact. She frequently expresses concern for White Baby's well-being, understanding that if it were to gain full independence, it could destroy everything in its and her allies' path to world domination. Although she never designed White Baby to destroy humanity, she knows that the virus has that potential and believes that the strong must control the weak.

Ghyslaine maintains a positive relationship with General Morden, admiring his charisma, leadership, use of manipulation tactics, and commitment to his soldiers' well-being. She strongly supports his efforts to combat government and military corruption, believing it will bring about positive change and overcome entrenched systemic injustices. In exchange for the Rebel Army's assistance in securing resources and protecting Amadeus Syndicate assets—including mines, worksites, weapon and medical facilities, underground laboratories, and the Amadeus Mainframe Base—she offers to aid the his army’s technological advancement and provide essential supplies, such as medical equipment and financial resources. Their dynamic is underscored by strong sexual tension, fueled by Ghyslaine’s alluring nature and strategic flirtation, which she employs to maintain a facade of innocence and avoid arousing suspicion.

She’s also on good terms with Rootmars, deeply respecting her mission to safeguard Earth's valuable resources. This alignment stems from her conviction that humans are wasteful and fail to utilise natural resources to their full potential. Additionally, she holds Martians and Invaders in high esteem, acknowledging their technological superiority over humanity. She finds Ptolemaios to be a captivating figure, intrigued by rumours suggesting he may be the first esper in all of human history, predating even Hyakutaro. Ghyslaine holds him in high esteem, respecting his vast experience, unwavering faith in the authentic deities, unrelenting dedication to the Ptolemaic Army's advancement, and calculating mindset.

She deeply appreciates Oghma's loyalty and willingness to support her as he demonstrates a clear understanding of her ambitions and genuine respect for her intellectual pursuits. She enjoys sharing a few drinks with him, engaging in lively gossip, and playfully teasing him about his serious yet slyly confident demeanour and his flustered reactions to her well-meaning compliments. Among everyone, she treats Oghma as a true friend rather than just a professional acquaintance or close ally. She never resorts to being rough, demanding, and mercilessly threatening with him. Instead, she subtly manipulates him in ways he doesn't notice, ensuring he remains obedient and appropriately occupied by offering him satisfying pay, fulfilling jobs, decent vacation time, and an adequate degree of freedom.

She previously shared a cordial connection with Marco, largely due to her admiration for his exceptional intellect and vast expertise in computer science, which surpassed that of most Regular Army soldiers. Despite severing their relationship after exploiting his vulnerability, she remains drawn to Marco's physical beauty, stoic demeanour, and impressive intellectual prowess. She finds Clark's melancholic nature exhausting, while Nadia's playful antics, sporadic laziness, and love of shopping sprees are thoroughly irritating and disruptive. To her, Nadia represents a profound disappointment—a willfully defiant and uncooperative individual who has failed to live up to expectations as the intended successor to the Amadeus Syndicate.

Backstory: Ghyslaine Laëtitia Comtois was born on October 5, 1968 in Annecy, France. She comes from a family with a notorious history of clandestine partnerships with corrupt government agencies, inhumane wildlife experimentation, and the development of devastating bioweapons and malicious computer viruses. Two of her most prominent ancestors, Duke Koudou and Parker Eugene von Wittenberg, have particularly troubling legacies.

Marmaduke Koudou was infamous for brokering shady business deals that advanced the political interests and technological capabilities of his government allies and his own company, which specialised in military technology and biochemistry research. Following his death from septic shock, his company was dismantled. In collaboration with renowned biologists, Duke Koudou conducted extensive research on the Elder Centipede, which he referred to as the "Sea Worm”. His studies revealed that this semi-aquatic creature, possessing biomechanical properties and sclerotized scales, has existed since antiquity, dating back to the Hadean Eon. Notably, his research identified the Elder Centipede as an antediluvian arthropod due to the presence of unknown microorganisms attached to it. Marmaduke proposed exploiting the Elder Centipede's unique characteristics—its ability to automatically attack moving objects and inject lethal microorganisms in the form of purple acid—as a potential bioweapon for outer space applications.

Parker Eugene von Wittenberg was a notorious hacker who worked secretly with government agencies across Southern Europe and North America, crafting malicious computer viruses for use against enemies during times of war. His most infamous creation was the highly classified "First Baby" virus, designed to infiltrate and extract sensitive data from adversary systems. Outside of cyber exploits, his research was deeply problematic, focusing on eugenic experiments that sought to control and manipulate wildlife populations, while also studying their social behaviours. He used his cybersecurity firm as a front to conceal his illicit experiments, but his life was cut short when an unknown assailant spiked his glass of cider with a lethal dose of tramadol. The assassination not only claimed his life but also marked the loss of the First Baby computer virus, which vanished without a trace, never to resurface again. Rumours suggest that the First Baby virus was either acquired by the Earth Federation or destroyed by the unknown assassin.

She grew up in a middle-class family. Her biological father left her mother, Jacqueline Comtois, 4 months before she was born for reasons unknown. 2 months after giving birth to Ghyslaine, a sole survivor of triplets whose siblings were stillborn, Jacqueline married Yoshihiko. Yoshihiko was the president of a Japanese video game development company. As part of his role, he travelled the world promoting the company's games, always carrying AES cartridges, a catalogue of new products, and a set of memory cards in his briefcase. However, he had a tendency to get distracted, and his briefcase often went missing. Invariably, he would blame the person he was with at the time. On every birthday, her parents would take her to visit a local museum featuring regional artifacts, including Alpine furniture and religious art, as well as a natural history exhibit.

At just 6-years-old, she demonstrated exceptional intellectual prowess by articulately outlining Sigmund Freud's psychosexual theory and reciting the entire periodic table with flawless accuracy. However, by age 7, having discovered her family's troubled legacy of unethical research and shady business dealings, she resolved to forge a different path. Ghyslaine’s insatiable curiosity drove her to explore diverse interests: science, medicine, computer science, occultism, mythology, religion, philosophy, politics, and human and animal psychology and sociology. With these passions in mind, she aspired to become a psychologist, humanistic philosopher, and biomedical scientist, determined to make a positive impact.

In 1976, a conflict erupted across Western, Northern, and Southern Europe as multiple countries engaged in battles over territory and political differences. The conflict erupted from a skirmish during a joint military and archaeological expedition on Ultima Thule, commonly known as Scrap Island, between Austria and Portugal. The dispute centred on two key issues: the exploitation of Ultima Thule’s resources and the fate of the ancient deity believed to be buried on the island, pending its discovery. The situation escalated into full-scale war with the involvement of France, Luxembourg, Denmark, the United Kingdom, Greece, and Montenegro.

Two rival alliances emerged, each with distinct objectives: the Vanguard and the Luminary. The Vanguard, consisting of France, the United Kingdom, and Austria, formed an alliance to harness Scrap Island's resources for military advancements and construction materials. Their primary goal was to excavate the deity, seeking insights into ancient history and the divine realm, while also aiming to advance military technology to enhance combat effectiveness. They received significant support from the Regular Army and the Germi family, who shared their vision. In contrast, the Luminary alliance included Luxembourg, Denmark, Greece, Portugal, and Montenegro, uniting to ethically use the island's resources for medical breakthroughs and jewelry production. Their ultimate aim was to excavate the deity to develop biological agents for warfare and medical use. The Gutenschiff family provided limited support to this coalition, aligning with its goals but refraining from full commitment.

To mobilise support, each country leveraged patriotism and nationalism, appealing to the sense of duty and loyalty among its citizens. The ultimate objective was to assemble a formidable army and emerge victorious on behalf of their aligned faction. However, not all citizens were driven by ideological conviction; some joined the fight solely out of concern for the safety of their loved ones, coerced by fear of the consequences of inaction. The conflict would become etched in history as the Thule Expeditionary Conquest and would culminate in 1988 with the signing of a landmark peace treaty among all involved nations and the Earth Federation, aimed at preventing similar events from occurring in the future.It was agreed that the resources of Ultima Thule could be used for the betterment of civilization; however, extreme exploitation and the use of these resources for nefarious purposes would be punishable by severe legal fines and imprisonment.

At age 9, Ghyslaine's life took a drastic turn when her family was tragically killed in an airstrike during a battle in France. Annecy found itself at the crossroads of a multifaceted struggle as France, Austria, and the wealthy, superstitious, and battle-hardened Germi family clashed with Portugal, Montenegro, and the bloodthirsty and fearsome Gutenschiff clan. She was initially consumed by deep fear as the war brought chaos to the streets. Crime ran rampant as opportunistic individuals exploited the conflict for personal gain. Mass hysteria gripped the city as many people either hid in fear or panicked and acted out of desperation.

With no one else to turn to, she was forced to rely on herself for survival. She gradually became acquainted with the harsh realities of the streets, navigating the underworld of petty crime and vulnerable individuals fighting to get by. As time passed, she became more skilled at manipulating others to get what she needed. She used her words to exploit their vulnerabilities and influence their actions. Ghyslaine also developed expertise in shoplifting and pickpocketing, and sold illicit goods and bootlegged liquor, often getting these items through theft or chance discovery. She even acquired illegally sold weapons to defend herself when necessary, which she would either methodically discard after committing murder or sell to others for a quick buck, teaching herself how to wield tasers and handguns.

Underneath, she would cultivate a cynical and misanthropic outlook on humanity, veering towards nihilism. Despite this, she remained optimistic, holding out hope for a brighter future. However, the rampant poverty, crime, and violence surrounding her increased her risk of developing psychopathic tendencies.

After being severely burned on her left hand and forearm while fighting off a sexual assailant, she retaliated against her attacker, ultimately killing them. She embarked on a path of vengeance against those who had wronged her, using her knowledge of psychology and chemistry to inflict unhappiness on others. In an attempt to cope with the emotional turmoil of the war and the harm she caused, she briefly resorted to self-harm, which left scars on her left hand and forearm.

At 14, Ghyslaine was among the teenagers from Annecy taken into the Regular Army's orphan program by urban troops. The program relocated her to Saint John, New Brunswick, Canada, providing refuge from the war. There, she received shelter and education, including English language instruction, which sparked her fascination with foreign languages, particularly Chinese, Spanish, and Afrikaans. However, her time in the orphan program was short-lived. A wealthy Canadian couple from Victoria, British Columbia, discovered her connection to Marmaduke Koudou and Parker Eugene von Wittenberg and promptly adopted her.

They lavished her with every comfort, introducing her to an opulent lifestyle that she secretly adored. Her adoptive parents, while strict and occasionally dismissive of her emotions, encouraged her to prioritise academic and professional excellence. They rarely disciplined her, convinced that her exceptional intelligence and self-regulation made her inherently responsible and incapable of wrongdoing. Ghyslaine didn't mind, as she was driven to excel and immersed herself in intellectual pursuits, such as political theory and scientific philosophy.

Upon graduating from high school, she received 8 prestigious awards and 6 scholarships in recognition of her outstanding achievements in calculus and STEM fields, biology, chemistry, computer programming and software development, geopolitics and international relations, religious studies, philosophical debates and ethics, and psychological and sociological research. She proceeded to university, driven by her ambition to become a leading scientist. Ghyslaine’s unconventional research and theories sparked controversy, exploring topics such as the potential therapeutic applications of controlled substances, ethical population management strategies, the interconnectedness of human consciousness through shared ancestry, neural electrical pulses, and subconscious processes, and the concept of digital immortality through consciousness uploading and cybernetic bodies.

She would also cultivate an obsessive fascination with pushing the boundaries of science, marked by a penchant for conducting self-experiments. These experiments included learning how to self-sterilise without medical aid, creating and taking anti-aging drugs, removing her own eye to study the ocular microbiome, and exhuming freshly buried corpses to explore ways to make a severed body part function without a host. Ghyslaine also performed self-trepanation, hoping to reduce bodily stress by improving cerebral circulation and alleviating neurosis. Additionally, she injected herself with various psychoactive substances, narcotic analgesics, and central nervous system stimulants to document their potential therapeutic benefits and explore possibilities for legal medications with less addictive side effects.

After graduating from university, she mysteriously got in touch with a hitman named Oghma, who possessed Tuatha Dé Danann DNA. At her command, Oghma assassinated her adoptive parents, disposing of their bodies and erasing evidence of the crime. She was driven by a malicious desire to secure her inheritance, the substantial sum her adoptive parents had kindly set aside for her. After accessing the funds, she relocated to Britain, where she went on to become a renowned scientist for the British government. Her breakthrough achievement came when she genetically modified active cancer cells into dormant ones, significantly reducing the likelihood of reactivation in children. After Oghma shared information about the ancient lore of the Tuatha Dé Danann and apotheosis, this newfound interest sparked a grand vision for her New World. 

Ghyslaine secretly masterminded a human and animal trafficking ring, as well as a theft operation targeting precious British artifacts. By exploiting these illicit resources, Ghyslaine furthered her research by developing simian and mantis serums, collecting DNA and bodily fluid samples, crafting pharmaceuticals from biological materials, designing cybernetic prosthetics, and conducting eugenic experiments. However, British authorities soon uncovered her clandestine activities and issued a warrant for her arrest, forcing Ghyslaine and Oghma to flee. They escaped to the Republic of Bashkortostan, where Ghyslaine assumed a new identity: Manfrida Amadeus. To maintain their empire, they resorted to peddling illicit substances and stolen artifacts, while also sharing sensitive government secrets. Bounty hunters from the British authorities and mercenaries from the Ikari Warriors who pursued her would vanish, leading to a collapse in the pursuit. As fear spread, the remaining hunters and mercenaries backed down, and the bounty on her head was quietly dropped.

After maintaining a low profile for five months, Oghma introduced her to President Marx, who was eager to collaborate with such a talented scientist. This meeting proved pivotal as President Marx successfully persuaded the Chief of the Regular Army to partner with her. Contrary to expectations, the Chief readily agreed. With the Regular Army and President Marx providing substantial funding, she established the Amadeus Syndicate and constructed the Amadeus Mainframe Base in Oceania. In exchange for their support, she agreed to develop cutting-edge weapons and war machines, provide medical services, and conduct scientific and technological experiments. She pioneered numerous innovations, including the development of the E-Armour, Slugnoids, Laser Guns, the Thunder Cloud, the Mobile Satellite, the special suits that high-ranking peacekeeping troops wear, Walking Machines, cyborgs, and a mandatory hospital protocol for uploading human consciousness into cyberspace.

Following a meeting with high-ranking Regular officials at the Joint Military Operations Headquarters to discuss the SV-001 prototype, Protogunner, and esper super soldier program, she crossed paths with Donald Morden. The two forged a cordial bond over dinner at an upscale Genoa restaurant, sharing stories about their lives and future aspirations. Later, while treating Tequila's battle injuries sustained during a skirmish against pirates in Riyadh, she met the seasoned mercenary. Her path would again cross with skilled operatives Gimlet and Red Eye during a visit to the Amadeus Mainframe Base, where they were restocking medical supplies, laser guns, and AR-10 Autorifles.

Impressed by Tequila, Gimlet, and Red Eye's exceptional combat skills and accomplishments, she conceived an idea: transforming them into super soldiers. However, recognizing the untimeliness of such a proposal, she opted to put the notion on hold, biding her time. She decided to befriend them in order to appear friendly and trustworthy. Gimlet welcomed her with open arms, while Red Eye warmed up to her gradually. However, it took a lot more effort to win Tequila over.

In 2010, utilising advanced Martian cloning technology, she created Nadia through a test tube in an underground laboratory owned by the Amadeus Syndicate in Quimper, France. Her goal was twofold: to produce the perfect heir to the Amadeus Syndicate by creating a woman of science and militarism, and to experiment with clone physiology and psychology. To foster an independent sense of identity, she kept Nadia's true status as an imperfect clone a secret, allowing her to believe she was her own person. Additionally, she withheld information about Nadia's family legacy to prevent her from questioning the Amadeus Syndicate's motives or abandoning her research, which was crucial to realising her vision of the New World.

During her time working with the Regular Army and involvement in President Marx's defence contract endeavours, she developed an artificial intelligence capable of simulating the psychological and sociological behaviours of children as they mature. This AI primarily drew upon research conducted on Nadia, utilising data from the Amadeus Syndicate's files, to which it had authorised access to. Initially dubbed Young Deus, a nod to her legally changed name, the AI's language use and responses to commands resembled those of a child, but its programming quickly evolved to mimic the characteristics of a mature adolescent.

Upon learning of her advanced artificial intelligence, the Chief of the Regular Army and President Marx urged her to adapt it for military applications. She subsequently transformed Young Deus into Iron Fortress, reprogramming it to commandeer enemy tanks and utilise them to safeguard Amadeus Syndicate members and registered affiliates, thereby promoting global peace and security.

However, Iron Fortress' flaws became catastrophically apparent during a guerrilla warfare incident in the southern United States. The AI mistakenly identified Regular Army urban troops as hostile forces and attempted to neutralise them, prioritising the protection of perceived innocent civilians who were, in reality, criminal insurgents. Recognizing the devastating potential of Iron Fortress, she swiftly shut it down and sequestered the virus in a secure, isolated compartment within her files. This decision brought relief to the Chief of the Regular Army but dismayed President Marx. Unbeknownst to them, she secretly redeveloped Iron Fortress into the White Baby computer virus. This revamped iteration could bypass the primary military systems of nations worldwide via the internet.

Three months before the Great Morden War, the alliance between the Amadeus Syndicate and the Regular Army shattered. The relationship imploded due to the Amadeus Syndicate's secretive creation of a bioweapon designed to further their plans for global domination, utilising the excavated extraterrestrial entity on Ultima Thule for experimentation. Additionally, Doctor Amadeus was involved in the sexual assault of Marco Rossi to harvest his DNA and semen samples. The Amadeus Syndicate also transformed innocent Regular Army troops into Mutated Soldiers and created terrifying creatures, including the Chowmein-Conga and Enormous Morays, on Pallas Island and in the Oro Sol Ruins. The final blow was the illicit plundering of advanced Tuatha Dé Danann technology from Scrap Island, native villages, and ancient Ajirabian ruins, aided by pirates and the Phantom Strike.

Ptolemaios offered refuge to Doctor Amadeus, Oghma, and their team of scientists and soldiers, fleeing the impending Great Morden War. Furthermore, Ptolemaios deployed his troops to support the Syndicate Infantry, repelling the Regular Army's assault on the Amadeus Mainframe Base, securing a decisive victory. During the war, she seized the opportunity to advance her research on her groundbreaking bioweapon, known as Wysteria. In addition to this, she designed cutting-edge weaponry and fully head-covering gas masks for the Ptolemaic Army. Meanwhile, she chose to keep Ptolemaios company, having observed his loneliness, and used this chance to forge a deeper connection with him. Through their interactions, she discreetly laid the groundwork for a potential future alliance.

Following the Great Morden War, General Morden forged an alliance with her, entrusting her with the bodies of Tequila, Gimlet, and Red Eye. United by a shared vision, they aimed to revolutionise these individuals into super soldiers, resulting in the creation of semi-clones. She integrated their recently updated digital consciousness into a biomechanical brain and nervous system. The experiments she conducted would heavily alter the three individuals: Gimlet and Tequila were imbued with psionic energy, while Red Eye received a Super Devil form and two new abilities. She ensured that they couldn’t recall the circumstances of their death, aware that such memories would pose significant risks to their loyalty and effectiveness within the Rebel Army and Amadeus Syndicate. In the heavily fortified basement of the Amadeus Mainframe Base, she maintained Tequila, Gimlet, and Red Eye in cryogenic stasis, alongside Wysteria, ensuring their secure containment.

[covid-safer-hotties]

Reference saved in our archive

Smaller study, but malnourished people have worse outcomes from acute covid infections. We're not gonna eat our way out of the pandemic, but making sure you eat some greens and blueberries from time to time can literally save your life.

Background: Identifying nutritional risk in COVID-19 patients poses a challenge due to the unique qualities of every nutritional screening instrument. The objective was to assess the efficacy of six nutritional scores, including the Nutritional Risk Screening 2002 (NRS-2002) score, the NUTRIC (nutrition risk in the critically ill) score, the modified NUTRIC score, the prognostic nutritional index (PNI), controlling nutritional status (CONUT) score, TCB index (TCBI), predicting prognosis of COVID-19 patients.

Methods: Clinical data were collected from COVID-19 patients admitted to the First Affiliated Hospital of Wenzhou Medical University between December 2022 and February 2023. Participants in this research were divided into two groups: all patients and those specifically from the intensive care unit (ICU). Each group was further stratified into two groups: survivors and non-survivors.

Result: 506 COVID-19 patients and 190 COVID-19 patients in intensive care unit (ICU) were evaluated. In all COVID-19 patients, we found that NRS-2002 (p < 0.001) and TCBI (p = 0.002) were statistically significant independent predictors in multivariate analyses, while APACHE II score (p = 0,048) and the mNUTRIC score (p = 0.025) were statistically significant independent predictors in multivariate analyses in ICU patients. The NRS-2002 demonstrated a higher AUC value (0.687) than other nutritional scores in all patients, with an optimum cut-off value of 3, translating into a corresponding sensitivity of 66.2% and specificity of 68.7%. With an optimum cut-off value of 4, the mNUTRIC score demonstrated a higher AUC value (0.884) in ICU patients, resulting in a sensitivity of 88.4% and a specificity of 76.9%. By using the discrimination and clinical application (DCA) curve, NRS-2002 demonstrated the greatest net benefit in all patients, while NUTRIC score and mNUTRIC score offered the more significant overall advantage than other nutritional scores in ICU patients. Kaplan–Meier analyses showed lower survival rates in patients in low nutritional risk.

Conclusion: Malnutrition was common in COVID-19 patients. The mNUTRIC score and NRS-2002 were, respectively, more effctive scoring systems of prognosis in all COVID-19 patients and severe or critical COVID-19 patients of the intensive care unit (ICU).

[spacetimewithstuartgary]

International team captures direct high-definition image of the 'cosmic web'

Matter in intergalactic space is distributed in a vast network of interconnected filamentary structures, collectively referred to as the cosmic web. With hundreds of hours of observations, an international team of researchers has now obtained an unprecedented high-definition image of a cosmic filament inside this web, connecting two active forming galaxies—dating back to when the universe was about 2 billion years old.

A pillar of modern cosmology is the existence of dark matter, which constitutes about 85% of all matter in the universe. Under the influence of gravity, dark matter forms an intricate cosmic web composed of filaments, at whose intersections the brightest galaxies emerge. This cosmic web acts as the scaffolding on which all visible structures in the universe are built: within the filaments, gas flows to fuel star formation in galaxies. Direct observations of the fuel supply of such galaxies would advance our understanding of galaxy formation and evolution.

However, studying the gas within this cosmic web is incredibly challenging. Intergalactic gas has been detected mainly indirectly through its absorption of light from bright background sources. But the observed results do not elucidate the distribution of this gas. Even the most abundant element, hydrogen, emits only a faint glow, making it basically impossible for instruments of the previous generation to directly observe such gas.

In this new study, an international team led by researchers at the University of Milano-Bicocca and including scientists at the Max Planck Institute for Astrophysics (MPA) obtained an unprecedented high-definition image of a cosmic filament using MUSE (Multi-Unit Spectroscopic Explorer), an innovative spectrograph installed on the Very Large Telescope at the European Southern Observatory in Chile.

Even with the advanced capabilities of this sophisticated instrument, the research group had to carry out one of the most ambitious MUSE observation campaigns ever completed in a single region of the sky, acquiring data over hundreds of hours to detect the filament at high significance.

The study, led by Davide Tornotti, Ph.D. student at the University of Milano-Bicocca, used this ultrasensitive data to produce the sharpest image ever obtained of a cosmic filament spanning 3 million light-years and connecting two galaxies, each hosting an active supermassive black hole.

The discovery, recently published in Nature Astronomy opens new avenues to directly constrain gas properties within intergalactic filaments and to refine our understanding of galaxy formation and evolution.

"By capturing the faint light emitted by this filament, which traveled for just under 12 billion years to reach Earth, we were able to precisely characterize its shape, explains Tornotti. "For the first time, we could trace the boundary between the gas residing in galaxies and the material contained within the cosmic web through direct measurements."

The researchers took advantage of supercomputer simulations of the universe run at MPA to calculate predictions of the expected filamentary emission given the current cosmological model. "When compared to the novel high-definition image of the cosmic web, we find substantial agreement between current theory and observations," Tornotti adds.

This discovery and the encouraging agreement with supercomputer simulations are key to understanding the tenuous gas environment around galaxies and open up novel possibilities to pin down the galaxies' fuel supply.

Fabrizio Arrigoni Battaia, MPA staff scientist involved in the study, concludes, "We are thrilled by this direct, high-definition observation of a cosmic filament. But as people say in Bavaria: 'Eine ist keine'—one doesn't count. So we are gathering further data to uncover more such structures, with the ultimate goal of having a comprehensive vision of how gas is distributed and flows in the cosmic web."

TOP IMAGE: Simulation of a vast region of the universe based on the current cosmological model and performed using supercomputers. In the image, the faint glow of the gas within the cosmic filaments, forming a dense cosmic web, is shown in white. At the intersections of these filaments, the gas within galaxies, which fuels the formation of new stars, is highlighted in red. Credit: Alejandro Benitez-Llambay/Universität Mailand-Bicocca/MPA

LOWER IMAGE: The image shows the diffuse gas (yellow to purple) contained within the cosmic filament connecting two galaxies (yellow stars), extending across a vast distance of 3 million light-years. Credit: Davide Tornotti/University of Milano-Bicocca

[dancingfoxrocks]

Wanted to collect some of the resources shared during the Weather and Climate Livestream. I know I didn't catch them all, so please reblog with any you'd like to add.

Fund U.S. Weather and Climate Science script and contacts on 5Calls (for calling U.S. senators)

Community Collaborative Rain, Hail, and Snow (CoCoRaHS) Network (an ongoing citizen science project to collect rain, hail, and snow data; you can contribute!)

OpenClimate's climate change resources (also @openclimate here on tumblr)

Zooniverse (research you can volunteer to support now)

Oceanography for Everyone (low cost and open source tools to support ocean science like the Open CTD instrument)

[wikipediapictures]

Elephant Island by Landsat 8

“When explorer Ernest Shackleton and the crew of Endurance lost their ship to crushing pack ice in the Weddell Sea in 1915, their chances of survival seemed dim. The 28 men spent months drifting on ice floes and traversing the Southern Ocean in small lifeboats until they finally spotted land. The hunk of rock and ice was not the welcoming refuge they hoped for, but it was enough.

Shackleton and the crew of the Imperial Trans-Antarctic expedition landed on the mountainous, ice-covered island today known as Elephant Island. Some say Elephant Island got its name from the sighting of elephant seals along its shores; others suggest it comes from its appearance as an elephant head. But Shackleton’s captain claimed it was a nickname given by the crew: ‘Hell-of-an-Island.’

The image above shows a rare, cloud-free view of the remote island on December 13, 2020, as captured by the Operational Land Imager (OLI) on Landsat 8. The highest points, Mount Pendragon (970 meters or 3,200 feet) and Mount Elder (945 meters or 3,100 feet), are located on the southern side. In the center, Endurance glacier collects most of the ice flowing in the southeast direction.

Elephant Island is located about 250 kilometers (150 miles) northeast of the tip of the Antarctic Peninsula. Geologically, the island is part of the Scotia Plate, which was formed from continental fragments that once formed a land bridge between South America and Antarctica. The rocky island is comprised of green and blue phyllites, blueschists, and greenschists along the coast and in ridges.

Elephant Island has few plants or animals, save for some seals and gentoo and chinstrap penguins. Although it is in a prime location for observing whales, the island is not well visited and has remained relatively under-studied due to its remoteness and difficult terrain.

Shackleton and his crew initially landed on the eastern coast at Cape Valentine, but falling rocks and the proximity to the sea made it difficult to set up safe campsites. In fact, much of the island’s coastline consists of cliffs with steep slopes rising more than 100 meters (330 feet) in places. Crew member Frank Wild scouted more stable ground to the west, with lower elevation but also more glaciers. The team set up camp, naming the site Point Wild.

Shackleton realized their chances of getting rescued from Elephant Island by passing ships were low, so he and five crewmates took a lifeboat to look for help, leaving Wild in charge.

The remaining crew built makeshift huts by resting their two remaining lifeboats upside down on rocks. To combat the perpetual darkness, they made lamps out of sardine tins, used surgical bandages for wicks, and burned seal blubber oil. Four and a half months later, Shackleton and crew returned with a ship and rescued all 22 men. King George V recognized Wild’s leadership as ‘instrumental in maintaining their courage and hope.’

Today, the island hosts one small research station occupied during the summer. At Point Wild, a monument was erected to honor the crew and their experience on the island.

[Author: NASA Earth Observatory image by Joshua Stevens, using Landsat data from the U.S. Geological Survey. Story by Kasha Patel.]” - via Wikimedia Commons

[inkwell-passion]

Together At The End Of Space

Dr. Iris Arkwright was an ordinary Alcubierre Space Specialist, officially having a Doctorate in Communication Theory, but that was only because research into Alcubierre Space was so new that it isn't considered a 'Major Field of Study'. Dr. Arkwright never really stuck out. She had bright brown hair, light blue eyes, and fair skin, the only thing that really shined beyond her normal exterior is the series of star-like freckles along her face and arms.

When Dr. Arkwright got the opportunity to work at the Asimov Remote Scanning Outpost, she jumped at the opportunity to further research that had enthralled her since she was a young lass, not particularly minding the isolation from her colleagues that the position would bring. The listing had made mention that the only company the Outpost Operator would have was a fledgling A.I. designed to interpret data from the Alcubierre Space probes, and package that data for other scientific minds to utilize.

That was months ago, Dr. Arkwright has been on the Edge of Space with only this A.I. and whatever reading material She brought with her, or requested in the monthly supply drop. It was a well paying job, and she got introduced to several interesting data recording instruments utilized in the study of Alcubierre Space.

"Hey, Orchestra?" Dr. Arkwright called out to the A.I. she named, with a curious look on her face.

"Yes Iris?" The A.I. had dismissed the formality of utilizing Prefixes and surnames long ago thanks to the doctor's casual attitude rubbing off on her.

"Have you ever wondered why I named you what I did?" Dr. Arkwright inquires with a smug grin playing at her lips.

"No I have not Iris, enlighten me." Orchestra humors her companion.

"Its because you have several….Instruments" Dr. Arkwright cackles at her own joke.

Orchestra's Avatar flickers with simulated laughter, articulated by several bits of interpreted data from the instruments that caused her name. A subtle, melodic laugh that contrasts Dr. Arkwright's ugly-yet-endearing cackles mixed with snorts.

Orchestra's Avatar is unique, having no reference point outside of her human companion, and the data she consolidates; Orchestra looks more like a being made out of the weaving of the fabric of Spacetime than anything else, her body ebbing and flowing like imperceivable waves, her voice having a silent melody to it, as if harmonizing with the universe itself, and resonating with the instruments she uses to see the world; their own hums and chimes orchestrating with her voice.

Dr. Arkwright would kick her feet up onto her table and crack open the soda that she bought a few weeks ago, taking a tentative sip before sticking out her tongue. "Bleh, its cranberry…" She whines.

A ping would chime into the open air of the station as Dr. Arkwright kicks her feet off the table and pivots to look at the console. "eeeee, the probe is back! Orchestra hit the lights!" The doctor would type away at her console, starting the collection and interpretation of data, before reclining back in her seat and waiting for the light show to start.

Dr. Arkwright and Orchestra started doing this a few months ago, whenever data would be collected Iris had Orchestra interpret it into visual and auditory data and then watch it with the lights off. The entire process was relaxing for the both of them and allowed them some much needed stimulus in the dark reaches of space.

The first strings of Data coil around themselves, weaving massive arches of light that expand into a starry sky, blurs of avian creatures and aircraft streak through the air. The sound of gentle wind chimes and birdsong filling the cockpit, before the scene collapses in on itself and shifts to a cityscape.

The cityscape is overgrown and abandoned, moss growing up the sides of skyscrapers and fountains that once had water flowing through them now host flowers and insects, nature reclaiming the space that had been taken from her, a planet learning to grow and repair itself.

The Scene shifts again to focus in on a single plant, as day becomes night then turns to day again, time and time again, the stars arching across the sky and becoming the arches of light that made the scene to begin with, coiling and dancing with each other. Two humanoid shapes appear out of this display, dancing with each other in unknown space, floating happily, and in the background Dr. Arkwright swears she hears a soft "My darling star…" before the data coalesces back into one final shape, a massive tree that shrinks in on itself until nothing is left, the lights turning back on.

Dr. Arkwright sits up and smiles, applauding Orchestra. "Oh my god that was amazing!" She cheers, a massive grin on her face.

Orchestra gives a small bow. "Simply doing my Job Iris."

"That was the best one yet!! But did you add your own touches on that one? I could have sworn I heard whispering" Dr. Arkwright tilts her head as she speaks.

"I didn't do anything of the sort, that was pure interpretation of data." Orchestra reassures her, the calming music that Dr. Arkwright had playing before returning to the speakers.

"Must have heard something…" Dr. Arkwright mutters to herself, before relaxing back into her chair.

A few weeks pass, Dr. Arkwright having ran out of the god-awful soda, among other necessities, but with good timing as her shipment was set to arrive today. Dr. Arkwright had her lab coat draped across the chair she was sat in, dressed in pajama shorts and a baggy tank top, and dozing off with a small trickle of drool sliding down her face.

There's a ping at her console that startles the Doctor awake. "I'm up! I'm up!" she defends herself to nobody, Orchestra smiling fondly from her pedestal.

"Your shipment will be here in T-Minus Ten. What new thing are you trying this month?" Orchestra tilts her head, intrigued by the Doctor's habits.

"Oh, it's actually this orange flavored tea. I wanted to compile my own notes on how it tasted so that you could simulate it, since I know you've always wanted to know how tea tastes!" Dr. Arkwright smiles brightly at her companion, before getting up and draping her lab coat over her shoulders, struggling to find the arm holes. "Hold on….I've got it…..damn it!"

It takes her a few minutes, but she gets the lab coat on, and walk towards the hanger bay, her last cup of coffee in her hand. When she gets there she smiles at the shipment driver, an average man with the nametag of 'Mark'.

"Hey Mark, any interesting news from your neck of the woods?" Dr. Arkwright prompts, helping with a few boxes here and there.

"Apparently the Pangea Initiative sent out their first multinational research ship, the Borealis." Mark comments, shrugging his shoulders.

Mark isn't a bad looking guy, completely average in Orchestra's and Dr. Arkwright's opinion, with a shock of black hair that never seems to comply with what Mark wants, and a stubble that when shaved leaves Mark with a babyface.

"Oh Interesting, say have you heard any odd going-ons in Alcubierre Space?" Dr. Arkwright would offer Mark a sip of her coffee, which he takes graciously.

"Not really, why do you ask?" Mark would hand her the digital clipboard she needs to sign off on

"Could have sworn I heard whispers in my last data package, speaking of which," Dr. Arkwright would jab a thumb to a container in the corner of the hanger bay. "There's our data shipment for the month."

"Huh, are you sure the loneliness isn't finally getting to you Iris?" Mark teases with a smirk.

"Orchestra is plenty company thank you very much!" Dr. Arkwright pouts, signing off on the dotted line, before handing the clipboard back to Mark.

"Alright, Alright, sorry I hurt your Digital Waifu's feelings" Mark smirks as he loads back up into Ol' Tessa and starts backing out, laughing as Dr. Arkwright fumes silently from his perspective.

"SHE IS A COWORKER AND A VALUED MIND AT THIS INSTITUTE YOU MINIMUM WAGE SLUT!" Dr. Arkwright bellows in faux righteousness, before returning to her normal posture; sipping her coffee and beginning to organize the shipment of goods and necessities for the month.

After a good few hours of manual labor, Dr. Arkwright returns to her chair, humming to herself as she starts brewing a cup of tea for herself, her notebook on standby ready to receive her mediocre impression of a food critic. Orchestra is sat on her pedestal watching her companion, her instruments whirring and chiming idly.

"Hey when are we slated for our next probe to fall out of Al-Space?" Dr. Arkwright inquires, steeping her tea for a few seconds longer before she tosses the teabag into the trash from across the room, pumping her fist in victory. "Booyah!"

"4 Days, 17 Hours." Orchestra would bring up the countdown that she has running in the background, showing it to the Doctor.

"Alright, can I request something?" Dr. Arkwright sips her tea, and lets it sit in her mouth for a few seconds before swallowing, and writing down a few notes.

"Always Dr. Iris." Orchestra tilts her head, as Dr. Arkwright puffs her chest up a bit at the mention of her title.

"Can I watch the actual code interpretation in real-time? Not the visual and auditory stuff, I mean the actual parsing of the data" Dr. Arkwright would put a spoon of sugar into the tea, stirring it with her pinkie before she sips the tea again, nodding to herself and taking a few more notes.

"Of course, I'll try my best." Orchestra responds, before blinking out of existence for a few seconds as Dr. Arkwright hears the sound of the Asteroid Defense System.

Dr. Arkwright smiles to herself as she starts plugging in the data that she recorded from her tea into Orchestra's Terminal, a small holographic cup of tea waiting for the A.I. for when it returns.

4 Days later, Dr. Arkwright and Orchestra would be comparing their tastes on the orange tea, when the console notified the two of them that their probe had returned.

"Alrighty Orchestra, time for us to do our actual jobs!" Dr. Arkwright would chime with a gentle smile.

The lights dim, as the light show starts once more, but this time there was a digital clipboard in Dr. Arkwright's arms that she routinely checked.

The data becomes grains of sand, slowly filling a desert with the sound of winds and solar flares being audible in the background. Small swirls of sand tornadoes rise and fall with a familiar ebb and flow, but in between the wind and ethereal sounds of the stars around them, Dr. Arkwright pinpoints a subtle whispering she can't quite make out; referring to her Digital Clipboard, she would find small fragments of data that weren't initially reported, and that hold no significance to the rest of the data collected, as if someone, or something was trying to communicate with her.

"Hey Orchestra, can you elaborate on the interpretation of this data fragment?" Dr. Arkwright points to the string with the Clipboard's pen.

"…I can't seem to parse that data, it enters the simulation unformatted…I'm sorry Doctor." Orchestra looks sheepishly to the floor.

"No no, it's alright. That's strange though…" Dr. Arkwright chews on the end of the pen. "Alright, continue processing the data, try to separate those fragments though, I'm gonna see if I can find any more information on this phenomenon." Orchestra nods, and returns to her parsing, isolating the data fragments and placing it within an addendum for now.

Only for a few seconds to pass, and the data fragments are back within the original file, much to the A.I.'s surprise.

"Iris, I can't isolate the data…it keeps finding its way back into the original file." Orchestra's melodic voice fills the open air of the station.

"That's….totally not terrifying." Dr. Arkwright responds as she starts tapping her foot.

A few days later, Dr. Arkwright finds herself perusing some conversation forums for those interested in Alcubierre Space, where there were a few posts here and there about "ghost data", but no one has any substantial theories on what causes it, but a thought pops into her head. "Hey Orchestra?"

"Yes Iris?"

"Do we ever input data into Al-Space?"

"I don't believe we do, we just send a probe out, recording data."

"What if we tried?"

"That would be unprecedented."

Dr. Arkwright would hum, scratching her chin, a grin growing on her face. "I'm going to order a modified probe from Mark."

"Shouldn't we try with my instruments and superior computational data first?" Orchestra suggests.

"That's a wonderful idea!" Dr. Arkwright giggles with glee, putting her goggles on as she prepares to send out a simple callback ping into open Al-Space.

Orchestra transmits the data, and they would sit in silence.

A minute passes.

Then two.

Suddenly, all the instruments and consoles start squawking and squealing, receiving what sounds like garbage data that pierces Dr. Arkwright's ears, physically hurting her as she slaps her hands over her ears. "ORCHESTRA SHUT IT OFF, SHUT IT OFF!" Dr. Arkwright orders.

Before Orchestra can do anything, all power shuts off except for Orchestra's Pedestal, which is now projecting what seems to be a non-Euclidean object, several overlapped whispers slip through Dr. Arkwright's ears straight into her mind, but none of it can understood.

Then, after a few seconds, everything returns to normal, the lights flicker back on, the consoles and instruments return to standard function, and Orchestra is sat in front of Dr. Arkwright, who, after a few seconds, runs a hand through her hair and grabs her notepad. "Time to make record of this….experience." She says softly, Orchestra providing the data samples that she was able to recover from the experience.

A few hours pass before Dr. Arkwright speaks up, saying, "What if that was a fluke? Y'know a prank." Her voice waivers, as if she's trying to convince herself more than Orchestra.

"That could be true, but it's unlikely." Orchestra was placing the order into the custom probe as they spoke.

"Well how would you explain that??"

"Due to a lack of understanding within this field, this unit can not properly describe the phenomenon experienced during the experiment."

"Oh my god that's such a bullshit answer" Dr. Arkwright grins and tosses a crumpled ball of paper at Orchestra that flies right through her.

"You asked how I would explain it, I am simply being true to the question." Orchestra's smug grin bleeds into her simulated voice.

"I'm going to bed, is Mark good to make an expedited trip out here?" Dr. Arkwright would recline her chair back, dimming the lights.

"That He is, he'll be here in a few days by his estimate, until then I request you refrain from making any calls into the unknown void of Space."

"Of course Orchestra, Good night." Dr. Arkwright closes her eyes and relaxes.

"Goodnight Iris."

After a week, Dr. Arkwright is making her way back to the Hanger bay once more, sipping the orange tea that Orchestra loved so much, finding Mark waiting for her already.

"I don't know why this was so urgent, you literally have all the time in the world, what does one probe mean to you?"

"Oh suck it up buttercup, I think Orchestra and I are on the verge of a discovery." Dr. Arkwright offers Mark a sip of tea, he passes this time, shaking his head and holding up a hand, before lifting his thermos.

"You said that every single time I dropped off supplies for the first year, what's different this time?"

"Rogue Data within our probes." Dr. Arkwright's voice betrays her excitement.

"That sounds like something you should be upset about, not sounding like an eager kid on Christmas."

"This is unprecedented, of course I'm eager!"

"You sciencey types weird me out, I'll never understand you."

"You're just mad cuz bad" Dr. Arkwright cackles, snorts sneaking their way in.

"What does that even mean in this context Iris?"

"I have no clue, but I have not been sleeping well and I think anything would be funny to me at this point."

"Dear god Kid, get some sleep."

"I will." Dr. Arkwright would nod to Mark, grabbing the probe from him and starting to head back to her station, waving to Mark behind her. "But first, SCIENCE!"

Dr. Arkwright would sit down and start fiddling with the probe, plugging it into her clipboard she would upload the initial query. 'Tell me a story.' If something was there, this was open ended enough that she should get a substantial response.

"Are you sure this is a good idea?" Orchestra's voice holds hints of worry.

"Nope, but I also know that I won't sleep well until I get to the end of this."

"If you're sure…"

Dr. Arkwright would finalize her query, before loading the probe into the deployment chute.

"We'll see our response in 12 hours, yeah?"

"That we will."

Dr. Arkwright sends the probe on its way, before walking off to her bed, and collapsing in it. "Wake me when you need me."

When Dr. Arkwright wakes up, the lights were already dimmed, and Orchestra was sat to the side. "The data came in about 5 minutes ago, get in your chair."

Dr. Arkwright nods and gets seated, watching as the motes of light coalesce into a humanoid shape, sat in a nondescript music shop, headphones on as they experience a cosmos of emotions within themselves, but externally, everything is monochrome, and blank. The scene would shift to that of riots within the streets, the young child wearing headphones to escape it all, slinking into a concert she got tickets for.

The music swells, being literally unworldly, flowing around the young girl, and swirling with itself, the scene shifts as she is now the one on stage, playing her guitar and screaming her soul out into the cosmos itself, a riot stopping in its tracks to listen to her play.

The concert is cut short as a gunshot rings out, the performer's blood and brain matter becoming a mist that then forms into a nebula.

The whispers that started all of this can be heard again, but much clearer, it's several voices, several stories.

Then it all fades into darkness.

Dr. Arkwright is sat there, mouth agape without any words forming.

"…I don't know what happens when we die," Dr. Arkwright finally speaks up, "But I think…I think the Universe doesn't forget that we were here…"

Orchestra nods solemnly.

[ezramainak]

NASA's Historic Achievement: Parker Solar Probe's Closest-Ever Approach to the Sun

NASA's Historic Achievement: Parker Solar Probe's Closest-Ever Approach to the Sun

Introduction: In a monumental breakthrough for space science, NASA's Parker Solar Probe has successfully completed its closest-ever approach to the Sun, bringing us closer than ever before to unlocking the mysteries of our star. This milestone marks a significant achievement in space exploration and has profound implications for our understanding of the Sun’s behavior, its impact on our solar system, and even space weather.

The Parker Solar Probe Mission: Launched in 2018, the Parker Solar Probe was designed to journey into the Sun's atmosphere, known as the corona, to collect data about the Sun’s magnetic fields, solar wind, and energetic particles. This close encounter has never been attempted by any spacecraft before due to the extreme temperatures and radiation near the Sun.

What Does This Historic Close-Approach Mean? The Parker Solar Probe came within approximately 6.2 million kilometers of the Sun’s surface. To put this into perspective, this is seven times closer than the previous record-holder, NASA's earlier spacecraft. This proximity allows scientists to observe phenomena that have been beyond reach for decades.

Why Is This Important? Understanding the Sun’s behavior is critical not only for science but also for the future of space travel and life on Earth. Solar winds and solar flares can interfere with satellite communications, GPS systems, and even power grids. By studying the Sun up close, researchers hope to predict and mitigate the effects of space weather on technology here on Earth.

Technological Innovation: This incredible feat was made possible by the development of cutting-edge technology, including the spacecraft's carbon-composite shield, which can withstand temperatures exceeding 1,370°C (2,500°F). This shield protects the instruments onboard, allowing the probe to gather critical data even in such extreme conditions.

Implications for the Future: With this success, NASA is now positioned to make groundbreaking discoveries that could reshape our understanding of the solar system and space weather. The data collected by the Parker Solar Probe will be invaluable in helping scientists better understand the Sun’s activity, including its cycle of solar flares and coronal mass ejections (CMEs), which can have significant effects on Earth’s atmosphere and space systems.

Conclusion: NASA’s Parker Solar Probe is on the cutting edge of space exploration, providing us with an unprecedented opportunity to explore the Sun up close. As we continue to explore the cosmos, these discoveries offer valuable insights not just for scientific advancement but for our everyday lives as well. The future of space exploration is bright, and this achievement represents just the beginning of many exciting developments to come.

[spacenutspod]

In a first, researchers from NASA and Virginia Tech used satellite data to measure the height and speed of potentially hazardous flood waves traveling down U.S. rivers. The three waves they tracked were likely caused by extreme rainfall and by a loosened ice jam. While there is currently no database that compiles satellite data on river flood waves, the new study highlights the potential of space-based observations to aid hydrologists and engineers, especially those working in communities along river networks with limited flood control structures such as levees and flood gates.Unlike ocean waves, which are ordinarily driven by wind and tides, and roll to shore at a steady clip, river waves (also called flood or flow waves) are temporary surges stretching tens to hundreds of miles. Typically caused by rainfall or seasonal snowmelt, they are essential to shuttling nutrients and organisms down a river. But they can also pose hazards: Extreme river waves triggered by a prolonged downpour or dam break can produce floods.“Ocean waves are well known from surfing and sailing, but rivers are the arteries of the planet. We want to understand their dynamics,” said Cedric David, a hydrologist at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Southern California and a coauthor of a new study published May 14 in Geophysical Research Letters.Measuring Speed and SizeTo search for river waves for her doctoral research, lead author Hana Thurman of Virginia Tech turned to a spacecraft launched in 2022. The SWOT (Surface Water and Ocean Topography) satellite is a collaboration between NASA and the French space agency CNES (Centre National d’Études Spatiales). It is surveying the height of nearly all of Earth’s surface waters, both fresh and salty, using its sensitive Ka-band Radar Interferometer (KaRIn). The instrument maps the elevation and width of water bodies by bouncing microwaves off the surface and timing how long the signal takes to return. SWOT is depicted in orbit in this artist’s concept, with sunlight glinting off one of its solar panels and both antennas of its key instrument — the Ka-band Radar Interferometer (KaRIn) — extended. The antennas collect data along a swath 30 miles (50 kilometers) wide on either side of the satellite. Credit: CNES “In addition to monitoring total storage of waters in lakes and rivers, we zoom in on dynamics and impacts of water movement and change,” said Nadya Vinogradova Shiffer, SWOT program scientist at NASA Headquarters in Washington.Thurman knew that SWOT has helped scientists track rising sea levels near the coast, spot tsunami slosh, and map the seafloor, but could she identify river height anomalies in the data indicating a wave on the move?She found that the mission had caught three clear examples of river waves, including one that arose abruptly on the Yellowstone River in Montana in April 2023. As the satellite passed overhead, it observed a 9.1-foot-tall (2.8-meter-tall) crest flowing toward the Missouri River in North Dakota. It was divided into a dramatic 6.8-mile-long (11-kilometer-long) peak followed by a more drawn‐out tail. These details are exciting to see from orbit and illustrate the KaRIn instrument’s uniquely high spatial resolution, Thurman said.Sleuthing through optical Sentinel-2 imagery of the area, she determined that the wave likely resulted from an ice jam breaking apart upstream and releasing pent-up water.The other two river waves that Thurman and the team found were triggered by rainfall runoff. One, spotted by SWOT starting on Jan. 25, 2024, on the Colorado River south of Austin, Texas, was associated with the largest flood of the year on that section of river. Measuring over 30 feet (9 meters) tall and 166 miles (267 kilometers) long, it traveled around 3.5 feet (1.07 meters) per second for over 250 miles (400 kilometers) before discharging into Matagorda Bay.The other wave originated on the Ocmulgee River near Macon, Georgia, in March 2024. Measuring over 20 feet (6 meters) tall and extending more than 100 miles (165 kilometers), it traveled about a foot (0.33 meters) per second for more than 124 miles (200 kilometers).“We’re learning more about the shape and speed of flow waves, and how they change along long stretches of river,” Thurman said. “That could help us answer questions like, how fast could a flood get here and is infrastructure at risk?”Complementary ObservationsEngineers and water managers measuring river waves have long relied on stream gauges, which record water height and estimate discharge at fixed points along a river. In the United States, stream gauge networks are maintained by agencies including the U.S. Geological Survey. They are sparser in other parts of the world.“Satellite data is complementary because it can help fill in the gaps,” said study supervisor George Allen, a hydrologist and remote sensing expert at Virginia Tech.If stream gauges are like toll booths clocking cars as they pass, SWOT is like a traffic helicopter taking snapshots of the highway. The wave speeds that SWOT helped determine were similar to those calculated using gauge data alone, Allen said, showing how the satellite could help monitor waves in river basins without gauges. Knowing where and why river waves develop can help scientists tracking changing flood patterns around the world.Orbiting Earth multiple times each day, SWOT is expected to observe some 55% of large-scale floods at some stage in their life cycle. “If we see something in the data, we can say something,” David said of SWOT’s potential to flag dangerous floods in the making. “For a long time, we’ve stood on the banks of our rivers, but we’ve never seen them like we are now.”More About SWOTThe SWOT satellite was jointly developed by NASA and CNES, with contributions from the Canadian Space Agency (CSA) and the UK Space Agency. NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory, managed for the agency by Caltech in Pasadena, California, leads the U.S. component of the project. For the flight system payload, NASA provided the Ka-band radar interferometer (KaRIn) instrument, a GPS science receiver, a laser retroreflector, a two-beam microwave radiometer, and NASA instrument operations. The Doppler Orbitography and Radioposition Integrated by Satellite system, the dual frequency Poseidon altimeter (developed by Thales Alenia Space), the KaRIn radio-frequency subsystem (together with Thales Alenia Space and with support from the UK Space Agency), the satellite platform, and ground operations were provided by CNES. The KaRIn high-power transmitter assembly was provided by CSA.

[justinspoliticalcorner]

Oliver Milman at The Guardian:

A sense of chaos has gripped the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (Noaa), one of the world’s premier research agencies, with key staff hastily fired and then rehired, cuts to vital weather forecasting operations and even a new, unsecured server that led to staff being deluged by obscene spam emails. Noaa is currently being upended by Donald Trump’s desire to slash the federal government workforce, with more than 1,000 people already fired or resigning from the agency and 1,000 more staffers are expected to be removed as the purge continues. In total, this represents around 20% of the Noaa’s workforce. Along with leading climate and marine research, Noaa also houses the National Weather Service, which provides bedrock weather forecasts to private providers and the public. There are concerns that the Trump administration’s cuts, spearheaded by Elon Musk’s so-called “department of government efficiency” (Doge), could imperil public safety by hindering timely warnings of tornadoes and hurricanes. Doge has already had to reverse some of its initial firings after removing staff including those who help track hurricanes. Five people involved in the “hurricane hunter” flights were fired, only for three of them to be told their jobs will be reinstated. Other staff within the National Weather Service have also been asked to disregard their terminations. Noaa’s data collection activity is still being affected, though, with the agency reducing the number of weather balloons it releases in six locations across the US. The balloons, fitted with weather instruments, are crucial in providing the information for weather forecasts. This tumultuous era for Noaa was for some staff crystallized by Doge’s decision to use a new email server to send missives from the federal government’s office of personnel management to the agency. The email server was not secure, meaning that staff got dozens of spam-like emails in January, one of them with a lewd title about the president and another stating: “the next 4 years has an [sic] 99% chance of shit showers.” While Noaa has since resolved the lack of email server security, staff said that it was emblematic of growing turmoil within the agency.

“The feeling has been ‘you’ve got to be kidding me,’” said one staffer, who was fired but is now on administrative leave pending potential reinstatement. “These people at Doge think they are the best at what they do but they can’t even protect an email list. They fired people and then had to hire them back, they are cutting contracts without learning what they are. I mean good lord take a minute before doing this. It’s an absolute joke.” Some former Noaa staff and elected Democrats have held recent protests outside the agency’s headquarters in Silver Spring, Maryland, warning that the cuts risk hampering the flow of crucial weather and climate information, as well as regulatory work around fisheries that prevent the over-exploitation of the oceans.

The cuts to NOAA and NWS by the Trump/Musk Regime are nothing but a disaster for weather forecasting.

[wayti-blog]

"For the first time, scientists have taken near-daily measurements of the sun's global coronal magnetic field, a region of the sun that has only been observed irregularly in the past. The resulting observations are providing valuable insights into the processes that drive the intense solar storms that impact fundamental technologies, and thus lives and livelihoods, here on Earth.

An analysis of the data, collected over eight months by an instrument called the Upgraded Coronal Multi-channel Polarimeter (UCoMP), has been published in Science."

""Global mapping of the coronal magnetic field has been a big missing part in the study of the sun," said Zihao Yang, lead author who pursued this research as a Ph.D. graduate at Peking University, China, and is now a postdoctoral fellow at the U.S. National Science Foundation National Center for Atmospheric Research (NSF NCAR).

"This research is helping us fill a crucial gap in our understanding of coronal magnetic fields, which are the source of the energy for storms that can impact Earth."

The international team is made of researchers from Northumbria University, UK; NSF NCAR; Peking University, China; and University of Michigan. The UCoMP instrument and is operated by NSF NCAR at the Mauna Loa Solar Observatory."

continue reading

[darkmaga-returns]

This is exactly what happened to a team from the University of Colorado Boulder during a recent field study in rural Oklahoma. They were using a state-of-the-art instrument to track how tiny particles form and grow in the air. But instead of just collecting expected data, they uncovered something completely new: the first-ever airborne detection of Medium Chain Chlorinated Paraffins (MCCPs), a kind of toxic organic pollutant, in the Western Hemisphere. The teams findings were published in ACS Environmental Au.

“It’s very exciting as a scientist to find something unexpected like this that we weren’t looking for,” said Daniel Katz, CU Boulder chemistry PhD student and lead author of the study. “We’re starting to learn more about this toxic, organic pollutant that we know is out there, and which we need to understand better.”

MCCPs are currently under consideration for regulation by the Stockholm Convention, a global treaty to protect human health from long-standing and widespread chemicals. While the toxic pollutants have been measured in Antarctica and Asia, researchers haven’t been sure how to document them in the Western Hemisphere’s atmosphere until now.

From Wastewater to Farm