NASA COVERAGE 11,593

WHO'S  PHONE ?

NASA  COVERAGE

Using NASA's Hubble Space Telescope have confirmed the existence of a baked object that could be called a "cometary planet." The gas giant planet, named HD 209458b, is orbiting so close to its star that its heated atmosphere is escaping into space. Observations taken with Hubble's Cosmic Origins Spectrograph (COS) suggest powerful stellar winds are sweeping the cast-off atmospheric material behind the scorched planet and shaping it into a comet-like tail.

*  Special thanks to "nasa.gov", "Google Images", "The New York Times" and "Wikipedia.com"

BLOG  POST

by Felicity Blaze Noodleman

Los Angeles, CA

8. 9.13

This illustration shows the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope in orbit above the Earth as it looked before the Second Servicing Mission in 1997.

Checking in with NASA in one of the resources we use from time to time since the Government has spent so much money in space.  Has it paid off?  In some areas the answer would be yes but in others it’s questionable.  One of the phenomenon is space are what scientists and astronomers have absorbed are “Black Holes”.  NASA still knows very little about these celestial curiosity’s but since so much money has been spent on the study of space one might think one of these black holes are devouring billions of federal tax dollars.

This article is not being written to expose all of the waste in federal spending.  It is truly meant to display some of the newer discoveries being made in the great beyond.  Still we have to think, how much is this costing us?  Yesterday I was reading a very alarming articles by one of Wall Street’s analytical firms who shall remain confidential.  

This firm claims to have warned about our last economic crash and is now predicting an even large catastrophe looming in the near future.  If their numbers are right, and I believe they are, this warning takes on even more significance.  Bases on the interest being paid on the Federal deficit ($200 million an hour – 24/7) which we are unable to pay, the Congressional sequester begins to take on more importance.

A black hole eating the sun and something else, our tax dollars!   Om nom nom. 
("$" by Noodleman)
http://www.askamathematician.com/2012/02/q-what-would-happen-if-a-black-hole-passed-through-our-solar-system-2/

We have written all of this just to make a point; these photos from space are very, very expensive!  Since they are costing us so much and really of so little consequence to us in our everyday lives.  It is some what comforting to know that NASA is sharing so much of what they are learning on line and through television and IMAX theatrical documentaries!  So with no further introduction we are pleases to present for your consideration some images from space you may have not seen.  

In reality it’s up to each what these images might mean.  High tech art (new screen covers & savers for computer and other devices), road signs to the future and where we may be going, objects for further study or just another black hole consuming billions of US tax dollars.  You decide!   No we will display some of the best and most interesting images and art NASA has produced.

This microscopic organism known as the E Coli bacteria resembles stellar formations in deep space demonstrating the infinite space known as our universe.  Nature replicating itself in so many different forms. 

Another aspect of space is it’s infinite nature.  Weather looking through outer space with the Hubble Telescope or peering through inner space with a high powered microscope, we are truly observing different areas of space!   As human beings we seem to be somewhere in the middle of all that surrounds us.  This all raises a lot of questions and demonstrate how nature seems to replicate different arrangements of matter from the smallest to the largest.

The Day the Earth Smiled: Sneak Preview  In this rare image taken on July 19, 2013, the wide-angle camera on NASA's Cassini spacecraft has captured Saturn's rings and our planet Earth and its moon in the same frame.

Helix Nebula  The Helix Nebula, also known as The Helix, NGC 7293, is a large planetary nebula (PN) located in the constellation Aquarius. Discovered by Karl Ludwig Harding, probably before 1824, this object is one of the closest to the Earth of all the bright planetary nebulae.

A Year of Assessing Astronomical Hazards.  Could an asteroid destroy civilization on Earth? Mountain-sized space rocks could potentially impact the Earth causing global effects, and perhaps even be mistaken for a nuclear blast of terrestrial origin. Such large impacts are rare but have happened before. Modern telescopes have therefore begun to scan the skies for signs of approaching celestial hazards. Over the past year, projects such as Spacewatch and Spaceguard have continually discovered previously unknown asteroids that indeed pass near the Earth. Such projects are still rather modest, however. In June, 100-meter asteroid 2002 MN was discovered only after it whizzed by the Earth, crossing even within the orbit of the Moon. This year brought much discussion in the astronomical community of expanding technology to discover most large Near Earth Objects and extend the time between discovery and impact for all potential astronomical hazards. Pictured above is an illustration of a busy planetary system, showing the view of a planet ringed with space debris from a recently formed crater of an orbiting moon.  

The Rose  The spinning vortex of Saturn's north polar storm resembles a deep red rose of giant proportions surrounded by green foliage in this false-color image from NASA's Cassini spacecraft.

Churning Out Stars.  W3 is an enormous stellar nursery about 6,200 light-years away in the Perseus Arm, one of the Milky Way galaxy's main spiral arms as seen by ESA's Herschel space observatory.

First Curiosity Drilling Sample in the Scoop  NASA's Curiosity rover shows the first sample of powdered rock extracted by the rover's drill. The image was taken after the sample was transferred from the drill to the rover's scoop.

X-Rays Indicate Star Ripped Up by Black Hole.    What could rip a star apart? A black hole. Giant black holes in just the right mass range would pull on the front of a closely passing star much more strongly than on the back. Such a strong tidal force would stretch out a star and likely cause some of the star's gasses to fall into the black hole.

A Primordial Quasar.   What did the first quasars look like? The nearest quasars are now known to be supermassive black holes in the centers of galaxies. Gas and dust that falls toward a quasar glows brightly, sometimes outglowing the entire home galaxy. The quasars that formed in the first billion years of the universe are more mysterious, though, with even the nature of the surrounding gas still unknown. Above, an artist's impression shows a primordial quasar as it might have been, surrounded by sheets of gas, dust, stars, and early star clusters. Exacting observations of three distant quasars now indicate emission of very specific colors of the element iron. These Hubble Space Telescope observations, which bolster recent results from the WMAP mission, indicate that a whole complete cycle of stars was born, created this iron, and died within the first few hundred million years of the universe.

Copper Moon, Golden Gate.   When the Moon rose over San Francisco's Golden Gate Bridge on May 15, both bridge and Moon were in already in Earth's shadow. Of course, the bridge is in the Earth's shadow nightly, while the Moon only has that opportunity about twice a year, during a lunar eclipse. And even though in western North America the total phase of the lunar eclipse began before moonrise, many in areas with clear skies came out to enjoy the spectacle. For this eclipse, skygazers reported a darker than normal, copper-colored Moon during totality. The dramatic color is evident in this multiple exposure of thereddened Moon rising, taken by astrophotographer Evad Damast. Damast viewed the eclipse from the Marin Headlands north and west of the famous bridge, looking back toward the bay and the city lights.

Snake in the Dark.   Dark nebulae snake across a gorgeous expanse of stars in this wide-field view toward the pronounceable constellation Ophiuchus and the center of our Milky Way Galaxy. In fact, the central S-shape seen here is well known as the Snake Nebula. It is also listed as Barnard 72 (B72), one of 182 dark markings of the sky cataloged in the early 20th century by astronomer E. E. Barnard. Unlike bright emission nebulae and star clusters, Barnard's nebulae are interstellar dark clouds of obscuring gas and dust. Their shapes are visible in cosmic silhouette only because they lie in the foreground along the line of sight to rich star fields and glowing stellar nurseries near the plane of our Galaxy.

Crab Nebula Mosaic from HST.   The Crab Nebula is cataloged as M1, the first object on Charles Messier's famous list of things which are not comets. In fact, the cosmic Crab is now known to be a supernova remnant, an expanding cloud of debris from the death explosion of a massive star. Light from that stellar catastrophe was first witnessed by astronomers on planet Earth in the year 1054. Composed of 24 exposures taken in October 1999, January 2000, and December 2000, this Hubble Space Telescope mosaic spans about twelve light years. 

This concludes our article featuring some of the most interesting imagery produced by NASA. In all fairness we should mention budget cuts have been made at the space agency.  The space shuttle program has been put on hold just to mention one of their biggest programs. Always able to apply the lyrics of a song for every situation we’ll only say, “and the beat goes on”!  Felicity;  writing about “where no man has gone before” and "on a planet far, far away"!

http://www.davegranlund.com/cartoons/2012/02/17/nasa-and-budget-cuts/

Patent Case Has Potential to Give Apple the Upper Hand

"The New York Times"

By NICK WINGFIELD and BRIAN X. CHEN

Published: August 8, 2013

Over the last couple of years, Apple and its competitors have fought so many patent cases against one another in so many courts that keeping score has nearly become a fool’s errand.

But if a final ruling in a case against Samsung goes Apple’s way on Friday, Apple would clearly hold the momentum in the patent disputes engulfing the mobile market.

The federal International Trade Commission is expected to say on Friday whether it will uphold a preliminary finding that Samsung mobile products violated a handful of Apple patents. A decision against Samsung by the commission could result in an import ban on some of the company’s mobile devices.

A decision for Apple would be its second major legal win against Samsung in less than a week. On Saturday, the Obama administration vetoed the federal commission’s ban on Apple mobile products in a separate case brought by Samsung.

Andrew Gombert/European 

Pressphoto Agency

Apple’s iPhone 4.

That rare move — the first time for such a veto since 1987 — was a major victory for Apple and other companies that had argued that disputes over a class of patents known as standards-essential patents should not lead to import bans by the trade commission.

Carolina Milanesi, a Gartner analyst, said that if Apple were to score a second victory with the International Trade Commission this week, the company would climb to a significant position of power in patent feuds — not just against Samsung, but against other companies as well.

“Apple can use that as a warning and say, ‘Look, if it hasn’t worked with Samsung, why would it work with you?’ ” she said. “It’s not real power. It’s more like a mind game.”

The patent disputes have led to a possible political skirmish between the United States and South Korea, where Samsung is a celebrated hometown legend. The decision on Saturday vexed the South Korean government, which issued a statement expressing concern that the ruling may have violated Samsung’s patent rights. The government pledged to watch the commission’s ruling on Friday in the separate case for fairness.

Essential patents, like those at the center of the dispute in Saturday’s veto, cover basic technologies that companies have to support in their products to comply with industry standards. In the case between Apple and Samsung, the standard involved wireless communications. The Obama administration said it overruled the decision on Saturday partly because it feared essential patents, which holders agree to license on reasonable terms, were being used in ways that could hurt competition and consumers. Apple and Samsung disagreed on whether Samsung was offering to license it essential patents on reasonable terms.

Jason Decrow/Associated Press

The Samsung Galaxy S4. 

The decision on Friday is not over essential patents. But if the commission hands Apple another victory, Robert P. Merges, a law professor at the University of California, Berkeley, said the Obama administration could again overrule any import ban the commission puts in place, as part of a strategy to diminish the power of patent litigation as an industry weapon.

“I think there are a lot of political implications,” he said, referring to the possible reaction by other governments. “You’ll have the obvious favoring-the-home-team problem. But I would be shocked if they didn’t think this through carefully.”

Kristin Huguet, an Apple spokeswoman, declined to comment on the case before the commission’s decision. David Steel, an executive vice president for Samsung, declined to comment.

Already, Apple has scored the biggest legal victory by far, by winning against Samsung in a federal court last year. In that case, a jury awarded Apple $1 billion in damages for violations of mobile patents related to the iPhone and iPad. That award was later reduced to $599 million by a judge, though the figure could go back up as the case drags on in court.

Although the case was a decisive win for Apple, the judge overseeing it denied a request by Apple for a permanent injunction against the sale of some Samsung mobile products. A Federal Appeals Court is expected to hear arguments on Friday from Apple about why such an injunction should be granted.

In another positive development for Apple, a Federal Appeals Court sent a patent case that Apple brought against Motorola Mobility, which is owned by Google, back to the trade commission this week. The ruling gives Apple another shot at winning an important ban on Motorola mobile products after the commission dismissed Apple’s complaint.

Apple has long argued that companies making smartphones based on Google’s operating system, especially Samsung, are copycats that have swiped many of the technical innovations that, at one point, gave the iPhone and iPad a huge edge.

But the wheels of justice grind along slowly, and as Apple’s suits have snaked their way through the courts in the last several years, the popularity of Android phones has continued to grow, swallowing much of the mobile market. In the second quarter of the year, Android phones accounted for almost 80 percent of global smartphone shipments, up from just under 70 percent the year before, according to IDC, the research firm.

The iPhone accounted for 13.2 percent of smartphone shipments in that same period, while Samsung’s share was 30.4 percent, IDC estimated.

It is unclear whether a series of legal setbacks would be more than a speed bump for Samsung, now the world’s largest mobile phone maker. Samsung has argued that it can modify the software in its phones so they steer clear of Apple’s patents, which could allow it to dodge sales bans.

Still, if the tide of legal battles begins to shift decisively in Apple’s favor, the company could extract a juicy financial settlement from Samsung and put the distraction of fighting its biggest rival behind it.

"The New York Times"

http://fbnoodleman.blogspot.com/

* “The Noodleman Group” is pleased to announce that we are now carrying a link to the “USA Today” news site.We installed the “widget/gadget” August 20, and it will be carried as a regular feature on our site.Now you can read“Noodleman” and then check in to “USA Today” for all the up to date News, Weather, Sports and more!Just scroll all the way down to the bottom of our site and hit the “USA Today” hyperlinks.Enjoy!

The Noodleman Group is on Google "Blogger"!