A new report shows that asteroids caused more than two dozen nuclear-level explosions in the Earth’s atmosphere.
The report from the B612 Foundation shows that the Nuclear Test Ban Treaty Organization recorded 26 nuclear-level explosions between 2000 and 2013. One blast was dozens of times stronger than the Hiroshima bomb with an equivalent power of 16 kilotons of TNT.
Scientists quoted in the report say that the explosions were too high in the atmosphere to cause serious damage on the ground. However, the explosions show the significant threat to the planet from asteroid impacts.
“While most large asteroids with the potential to destroy an entire country or continent have been detected, less than 10,000 of the more than a million dangerous asteroids with the potential to destroy an entire major metropolitan area have been found by all existing space or terrestrially operated observatories,” former astronaut Ed Lu said.
Lu referenced the 2013 500-kiloton meteor explosion over Russia that caused significant damage to hundreds of square miles of homes and businesses.
A genetic disease has been cured in an adult animal for the first time in history.
Scientists at MIT have recorded using a procedure where they edit the DNA of a live adult animal to replace a defective gene that causes liver disease. The scientists say the procedure, known as Crispr, allows them to edit a single “letter” in the genetic alphabet.
“We basically showed you could use the Crispr system in an animal to cure a genetic disease, and the one we picked was a disease in the liver which is very similar to one found in humans,” said Professor Daniel Anderson.
The MIT team believes because the DNA is so similar, they should be able to begin testing of the Crispr protocol in humans within the next few years.
The process would have to be altered, however, to carry the mutations into the human body via harmless adeno-associated viruses.
A new report from three former NASA astronauts shows that asteroid impacts on Earth are up to ten times more common than previously believed by scientists.
The report, scheduled to be issued to the public on Earth Day April 22nd, presents evidence that it’s been a miracle no major city has been decimated by a major asteroid strike.
“This network has detected 26 multi-kiloton explosions since 2001, all of which are due to asteroid impacts,” Ed Lu of the B612 Foundation said. “It shows that asteroid impacts are NOT rare—but actually 3-10 times more common than we previously thought. The fact that none of these asteroid impacts shown in the video was detected in advance is proof that the only thing preventing a catastrophe from a ‘city-killer’ sized asteroid is blind luck. The goal of the B612 Sentinel mission is to find and track asteroids decades before they hit Earth, allowing us to easily deflect them.”
The B612 Foundation is building a special infrared satellite that once launched in 2017 will allow scientists to detect hundreds of near-Earth objects that cannot be currently seen by telescope and satellite systems.
Residents of Nicaragua have been on edge for days after a series of earthquakes rocked the country.
A string of quakes that started Thursday night with a magnitude 6.1 quake has caused many residents to sleep on the ground outside of their homes in fear that a quake while they are sleeping would collapse their houses.
The country’s government has placed the nation on red alert and is urging them to continue sleeping outside until further notice.
The Thursday quake was followed by a stronger 6.6 magnitude quake on Friday. Sunday night, 4.6 and 5.6 magnitude quakes kept most of the nation awake through the night.
“We didn’t sleep a wink last night,” Ana Maria Echaniz, 30, told the Associated Press. “It’s continuous anxiety, fear that comes and goes all the time.”
The first lady of Nicaragua, the government’s official spokeswoman, told state media that the recent activity has reactivated the Managua fault that caused a 6.2 magnitude quake in 1972 that killed close to 10,000 people.
One resident told the AP that the fear is so bad people jump in the night from a gust of wind because it “breaks the silence.”
A new study shows that Earth was nine days away from suffering the effects from a massive solar burst.
Scientists say the burst from the sun would have at least matched the severity of the 1859 Carrington Event which blew out the telegraph system across the entire United States.
Berkeley research physicist Janet Luhmann, who led the study, said that the burst would have had more impact than the 1859 event.
“Had it hit Earth, it probably would have been like the big one in 1859, but the effect today, with our modern technologies, would have been tremendous,” Luhmann said.
The coronal mass ejection that burst from the sun on July 23, 2012 would have been aimed directly at Earth if the event happened nine days earlier. The blast of southward magnetic fields would clash with the Earth’s northward field, causing electrical transformers to burst into flames, disabling many older satellites, damaging electronic devices on Earth and causing problems for the GPS system.
The scientists hope by being able to study the results of the 2012 burst they can better predict future events.
A new report is showing that internet routers have significant security flaws that could allow a hacker to take control of your computer without ever putting a virus onto the actual computer.
Security officials have found “backdoors” in routers produced by NetGear and Linksys, two of the biggest selling router manufacturers. The security flaws allow a hacker to take control of the router and guide your web browser to fake websites that could look like Google, Facebook or a host of other sites.
The hackers would then steal personal information that you enter into the spoofed websites.
Many internet service providers give a cable or DSL modem with a built-in router that could be compromised by hackers depending on the manufacturer.
Security officials recommend placing a password on your router with an unusually long string of letters and numbers to make it unlikely a causal hacker will take the time to try and crack the long code.
Scientists are working on a technology that would eliminate genetic disease in newborns by combining the DNA of three people instead of two in a single embryo.
However, the announcement of the study raised the alarm that the scientists would open the door for people to create “designer babies” with special features such as eye color, hair color or skin.
Food and Drug Administration officials are meeting over the next two days with the scientists in the project to see if they will allow testing on humans. The process is currently only approved to be used on monkeys.
“Once you make this change, if a female arises from the process and goes on to have children, that change is passed on, so it’s forever,” Phil Yeske, chief science officer of the United Mitochondrial Disease Foundation, told Bloomberg. “That’s uncharted territory; we just don’t know what it means. Permanent change of the human germline has never been done before, and we don’t know what will happen in future generations.”
Four monkeys have been created using the process and have been healthy through their first three years.
They make blockbuster movies about asteroids this size.
An asteroid the size of three football fields is set to make a close brush with Earth Monday night. The near-Earth asteroid, known as 2000 EM26, will not hit the planet but will pass close enough to be seen clearly by orbiting cameras.
Scientists say the asteroid is flying at 27,000 miles per hour and will pass about 8.8 lunar distances from Earth. (A lunar distance is the space between the Earth and the moon or approximately 238,900 miles.)
Operators of the Slooh Space Camera are using the arrival of the asteroid to raise awareness of the fact many asteroids are not found until they are days away from the planet.
“We continue to discover these potentially hazardous asteroids — sometimes only days before they make their close approaches to Earth,” said Paul Cox, Slooh’s technical and research director. “Slooh’s asteroid research campaign is gathering momentum with Slooh members using the Slooh robotic telescopes to monitor this huge population of potentially hazardous space rocks. We need to find them before they find us!”
The fly by comes almost exactly a year after an asteroid exploded over Chelyabinsk, Russia, with the energy equivalent of 20 atomic bombs. On that day, scientists were focused on another near-Earth object’s passing, 2012 DA14, and did not notice the space rock that exploded over Russia.
NASA will be streaming video of the asteroid’s passing starting around 9 p.m. Eastern time on their website space.com.
A new technology claims to allow customers to pay for purchases by using a scan of their veins.
The program is called Pulse Wallet and the device is scanner similar to the point of sale devices where you slide your credit or debit card. Pulse Wallet links to a credit card or other payment methods so that a customer can leave all identifying information at home.
The founders say the technology has many benefits.
In addition to being used in retail locations, the device can be used by airlines as a new form of boarding pass. They say because the form and scan of veins is unique to each person…and people don’t really know what the pattern of their veins looks like…it gives them a password that no thief can steal.
The company says that there are no traces for someone to find like fingerprints and the person would have to be alive with the limb attached because blood flow is needed to perform the scan.
If you thought your cell phone, laptop or other electronics were draining faster than usual during the unusual bitter cold, you’re not wrong.
Electronic experts say the bitter cold drains batteries faster so people who depend on their cell phones in remote locations need to make sure they recharge often and have chargers in their car in the event of an emergency.
One computer expert said that Apple computers are especially vulnerable to the cold.
“Apple is rated from I believe 32 degrees to roughly 95 degrees,” David Greer of Digital Doc told CBS. “Samsung is rated from minus, negative 4 to up to 128.”
Greer also warned of the importance of not trying to rapidly heat your phone or computer if it’s cold. Greer said you risk major damage to the devices if you do not allow them to slowly reach room temperature.
He suggests making sure you keep your phone in a jacket or close to your body to keep it warm.