Boson discovery announced by CERN

Today CERN (European Organization for Nuclear Research) announced that after 3 years of research using the brand new Large Hadron Collider in Geneva, Switzerland, they have gathered enough data to recognize a new sub-atomic particle. This discovery has been made in the frame of the search for the elusive Higgs Boson, a particle that has been predicted theoretically, but never observed, as an essential part of the most widely accepted model for quantum mechanics, the Standard Model.

There are currently two independent teams working at the collider with this goal in mind, and combined data results show that a previously unknown particle has been definitely observed, and it is with certainty a boson. However, in the press conference this morning, scientists and project leaders have made it clear that while it was a boson, they could not yet confirm it was the boson.

Much more analysis of the data will be needed for this, however the news has been well received by the science community, and the general consensus is that, while it will take a little more confirmation, this is probably it.

Whichever the end result is, whether it's the Higgs boson or a completely new boson, it is certainly a historic day and it will unlock new paths for quantum physics.

A Q and A followed the press conference as usual and some pertinent questions were answered. The team was very careful to let know that this was not the definite answer to whether or not the Higgs boson exists yet, and that the Standard Model was incomplete and this is just another piece of the puzzle.
Some other journalists in the room seemed more interested in when will the particle be confirmed, why are we putting so much budget into research in a time of crisis, and other irrelevant questions.

The fact of the matter is, after much hard work with the aid of an superb machine, scientists once again delve deeper into the makings of the universe around us, taking us closer maybe to the ultimate question of what is everything made of and where did it come from?

The Transit of Venus

"Once in a lifetime opportunity" is often an over used sentence, but it really applies to what's going to happen this June 6th: the planet Venus will appear to move across the Sun from our perspective. Call it a "Venus Eclipse" if you will, with the difference to normal eclipses being that the planet is too far from us to appear to block out the Sun.

Instead, we will be able to observe its small disk crossing in front of our bright star. 

The orbits of the Earth and Venus make this a rare event. It happens in a regular pattern, with two transits taking place within 8 years of each other, and then long gaps of either 121.5 or 105.5 years. The last one was in the 8th of June of 2004, and almost 8 exact years to the date we have the next one. If you miss this chance, you will have to wait until December of 2117, which might cause an inconvenience.

Where to see it?

Well look at this map and check if you will be able to observe it from your location. 

Make sure you know what you're doing if trying to view the Sun through any magnification device!

DO NOT LOOK AT THE SUN DIRECTLY!

Are you in the shadow zone of the map like I am? Well, we will have to settle for broadcasts. Many TV channels will certainly take an interest in such a rare piece of news, but if you're like me, you'll wanna follow this online. NASA will be covering the event in full, as well as many people streaming from their telescopes, for example, one of my favorite YouTube scientists, Thunderf00t.

Whatever you do to follow this, and you should, enjoy yourself and remember all the details.

Later in life, you will be able to say "I saw the Venus Transit of '12! Oh yeah I was there...!"

Solar eclipse tomorrow

Get your sun watching eyeglasses out. If you live in either East Asia (particularly southern Japan) or western North America you will get to see an annular solar eclipse.

The Moon's shadow will streak across the Pacific mostly, as our natural satellite will be positioned between the Earth and the Sun. People located in East Asia will see the phenomena the morning of the 21st of May, while those located in Western America will see it at the late hours of the 20th, right before sunset. Those in the penumbra will be able to see a partial eclipse.

However, the moon is currently close to it's apogee (when it's furthest to the earth), so its apparent size is not enough to cover the Sun's disk. The result is what looks like a bright ring on the sky, hence the name 'annular eclipse' (from the latin annulus, meaning little ring).

Although the Moon will cover some of the sun's brightness, it is not safe to look at it with naked eyes. It is advisable to get some purpose made glasses or filters, in case of observation with binoculars or a telescope.

This eclipse is a part of a series which has been going on since the year 984, every 18 years and 11 days, called Saros 128. Goes to show how much of a clockwork our solar system can be. The series has 73 events and will end in November of 2282.

25th of April, the Carnation revolution

The word “Revolution” beckons thoughts of bloodshed, popular uprising, violence, and the ultimate need for change.

A peaceful and bloodless revolution is sometimes considered an ideal, albeit unreachable, possibility. It was 38 years ago in Portugal that it became a reality.

The story starts in early XX Century when the old ways of monarchy were abandoned in favor of a republic. A coup d’état saw this end not much longer, and Portugal joined many other European nations in the ways of dictatorship and fascism. It was called the “New State” and it imposed itself using the usual fascist weapons of censorship, military enforced strict laws, a secret police dealing with “undesirables”, and rigged elections.  As a part of NATO this regime was only tolerated because it was opposed to communism (as most other dictatorships at the time, in Germany and Italy for example).  The strict control over economy and expenditure meant at first the country was growing and benefiting from the creation of companies and conglomerates, as well as by the imports of the overseas colonies, like Angola and Mozambique. There had always been a good relationship between the ‘mainland’ and the colonies.  However by the 60s, both blocks of the cold war wanted to gain favor within these territories. Guerrillas funded by the US and Russia started battling local control with the colonists, which started wars in almost all the territories, stretching Portugal’s military thin and demanded an increase on the budget. Conscription for these wars forced many young men to flee the country. In later stages, a plan was to be introduced where conscripted officers would attain the same rank as those who formed in a proper military academy, after some service overseas. This pissed off the high rank of the military, which in a military dictatorship, was not good news to the regime.

How to access iPhone location data

After last post where I mentioned iPhones and Androids stored some location information, some people asked me how could they check theirs.
The truth is I don't have a smartphone, neither do I plan to get one since my old trusted Sony Ericsson keeps working perfectly after 4 years. The other truth is I know exactly who can help you.

MyPhoneTracker in action

This easy to use software is located at the very excellent source for Apple news, applications and other goodies, Mac-and-I .  As well as MyPhoneTracker you will find all kinds of tips and tricks, recommended programs for your Mac, games, etc.. Check it out and leave him a thanks for his work on this free and open source app!

The Globe at Night project

Light pollution is defined simply by the glow of artificial lights that get scattered at night and block the natural light of stars and other celestial objects, blocking our views of the sky. It seems that recent studies show that it also can have serious health implications. In a nutshell, our bodies are "fooled" into thinking it's still day light and the production of melatonin - a hormone that regulates our awake/sleep cycles - and this can have an influence on bad sleep patterns, but more dangerously, low melatonin is linked with a higher risk of breast cancer.

“Light at night is now clearly a risk factor for breast cancer. (...) Breast tumors are awake during the day, and melatonin puts them to sleep at night.”

David Blask, researcher at the Cooperstown, New York-based Mary Imogene Bassett Research Institute.

To reduce the risks specialists recommend a good night of sleep with all light sources blocked, both from outside and inside. This means shades closed, TVs and monitors off, lamps, and everything else that's lit enough to be a substitute for daylight. 

The light bill for all of this night town lights is huge. Estimates show 1.5 billion dollars of wasted energy worldwide and more than 10 million tons of carbon dioxide produced. In a world running mostly on oil and looking for alternative energy sources, this is completely unacceptable. 

The Globe at Night project is a project that aims at measuring light pollution all over the planet, and it relies on common people to input their observations. It's as simple as going out for some minutes at night and looking for the Orion constellation, and comparing your observations to the examples given in the website to measure which magnitude stars can be seen from your location. Head over to their website and give your contribution.

A giant earth discovered: Kepler 22b

When people ask me whether I think there is life outside our planet, I say yes. When they ask me why... I don't feel like explaining.


But here's why:

The Milky Way (the galaxy in which our Solar system is located) has around 400,000,000,000 stars. If only a 0.5% of those have planets, then there are 2,000,000,000 Solar systems out there. If out of those solar systems only 0.1% have any planets within an inhabitable region, there are 2 million planets suitable for life out there. Even if one out of a thousand actually harbors life, then there are 2 thousand living planets floating around. And this is being really pessimistic with the numbers.

Then we look beyond our galaxy. The Hubble telescope was pointed a tiny piece of the sky for a month taking in all the light it could get. The result was this famous picture:

Each one of these dots is another galaxy, each one containing billions of other stars. So in my mind, it's very likely there are hundreds of civilizations out there. However, I don't think we will meet any of them.

Ozone, friend and foe

We've all heard talk about Ozone, the ozone layer, products with ozone, etc.. But how many of us know what it really is?

The ozone molecule is basically three Oxygen atoms bonded together, as the figure shows below.

The arrow in the figure represents that the molecule "mutates" between the two existing forms (which are just mirror images in this case since the molecule only has one type of atom), in what is called Molecular Resonance. A pair of shared atoms keeps shifting from left to right, and right to left, changing the polarity of the molecule along with it. What we have in practical terms is not a single or a dual bond, but something like a "1.5" bond between the atoms. This makes it quite unstable and reactive. It will easily oxidize most metals, with the exception of Gold, Platinum and Iridium.

One of the most interesting aspects of it is the duality of being essential to life but also harmful to it.

Keep your helmets on! 2005 YU55 near pass.

Tomorrow (tuesday the 8th of November) an asteroid the size of an aircraft carrier will pass us really close by. It's called 2005 YU55, and while astronomically we can call this a close miss, it will be 0.00217 AU (Eart-Sun distance) away, around 325,000 km or 200,000 mi. This is 15% closer than the distance at which the moon orbits (0.85 lunar distances).

Unfortunately, it will not be visible to the naked eye as it is not big enough, and since it is not a comet, it will not leave a visible trail. The object is approaching from the direction of the Sun, so it will be a daylight object, observable for astronomers who will surely be delighted pointing their optical and infra-red telescopes at it.
It poses no threat of collision, and by calculations, it won't do so for at least 100 years.

The next tracked object to come close to earth (0.6 lunar distances) won't come until 2028. Keep your helmets in good condition for that one as well.

Check out the original story at NASA's site

The world in shades of bastards.

cor·rup·tion noun \kə-ˈrəp-shən\
  a : impairment of integrity, virtue, or moral principle : depravity
  b : decay, decomposition
  c : inducement to wrong by improper or unlawful means (as bribery)
  d : a departure from the original or from what is pure or correct

This is a word most of us are familiar with, and when applied to government or the ruling class of a country or state, it refers to the deviation of public funds for private enrichment, as well as the acceptance of bribes or generally speaking, forgetting about the greater good for personal gain.

It has always been a huge problem in human societies because, like it or not, we are many times driven by greed. It is not a good basis to function on, and it shows.

Is it possible to measure corruption? Well, with some surveys and studies, people certainly have tried. The folks at Transparency International compiled all the results into a simple graphical media where we can appreciate the severity of the problem, the Corruption Perceptions Index 2010 Results.

The countries are given a rating from 0 to 10, with lower numbers indicating more corruption and higher numbers indicating more transparency, based on several surveys conducted (at least 3 or 4, with as many as 10 for some).

A world of planks is dangerous

Have you ever thought we should have buildings made entirely out of planks?
And then, what would happen if someone came along with a giant catapult shooting balls at these structures?

Yeah me neither...

Despite that, some people find it fun to simulate structures made out of planks and then crashing stuff into them, posting the videos which are extremely entertaining to watch.

Happy birthday Google

So, today Google becomes a teenager.

I can remember more or less my reaction when I first heard of it... "Google, what is this? some kind of competition for Lycos? those fools, they'll never be as big".

The interface in 1998

Right now the company is one the largest internet related businesses offering everything: searches, blog hosting, videos, documents, and even a new social network. Who would have thought about it all those years ago? And people who have grown with Google, how do they think we searched the web before it existed?

Well there were several web hosting companies that offered a search, and some others that established themselves as the first generation of dedicated search engines: Altavista, Lycos, Excite, Yahoo!. Some of these still exist but none has a chance of competing with the almight Googz, not even Microsoft's attempt Bing.

Will the domination end? Will space explorers still use Google's services 500 years from now? Will it all end December 21st, 2012?
For now, Happy birthday, yo.

Where Romans walked

It is no secret that some ancient civilizations were able to construct incredible things that would impose a challenge to modern engineers: Pyramids, aqueducts, catapults, temples and cathedrals... and also long lasting, good quality roads.
As part of a number of activities planned for a neighbouring city's annual festival Chocalhos, I got to walk on a Roman road.

The walk started from the local city hall and ended at the neighbouring town, which is straight on the other side of the local mountain range. It started pretty early with the traditional bell-bearers and then some goats (yes, tradition... they didn't come along on their own accord). We overtook the goats 'cos they were shitting all over the place, and began the uphill walk with a good rythm. Got to the other side in around an hour and then started descending towards the other town through the roman road. This took like half an hour.

I'm back! Paredes de Coura report

Well, after that short summer break of doing nothing and procrastinating as far as blog posts go, I'm back. Like you hadn't noticed by the fact there's a new post. Thank you Mr. Obvious Blogger... carrying on.

As I referenced in my last post I was attending an annual summer festival called Paredes de Coura, located in the far north of Portugal. I had never gone to it so it was a great new experience. As we all know the world is in economic turmoil and this country is one of the most affected at the moment by it, so the line up was not full of stars and world class bands, yet those who attended did their best to put on a show.

The Pwnie Awards

A couple of days ago the Pwnies were handed in Las Vegas. In case you're not familiar with them, they're basically the Oscars for achievements in technology (more specifically Information Security), awarded to those who move the field forwards, but at the same time they're the Raspberries, giving the dreaded "Most Epic Fail" award to those who deserve it.

The ponies pwnies

The big loser this year was Sony. It came as no surprise because it was the only nominee, albeit for a number of different reasons:

Sony After Fail0verflow and GeoHot published how to jailbreak the PS3, Sony got a bit miffed. Apparently unfamiliar with how the Internet works and how difficult it is to remove the piss from a swimming pool, Sony proceeded to try erase the information from the Internet and sue GeoHot et al. into oblivion. Needless to say, this was about as successful as the MiniDisc.

Sony Speaking of piss in a swimming pool, that just happened to be how well Sony protected their Sony Online Entertainment (SOE) users' account info and roughly 25 to 77 million account details were stolen by unknown hackers. That metaphor makes just about no sense at all, but you get the point: FAIL.

Sony Sony is definitely good at one thing: keeping the hits coming and their fans entertained. Oh wait, did we say Sony? We meant LulzSec. I guess that counts as another FAIL for Sony.

Sony After learning the hard way that their PlayStation Network was about as porous as air, Sony had to shut it down for over two months to rebuild it from scratch. In doing so, they made everyone from your 8-year old cousin to your barber learn about the importance of security. Hooray for us, sorry Sony shareholders.

Sony Noticing a pattern here? But wait, it gets better. Sony might have been able to better repel the multitude of attacks if they hadn't just recently laid off a significant number of their network security team. Great timing, guys.

The polar opposite, Epic 0wnage, which goes for "the hackers responsible for delivering the most damaging, widely publicized, or hilarious 0wnage.", went to Stuxnet this year, a worm that targets Siemens industrial equipment and that some say was engineered on purpose to tackle Iran's nuclear program supposedly using black marketed Siemens machinery.

How many centrifuges did your rootkit destroy? How many national nuclear programs did your worm disrupt? How many 0day exploits and rootkits for equipment that no one you has ever heard of have you written? Exactly.

Other nominees included LulzSec, Anonymous and Wikileaks.

Click here for the rest of the winners.

Sleeping to the soothing rain

If there's something that calms me down is the steady noise of rainfall.
Not long ago I was in one of those situations where you're trying to sleep, but all you manage to do is close your eyes and turn around in bed countless times till you end up belly up looking at the ceiling asking nobody "why can't I sleeeeeeeeep?"

So I got up and googled rain sound. Came across this very simple website Rainy Mood which plays rain and thunder noises in an endless loop.

It has over 400,000 likes on Facebook and a bunch of retweets, so it seems there are a lot of people out there who like going to sleep with the rain. All you need is a good set of speakers and a little power of abstraction to forget the fact it's coming from your computer.

Goodbye to all that

Today, at about 5:57 local time, the Space Shuttle Atlantis touched down for the last time, ending the Space Shuttle program, after a 13 day mission. I watched it live; it felt  like it is the end of an era, and space exploration won't be the same.

For 30 years we have seen these black and white, goofy looking crafts going up roaring through the skies, it almost felt routine.
The International Space Station will now be serviced by reliable, yet dated, Russian Soyuz rockets, however it feels that we're giving up, sort of ignoring our spirit of adventure. With so much economic turmoil all over the globe, nobody really knows if this is the passing of the torch to another western program, or if a new space power will emerge. NASA's funding is being pulled out in favor of other, less noble, projects. There are no big missions planned; no mission to Mars or even going back to the moon. We have so much to learn out there; canceling space exploration instead of investing heavily on it shows how immature we are as a species yet again. Countries much rather keep bickering at each other instead of pulling together somewhere. Things like these make me lose hope in mankind. 40 years ago we could go to the Moon. 10 years ago we had a supersonic passenger plane. Yesterday we had Space shuttles. What can we be proud of today? Smart phones? Are we regressing?

I can go on and on for years but I'll let some of these pictures do the talking for me.

To laugh, or to cry?

The last mission badge added to the ISS

Mission control applauds the last undocking

Welcome home indeed.

 I digress. I'm sad. See you next time.

Karting for 4 hours, fun!

This past saturday some of my friends decided to enter a local amateur motor racing competition: 4 hours go-kart endurance race. Their team was all made up so I joined in as the official pit-boy, controlling their times and helping wherever I could. It was a thoroughly enjoyable experience and we all had a good time.

Friday night:

Arrived at the place. In week days, it's a big market, but for the coming weekend it had been transformed into a kart track/expo center for cars. I had a couple of beers with the fellas and paid a little fee to get 10 minutes around the track. We usually go to the local indoor go-kart track, which is ran by the same people who were organizing this event, and I have to say running them outdoor a lot more fun.
There was a limit of 4 pilots per car and my friends had already organized a nice team so I couldn't run with them, however I offered my services of time keeping and organization, based entirely on theoretical knowledge of racing since I'd never done this before.

Flying from home

From a very early age I've been interested in airplanes, thanks to my father and some 80s movie starring a short scientologist, who is nowadays crazy. This interest of mine grew over the years by building Airfix models of war planes, throwing wooden gliders I had constructed, and when I finally got a computer of my own I got my hands on a piece of software that would become a hobby for me ever since.

The cherry party

If you follow the blog you might remember that post back in April in which I shown you all some of the views around here, specially the blossoming cherry trees. If you don't remember, go read it now, that's an order!

In any case, those little white flowers turned into cherries somehow (I think wizardry is involved) and now the whole region is overflowing with tasty round sweet red orbs of goodness.