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This Week In Science

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JGWI
Posts: 2842 - Karma: 7,812
Not sure what happened to the last thread about this...Anyways!




Here's NASA's astronomy picture of the day...

It's an image of the Soul nebula which is an active region of star formation in in the constellation Cassiopeia. It's about 7500lys away and spans just over 100ly from end to end. Just to put that in perspective that's over 588 trillion miles! The fastest spacecraft (New Horizon) we have ever launched exceeded speeds of 36,300mph (without gravitational assistance). Therefor to travel from the left side of this image to the right in the fastest vehicle we have today under its own power, it would take over 16 billion years!

We are merely a speck amongst the cosmos.
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Talk about science stuff!
Feb 28 2016 12:44AM
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.lencon
Posts: 6753 - Karma: 17,186
Man that nebula stuff is crazy. It's funny how everyone is freaking about global warming (it is a real problem) but in reality what we do on this earth probably affects nothing in the grand scheme of things.

Where are the aliens at tho!?
Feb 28 2016 12:52AM
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JGWI
Posts: 2842 - Karma: 7,812
Lol oops, I forgot to finish the calculation. It would take about 1.8 million years to cross from left to right not 16 billion.
Feb 28 2016 1:46AM
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miroz
Posts: 10333 - Karma: 3,945
.lenconMan that nebula stuff is crazy. It's funny how everyone is freaking about global warming (it is a real problem) but in reality what we do on this earth probably affects nothing in the grand scheme of things.

Where are the aliens at tho!?


Probably? More like definitely. Alien civilizations have risen and fallen long before we came to be, haven't you seen Star Wars?
Feb 28 2016 1:53AM
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Panta.Pow
Posts: 111 - Karma: 310
This is dope man. Please continue posting stuff like this every week. +K
Feb 28 2016 4:23AM
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*DUMBCAN*
Posts: 2447 - Karma: 5,628
Let's get some reality in this thread.

Feb 28 2016 8:14AM
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.Rybak.
Posts: 9017 - Karma: 9,864
mirozProbably? More like definitely. Alien civilizations have risen and fallen long before we came to be, haven't you seen Star Wars?


We can only see far away for now. We are trying to see far, far away.
Feb 29 2016 12:13PM
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JGWI
Posts: 2842 - Karma: 7,812
http://www.nasa.gov/multimedia/nasatv/

Soyuz reentry from ISS happening now if anyone is interested.
Mar 1 2016 10:34PM
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crotchvent
Posts: 1527 - Karma: 2,184
.lenconMan that nebula stuff is crazy. It's funny how everyone is freaking about global warming (it is a real problem) but in reality what we do on this earth probably affects nothing in the grand scheme of things.

Where are the aliens at tho!?


I got in an argument the other night with a friend about global warming who compared it existing to santa existing.
Mar 1 2016 10:53PM
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a_pla5tic_bag
Posts: 9217 - Karma: 5,399
No view of the landing provided, thanks russia. There will probably be some video eventually.
Mar 1 2016 11:48PM
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Casey
Posts: 7875 - Karma: 24,674
crotchventI got in an argument the other night with a friend about global warming who compared it existing to santa existing.


Its kind of like the existence of Santa in that we aren't going to do anything about climate change so its kind of like it doesn't exist. Well we at least pretend like Santa exists. I don't know!
Mar 2 2016 12:24AM
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JGWI
Posts: 2842 - Karma: 7,812
Photo of the day and one of my favorite!

Taken by Voyager 1 nearly 20 years ago and 6 billion kilometers away (near the orbit of Pluto).
Mar 4 2016 1:27AM
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georgen12
Posts: 363 - Karma: 2,759
There is a space x launch today at 6:35PM ET if you are interested.
This mission will deliver the SES-9 communications satellite to GTO for Luxembourg-based SES.
They will attempt to land the first stage on the barge again. This is the second v1.2 Falcon 9. The first v1.2 was the first one and so far only to land successfully, so high hopes.
More info here https://www.reddit.com/r/spacex/comments/48u4yq/rspacex_ses9_official_launch_discussion_updates/
Mar 4 2016 6:00AM
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zard_gawd
Posts: 254 - Karma: 329
crotchventI got in an argument the other night with a friend about global warming who compared it existing to santa existing.


slap your friend on the back of the neck for me
Mar 4 2016 9:41AM
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JGWI
Posts: 2842 - Karma: 7,812
Mar 7 2016 7:25PM
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Slush
Posts: 1916 - Karma: 12,957
^ every single one of those blow my mind
Mar 7 2016 7:45PM
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kohlfreeskier
Posts: 138 - Karma: 856
This is actually super cool to be able to watch edits as usual but then take a break from skiing and into something else super interesting. 10/10
Mar 7 2016 8:55PM
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JGWI
Posts: 2842 - Karma: 7,812
Came across the video a bit ago. It's an animation of the new James Webb telescope set to launch in 2018 (successor to Hubble). The engineering behind this thing is jaw dropping.
https://www.newschoolers.com/videos/watch/819003/James-Webb-Space-Telescope-Deployment-In-Detail

JWST's capabilities will enable a broad range of investigations across the fields of astronomy and cosmology.[5] One particular goal involves observing some of the most distant objects in the Universe, beyond the reach of current ground and space based instruments. This includes the very first stars, the epoch of reionization, and the formation of the first galaxies. Another goal is understanding the formation of stars and planets. This will include imaging molecular clouds and star-forming clusters, studying the debris disks around stars, direct imaging of exoplanets, and spectroscopic examination of planetary transits.
*https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Webb_Space_Telescope
The mirror on this think is almost 3 times larger than Hubble! Plus it will be set 1,600,000km from earth where Hubble is only about 560km.





Congress nearly pulled the plug on this as well to, you know, blow more shit up and stuff.

http://www.space.com/24563-james-webb-space-telescope-budget.html
Mar 12 2016 11:13PM
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JGWI
Posts: 2842 - Karma: 7,812
Big week!
Mar 15 2016 10:30PM
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JGWI
Posts: 2842 - Karma: 7,812
Sagan time!
https://www.newschoolers.com/videos/watch/819761/Carl-Sagan---You-Are-Here--Pale-Blue-Dot---Sagan-Time-
Mar 16 2016 11:34PM
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Bodhisattva_
Posts: 5749 - Karma: 2,009
Pretty cool that it's Montana State was involved with proving the existence of gravitational waves, and now China is working on related projects. Love my school :)
Mar 16 2016 11:52PM
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Alvaro
Posts: 323 - Karma: 2,066
what do you think about the electric universe theory and the thunderbolts project? (check them out on youtube if you dont know what im talking about)
Mar 17 2016 9:21AM
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JGWI
Posts: 2842 - Karma: 7,812
Alvarowhat do you think about the electric universe theory and the thunderbolts project? (check them out on youtube if you dont know what im talking about)


What I got from that video is that they are basically dismissing gravity as playing any significant role in the universe which is a direct contradiction to relativity, and of Newton's ideas, Kepler's, ect...

When Einstein came along and screwed everything in physics up with this new wild idea of relativity, yes people denied it as is going on here, however, the difference is relativity was a well motivated theory and had subsequent evidence to back it up. Yes rationally this stuff makes sense to people who know little to nothing about the field, but to people who do they are basically making the claim that pretty much everything people thought they knew about physics is wrong and their new theory which zero credible evidence to support it is right.

Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence.
Mar 17 2016 12:04PM
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.lencon
Posts: 6753 - Karma: 17,186
crotchventI got in an argument the other night with a friend about global warming who compared it existing to santa existing.


Santa won't be able to live in the north pole after all this climate change
Mar 17 2016 12:23PM
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Alvaro
Posts: 323 - Karma: 2,066
JGWIWhat I got from that video is that they are basically dismissing gravity as playing any significant role in the universe which is a direct contradiction to relativity, and of Newton's ideas, Kepler's, ect...

When Einstein came along and screwed everything in physics up with this new wild idea of relativity, yes people denied it as is going on here, however, the difference is relativity was a well motivated theory and had subsequent evidence to back it up. Yes rationally this stuff makes sense to people who know little to nothing about the field, but to people who do they are basically making the claim that pretty much everything people thought they knew about physics is wrong and their new theory which zero credible evidence to support it is right.

Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence.


the geocentric theory was dismissed mainly because it failed to explain the trajectories of planets, the modern theory is currently failing to explain a huge amount of stuff (like the aceleration of solar wind, the form of galaxies, pulsars and a lot more) and thats when they start coming up with concepts like "dark matter", "black holes", "strange matter" which have no real evidence and are a way to try to keep gravity as the only force that plays any role at the universe.
im not trying to say that the e.u. has all the answers to this stuff but its healthy for science to be open to new explanations and not get too close minded.
Mar 17 2016 3:11PM
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JGWI
Posts: 2842 - Karma: 7,812
Alvarothe geocentric theory was dismissed mainly because it failed to explain the trajectories of planets, the modern theory is currently failing to explain a huge amount of stuff (like the aceleration of solar wind, the form of galaxies, pulsars and a lot more) and thats when they start coming up with concepts like "dark matter", "black holes", "strange matter" which have no real evidence and are a way to try to keep gravity as the only force that plays any role at the universe.
im not trying to say that the e.u. has all the answers to this stuff but its healthy for science to be open to new explanations and not get too close minded.


No doubt it's healthy to be exposed to new ideas! However, those ideas need to have some credibility behind them. I couldn't so much as find a academic article, non bias website, or even a Wikipedia page on the e.u. theory. And as for there being no evidence of dark matter, black holes, dark energy, ect... Id have to disagree.
Mar 17 2016 4:12PM
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Lé.Skiing
Posts: 10035 - Karma: 8,128
Just saw this in my FB news feed.... I dunno if it's really "this week in science" worthy, but this creepy ass robot makes a joke about destroying all humans. Link: http://theantimedia.org/watch-this-frighteningly-life-like-smart-robot-joke-about-destroying-humans/



Also just have to say; the smile at the end..... Suuuuper fucking creepy.

















Robot was all like

Mar 18 2016 8:01PM
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skierman
Posts: 8371 - Karma: 7,590
JGWITaken by Voyager 1 nearly 20 years ago and 6 billion kilometers away (near the orbit of Pluto).


What's so impressive about a picture taken 500 miles away?
Mar 18 2016 9:29PM
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JGWI
Posts: 2842 - Karma: 7,812
skiermanWhat's so impressive about a picture taken 500 miles away?


I think you're a little off on your conversion there.
Mar 18 2016 10:18PM
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JGWI
Posts: 2842 - Karma: 7,812
Came across a video a couple days ago of a rendering of what Betelgeuse would look like going supernova from Earth.

https://www.newschoolers.com/videos/watch/820135/Betelgeuse-explosion-footage-as-seen-from-Earth
now keep in mind, we wouldn't see this as it happened but rather some 600 years after the fact due to the distance between us and it. Which means perhaps it has already exploded.

If you've looked up in the sky you've probably seen Betelgeuse. It is rather bright and has a distinct reddish orange glow to it as it is a type M star.

Relatively young(10 million years old) and nearing the end of its life in the next million years or so. At the moment Betelgeuse is a red supergiant which means it has nearly exhausted it's fuel. (Fused elements to the highest it can based on it's mass). Once fusion stops the star will explode leaving only a neutron star behind around 20km in diameter. The remarkable thing about this is all the mass that was present in the star before the explosion now is contained in the neutron star. Which when you consider that Betelgeuse is somewhere around 5-30 times larger than our sun, it is mindboggling to think about. A teaspoon of neutron star material would weigh about 10 million tons!

So the next time you look at Orion's Belt just think that there is a chance however small that one of those stars no longer exist.
Mar 19 2016 2:56PM
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Drail
Posts: 14012 - Karma: 10,011
JGWICame across a video a couple days ago of a rendering of what Betelgeuse would look like going supernova from Earth.

https://www.newschoolers.com/videos/watch/820135/Betelgeuse-explosion-footage-as-seen-from-Earth
now keep in mind, we wouldn't see this as it happened but rather some 600 years after the fact due to the distance between us and it. Which means perhaps it has already exploded.

If you've looked up in the sky you've probably seen Betelgeuse. It is rather bright and has a distinct reddish orange glow to it as it is a type M star.

Relatively young(10 million years old) and nearing the end of its life in the next million years or so. At the moment Betelgeuse is a red supergiant which means it has nearly exhausted it's fuel. (Fused elements to the highest it can based on it's mass). Once fusion stops the star will explode leaving only a neutron star behind around 20km in diameter. The remarkable thing about this is all the mass that was present in the star before the explosion now is contained in the neutron star. Which when you consider that Betelgeuse is somewhere around 5-30 times larger than our sun, it is mindboggling to think about. A teaspoon of neutron star material would weigh about 10 million tons!

So the next time you look at Orion's Belt just think that there is a chance however small that one of those stars no longer exist.


It's the lookers left 'hand' of Orion for those wondering. I really really hope it happens during my life time. #lifegoals.
Mar 19 2016 5:20PM
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lgward
Posts: 301 - Karma: 404
mind if i join in?
this website never ceases to both amaze and infuriate me. our solar system... to scale.

http://joshworth.com/dev/pixelspace/pixelspace_solarsystem.html
Mar 19 2016 9:50PM
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a_pla5tic_bag
Posts: 9217 - Karma: 5,399
#RealScientistsOfNS

I took this photo on a Nikon A1R+ laser scanning confocal microscope. This is at 600x magnification with a NA 1.40 60x oil lens. I used 2 primary antibodies and 2 secondaries, one green and one red. Blue was a hard setting mounting media with DAPI. Blue is DNA, red is a marker of DNA damage, green is the labs protein of interest. I played with the laser power so the green wasn't too overpowering and what you see here is the detector reading all three colors and overlaying them. I deliberately caused a lot of DNA damage here. The original image was 512x512 pixels but I enlarged it. These are lung cancer cells, obviously fixed in formaldehyde before I did any of the staining.
Mar 19 2016 11:56PM
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JGWI
Posts: 2842 - Karma: 7,812
Mar 22 2016 9:07PM
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qazwsxedc34
Posts: 2955 - Karma: 2,141
Bodhisattva_Pretty cool that it's Montana State was involved with proving the existence of gravitational waves, and now China is working on related projects. Love my school :)


Gravity is merely an element of electro-magnetism in disguise.
Apr 5 2016 5:45PM
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Bodhisattva_
Posts: 5749 - Karma: 2,009
fuckmekevinGravity is merely an element of electro-magnetism in disguise.


Thanks
Apr 5 2016 6:34PM
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Willgum
Posts: 3254 - Karma: 3,066
It's kind of odd if you think about it. In today's day & age, humans pour immense, IMMENSE amounts of money, time and energy into the constant state of conflict which makes up foreign ( and domestic) affairs. From wars, to lobbying, to inefficient spending through bureaucracy, and everything in between. We've come a long ways, but on a scale of 1-10 on the maximum efficiency and utility scale, we're only at like a 3.

Imagine the era where the world operates near peak efficiency. Technology combined with education will( hopefully) lead to very little conflict & waste; spending money will yield investments, not expenses.

If the day ever comes, imagine how much progress humans would make when we focus our energy outwards to the stars, and continue building our technology. Right now the budget allocates 0.5% towads Nasa. imagine if that number was 25%, with a huge army of educated minds armed with latest technology.

Hopefully we don't blow ourselves up before we reach that point
Apr 5 2016 7:59PM
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qazwsxedc34
Posts: 2955 - Karma: 2,141
WillgumIt's kind of odd if you think about it. In today's day & age, humans pour immense, IMMENSE amounts of money, time and energy into the constant state of conflict which makes up foreign ( and domestic) affairs. From wars, to lobbying, to inefficient spending through bureaucracy, and everything in between. We've come a long ways, but on a scale of 1-10 on the maximum efficiency and utility scale, we're only at like a 3.

Imagine the era where the world operates near peak efficiency. Technology combined with education will( hopefully) lead to very little conflict & waste; spending money will yield investments, not expenses.

If the day ever comes, imagine how much progress humans would make when we focus our energy outwards to the stars, and continue building our technology. Right now the budget allocates 0.5% towads Nasa. imagine if that number was 25%, with a huge army of educated minds armed with latest technology.

Hopefully we don't blow ourselves up before we reach that point


Planned Obsolescence is a hell of a drug.
Apr 6 2016 7:07PM
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zard_gawd
Posts: 254 - Karma: 329
WillgumIt's kind of odd if you think about it. In today's day & age, humans pour immense, IMMENSE amounts of money, time and energy into the constant state of conflict which makes up foreign ( and domestic) affairs. From wars, to lobbying, to inefficient spending through bureaucracy, and everything in between. We've come a long ways, but on a scale of 1-10 on the maximum efficiency and utility scale, we're only at like a 3.

Imagine the era where the world operates near peak efficiency. Technology combined with education will( hopefully) lead to very little conflict & waste; spending money will yield investments, not expenses.

If the day ever comes, imagine how much progress humans would make when we focus our energy outwards to the stars, and continue building our technology. Right now the budget allocates 0.5% towads Nasa. imagine if that number was 25%, with a huge army of educated minds armed with latest technology.

Hopefully we don't blow ourselves up before we reach that point


I think I should sig this
Apr 6 2016 7:28PM
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e.littt
Posts: 414 - Karma: 2,348
WillgumIt's kind of odd if you think about it. In today's day & age, humans pour immense, IMMENSE amounts of money, time and energy into the constant state of conflict which makes up foreign ( and domestic) affairs. From wars, to lobbying, to inefficient spending through bureaucracy, and everything in between. We've come a long ways, but on a scale of 1-10 on the maximum efficiency and utility scale, we're only at like a 3.

Imagine the era where the world operates near peak efficiency. Technology combined with education will( hopefully) lead to very little conflict & waste; spending money will yield investments, not expenses.

If the day ever comes, imagine how much progress humans would make when we focus our energy outwards to the stars, and continue building our technology. Right now the budget allocates 0.5% towads Nasa. imagine if that number was 25%, with a huge army of educated minds armed with latest technology.

Hopefully we don't blow ourselves up before we reach that point


Just imagine if every country swapped their military budgets with their space/science budget.. we would probably be on Mars already. Its a major leap for our global society to transfer from where it is now, to realizing that in our current state of affairs: we are going to be torn a new one real soon.
Apr 6 2016 7:29PM
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DrZoidberg
Posts: 5675 - Karma: 4,269
e.litttJust imagine if every country swapped their military budgets with their space/science budget.. we would probably be on Mars already. Its a major leap for our global society to transfer from where it is now, to realizing that in our current state of affairs: we are going to be torn a new one real soon.


Sort of. A lot of the technology that came out of the space race was also destined for military glory, should it have came to that. I'm pretty sure all the rockets/boosters were ICBM stuff that they were able to call spaceship parts as an aside. Trying to kill somebody seems to be a great motivator for new tech though.

Although I do agree that it's dumb that we fund ways to kill each other more than other scientific stuff, save for when the two are mutual outcomes, like with nuclear science.
Apr 6 2016 8:24PM
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Alvaro
Posts: 323 - Karma: 2,066
falcon 9 launch in 3 hours, stoked af
http://www.spacex.com/webcast
Apr 8 2016 1:26PM
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miroz
Posts: 10333 - Karma: 3,945
e.litttJust imagine if every country swapped their military budgets with their space/science budget.. we would probably be on Mars already. Its a major leap for our global society to transfer from where it is now, to realizing that in our current state of affairs: we are going to be torn a new one real soon.


DrZoidbergSort of. A lot of the technology that came out of the space race was also destined for military glory, should it have came to that. I'm pretty sure all the rockets/boosters were ICBM stuff that they were able to call spaceship parts as an aside. Trying to kill somebody seems to be a great motivator for new tech though.

Although I do agree that it's dumb that we fund ways to kill each other more than other scientific stuff, save for when the two are mutual outcomes, like with nuclear science.


Word.

It's important to distinguish what is meant by military budgets. Military research often results in things you wouldn't expect and is carried out with an urgency (in the name of national defense) not found in basic science and academic engineering research. ENIAC (the grandfather of digital computers as we know them) was developed to perform calculations about nuclear weapons. It's important to remember that not all discoveries and innovations are inevitable, and there are infinite ways things can turn out. Money spent on research is often good for advancement, even if it's military research (and as long as we don't all kill each other in doing it).

On the other hand, I've heard from a friend who worked for a while at the DoD that Congress approves the purchases of tons of military equipment each year with the goal of keeping military contracting companies afloat to preserve the human/employee knowledge in case we need it later...even though we don't need the equipment now. IMO that's a bit more complicated.
Apr 8 2016 4:03PM
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a_pla5tic_bag
Posts: 9217 - Karma: 5,399
AAHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!! IT LANDED ON THE DRONE SHIP
Apr 8 2016 5:00PM
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Lé.Skiing
Posts: 10035 - Karma: 8,128
This is pretty awesome.

https://www.newschoolers.com/videos/watch/825050/Nanotubes-assemble--Rice-introduces-Teslaphoresis



Nano tubes assembling themselves.
Apr 16 2016 5:08PM
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JGWI
Posts: 2842 - Karma: 7,812
ahhhh I'm getting lazy.

Most have probably seen this but it still is neat. It just shows how connected and intricate things are on this planet and how important it is to care for our environment and preserve keystone species.
https://www.newschoolers.com/videos/watch/825850/How-Wolves-Change-Rivers
Apr 22 2016 4:17PM
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