Lifeboat Foundation

Efforts to study the early stages of the coronavirus pandemic have received help from a surprising source. A biologist in the United States has ‘excavated’ partial SARS-CoV-2 genome sequences from the beginnings of the pandemic’s probable epicentre in Wuhan, China, that were deposited — but later removed — from a US government database.

The partial genome sequences address an evolutionary conundrum about the early genetic diversity of the coronavirus SARS-CoV-2, although scientists emphasize that they do not shed light on its origins. Nor is it fully clear why researchers at Wuhan University asked for the sequences to be removed from the Sequence Read Archive (SRA), a repository for raw sequencing data maintained by the National Center for Biotechnology Information (NCBI), part of the US National Institutes of Health (NIH).

Partial SARS-CoV-2 sequences from early outbreaks in Wuhan were removed from a US government database by the scientists who deposited them.

Stimulating STEM Innovation & Securing U.S. High-Tech Economy — Kimberly A. Reed, Fmr President and Chairman Export-Import Bank of the United States.

Kimberly A. Reed just finished up a 2-year term as President and Chairman of the Board of Directors of the Export-Import Bank of the United States (EXIM — https://www.exim.gov). She was the first woman to lead EXIM in the agency’s 87-year history, was the first recipient of EXIM’s highest honor, the Franklin D. Roosevelt Award, and was confirmed by the U.S. Senate in 2019 on a strong bi-partisan basis.

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El Salvador has mined 0.00599179 bitcoin, or about $269, with power harnessed from a volcano.

President Nayib Bukele – who has banked his political future on a nationwide bitcoin experiment – tweeted early Friday morning that this is the country’s maiden voyage into volcano-powered bitcoin mining.

On Tuesday, the president posted a flashy 25-second teaser video, which includes shots of a government-branded shipping container full of bitcoin mining rigs, technicians installing and plugging in ASIC miners, as well as sweeping landscape aerials of an energy factory in the thick of a forest, bordering a volcano.

A geomagnetic storm is set to hit the Earth and may affect satellites and electricity grids. The US government’s space weather tracking body has warned the public about the possibility of a geomagnetic storm, which is different from a solar storm. The phenomenon is caused by the solar wind and it will likely spark an aurora.

After the solar storm, here comes the solar wind! Over the past couple of weeks, reports have detailed the devastating impact that solar storms or coronal mass ejections (CMEs) can have on the Internet infrastructure on Earth. Now, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s (NOAA) Space Weather Prediction Center (SWPC) has issued a Geomagnetic Storm Watch for Sunday, that is, September 26. A geomagnetic storm is set to hit the Earth. The US government’s space weather tracking body has warned the public about the possibility of a of G1 or G2-level geomagnetic storm. Among some of its effects on Earth is that it is expected to light up the skies in the form of an aurora, aka Northern Lights, and perhaps affect infrastructure.

For the uninitiated, a geomagnetic storm is a major disturbance of Earth’s magnetosphere that occurs when there is an exchange of energy from the solar wind into the space environment surrounding Earth. These storms result from variations in the solar wind that produces major changes in the currents, plasmas, and fields in Earth’s magnetosphere. According to SWPC, the largest storms that result from these conditions are associated with solar coronal mass ejections (CMEs) where a billion tons or so of plasma from the sun, with its embedded magnetic field, is shot outwards and it get directed at Earth.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cX2tXnUL-cY&feature=youtu.be

LIVE.

UNTV Live Schedule — 28 September 2021.

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I agree with Elon.

Elon Musk repeated prior criticisms of fellow billionaire space mogul Jeff Bezos, as their respective companies continue to battle in federal court and in front of regulators.

“I think I’ve expressed my thoughts on that front — I think he should put more of his energy into getting to orbit, [rather] than lawsuits,” Musk said Tuesday at the CodeCon 2021 conference in Beverly Hills, California. “You cannot sue your way to the moon, no matter how good your lawyers are,” Musk added. Bezos’ Blue Origin is suing SpaceX, by way of NASA, in the U.S. Federal Court of Claims over a $2.9 billion astronaut lunar lander contract the agency awarded Musk’s company earlier this year.

Continue reading “Elon Musk fires shot at Jeff Bezos, ‘you can’t sue your way to orbit’” »

A Chinese Kuaizhou 1A (KZ-1A) rocket lifted off from the Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center in Inner Mongolia at 06:19 UTC on September 27 lofting a new high-resolution remote sensing satellite into orbit.

The rocket lifted off from Site 95 at Jiuquan, marking the 14th flight of a KZ-1 series rocket. This was also the first KZ-1 launch since the Jilin-1 Gaofen-02C launch in September 2,020 which ended in failure and the loss of its payload.

China’s KZ-1A rocket is manufactured by the ExPace Technology Corporation, an aerospace company owned by the Chinese government, based out of Wuhan in China’s Hubei province. The rocket is capable of delivering payloads of up to 200 kg into a Sun-Synchronous Orbit, and therefore is mainly marketed as a small satellite launch vehicle.

Intelligent sensing and tele-presence robotic technology, enabling health practitioners to remotely assess a person’s physical and cognitive health from anywhere in the world, is being pioneered in research co-led at the University of Strathclyde.

The technology could aid cost-effective diagnosis, more regular monitoring and health assessments alongside assistance, especially for people living with conditions such as Alzheimer’s disease and other cognitive impairments.

The system was demonstrated for the first time to the UK Government Minister, Iain Stewart during a visit to the construction site of the National Robotarium, hosted at Heriot-Watt University, which is co-leading the research with Strathclyde.

The space station has been showing its age, with new damage and other signs of wear being found in various modules. Most recently, Russian cosmonauts spotted about half a dozen new cracks in their Zarya module. And while both NASA and Roscosmos say the cracks don’t pose a threat to crewmembers, Insider reports that Shepherd spoke to a House of Representatives committee on Tuesday, telling the lawmakers that they need to pay attention to the possible hazard, which he called a “serious problem.”

NASA is currently trying to secure another four years’ worth of funding for the ISS, which would allow it to keep the orbital outpost running until 2,028 according to Insider. But Shepherd says NASA would be unwise to do so before actually investigating these cracks to determine not only how bad they are today but whether they’ll continue to get worse, as Russian officials have warned they might.

“Getting to the bottom of this is a fairly serious issue,” Shepherd told Congress. “I don’t think the station’s in any immediate danger. But before we clear the station for another so many years of operational use, we should better understand this.”