While visiting the fam on the west coast of Florida, we drove over to Kennedy Space Center (KSC) to catch the Juno launch!   It was the first time I’ve seen a launch up close.  The most surprising thing about it was not how loud it was, but how bright and blinding the blast was… especially when watching it through the binoculars.  Amazing!!

Juno is on its way to Jupiter and will arrive by July 2016.  Once it gets there, it’ll orbit the planet for about a year to collect data about it’s structure and origins.  If you’re into those Discovery Channel shows about the universe like I am, then you’ll love digging around on the Mission Juno site… tells you all about it.

After spending the day at KSC, we headed to the Brevard Observatory which is home to Florida’s largest telescope… more pics to share in the next post.

Juno on Twitter

I instantly gravitated toward the book 3-Minute Einstein by Ivy Press at Barnes and Noble the other day.  It’s a quick biography of Einstein’s life and theories done in a creative way.  I think I’m going to have to go back and get it.

I came across this site on PBS that features him and loved what he said about his work, “The daily effort comes from no deliberate intention or program, but straight from the heart.”  Not only did he have the mind, but his heart was completely in it too.  He truly loved what he did.

(Here’s a 1-minute explanation of E = mc² by another one of my favorite scientists and theoretical physicist, Michio Kaku.)

p.s. nerd’s the word.

MYTH:  Women and science don’t mix.

If Velokova had a middle name, it would be Kari.  Kari Byron from Discovery Channel’s Mythbusters, is the ultimate badass science chick… hands down.  She redefines what it means to be a scientist.  She shoots cannons, builds rockets, conducts experiments, and jumps out of planes… all for the love of learning and adventure.  Lucky girl!  I’d love to hang with her for a day and bust some myths!

By the age of 5 Kari was experimenting on her sister and using dolls as crash-test dummies.  With a background in sculpting and painting, she began model-making and eventually landed a job at M5 Industries in San Francisco which led to her big debut on Discovery Channel’s Mythbusters.

Kari is an amazing role-model.  She also hosts the show, Head Rush, on the Science Channel to inspire kids to take an interest in science and technology.  “Let’s face it: subjects like science and math have an unfortunate reputation for being boring and dry and, dare I say, even “nerdy.”  Another huge roadblock for students is the lack of role models in the fields of science, technology, engineering and math (what the President calls the STEM initiative) in our media-driven world of glamor, fame, and money. Close your eyes and picture a scientist. Do you see an awkward nerdy man with bad posture, glasses and a lab coat? Who wants to be him when you are inundated with exciting visions of gorgeous movie stars and rich athletes?”

Wait, it gets even better.  She’s also a kickass mom!  “Everyone told me I would take less risks as a mom…What?! I am still me.   I don’t hold back from doing daring things. Of course I still jump out of planes! What really changed was that my everyday life has become a profoundly blissful experience. I get just as excited about peek-a-boo as I do about counting down an explosion.  Even though I will have to eat live bugs this season and possibly handle poop, I am not fazed. I still do exciting, daredevil, and wild things — but now I do them so that my little girl will know that a mommy can distinguish between a C4 and an ANFO explosion.  If I want my daughter to be an adventurous independent woman who doesn’t shy away from new experiences, I will have to be that woman too.”

Episode recap…MYTH: Women and science don’t mix..

You can catch up with Kari on Geekmom and Twitter.

Photos:  Discovery Channel

Did you catch the final launch of the Discovery??  I was so stoked to see it live online, but I was bummed knowing it was the shuttle’s last flight. Growing up in Florida I watched all the launches as a kid.  In elementary school, the teachers would let us out to watch and one day I was sooo excited that I ran, tripped, and fell hard on my leg.  I had to get stitches in my knee and I still have the scar…. space tattoo?

Discovery has had a great run.  It’s been flying since ’84 and it even carried the Hubble Telescope into orbit.  Nicole Stott is one of the crew members aboard for it’s final mission.  As an astronaut, engineer, and a mother, she’s an incredible role model.  Becoming an astronaut is one of those things that seems completely out of reach, but it’s not impossible.  Look what she said about applying for the job… “I think that’s one of the hardest things, is actually convincing yourself that you should fill out the application and send it in.  That took a lot for me.  I always thought it was really cool but never thought it was a reality kind of thing.”

Nicole spent a few months at the International Space Station and shares what the experience is like in an article in Dwell.  She says that, “When my heart beats, I actually feel like the space station is moving around me because of it, when in fact, it’s really my whole body gently moving in response to it and not the station motion at all.”

I can only imagine what it would be like looking through the window up there.  I love her view on spacecraft, “We get to and from space in them, they deliver food and supplies to us, they dock to each other, they provide us with everything we need to live in the vacuum of space — and they are amazingly beautiful.  There is a shiny, spectacular independence to each of them when you see them hanging so naturally in space, like they were meant to be there with the forces of nature holding them in their place.”

You can read about Nicole in her inteview with NASA

Nicole on Twitter

Sources and Photos:  NASA, Nicole Stott’s Blog, Dwell

Nerding out with this space art by Christopher David Ryan and these incredible NASA photos.

This tee just might have to warp into my closet.

As I was flipping through the Hubble telescope gallery, I nearly fell out of my chair when I saw that IMAX and NASA teamed up together to film the final repair mission back in May ’09.. and all in 3D!

I was completely in shock when I read in Scott’s American Cinematographer magazine how much effort went into the development of the movie from start to finish.  In a short period of time, the IMAX team trained the astronauts how to use the camera in the Neutral Buoyancy Laboratory, a 6.2 million gallon pool where the astronauts train for life in space.

Since just a single load of film could be taken up to space, they were only able to capture 8 minutes of actual spacewalk footage (which equals over a mile of film).  Once fixed into position, the camera had no way to pan or tilt and all functions were operated via laptop.  The film stock was specifically made for the production and the undeveloped negative weighed more than 50 pounds per roll in custom made cans.  They also had to create a vacuum and pressurized system to keep the film from curling inside the container and to allow it to enter and re-enter the atmosphere properly.  The footage had to be deemed a “national treasure’ by NASA to allow cinematographer James Neihouse to hand carry the film back to California on a commercial flight without having to put it through the x-ray scanner.

So much can go wrong up there in space.  Astronaut Mike Massimino had to rip off a handrail after attempting to remove a bolt that wouldn’t budge.  In the movie he describes that working on Hubble is like “doing brain surgery with oven mitts on”.  Also, they say the most vulnerable part of the spacesuit are the gloves since they could slice open easily with one wrong move.  Can you imagine??

So the only place it seemed to be showing near me was at the California Science Center in LA.  Narrated by Leonardo DiCaprio, the movie is only 45 minutes long… and yes, you really do feel like you are right there changing Hubble’s batteries along with the crew.  For about $10 you can get this life-like astronaut’s perspective of Earth from space, here’s your ticket:  HUBBLE 3D

The final servicing mission included the installation of the New Wide Field Camera 3 and a Cosmic Origins Spectrograph allowing detailed imagery using UV and infrared spectrums of light.  So now we can see deep into the universe better than ever…

Saturn with Aurora

Omega Swan Nebula

Cat’s Eye Nebula (dying star)

Supernova Remnant

Helix Nebula & Galaxy NGC 1512

Butterfly emerges from stellar demise in planetary nebula NGC 6302

UFO – no really, they have no idea what this is… photo taken on January 29, 2010.  Looks like they call it a “comet-like asteroid”.

Spiral Galaxies NGC 2207 & IC 2163

Jupiter and moon IO

Eagle Nebula

Deepest view of universe – galaxies galore

The universe is just filled with intergalactic art.

Photos:  Peter Ginter, National Geographic

Over in Geneva, Switzerland…. in a few hours a webcast will be streaming live from the control room at CERN in their attempt to smash up some protons with the Large Hadron Collider.

Why should you care about CERN and some nerdy experimental particle physics?  Well, you wouldn’t have been able to check your twitter updates or go on a run this morning with your ipod.  CERN was responsible for the invention of the interweb as well as the giant magnetoresistance.  The latter allowed the development of mini hard disks that are the main ingredient in small electronics.

To join the party, I’m offering 20% off these scientific pieces in my shop through April 7th with the coupon code:  CERN

HADRON EARRINGS
SUBATOMIC NECKLACE
SUBATOMIC EARRINGS
QUARK NECKLACE

Photos:  Moon from my front porch, Virgin Galactic on Flickr – Herb Lingl

I’m completely blown away with every facet of space.  Just the thought of being on a rotating orb traveling around the sun at 67,000 miles per hour makes my head spin.

The full moon on saturday night was the biggest and brightest it will be in 2010. Not to be outdone, Mars joined the party with its little red glow too.  As I was snapping away with my jaw dropped, I was thinking about all the lucky bastards that are going to space via Branson’s Virgin Galactic spaceships.  A six minute float in space breaks the piggy bank at $200,000 with a $20,000 down payment.  Unbuckling your seat belt to float around the cabin and bumping into everything is one thing….. but man, the thought of being able to look back at Earth with my own eyes just takes my breath away.  Very humbling.

Branson and his mother, Eve, celebrating over a bottle of bubbly.  She looks like a woman that loves an adventure.  Love it.