Scientific Computing

Delivering IT and Informatics Solutions to the Scientific and Engineering Communities

[scientificcomputing]

The Martian: From Self-Published Blog to Major Motion Picture

The Martian is Weir’s first novel. He started the book in 2009, researching it to be as realistic as possible based on existing technology, and posting it to his blog chapter by chapter. The story unfolded over the course of several years, but Weir has stated that he knows the exact date of each day in The Martian.

[scientificcomputing]

How Close are We to Actually Becoming Martians?

Like any long-distance relationship, our love affair with Mars has had its ups and downs. The planet’s red tint made it a distinctive — but ominous — nighttime presence to the ancients, who gazed at it with the naked eye. Later we got closer views through telescopes, but the planet still remained a mystery, ripe for speculation.

[scientificcomputing]

Look to the Sky for a Rare Sight: A Dramatic Supermoon Eclipse

For the first time in more than 30 years, a total lunar eclipse will occur at the same time as a “supermoon,” masking the moon’s larger-than-life face this Sunday, September 27, 2015. These events have taken place simultaneously only five times since the start of the 20th century — the last time was in 1982 — and they will not happen again until 2033. The eclipse will spawn a deep red “blood moon.”

[scientificcomputing]

NASA Partners with Hoverboard Company to Build Real-life Tractor Beam

Arx Pax, creator of Magnetic Field Architecture (MFA) and hover engine technology, announced that it has entered into a Space Act Agreement (SAA) with the National Aeronautics and Space Administration. The purpose of the collaboration is to use Arx Pax’s MFA to create “micro-satellite capture devices” that can manipulate and couple satellites from a distance. This can be achieved by using a magnetic tether between the objects.

[scientificcomputing]

10 Years Later, Researchers are still Gaining Insight from Hurricane Katina Impact Data

Over the past decade, researchers have been working steadily to collect and analyze data on the storm’s aftermath, including coastal change, science for recovery and restoration, and census data. Here are just a few examples of the many projects and resources associated with the storm and the first 10 years of post-storm recovery

[scientificcomputing]

Chocolate Physics: How Molecular Simulation could Improve Texture and Aromatic Sensation

Lecithin is an ingredient that you’ve quite possibly never heard of, but one that plays a vital role in the production of chocolate and many other foods. It’s never been clear how this ingredient works on a molecular level, and confectioners have relied on observational methods — essentially trial and error — to perfect their recipes. Now, scientists have shown how the field of molecular dynamics — simulation on a molecular level — could be a valuable tool in understanding chocolate conching

[scientificcomputing]

Will We Finally Get a Global, Query-able Scientific Cloud?

Ever since ARPANET, the network that became the basis for the Internet and then the subsequent birth of the Web, a revolution in science has appeared to be imminent. While the number of academic papers disseminated by the Web continues to grow, it is safe to say that the Web-based advances in science have not matched the revolutions in other areas, such as music and mainstream publishing. That isn’t to say there haven’t been great steps forward and pockets of success. These include the ability to map and query genomes following the success of the human genome project and, perhaps most notable, the role of computers in the 2013 Nobel Prize in Chemistry for the development of multiscale models for complex chemical systems. However, as the complexity of research increases, the need for larger volumes of data and more processing power to analyze that data has never been greater.

[scientificcomputing]

S. H. Jucha: Future Technological Innovations for Space Exploration and Earth

Space exploration and commercial applications have always been inextricably linked. NASA’s innovations have found their way into our everyday technology in health and medicine, public safety, transportation, consumer goods, environmental and agricultural resources, computer technology and industrial productivity.

[scientificcomputing]

Aliens Among Us: Andy Weir’s The Martian Transports Him to Another World

Andy Weir chats re #TheMartian and how tsunami of events changed his life http://bit.ly/1hlAFxN

[scientificcomputing]

Statistical Model Predicts Play-calling of NFL Teams with High Accuracy

Researchers have built a statistical model that predicts the play-calling tendency of NFL teams with high accuracy. Their model, which correctly called run and pass plays at a high rate when tested using play-by-play data from actual NFL games, could be used by casual fans and even NFL defensive coordinators during real games to predict their opponent’s next play.

[scientificcomputing]

Bill Gates Calls for Power and Energy Miracles

Bill Gates is making a huge investment into clean-energy technology. Gates has already invested roughly $1 billion of his personal fortune in companies that are working on clean energy, and he recently told the Financial Times he plans to spend another $1 billion in the next five years on "wild-eyed" energy tech companies. In addition, he feels that the U.S. government should roughly triple energy R&D to $16 billion a year.

[scientificcomputing]

#ILookLikeAnEngineer: Challenging Stereotypes about Who Works in Tech

“Do you feel passionately about helping spread awareness about tech gender diversity? Do you not fit the ‘cookie-cutter mold’ of what people believe engineers ‘should look like?’ If you answered yes to any of these questions, I invite you to help spread the word and help us redefine ‘what an engineer should look like’ #iLookLikeAnEngineer,”

[scientificcomputing]

Ground-breaking Open Source Cybersecurity Software Turns 20

In 1995, Vern Paxson, then a computer science Ph.D. student at the University of California, Berkeley, began writing what would eventually become Bro, the ground-breaking open source cybersecurity software that defends innumerable networks today, including key government and business enterprises in the U.S. 

[scientificcomputing]

Dark Side of the Moon

From a Million Miles Away, NASA Camera Shows Moon Crossing Face of Earth

[scientificcomputing]

Make or Break your Data IQ: The Intersection between Integrity and Quality

Big data can become a company’s savior or a scam — depending on how well or poorly it is leveraged. Before it goes through the analytics process, data must score high in “data IQ,” which is a combination of data integrity and data quality. It is critical that leadership across functions recognize the importance of reliable data, because without a willingness throughout the enterprise to ensure its integrity and quality — in other words, its data IQ — efforts to leverage analytics throughout the organization will falter and may ultimately fail.

[scientificcomputing]

Setting Up Your Own Personal Cloud

Okay, let's have a show of hands. How many of you are sick of being pelted with the term “The Cloud”? For that matter, what is this cloud thing? As I'm sure many of you have discovered by now, just like the term “LIMS”, it seems that everyone has their own definition of what “The Cloud” is. You will frequently find the term used to refer to anything that incorporates the Internet. Several formal definitions have actually been attempted.

[scientificcomputing]

Perhaps Aliens like Continuous Streaming, Too

The Voyager Golden Records are now available on Soundcloud, which means that anyone with an Internet connection can experience NASA’s “time capsule” for themselves, knowing that the originals are still traveling through empty space or the heliosphere.