Asteroid to pass Earth on Christmas Eve | Science Wire | EarthSky

A large asteroid is approaching the Earth-moon system and will provide a good opportunity for radar observations in the days ahead. Asteroid 163899 – also known as 2003 SD220 – will come closest to Earth on Christmas Eve (December 24, 2015). It’ll pass at a safe distance, and there’s no need to worry about reports claiming it will skim the Earth, or cause earthquakes. At its closest, asteroid 2003 SD220 will be some 6,787,600 miles (11 million km) from our planet’s surface. That’s more than 28 times the Earth-moon distance! It’s so far away that only professional and advanced amateur astronomers are likely to capture optical images of this space rock.

Don’t believe any media suggesting that this space rock may cause earthquakes. Those assertions are misleading and incorrect. Even if 2003 SD220 were passing closer, it’s doubtful earthquakes would result. In fact, there’s no scientific evidence that an asteroid’s flyby can cause any seismic activity, unless it collides with Earth, but – in this case – that clearly will not be the case.

This asteroid isn’t a newly discovered object. Its name – 2003 SD220 – indicates its discovery year. The Lowell Observatory Near-Earth Object Search (LONEOS) program in Flagstaff, Arizona discovered the asteroid on September 29, 2003.

One notable feature of this asteroid is its large size. Preliminary estimates suggested a size of 0.7 miles to 1.5 miles (1.1 km to 2.5 km). Now the size estimate has been bumped up, after recent radar observations from the Arecibo telescope in Puerto Rico. The new observations suggest the asteroid is about 1.25 miles (2 km) long.

The asteroid is thought to have a very slow rotation of about one week.

Although some other asteroids such as 2015 TB145 (the Halloween asteroid) and 2004 BL86 (January, 2015) were visible using 8″ telescopes, the Christmas asteroid will be much more difficult to see because of its distance.

However, using radio telescopes, astronomers are already observing this asteroid by bouncing radio signals from the space rock’s surface. The Arecibo Observatory in Puerto Rico is studying asteroid 2003 SD220 from December 3 to 17, while the Goldstone Antenna in California is analyzing the space rock from December 5 to 20.

Image via Arecibo Observatory/NASA/NSF

This space rock – whose shape can be compared to a chicken tender – will make its approach to Earth on December 24, 2015 but will return again in 2018. NASA astronomer and asteroid expert Lance Benner said in a Goldstone radar observations planning document:

2003 SD220 is on NASA’s NHATS list of potential human-accessible targets, so observations of this object are particularly important.

The 2015 apparition is the first of five encounters by this object in the next 12 years when it will be close enough for a radar detection.

The Near-Earth Object Human Space Flight Accessible Targets Study (NHATS) is a program developed to identify those near-Earth objects that may be well-suited for future human-space-flight rendezvous missions.

Although this is a huge asteroid, there is no danger of a future collision. The orbit of asteroid 2003 SD220 is well known and NASA has verified that the space rock will not pass at any dangerous distance during the next two centuries.

The path of asteroid 2003 SD220 through our solar system. Image via NASA

Bottom line: Asteroid 163899 – aka 2003 SD220 – will pass safely, at more than 28 times the Earth-moon distance, on December 24, 2015. Astronomers at Arecibo in Puerto Rico and Goldstone in California are taking this opportunity to study it with radar as it approaches. It’ll pass too far away to be visible in small amateur telescopes. Media reports suggesting that this space rock may cause earthquakes are misleading and incorrect.

Image via Arecibo Observatory/NASA/NSF

Asteroid 163899 – aka 2003 SD220 – will pass safely, at more than 28 times the moon’s distance. Assertions it’ll cause earthquakes are misleading and incorrect.

Asteroid to pass Earth on Christmas Eve | Science Wire | EarthSky

SPACE PHONE: Puerto Rico's Arecibo Observatory

Of the many reasons to visit Puerto Rico: tropical climate, Caribbean cuisine and Latin Music, only one is truly out of this world.

When Earthlings finally make contact with an intelligent alien civilization, odds are, the conversation will originate from Puerto Rico's historic Arecibo Observatory, the world's largest single-aperture telescope.

In the not too distant future, when some hero scientist discovers a giant meteor hurtling towards Earth (hopefully) BEFORE it delivers a fiery knock out punch to life as we know it, this is where they'll sound the alarm. When yet another smarty-pants surveys the signature wavelengths bouncing off a far away planet and confirms the presence of liquid water and oxygen similar to habitat here on Earth, these are the screens that will announce those momentous results.

This National Science Foundation radio telescope, located a mountainous 40-minute, mostly freeway drive, from downtown San Juan, is the same facility featured in the Jody Foster/Carl Sagan movie Contact. It's also the home for the SETI@home project, Earth's most organized and scientific crowd-sourced Search for Extra Terrestrial Intelligence. It is, quite simply, the super bowl of Space Exploration. And it looks like it.

Completed in 1963, the dish and its collectors are suspended by enormous grid wires strung across a natural bowl high in the mountains of northern Puerto Rico. The major update completed on the facility in 1974 has lead to many amazing space discoveries, including the Nobel Peace Prize winning discovery of the first binary pulsar by Hulse and Taylor. In 1989, the Observatory directly imaged an asteroid for the first time in history.

Even if you've seen photos of the telescope's radio dish, it's sheer size - 1000 fit across - must been experienced in person to appreciate. The bowl of the dish is made up of metal mesh, arrayed as a spherical reflector that collects radio waves from all over the universe and focuses them on the Gregorian Sub-Reflector suspended 500 feet above. The deluge of data streams across the gantry into the nearby control room where men and women with doctoral degrees, and kick ass Star Wars Halloween costumes, sift through the noise, listening and looking for... something. Anything; a coherent signal, a chemical signature - an "I'll know it when I see it" anomaly that in all probability would reward it's finder with a Nobel Prize.

Today, Arecibo is the focal point for the three major prongs of Earth's deep space research; Radio Astronomy, Atmospheric Science and Radar Astronomy. And you learn about all of it on your own tour.

Our tour was led by three of the leading space researchers working today, (l-r) Astronomy PhD Patrick Taylor, Andrew Seymour, the Physics Phd and Space & Planetary Science Phd Edgard Rivera-Valentin.

These guys, who look more like Ultimate Frisbee intramural players than the guys responsible for saving Earth from, well... everything we'd need saving from, took us on an amazing walking tour down into the ravine and under the dish.

They are each focused on their own speciality, actively teasing out the secrets of the Cosmos, much like Carl Sagan, the Cornell University professor who brought his wonder and excitement of space to the rest of us. Sagan was involved in the early history of Arecibo, which is one of the reasons the wonderful film CONTACT was shot on location here. Another is... there's no place else like it on Earth.

The Space Men took us on an hour-long tour of the facility and dish, and put up with far more stupid questions from me than they should have had to endure over a holiday weekend. The important take away, in layman's terms, is the rest of us are in good hands because these guys - and thousands of other men and women around the world working in similar fields - are crusading to squeeze amazingly esoteric truths from Terabytes of ones and zeroes. The kinds of truths that will one day, not maybe, but absolutely, save our planet.

Where do these uber-geniuses come from? The Dish. If you build it, they will come. Arecibo acts like a magnet, drawing in space nerds and crazy thinkers from all over the world to sit behind the wheel and study in its shadow.

On our walk they explained how Arecibo helps find new planets by their 'wobble,' new ways to spot NEO's [near Earth objects] before its too late, and nurture the next generation of scientists. Far as I could tell, they're Magna Cum Laude across the board.

After our tour with the current Wizards behind the curtain, we had an opportunity to talk with a group of high school kids during their summer residency at the dish. Normally, I am extremely cynical about 'these kids today.' But after spending an hour chatting with these kids inside a lab van during a tropical downpour, I'm convinced our future's so bright, I gotta wear shades.

Listen to their hilarious, and incredibly insightful conversation about the nature of science, humanity and the future of Earth itself on our Puerto Rico podcast, right here. And make sure you visit Arecibo during touring hours before you blast off back home. You'll never be the same.

Follow @MarkDeCarlo on Twitter to win travel prizes, get show and travel news and see our original travel videos. Listen to a new show every Thursday @ Orbitz

SPACE PHONE: Puerto Rico's Arecibo Observatory

Skull-Shaped Halloween Asteroid Zips by Earth, a Treat for Scientists

On Halloween night, while ghouls and goblins did their trick-or-treating, an asteroid that is most likely a dead comet made a close flyby of Earth, with radar images revealing its eerie skull shape.

On Saturday (Oct. 31), the asteroid 2015 TB145 passed by Earth at a range of just over 300,000 miles (480,000 kilometers), placing it just outside the orbit of the moon, where it posed no threat to the planet. The timing of the flyby earned the asteroid - which is about 2,000 feet (600 meters) across - the nickname "Spooky" and "Great Pumpkin."

Unfortunately for skywatching hobbyists, 2015 TB145 was extremely difficult to see from the ground, but the online Slooh Community Observatory hosted a webcast Saturday afternoon that featured updates on the asteroid's path, and discussions about the dangers of near-Earth asteroids. [Related: Boo! Halloween Asteroid Looks Just Like a Skull]

NASA observed the asteroid with radar in infrared using its NASA Infrared Telescope Facility (IRTF) in Mauna Kea, Hawaii.

"The IRTF data may indicate that the object might be a dead comet, but in the Arecibo images it appears to have donned a skull costume for its Halloween flyby," Kelly Fast, IRTF program scientist and acting program manager for NASA's NEO Observations Program, said in a NASA statement Friday (Oct. 30).

Slooh used a remotely operated observatory in the Canary Islands to record animations of asteroid 2015 TB145 passing by. The "dead comet" asteroid looks like a bright object speeding across a starry background in those views. It was Slooh who nicknamed the asteroid "Spooky," and the online observatory was thrilled to see the space rock's skull shape in radar views.

"We all saw those dramatic images of the skull-like object whirling through space captured by NASA's Arecibo Observatory," Slooh's Tricia Ennis wrote in an email update. "We got a kick out of how appropriate our 'Spooky' moniker ended up being, here at Slooh."

The flyby was a treat for scientists, because it allowed them to see the space rock up close, with a radar resolution of as little as 6.6 feet (2 meters) on the surface. On Saturday, scientists fired radio waves at the passing space rock using a 110-foot-wide (34 m) antenna at NASA's Deep Space Network facility in Goldstone, California. The radio waves that bounced off the asteroid and came back to Earth were then collected using the Green Bank Telescope in West Virginia and Puerto Rico's Arecibo Observatory.

This first series of radar images of the Halloween asteroid 2015 TB145 show that it is about 2,000 feet (600 meters) wide and roughly spherical in shape. The images were taken by the Arecibo Observatory in Puerto Rico.

Credit: NAIC-Arecibo/NSF

View full size image

This radar image of asteroid 2015 TB145, which NASA says is likely a dead comet, was captured using the Arecibo Observatory in Puerto Rico on Oct. 30, 2015 with a resolution of 25 feet per pixel. The skull shaped asteroid flew by Earth on Halloween (Oct. 31). Credit: NAIC-Arecibo/NSF

by Calla Cofield

Skull-Shaped Halloween Asteroid Zips by Earth, a Treat for Scientists

Puerto Rico Demands Same Bankruptcy Help That States Get

Puerto Rican officials testifying at a Senate Committee on Finance hearing Tuesday urged U.S. lawmakers to provide Puerto Rico with the same access to Chapter 9 of the federal bankruptcy code that U.S. states receive as the territory struggles under a $73 billion debt cloud.

While Melba Acosta, president of the Government Development Bank for Puerto Rico, said the financial crisis has “passed the tipping point” and called on Congress to take immediate action, Puerto Rico’s representative in the U.S. Congress, Pedro R. Pierluisi, said disparities...

By Maya Rajamani

Puerto Rico Demands Same Bankruptcy Help That States Get

Puerto Rico gets $3.8 mn grant for brain research

The Institute of Neurobiology at the University of Puerto Rico's Medical Sciences Campus was awarded a $3.8 million U.S. National Science Foundation grant to conduct research on the rewards and decision mechanisms in the brain.

The project's goal is "to understand how the brain evaluates its environment and implements an action plan," Mark Miller, director of UPR's Neural Mechanisms of Reward and Decision Project, said.

"A better understanding of the decision-making process could lead us to improve strategies to solve problems in a more effective and appropriate manner," Miller said.

The project is being funded by NSF's Partnership in Research and Education program, which "recognizes that international alliances are essential to deal with critical problems in science and engineering," Miller said.

The Neural Mechanisms of Reward and Decision Project will link researchers from the UPR, Oklahoma State University, Canada, Egypt, Italy, Turkey and Chile.

The collaborative project is comprised of four interdisciplinary projects focused on the role that dopamine, a neurotransmitter present in a wide variety of animals, both vertebrates and invertebrates, plays in the brain's decision-making and reward mechanisms.

"This knowledge will also provide us with information about certain behavioral and developmental disorders that affect the decision-making process," Miller said. EFE

Puerto Rico gets $3.8 mn grant for brain research

Homo Naledi, New Species in Human Lineage, Is Found in South African Cave

Acting on a tip from spelunkers two years ago, scientists in South Africa discovered what the cavers had only dimly glimpsed through a crack in a limestone wall deep in the Rising Star Cave: lots and lots of old bones.

The remains covered the earthen floor beyond the narrow opening. This was, the scientists concluded, a large, dark chamber for the dead of a previously unidentified species of the early human lineage — Homo naledi.

The new hominin species was announced on Thursday by an international team of more than 60 scientists led by Lee R. Berger, an American paleoanthropologist who is a professor of human evolution studies at the University of the Witwatersrand in Johannesburg. The species name, H. naledi, refers to the cave where the bones lay undisturbed for so long; “naledi” means “star” in the local Sesotho language.

In two papers published this week in the open-access journal eLife, the researchers said that the more than 1,550 fossil elements documenting the discovery constituted the largest sample for any hominin species in a single African site, and one of the largest anywhere in the world. Further, the scientists said, that sample is probably a small fraction of the fossils yet to be recovered from the chamber. So far the team has recovered parts of at least 15 individuals.

“With almost every bone in the body represented multiple times, Homo naledi is already practically the best-known fossil member of our lineage,” Dr. Berger said.

The finding, like so many others in science, was the result of pure luck followed by considerable effort.

Two local cavers, Rick Hunter and Steven Tucker, found the narrow entrance to the chamber, measuring no more than seven and a half inches wide. They were skinny enough to squeeze through, and in the light of their headlamps they saw the bones all around them. When they showed the fossil pictures to Pedro Boshoff, a caver who is also a geologist, he alerted Dr. Berger, who organized an investigation.

Just getting into the chamber and bringing out samples proved to be a huge challenge. The narrow opening was the only way in.

Paul Dirks, a geologist at James Cook University in Australia, who was lead author of the journal paper describing the chamber, said the investigators first had a steep climb up a stone block called the Dragon’s Back and then a drop down to the entrance passage — all of this in the total absence of natural light.

For the two extended investigations of the chamber in 2013 and 2014, Dr. Berger rounded up the international team of scientists and then recruited six excavating scientists through notices on social media. One special requirement: They had to be slender enough to crawl through that crack in the wall.

One of the six, who were all women and were called “underground astronauts,” was Marina Elliott of Simon Fraser University in British Columbia. She said the collection and removal of the fossils involved “some of the most difficult and dangerous conditions ever encountered in the search for human origins.”

Lee R. Berger, leader of a research team, in the Rising Star Cave near Johannesburg, where over 1,550 fossil elements were found. CreditNaashon Zalk for The New York Times

Besides introducing a new member of the prehuman family, the discovery suggests that some early hominins intentionally deposited bodies of their dead in a remote and largely inaccessible cave chamber, a behavior previously considered limited to modern humans. Some of the scientists referred to the practice as a ritualized treatment of their dead, but by “ritual” they said they meant a deliberate and repeated practice, not necessarily a kind of religious rite.

SOUTH AFRICA

Pretoria

Rising Star cave

NAMIBIA

BOTSWANA

MOZAM.

Johannesburg

Rising Star Cave

SWAZILAND

LESOTHO

Indian

Ocean

SOUTH AFRICA

20 Miles

By The New York Times

“It’s very, very fascinating,” said Ian Tattersall, an authority on human evolution at the American Museum of Natural History in New York, who was not involved in the research.

“No question there’s at least one new species here,” he added, “but there may be debate over the Homo designation, though the species is quite different from anything else we have seen.”

A colleague of Dr. Tattersall’s at the museum, Eric Delson, who is a professor at Lehman College of the City University of New York, was also impressed, saying, “Berger does it again!”

Dr. Delson was referring to Dr. Berger’s previous headline discovery, published in 2010, also involving cave deposits near Johannesburg. He found many fewer fossils that time, but enough to conclude that he was looking at a new species, which he named Australopithecus sediba. Geologists said the individuals lived 1.78 million to 1.95 million years ago, when australopithecines and early species of Homo were contemporaries.

Pieces of a skeleton of Homo naledi, a newly discovered human species.CreditJohn Hawks/University of Wisconsin-Madison, via European Pressphoto Agency

Researchers analyzing the H. naledi fossils have not yet nailed down their age, which is difficult to measure because of the muddled chamber sediments and the absence of other fauna remains nearby. Some of its primitive anatomy, like a brain no larger than an average orange, Dr. Berger said, indicated that the species evolved near or at the root of the Homo genus, meaning it must be in excess of 2.5 million to 2.8 million years old. Geologists think the cave is no older than three million years.

The field work and two years of analysis for Dr. Berger’s latest discovery were supported by the University of the Witwatersrand, the National Geographic Society and the South African Department of Science and Technology/National Research Foundation. In addition to the journal articles, the findings will be featured in the October issue of National Geographic Magazine and in a two-hour NOVA/National Geographic documentary to air Wednesday on PBS.

Scientists on the discovery team and those not involved in the research noted the mosaic of contrasting anatomical features, including more modern-looking jaws and teeth and feet, that warrant the hominin’s placement as a species in the genus Homo, not Australopithecus, the genus that includes the famous Lucy species that lived 3.2 million years ago. The hands of the newly discovered specimens reminded some scientists of the earliest previously identified specimens of Homo habilis, who were apparently among the first toolmakers.

At a news conference on Wednesday, John Hawks of the University of Wisconsin, Madison, a senior author of the paper describing the new species, said it was “unlike any other species seen before,” noting that a small skull with a brain one-third the size of modern human braincases was perched atop a very slender body. An average H. naledi was about five feet tall and weighed almost 100 pounds, he said.

By JOHN NOBLE WILFORD

Homo Naledi, New Species in Human Lineage, Is Found in South African Cave

Asteroid to strike near Puerto Rico? Not true, says NASA

The rumors flying around Twitter, YouTube and other corners of the Internet about a giant asteroid striking Earth? Total nonsense, according to NASA.

The erroneous story varies, but mostly it goes like this: an asteroid will hit near Puerto Rico between Sept. 15 and 28, 2015, and destroy much of the Southeastern United States, the Gulf Coast of Mexico, and parts of Central and South America.

“There is no scientific basis — not one shred of evidence — that an asteroid or any other celestial object will impact Earth on those dates,” Paul Chodas, manager of NASA’s Near-Earth Object office, said in a statement.

Yes, NASA is always keeping an eye out for “potentially hazardous asteroids,” and it turns out there is a 0.01 percent chance that one will hit Earth in the next 100 years.

How do they know? NASA spends around $40 million a year tracking asteroids and other near-Earth objects, both for research purposes and to make sure that killer space objects doesn’t catch us by surprise.

There are also many telescopes scanning the sky from various organizations, and none of them has spotted an asteroid headed toward Puerto Rico.

“If there were any object large enough to do that type of destruction in September,” Chodas said, “we would have seen something of it by now.”



By Keith Wagstaff

The superstructure up top and the dish below are the primary instruments of the world's largest radio telescope, currently undergoing a paintjob, near Arecibo, Puerto Rico, May 31, 2007. 

Photo by Brennan Linsley/AP

 

Asteroid to strike near Puerto Rico? Not true, says NASA

Authorities investigate destruction of turtle eggs on Puerto Rico beach

Environmental agencies in Puerto Rico are investigating the destruction of 99 eggs of the endangered leatherback turtle that were found in a nest on a beach in San Juan, activist Deborah Feliciano told EFE Friday.

Feliciano, a member of the government-sponsored 7 Quillas group that is charged with keeping watch on the beaches of Condado and Ocean Park, found that the eggs were rotten, the nest was inundated with water, and there was a distinct smell of excrement in the air.

She said the group reported the situation to Puerto Rico's Natural Resources Department, or DRNA, and to the Board of Environmental Quality.

The spokeswoman for 7 Quillas, the DRNA unit that protects sea turtles on the island, said the San Juan municipality also made tests Friday in the sewage system at Condado Beach to find out how the contaminated water was able to flood the nest.

She also said that DRNA marine biologist Carlos Diez found that the eggs contained undeveloped embryos.

"There were no turtles in the development stage, which for us is very odd," Feliciano said, while expressing her concern about the crowds of people on the beach where the nest was located.

In this hatching season, 1,125 leatherbacks have been released on the beaches of Ocean Park and Condado, and three nests still remain.

This year a total of 28 nests have been reported in the area, a figure considerably higher than in other years.

Feliciano also expressed her concern for the great quantities of seaweed on the beaches of Puerto Rico, which have affected the hatching process in a nest on Condado Beach and impeded the arrival of other leatherbacks on the coast.

"The seaweed affected us for two or three weeks. We found turtles tangled up in it, but with the help of the DRNA we managed to clean the area every day," she said. EFE

Authorities investigate destruction of turtle eggs on Puerto Rico beach

El ADN revela secretos de la primera migración a América

Dos estudios genéticos separados hallaron evidencias de un sorprendente vínculo genético entre las poblaciones nativas de las Américas y Oceanía.

El ADN de algunos nativos amazónicos muestra una semejanza significativa con los habitantes indígenas de Australia y Melanesia, el cinturón de islas que van desde el Pacífico occidental hasta Fiji.

Los dos grupos de investigación, sin embargo, hacen distintas interpretaciones de cómo fue poblada América.

Los estudios fueron publicados en las revistas Science y Nature.

Hay un consenso en que los primeros pobladores de las Américas llegaron a través de Siberia, por un puente de tierra que conectaba con Europa y Asia.

Pero no hay acuerdo sobre la procedencia de estos pobladores y en qué momento llegaron.

Al analizar el ADN de los nativos americanos modernos y de antiguos restos humanos, el grupo que escribe para Science concluye que todos los nativos americanos de la actualidad proceden de una migración única no más temprana a hace más de 23.000 años.

Entonces, alegan, hace unos 13.000 años los nativos americanos se dividieron en dos ramas: una que ahora está dispersa por América del Norte y del Sur, mientras que la otra se limita a América del Norte.

"Nuestro estudio muestra que el modelo más simple posible parece ser verdadero, con una sola y notoria excepción", le dijo a la BBC el profesor Rasmus Nielsen de la Universidad de California, Berkley.

No hay acuerdo sobre la procedencia de los pobladores de América y en qué momento llegaron.

"Así que las ideas fantasiosas de que de alguna manera América fue poblada por personas procedentes de Europa y todo tipo de lugares son erróneas".

El análisis también descarta la teoría, defendida por algunos, de una migración escalonada desde Siberia: la primera de hace más de 30.000 años que fue detenida durante 15.000 años por el hielo que bloqueaba la ruta y una segunda oleada una vez que el camino se despejó.

Pero, al igual que en el estudio de la revisa Nature, el equipo de Nielsen registró rastros de ancestros "australo-melanesios" en algunas poblaciones, incluidas aquellas de las islas Aleutianas (frente a Alaska) y la comunidad surui del Amazonas brasileño.

El profesor David Reich de la Escuela Médica de Harvard lideró el estudio de Nature.

Reich le explicó a la BBC que "ambos estudios muestran que ha habido múltiples flujos de migración hacia las Américas".

Según Reich, el descubrimiento del linaje oceánicos entre algunos grupos nativos Americanos indica que América fue poblada por una serie de grupos más diversos de lo que anteriormente se creía.

El mapa del artículo de Nature resalta la similitud entre los indígenas amazónicos y los australasianos.

"El modelo más simple posible nunca predijo una afinidad entre los amazónicos y los australasianos", señaló.

"Esto sugiere que hay una población ancestral que cruzó hacia América que es diferente de la población que dio lugar a la gran mayoría de americanos. Y esto es una gran sorpresa".

Reich cree que la explicación más plausible es que hubo una migración separada desde Australasia (región que comprende Australia, Melanesia y Nueva Zelanda), posiblemente hace unos 15.000 años.

Este grupo, considera, probablemente se dispersó más por América del Norte pero gradualmente fue expulsado por otras comunidades nativas americanas.

Por su parte, Nielsen tiene una interpretación diferente pues opina que los rastros del ADN australasiano se derivan de una migración posterior, hace unos 8.000 años, que avanzó por la costa del Pacífico.







El ADN revela secretos de la primera migración a América

Can the U.S. Avoid Chaos In Puerto Rico?

awmakers in Washington appear to be getting increasingly anxious about the situation in Puerto Rico, which is poised to default on some $70 billion in debt the island territory has acquired over the past several years. A key concern is the impact such a default could have on U.S. bond markets.

In a letter to Treasury Secretary Jack Lew on Friday, Senate Finance Committee Chairman Orrin Hatch (R-UT) asked the administration about its plans for dealing with the island’s finances, including its opinion on a move being pushed in Congress to allow Puerto Rico’s municipalities and public utilities to file for Chapter 9 bankruptcy. Hatch’s letter came just days after two other senators, Chuck Schumer (D-NY) and Richard Blumenthal (D-CT) introduced legislation that would make those Chapter 9 filings possible.

Related: How the U.S. Is Helping Sink Puerto Rico

Two big questions right now are whether there is significant support in Congress to make such a change to bankruptcy laws and whether any such action can happen quickly enough to avoid what Hatch called a “chaotic resolution” of the crisis.

Puerto Rican municipalities and public utilities were for years allowed to issue “triple tax-free” obligations – meaning that lenders’ earnings were exempt from local, state, and federal taxation. This made Puerto Rican debt an attractive option for investors, whose eagerness to benefit from the tax exemption helped Puerto Rico cover a substantial budget deficit.

But slow economic growth has made it impossible for Puerto Rico to continue servicing its debts while providing basic services to its citizens.

“The debt is not payable,” the Island’s governor, Alejandro Garcia Padilla, warned in an interview with The New York Times last month. “There is no other option. I would love to have an easier option. This is not politics, this is math.”

Related: S&P Cuts Puerto Rico’s Debt Financing Arm, Says Default Certain

This week, with the report that the agency managing the government’s debt failed to make a deposit into a fund used to pay bondholders, the likelihood of default when those payments come due on August 1 seemed higher than ever. In his letter to Lew, Hatch made it plain where he believes the blame for the crisis lies.

“Unfortunately for residents of Puerto Rico, the Commonwealth has made unsustainable government benefit promises that have been papered over for far too long with debt-fueled expenditures which fail to align benefits with underlying economic fundamentals such as productivity, leading to the ultimate prospect of debt default,” he wrote. “Tragically, unsound financial decisions of government officials have led to a sharp rise in outmigration.”

Hatch noted that he believes there is at least some common ground between the White House and his committee on how to deal with the crisis.

Related: How Puerto Rico’s Debt Crisis Could Hurt the GOP

“I believe that the Obama administration may be in agreement with two reasonable principles to apply to the debt difficulties facing Puerto Rico: 1) there shall not be a federal bailout; and 2) orderly resolution of debt defaults are preferred to chaotic resolutions.”

Among other things, he asked for the administration’s specific thoughts on making Chapter 9 bankruptcy available to Puerto Rico’s bond issuers. He noted that a key element could be the “retroactive application” of that eligibility to existing debts – something that would likely anger creditors who could claim that the government is changing the rules in the middle of the game.

But that rule change may be the only way out, according to some in Washington. In introducing the “Puerto Rico Chapter 9 Uniformity Act” earlier this week, Sen. Blumenthal said, ““This measure is vital to prevent a humanitarian and financial catastrophe – a clearly avoidable disaster. Creditors, investors, ordinary citizens, all will be harmed if the Congress fails to act. This measure is not a bailout – involving not a dime of federal funds. It enables an orderly, rational restructuring of debt, instead of a financial free for all and potential free fall.”

Sen. Schumer added, “We can either do the right thing and give Puerto Rico the bankruptcy option it needs and deserves, or we can risk a disaster on the island and billions in bailout payments later.”

By Rob Garver

Can the U.S. Avoid Chaos In Puerto Rico?

Asteroid spotted in Puerto Rico awes scientists for its shape and tremendous speed

The Arecibo Observatory in Puerto Rico has announced that the first detailed images have been obtained of Asteroid 2011 UW158, which show it has a very odd shape and structure, and that it spins at a tremendous speed on its own axis, phenomena that have intrigued scientists.

The images were obtained by scientists at this Puerto Rican observatory - which has the largest, most sensitive single-dish radio telescope in the world - on Tuesday, July 14, when the asteroid passed by at some 6.9 million kilometers (4.3 million miles) from Earth, or nine time the distance from this planet to the moon.

Many of the asteroids observed up to now appear to be numerous small stones weakly held together by gravity, the observatory said in a communique.

However, Asteroid 2011 UW158 has "an odd shape much like an unshelled walnut" and with a diameter of 300 by 600 meters (1,000 by 2,000 feet), almost twice the size of the reflector of this observatory's radio telescope.

The scientists working there were also able to confirm that the asteroid "rotates very rapidly, once every 37 minutes" as in previous optical observations.

While many scientists were watching the historic flight of the New Horizons spacecraft past the dwarf planet Pluto, those at the Arecibo observatory said they were observing this object, very small and much closer, as it passed by Earth.

"We expect that something this big should have been shattered into smaller pieces by collisions with other asteroids over the age of the Solar System. It is interesting that something this large and apparently solid is still around," scientist Patrick Taylor, of the Planetary Studies Department and leader of these observations, said.

He added that this asteroid will pass relatively close to Earth again in the year 2108, but will not represent any danger.







Asteroid spotted in Puerto Rico awes scientists for its shape and tremendous speed

After Hundreds of Years, Astronomers Finally Agree: This Is the Distance From the Earth to the Sun - The Atlantic

The International Astronomical Union drops the mic.

How far away from Earth is the sun? Not just, you know, very, very far, but in terms of an actual, measurable distance? When you're calculating, how do you decide which location on Earth to measure from? How do you decide which spot on the path of Earth's orbit will serve as the focal point for the measurement? How do you account for the sheer size of the sun, for the lengthy reach of its fumes and flames?

The measurable, mean distance -- also known as the astronomical number -- has been a subject of debate among astronomers since the 17th century. The first precise measurement of the Earth/sun divide, Nature notes, was made by the astronomer and engineer Giovanni Cassini in 1672. Cassini, from Paris, compared his measurements of Mars against observations recorded by his colleague Jean Richer, working from French Guiana. Combining their calculations, the astronomers were able to determine a third measurement: the distance between the Earth and the sun. The pair estimated a stretch of 87 million miles -- which is actually pretty close to the value astronomers assume today.

But their measurement wasn't, actually, a number. It was a parallax measurement, a combination of constants used to transform angular measurements into distance. Until the second half of the twentieth century -- until innovations like spacecraft, radar, and lasers gave us the tools to catch up with our ambition -- that approach to measuring the cosmos was the best we had. Until quite recently, if you were to ask an astronomer, "What's the distance between Earth and the sun?" that astronomer would be compelled to reply: "Oh, it's the radius of an unperturbed circular orbit a massless body would revolve about the sun in 2*(pi)/k days (i.e., 365.2568983.... days), where k is defined as the Gaussian constant exactly equal to 0.01720209895."

Oh, right. Of course.

But rocket science just got a little more straightforward. With little fanfare, Nature reports, the International Astronomical Union has redefined the astronomical number, once and for all -- or, at least, once and for now. According to the Union's unanimous vote, here is Earth's official, scientific, and fixed distance from the sun: 149,597,870,700 meters. Approximately 93,000,000 miles.

For astronomers, the change from complexity to fixity will mean a new convenience when they're calculating distances (not to mention explaining those distances to students and non-rocket scientists). It will mean the ability to ditch ad hoc numbers in favor of more uniform calculations. It will mean a measurement that more properly accounts for the general theory of relativity. (A meter in this case is defined as "the distance traveled by light in a vacuum in 1/299,792,458 of a second" -- and since the speed of light is constant, the astronomical unit will no longer depend on an observer's location with the solar system.) The new unit will also more accurately account for the state of the sun, which is slowly losing mass as it radiates energy. (The Gaussian constant is based on solar mass.)

So why did it take so long for the astronomy community to agree on a standard measurement? For, among other things, the same reason this story mentions both meters and miles. Tradition can be its own powerful force, and the widespread use of the old unit -- which has been in place since 1976 -- means that a new one will require changes both minor and sweeping. Calculations are based on the old unit. Computer programs are based on the old unit. Straightforwardness is not without its inconveniences.

But it's also not without its benefits. The astronomical unit serves as a basis for many of the other measures astronomers make as they attempt to understand the universe. The moon, for example, is 0.0026 ± 0.0001 AU from Earth. Venus is 0.72 ± 0.01 AU from the sun. Mars is 1.52 ± 0.04 AU from our host star. Descriptions like that -- particularly for amateurs who want to understand our world as astronomers do -- just got a little more comprehensible. And thus a little more meaningful.

Megan Garber

After Hundreds of Years, Astronomers Finally Agree: This Is the Distance From the Earth to the Sun

More than 7,000 sardines die in Puerto Rico reservoir from lack of water

Almost 7,000 sardines have died over the last two days in a reservoir in northern Puerto Rico due to the drought that has been shrinking the water supply for two months, making this the third massive dying off of this fish species in less than two weeks.

The secretary of the Natural and Environmental Resources Department, Carmen Guerrero Perez, reported the situation Tuesday in a statement that said the fish perished in the Wildlife Refuge of La Plata Reservoir in Toa Alta.

"We ask citizens not to consume or come in contact with these dead fish, since they decompose rapidly and can put their health at risk," Guerrero said.

She recalled that access to the area was closed to the public on July 1 as a security measure because of the instability of the banks of the reservoir and the impossibility of using the boat ramp.

For her part, Wildlife Refuge manager Marinelly Valentin Sivico said that as happened twice before, the mortality was the result of less available dissolved oxygen for aquatic life due to the low level of the reservoir.

Between July 2-3, close to 8,000 sardines died off and a few days later the same disaster was repeated.

"With the reduction of oxygen in the reservoir, the most vulnerable fish are the sardines," Guerrero said.

"The purpose of these fish in the reservoir is precisely to serve and an indicator of water conditions behind our dams, while also providing recreational fishing," she said.



More than 7,000 sardines die in Puerto Rico reservoir from lack of water

Japan train sets new speed record

A Japanese magnetic levitation train has broken its own world speed record, hitting 603km/h (374mph) in a test run near Mount Fuji.

The train beat the 590km/h speed it had set last week in another test.

Maglev trains use a electrically charged magnets to lift and move carriages above the rail tracks.

Central Japan Railway (JR Central), which owns the trains, wants to introduce the service between Tokyo and the central city of Nagoya by 2027.

The 280km journey would take only about 40 minutes, less than half the current time.

However, passengers will not get to experience the maglev's record-breaking speeds because the company said its trains will operate at a maximum of 505km/h.

Construction is estimated at nearly $100bn (£67bn) just for the stretch to Nagoya, with more than 80% of the route expected to go through costly tunnels, reported AFP news agency.

The government is also hoping to sell the maglev train technology overseas.

Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe is visiting the US on Sunday where he is expected to pitch for a role in building a new high-speed rail line between New York and Washington.



© Getty Images The Maglev (magnetic levitation) train during a test run on the experimental track in Tsuru, 100km west of Tokyo, on May 11, 2010.

Japan train sets new speed record

Okeanos Explorer | Expeditions | NOAA Ship Okeanos Explorer: Exploring Puerto Rico’s Seamounts, Trenches, and Troughs | Media Resources | Highlight Video and Images

Dive highlight videos, short video clips, and photos for the Océano Profundo: Exploring Puerto Rico's Seamounts, Trenches and Troughs 2015 expedition for members of the media will be posted here as they are available.

Unless otherwise noted, all videos and images posted here are in the public domain and are thus free for use and reproduction. Please credit NOAA Office of Ocean Exploration and Research.

Access LIVE video feeds here.

For videos and images associated with mission updates and logs, visit this page.

---

Highlight Images

Leg 3 Exploration Map

This map shows the areas NOAA Ship Okeanos Explorer will explore during the 20 ROV dives to be conducted between April 9 and 30 in and around the Puerto Rico Trench and the U.​S.​ Virgin Islands. Data displayed provided by ESRI, Delorme, GEBCO, USGS, NOAA NGDC, and other contributors; map created with ESRI ArcMap software.



Image courtesy of the NOAA Office of Ocean Exploration and Research.

Download.

 

Bathymetry of Puerto Rico Trench

Bathymetry (underwater topography) of the northeast corner of the Caribbean Plate, including the Puerto Rico Trench, collected during a 2003 U.S. Geological Survey expedition to the Puerto Rico Trench funded by NOAA's Office of Ocean Exploration and Research. The complex bathymetry of the seafloor of this region is a consequence of plate tectonics, the theory that describes the large-scale motion of the various plates that make up the outer shell of the earth.

Image courtesy of USGS.

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Dumbo Octopus

A dumbo octopus displays a body posture never before observed in cirrate octopods. Unprecedented sights like this are one of the reasons dozens of scientists (and hundreds of thousands of members of the public) follow live video from the seafloor during each Okeanos Explorer expedition.





Image courtesy of the NOAA's Office of Ocean Exploration and Research.

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Chemosynthetic Mussels

These chemosynthetic mussels were discovered by the ROV Deep Discoverer while it explored a canyon off the northeast coast of the U.S. in 2013. Over 800,000 members of the public tuned in to the video the ROV live-streamed over the internet during this expedition. Chemosynthetic mussels are found in areas of active hydrocarbon seepage; NOAA Ship Okeanos Explorer has discovered hundreds of previously unknown methane seeps in this and other areas over the past five years.

Image courtesy of the NOAA's Office of Ocean Exploration and Research.

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Black Coral

During a 2014 expedition on the Ocean Exploration Trust's ship, Nautilus, to areas just off the coast of the British Virgin Islands, the ship's ROV came across this large colony of black coral. Scientists aboard NOAA Ship Okeanos Explorer hope to see similar deep-sea corals when they explore the nearby Puerto Rico Trench in April. NOAA's Office of Ocean Exploration and Research funds about half of the nonprofit Ocean Exploration Trust's operating costs.

Image courtesy of Ocean Exploration Trust.

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ROV System Launch

Okeanos Explorer's dual-body ROV system is loaded from the aftdeck of the ship into the water before conducting an exploration dive.







Image courtesy of the NOAA's Office of Ocean Exploration and Research.

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Control Room

The Okeanos Explorer control room just before the start of an ROV dive. The control room is where the ROV pilots, the science leads, and other expedition personnel work during an ROV dive.







Image courtesy of the NOAA's Office of Ocean Exploration and Research.

Download.

Okeanos Explorer | Expeditions | NOAA Ship Okeanos Explorer: Exploring Puerto Rico’s Seamounts, Trenches, and Troughs | Media Resources | Highlight Video and Images

Deepwater exploration vehicle prototype successfully tested in Puerto Rico

The prototype of a new deepsea exploration vehicle designed and developed in the University of Mayagüez's Electrical and Computer Engineering department labs was successfully tested, its developers said on the weekend.

The tests were carried out this past week during the scientific expedition of the vessel Okeanos Explorer, owned by the U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration in waters just off the Puerto Rican coast.

"Two of these deployments touched the deepest point in the Puerto Rico Trench and Atlantic Ocean, one of the most extreme places on the planet and about which little information is known," said Wilford Schmidt, a professor of Marine Sciences at the Puerto Rico university and one of those in charge of the project, in a communique.

"This is the first of several excursions that we forecast will be undertaken in the Puerto Rico Trench and the Muertos Trough, south of the island," he added.

"We hope to continue obtaining data that will supply models for analysis and prediction of geological activity, planetary aquatic circulation patterns and the study of marine species, among other things," he said.

The new DMS-ECE Free-Vehicle (FV) technology is designed to serve as a means to facilitate research on the Puerto Rico Trench, the deepest trough in the entire Atlantic Ocean and the seventh-deepest in the world.

"The FV is an autonomous free-descent and -ascent vehicle with a series of instruments and sensors that allow us to obtain data about vehicular interaction and autonomy in the presence of submarine currents, pressure and temperature, among other monitored parameters," said Manuel Jimenez, a professor of Electrical and Computer Engineering and the associate dean of the Engineering Department at the University of Mayagüez. EFE

Deepwater exploration vehicle prototype successfully tested in Puerto Rico

Okeanos Explorer | Expeditions | Exploring Puerto Rico’s Seamounts, Trenches, and Troughs

Remotely operated vehicle Deep Discoverer is deployed for a dive. Image courtesy of NOAA Okeanos Explorer Program, Océano Profundo 2015: Exploring Puerto Rico’s Seamounts, Trenches, and Troughs.

Okeanos Explorer | Expeditions | Exploring Puerto Rico’s Seamounts, Trenches, and Troughs

Discover the Puerto Rico Trench with America’s Ocean Exploration Team

Every two years people around the world suddenly obsessively watch odd niche sports like ice dancing, biathalon, and rhythmic gymnastics. So I wish similar enthusiasm could be summoned for the exploration dives of the Deep Discoverer, NOAA’s ROV aboard the research vessel Okeanos Explorer and vehicles like it, which are streamed live on the internet. Perhaps it would help if they got some catchy theme music by John Williams that played every time they fired up their feed, video interludes featuring the touching back stories of the scientists and engineers on board, or set pieces about the shenanigans that go on in the “scientists’ village” aboard the ship? Are you listening, NBC?

In any case, the Okeanos Explorer and Deep Discoverer begin their next series of 20 dives starting TODAY, April 10. As I write this, the ROV is already descending toward the bottom and has just passed 3500 meters on its way to a target depth of 4000 meters, which they expect to reach in about 15 minutes. They plan to explore the area until about 4pm EDT. As always, the dives are being streamed live on the internet and all of you can follow along at home, just as you would if you were watching a shuttle launch or moon landing in days of yore.



Thanks to the Miracle of the Internet, we can all now watch along at home every exciting minute of these voyages, and see and discover new creatures and exciting geology at virtually the same moment as mission scientists, who, as a bonus, give you a running play by play commentary. Plus, it’s all free, or rather, supported by the generosity of American taxpayers. Why not reap the benefits of our collective investment in science by joining them for the ride in high-definition video?

Here’s an example of what you might see if you are lucky. This video, which I’ve posted here before, was captured last fall in Norfolk Canyon off the east coast of the United States. It shows two attempted squid-nappings: one failed attempt by a red crab, and one squid sashimi served up for a monkfish near the end of the video (watch the upper left corner).



To get a better feel for what you might see over the course of any given day, check out several of the 5-minute daily highlight videos from the mission last fall. Here’s one I can recommend in particular, featuring cameos by Echinoblogger Chris Mah at the Smithsonian! If you can’t spend 8 hours a day watching along at home, these five-minute daily highlight reels are a great way to still feel part of the magic, and I imagine similar videos will soon be posted for this mission here.

On the docket for this voyage are the seamounts, trenches, and troughs around Puerto Rico. The Puerto Rico Trench runs for 500 miles along the north side of Puerto Rico and the Dominican Republic and plunges 5.4 miles below the surface — the deepest point in the Atlantic Ocean. The expedition will also visit the Muertos Trough to the south of the island, the Mona Channel between the Dominican Republic and Puerto Rico, and the Virgin Islands Trough to the east.

Courtesy NOAA; click image for full-sized version and source.

What might they see? Of course, no one knows for sure what’s down there. They are hopeful they will see deepwater snapper, corals, seamounts and mud volcanoes. It is also likely, based on past experience, that the expedition will find new species, see living versions of animals known only from pallid preserved specimens, and see old species displaying unknown behaviors.

On the docket for today is the Arecibo amphitheater, a little-explored escarpment northwest of San Juan. They’ll be looking for landslides and exposed rocks on the slope, along with any critters living there. The area is close to the epicenter of a magnitude 6.4 earthquake that rumbled through San Juan just after midnight on January 13, 2014. Puerto Rico has a history of earthquakes and tsunamis; an October 1918 magnitude 7.3 earthquake produced a tsunami that killed 116 people.

Tomorrow, April 11, the team plans to visit Mona Seamount northwest of Puerto Rico, an area they expect to be richly biodiverse as many seamounts are.

There will also be a Reddit Ask Me Anything on April 16 from 1-3 pm EDT featuring NOAA ocean explorer and officer Brian Kennedy; Andrea Quattrini, a U.S. Geological Survey biologist; and Mike Cheadle, a geologist from the University of Wyoming.

This expedition runs through April 30, but if you miss it, the next one will take place July through September in an even more enticing target: the Papahānaumokuākea Marine National Monument and Hawaiian Islands Humpback Whale National Marine Sanctuary in the Pacific Ocean.

Finally, if you would like to see the many amazing photos and video collected by America’s Own Ocean Exploration Team, they are all freely available here.

About the Author: Jennifer Frazer is a AAAS Science Journalism Award-winning science writer. She has degrees in biology, plant pathology/mycology, and science writing, and has spent many happy hours studying life in situ. Follow on Twitter @JenniferFrazer.

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The views expressed are those of the author and are not necessarily those of Scientific American.

By Jennifer Frazer

Discover the Puerto Rico Trench with America’s Ocean Exploration Team | The Artful Amoeba, Scientific American Blog Network

Scientists map Caribbean seafloor as part of 12-year project

U.S. scientists on Tuesday completed a nearly two-week mission to explore waters around the U.S. Virgin Islands as part of a 12-year project to map the Caribbean seafloor and help protect its reefs.

A team with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration studied an area of 270 square miles (700 square kilometers), using equipment including underwater gliders and a remotely operated vehicle to help map the seafloor and locate areas where fish spawn. They focused mostly on the southern coast of St. Croix and the northwestern coast of St. Thomas.

"It's a relatively unexplored but believed to be rich ecosystem," lead researcher Tim Battista said by telephone. "We're able to map large areas that you couldn't do with just divers."

The information will be used in efforts to conserve coral reefs as well as to update navigational charts and help government officials manage and better protect fish populations.

Reefs across the Caribbean have shrunk by more than 50 percent since the 1970s, with experts blaming climate change as well as a drop in the populations of parrotfish and sea urchins.

Part of the mission focused on studying the habitat and number of deep-water snappers that have become increasingly popular with fishermen in the area, scientist Chris Taylor said. Researchers currently know very little about the status and habitat of the silk snapper, which has golden eyes and is almost iridescent pink in color, he said.

About two-thirds of the survey was conducted in deep water, in depths up to 7,500 feet (2,300 meters), researchers said.

Among the more interesting discoveries was an underwater landslide about 6 square miles (16 square kilometers) in size as well as hundreds of cylindrical sea floor structures that were packed closely together and featured hard and soft coral on top, Battista said.

"It was really kind of unique," he said. "I hadn't seen that before."

Researchers also found a collection of sea anemones in purple, green, white and black; gray sea cucumbers with stubby green spines; and white starfish with red stripes.

Read more here: http://www.bellinghamherald.com/2015/04/07/4228772_scientists-map-caribbean-seafloor.html?rh=1#storylink=cpy

By DANICA COTO

Scientists map Caribbean seafloor as part of 12-year project