• Technology

    Web's Eulogy for the Phoenix Mars Lander

    By Jeremy Hsu Posted on 11.10.2008 10 Comments

    NASA has begun bidding a planned goodbye to its Phoenix Mars Lander. The lander relies on solar panels and the sun's golden touch to reawaken it each day, but a dust storm has hastened the end in the face of the oncoming Martian winter.

    11.9.2008 at 06:26pm - Comment by Eworks

    But what would happen if a dust storm came, if we have aircraft there is would have to be more stable than a balloon, and that would cost money. Also how would we get it up there? How do you get a $50 balloon to Mars? Also, how are you going to power it? If it runs on solar power, it is going to be expensive. A $50 (cheap) balloon on Mars is just not practical.

  • The Environment

    Farming in the Sky

    By Cliff Kuang Posted on 10.16.2008 33 Comments

    Article Rating:
    11.6.2008 at 07:43pm - Comment by Eworks

    I agree, If you need food, you should buy it local, to help support your town's economy, and to save on fuel and energy consumption.

  • Gadgets

    A House That Walks

    By John Brandon Posted on 11.6.2008 19 Comments

    Houses are normally fairly stationary objects, and that's not considered a bad thing. But innovation never stands still, and a new prototype house that can walk on six legs has been built . The house is ten feet high, powered by solar panels, and is outfitted with a kitchen, toilet, bed, and wood stove. Last week, the house, a collaboration between MIT and the Danish design collective N55, took a journey through Cambridgeshire in England as part of an art project at the Wysing Art Center. Designed to move at the muscle speed of a human, the house walked at about five kilometers an hour around the 11-acre campus. (See video)

    11.6.2008 at 07:34pm - Comment by Eworks

    It would be helpful for the Space Program. I think that it would need to be smaller to get it to the moon or mars. Don't you agree?

  • Technology

    Going Up?

    By Paul Adams Posted on 9.24.2008 68 Comments

    One of the most promising technologies for the aspiring outer-space commuter is the space elevator. The concept, like quite a few others, was pressed into the public imagination by Arthur C. Clarke, who in his 1979 novel The Fountains of Paradise described a incredibly thin, incredibly strong carbon filament with one end anchored on Earth and the other extending up to a satellite in geostationary orbit. Now, a group of Japanese scientists are convinced that they can build a space elevator more quickly and cheaply than has been believed possible. Such a cable could convey cargo into space very cheaply and easily. Carriages would travel up and down the cable under modest power, not the vast expenditures of energy that are currently needed to send anything into orbit.

    11.5.2008 at 06:41pm - Comment by Eworks

    I still don't understand how it would work. How do they get the cable to stay in place? Is it connected to anything? I think it would be a cheap way to get into space, but it would also cost trillions to get it built.



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