C2ST Blog

Bugs in the Climate System

                To those of you who use computers, you can understand the issues that can sometimes be caused by them. Faulty hardware, operating system issues, programs not working, drivers not installed properly, the list goes on and on. The average user has no end to the issues they could have, with many being very subtle and tricky to solve.

Printing a Future

You hear it humming and whirring, probably right next to you. It’s a small device that somehow takes your words and images and makes physical copies of them, all day long, and never stopping. It’s obviously your printer, but there’s a device coming around that would fit that description just the same, and yet has a much grander use. At the moment it exists as massive and expensive facilities, or centers and companies devoted to its use. It’s called nanofabrication, and researchers at Northwestern University are making it happen.

The Quadrotors are coming!

This article is by Scott Michael Slone, C2ST’s resident intern.

Robots are coming in from everywhere! By land, by sea, by air! Speaking of air, dozens of tiny robots known as quadrotors are making themselves visible! A quadrotor is a small flying robot that uses four propellers pointed upwards to fly. On their own they’re quite the acrobatic little fellas, and are capable of navigating themselves easily around their environment. The first video of this collection focuses on the swarm capabilities of the quadrotors being made at University of Pennsylvania.

Voyager: Our Most Distant Explorer

It has been nearly 36 years since the Voyager 1 was sent into space on its journey. Its purpose at the time: to take vivid and detailed pictures of the planets of our Solar System in a way that had never been attempted before. Eventually its primary mission was completed, giving breathtaking images of Saturn and Jupiter, as well as the famous picture of a “pale blue dot” known to some beings as Earth.

Mercury, Gallium, and Aluminum, oh my!

The internet is abuzz with all sorts of videos on cool, weird, and interesting chemical reactions. I felt these were unique enough to share with you all, and thus compiled several of them. So here you have it, three reactions and three videos!