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Theoretical Musings
Dave Bacon is a theoretical ski bum who is also a pseudo professor. His research is on quantum computing, his scientific passions extend to everything in physics, mathematics, computer science and beyond, and his personal pleasures include making wine, playing poker, skiing, camping, and daydreaming (although not all of those at the same time.)
Nothing he says on this blog should be construed as having anything to do with his employer or his dog.
Category: Astronomy
I get a lot of press releases forward to me which usually get forwarded directly into my gmail archive. But this one I'm happy to pass along: Third Man Records is releasing A Glorious Dawn. You know the Carl Sagan...
Posted by Dave Bacon at 6:00 PM • 2 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
Category: Astronomy
Via physicsandcake, on some days I wish I was as dorky and as elegant as Carl Sagan: Look again at that dot. That's here. That's home. That's us. On it everyone you love, everyone you know, everyone you ever heard...
Posted by Dave Bacon at 12:56 PM • 0 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
Category: Physics
I'm a pretty optimistic guy. Okay, I'm a really optimistic guy. But even my optimism has its limits when bashing up against the cold hard reality of what experiments plus our understanding of the laws of physics tells us about...
Posted by Dave Bacon at 12:10 PM • 41 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
Category: Astronomy
A widget to watch out for wayward asteroids:JPL's Asteroid Watch Widget tracks asteroids and comets that will make relatively close approaches to Earth. The Widget displays the date of closest approach, approximate object diameter, relative size and distance from Earth...
Posted by Dave Bacon at 9:39 PM • 0 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
Category: Astronomy
Two notes from Caltech of interest:Michael L. Roukes' group at Caltech has produced a NEMS (nanoelectromechanical system) device which can (almost) measure the mass of a single molecule (as opposed to the many tens of thousands (is this the correct...
Posted by Dave Bacon at 10:55 PM • 9 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
Category: Astronomy
As someone who was born on a lunar eclipse (explains a lot, no?) the 40th anniversary of man walking on the moon has a special place in my heart. Okay, that sentence makes no sense (I was born on a...
Posted by Dave Bacon at 2:21 PM • 3 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
Category: Science 2.0
The astro/physics blogosphere is all atwitter about papers the Nature embargo policy (See Julianne If a paper is submitted to nature does it still make a sound, the cat herder Hear a paper, see a paper, speak no paper, and...
Posted by Dave Bacon at 12:28 PM • 3 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
Category: Astronomy
It seems that astrometry has finally succeeded at detecting a planet. A star and its planets perform a complex dance as they move through space. In astrometry planet hunting one looks for a planet by looking for the "wobble" of...
Posted by Dave Bacon at 3:02 PM • 2 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
Category: Astronomy
Direct imaging of extra solar planets. The cat dynamicist has the details. (because, linking, I've heard, is good.) Fomalhaut b, a nice name. When I was on the road to becoming an astrophysicist, as a young grad student, I remember...
Posted by Dave Bacon at 10:54 PM • 7 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
Category: Caltech
Someone at Caltech's PR office sure was having fun: Caltech Astronomers Describe the Bar Scene at the Beginning of the Universe PASADENA, Calif.--Bars abound in spiral galaxies today, but this was not always the case. A group of 16 astronomers,...
Posted by Dave Bacon at 7:59 PM • 6 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
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