Our world from the International Space Station

Photo by Chris Hadfield / NASA: Lake Baikal, Siberia. Immensely old and deep, it holds one-fifth of all the Earth’s fresh water. 26 Feb 2013, 7:31 PM (Click photo to enlarge)

Anyone following Chris Hadfield (@Cmdr_Hadfield) on Twitter will have seen some of his gorgeous photos taken from the International Space Station (ISS). Somebody should collect them together so we can browse them.

Well, someone has done that with photos taken by Hadfield and other members of the ISS crew. Have a look at the web site Our World From The ISS or click the screen image below.

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Climate change is not simple

I have said this before – but it bears repeating Climate change is complex. And I feel the need to repeat it now because of a current myth being pushed very strongly by climate change deniers/contrarians/sceptics. The claim that “there has been no global warming for 16 years.”

If you doubt climate change is complex have a look at this global temperature record from NASA’s Goddard Institute for Space Studies.

Line plot of global mean land-ocean temperature index, 1880 to present, with the base period 1951-1980. The dotted black line is the annual mean and the solid red line is the five-year mean. The green bars show uncertainty estimates. [This is an update of Fig. 1A in Hansen et al. (2006).]

Isn’t cherry picky wonderful?

There’s a lot of noise in that graph but it does sort of support the conclusion that global temperatures have increased in the last 100 years. Mind you, if you want to create a contrary impression you can easily take a short time period – say around 1950, 1960 – 1980, 1985 – 1995 – or even the last 16 years. Cherry picking is a great thing – if your aim is to support a predetermined conclusion, and avoid (or even hide) evidence to the contrary.

So we get this sort of thing being promoted by climate change deniers (thanks to Andy for this one). Didn’t someone say a little knowledge is a dangerous thing? And isn’t cherry picking a great way of restricting knowledge?

So, just to repeat myself – here’s an extract from my post Climate change is complex. It indicates some of the scientific knowledge that climate change deniers/contrarians/sceptics ignore when they cherry pick to make this silly claims.

Natural influences just can’t explain global temperature

The figure below shows the results of simulations of global temperature from 1900 to 2005. Figure a included all the natural and anthropogenic influences.  The black line is the actual measured global temperature anomaly (obtained by subtracting the average temperature for 1901 to 1950).  The individual simulations are shown as thin yellow curves. The red line is the multi-model ensemble mean (see Figure 9.5 – AR4 WGI Chapter 9: Understanding and Attributing Climate Change).

Figure b is a similar plot using simulations which consider only the natural influences on climate. The individual simulations are shown as thin blue curves. The thick blue line is the multi-model ensemble mean.

So, climate scientist have considered both natural and anthropogenic influences. And they are unable to reproduce the global temperature changes since 1970 unless anthropogenic influences are included.

That is why the IPCC has concluded that there is a high probability (>90%) that human influences are contributing to the current observed global temperature increase.

Notice also that the experts talk about probabilities. It’s a complex field and things are rarely cut and dried. We are more certain about some influences than others. And the IPCC doesn’t hide this fact – far from it. It doesn’t make sweeping claims in the way that some of their opponents do.

Knowing what we don’t know

We can see this in another figure from the report (Figure 2.20 – AR4 WGI Chapter 2: Changes in Atmospheric Constituents and in Radiative Forcing). It shows the estimated influences of several human caused effect and solar radiation since 1750. Notice the error bars. They are much bigger in some cases than others. Notice the assessment of scientific understanding for these influences. We have a high understanding for some of them and a low understanding for others.

So, climate scientists aren’t hiding anything. They are not ignoring natural effects. They are up-front about probabilities. They acknowledge that we need more information is some areas. They are behaving like professionals.

Considering there are areas where scientific understanding is low there is clearly room for debate, discussion and more research. But deniers and contrarians who take an extreme reductionist stance, misrepresent the IPCC reports and attack honest scientists doing the research are not in a position to contribute to this.

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Global climate – and your grandchildren

I am spending some time dealing with family business so am reposting some of my past book reviews over the next few day.

Another excellent book about climate change – by a climate science who has been centrally involved from the beginning. His book provides a lot of the science, but also the history of the science..

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Book Review: Storms of My Grandchildren: The Truth About the Coming Climate Catastrophe and Our Last Chance to Save Humanity by James Hansen

Price: US$16.50*
Hardcover: 320 pages
Publisher: Bloomsbury USA (December 8, 2009)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 1608192008
ISBN-13: 978-1608192007

Climate change contrarians and deniers love to hate James Hansen. He’s up there alongside Al Gore, Michael Mann and Phil Jones. And of course their hatred is no more justified in Hansen’s case than it is for the others.

Others criticise Hansen for his “activism.” His willingness to warn politicians and the population in general of the dangers we face if we continue with a “business as usual” approach to fossil fuel and CO₂ emissions. They suggest this could discredit his science. Scientists must always be objective and should limit their pronouncements to the scientific facts alone.

This is not an old problem for scientists – remember their activism after the first use of nuclear weapons and the beginning of the nuclear arms race. Scientists often confront ethical issues arising out of their work.

Christmas present from NASA

Photography can produce some great abstract art. Even if it’s of the very large or very small.

Here’s some really beautiful abstract art based on photograph of earth taken from orbit.

The Dasht-e Kavir, or Great Salt Desert, is the larger of Iran’s two major deserts, which occupy most of the country’s central plateau.

From the introduction:

In 1960, the United States put its first Earth-observing environmental satellite into orbit around the planet. Over the decades, these satellites have provided invaluable information, and the vantage point of space has provided new perspectives on Earth. This book celebrates Earth’s aesthetic beauty in the patterns, shapes, colors, and textures of the land, oceans, ice, and atmosphere. The book features 75 stunning images of Earth from the Terra, Landsat 5, Landsat 7, EO-1, and Aqua satellites. Sensors on these satellites can measure light outside of the visible range, so the images show more than what is visible to the naked eye. The images are intended for viewing enjoyment rather than scientific interpretation. The beauty of Earth is clear, and the artistry ranges from the surreal to the sublime.

Earth as art—enjoy the gallery.

NASA Science Mission Directorate

Earth Science Division

Download your gift:

As a PDF

As the Accompanying iPad App

via NASA – “Earth As Art”.

Thanks to ebook friendly

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A Kiwi makes it to Mars!

Forget optical illusions like the human face on Mars. That was observed from orbit and you had to hold your mouth right – not to mention the light direction.
But Curiosity is much closer to the ground. It has amazing equipment and excellent cameras.

And they have now seen a Kiwi!

Here’s the high-resolution photographic evidence (click to enlarge and look down at the left side, 1/3 the way up).

This was reported locally (of course) by Stuff at Kiwi Sighting On Mars | Nasa Rover Curiosity. The report says:

There aren’t many places intrepid Kiwi travellers haven’t set foot on in this world and now they’re moving on to others.

A New Zealander following the travels of Nasa’s Mars rover Curiosity has unearthed possible evidence of a Kiwi hiding on the red planet.

Ned Walker, a New Zealander living in Australia, said he was surprised at the find, but it was unmistakable.

“I have a huge interest in the Mars Curiosity Rover and I like to look at the raw images Nasa uploads onto its site each day from the rover’s cameras.

‘‘I was amazed to find in today’s raw images what can only be described a Kiwi.”

Walker thought the “monumental find”, would be of interest to all New Zealanders.”

Nasa’s online publication of the Kiwi picture.

US air traffic on a typical day and on September 11, 2001

Here’s a short video which drives home how busy air traffic is these days – especially in the United States. It presents several representations of air traffic in the US on a normal day – and on September 11 2011 – a very abnormal day.

US Air Traffic on a Typical Day Shows Need for NextGen Air Traffic Control 2012 NASA 6min.

A sundial on Curiosity?

When I saw the first reports of this on Twitter I thought it was a joke. A sundial on Curiosity? Just in case the computer packs up they can still tell the time? I thought some wag was pulling our collective legs with a photo of one of the rover’s antennae.

But, turns out this is something like a sundial. Its a Marsdial – actually a calibration target enabling photographs to be corrected for colour. BIll Nye, from the Planetary Society, describes its role in Curiosity’s Marsdial is on Mars!

“As I’m sure you’re aware, geologists love rocks, and they especially love the rocks on Mars. The first thing they all want to know about a rock is what’s it made of. For that, it’s good to just take a look at the color of the rock surface. When everything is being done on the alien landscape of another world, it’s easy enough to electronically get the color wrong, or not quite right. To that end, artists, photographers, and a few scientists have noticed that by looking at the color of a shadow on a neutral white or gray background, you can infer the color contributed to the scene by the sky.

On Earth, shadows take on a sky blue tinge (what I like to call “cerulescence”). On Mars, it’s a salmon color (what I like to call “arangidescence”). And so, the MarsDials bear a small metal post that casts a shadow onto some white and gray rings of known value or grayness.”

The NASA animation above is made up from four Mastcam images of the calibration target — the Marsdial. They were taken on Curiosity’s sol 3 (August 9, 2012) over a period of about 8 minutes. In that time, the shadow moved slightly, marking time on Mars with a sundial. (You may need to click on the photo to see the animation).

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Scientific shift work

Some of the people on teams managing the rovers on Mars call themselves “Rover drivers” or “Mars drivers.” Of course, things are not that simple. It is not possible to drive a vehicle on Mars in real-time from Earth. Instead, computer code must be uploaded to enable the vehicle to carry out planned manoeuvres, analyses, etc., autonomously.  And the computer code can only be written after the results of the previous commands are known.

In practice, this involves large teams of engineers, software experts and scientists. Each team has their own work – and the teams need to interact to plan the rover’s work, iron out priorities, and deal with problems. This work has to occur at strange times, and with deadlines, to fit in with the activity and day/night programme on Mars. Energy limitations means that the rover usually does not operate during the Martial day.

So all this work, the meetings of each team and their joint meetings, and decisions about planned activity must take place before the rover “wakes up.” And because the results from the previous day’s activities feed into this detailed decision cannot be made and code written until after that data has been downloaded and analysed.

The graphic above was shown in one of the recent Mars Science Laboratory – Curiosity – media briefings. It indicates the time line for the Laboratory to be active (“awake”), the downloading of data via the Mars Odyssey and Mars Reconnaissance orbiters, assessment of data, planning of future activity (particularly that for the next day), interaction of engineering, scientific and software teams, integration of plans, validation and approval and then the sending of the new commands to Curiosity as it “wakes up” for the new day.

I note they have even left a brief time gap “margin” to handle unforeseen problems.

It must be fascinating to work in large teams like this on scientific projects. And I am sure there are also political and emotional problems that need management as well as the engineering, scientific and software problems. Apparently with groups managing Mars rovers the shift-work, and the drift in shift times because of mismatch in the length of the Earth day and the Mars sol, causes “jet lag.” So the emotional and human issues resulting from this also need management.

Andrew Kessler gives an idea of the procedures involved in managing Mars rovers and landers in his book Martian Summer: Robot Arms, Cowboy Spacemen, and My 90 Days with the Phoenix Mars Mission. This is based on his own experiences as a journalist embedded in the teams managing the recent Phoenix lander. It’s a bit of an eye-opener – at least for someone who hasn’t worked in such large scientific teams before.

See Working on Mars for my review of that book.

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Infectious jubilation

Crowd in New York’s Times Square celebrate successful Mars landing – 1:30 am. Credit: Jason Major (@JPMajor)

The mass interest in the current Olympics, and yesterday’s landing of the Curiosity Rover on Mars really brought home to me that we are an empathetic species. We celebrate the achievements of others and feel the jubilation they do when things go right.

And with Curiosity’s successful landing I think we also celebrate the achievement because we see that it belongs to all of us. It is an achievement for all humanity.

The achievement is huge. The technically difficult landing seemed to go without a hitch. Scientists and engineers at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory were receiving images within minutes. Everyone was aware that attempts at Mars landing have a history of failure.

The descent by parachute was photographed by a high-resolution camera on board the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter. – see below.

Photo: NASA – Curiosity Spotted on Parachute by Orbiter.

That seems incredibly lucky but clearly a lot of skill and technology went into this achievement as well. As Phil Plait wrote on Bad Astronomy:

“The simple and sheer amazingness of this picture cannot be overstated. Here we have a picture taken by a camera on board a space probe that’s been orbiting Mars for six years, reset and re-aimed by programmers hundreds of millions of kilometers away using math and science pioneered centuries ago, so that it could catch the fleeting view of another machine we humans flung across space, traveling hundreds of million of kilometers to another world at mind-bending speeds, only to gently – and perfectly – touch down on the surface mere minutes later.”

According to a media briefing earlier today the full version of this image also shows the abandoned heat shield which landed some distance from the Curiosity’s landing site.

Patience

Now we have to be patient while Curiosity is checked out by engineers and slowly brought into full functioning. It will be weeks before the vehicle starts driving around, sampling soil and rocks, and analysing samples.

Even the downloading of images already captured will take time. So far we are only seeing relatively low resolution images. Large teams of engineers and scientists will be working strange hours (the slightly different length of the Martian day (sol) and the Earth day causes “jet lag” for these people) receiving data, planning experiments, writing code and uplifting code and instructions.

Andrew Kessler gives an idea of the activity and life style of the teams involved in managing the last Mars lander – Phoenix – in his book Martian Summer: Robot Arms, Cowboy Spacemen, and My 90 Days with the Phoenix Mars Mission. For my review of this book see Working on Mars.

See also:
Curiosity requires patience
Going for gold – on Mars
Seven Minutes of Terror
Christmas gift ideas: Working on Mars

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Curiosity requires patience

The Mars Science Laboratory, Curiosity, lands today – hopefully (5:31 pm NZ time). But when will we know if the landing has been successful?

Communication between Mars and Earth is hardly simple. It’s not just the time delays involved (currently about 15 min). There’s also rotation of both planets. So communication with Curiosity (if it lands successfully) will involve three satellites in orbit around Mars – the Odyssey Orbiter, the Reconnaissance Orbiter and ESA’s Mars Express. (Watch this video to see the alignment of Curiosity, Odyssey and Reconnaiscance during landing). Messages, and particularly data, may need to be stored on board Curiosity or the satellites before transmission to earth.

So we may not even have confirmation of Curiosity’s safe landing for several hours – maybe even several days. This video describes the problems and how they are overcome.

Thanks to Universe Today: When Will We Hear From Curiosity?

Curiosity’s landing site

Here’s a computer-generated view of Mars’ Gale crater as if seen from an aircraft north of the crater. Because of its history, 96-mile wide Gale Crater crater landing site is an ideal region for exploration of the planets history.

It has thick exposed sections of layered sedimentary rocks with a wet history. Joy Crisp, Mars Science Laboratory Deputy Project Scientist from NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory said:

“The rock record preserved in those layers holds stories that are billions of years old — stories about whether, when, and for how long Mars might have been habitable.”

For further information go to Image of the Day –NASA’s Gale Crater Mars Landing Site for Tomorrow’s ‘Search-for-Life’ Mission.

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