All Things Space / Science / Technology

Scientists discover black hole so big it contradicts growth theory

news.yahoo.com/scientists-discover-black-hole-big-contradicts-growth-theory-182735953.html

Scientists said this black hole was formed about 900 million years after the Big Bang.

But with measurements indicating it is 12 billion times the size of the Sun, the black hole challenges a widely accepted hypothesis of growth rates.

This giant lobster ancestor was once the biggest animal on Earth

www.theverge.com/2015/3/11/8191763/yale-nature-study-giant-lobster-aegirocassis-benmoulae

Ceres’ mystery: NASA’s Dawn seeks answers on a dwarf planet

The dwarf planet Ceres is finally ready for its close-up. Fresh from its 14-month mission studying the asteroid Vesta, NASA’s Dawn spacecraft is now in orbit around what is without question the most fascinating denizen of the asteroid belt between Mars and Jupiter.

Ceres contains a lot of water. If Dawn’s mission is successful, the data it transmits back to Earth over the coming months will help scientists figure out why Ceres has so much liquid when so many of its neighbors in the asteroid belt are rocky and barren. Ultimately, it may give scientists deeper insight into the conditions that led to planetary formation in our solar system billions of years ago.

The Dawn spacecraft also represents an evolution in unmanned space exploration. Instead of standard rocket fuel, Dawn uses ion propulsion technology that was first tested on the Deep Space 1 mission in 1998.

Launched in 2007, Dawn has used only 10 percent of the fuel that a more conventional spacecraft would have required to span the distance from Earth to the asteroid belt. So far, the new technology has made the spacecraft more maneuverable than previous probes.

Besides exploring the mystery of Ceres’ ability to hold onto liquid water, NASA is eager to learn the source of two mysterious reflective patches of light centered in one of the dwarf planet’s craters. No one at the space agency believes it is evidence of extraterrestrial intelligence, but it will be nice to have a scientific explanation, finally, for an oddity that fueled some wild speculation.


For this reason and many more, the journey to Ceres is one of the most exciting, yet understated, missions NASA has pursued.

www.post-gazette.com/opinion/editorials/2015/03/12/Ceres-mystery-NASA-s-Dawn-seeks-answers-on-a-dwarf-planet/stories/201503310015

NASA is experimenting with an EM drive.

I'm waiting for a test warp, then I'll get excited.

Boy discovers new planet 1,000 light years away

A 15-year-old schoolboy has been credited with discovering a new planet 1,000 light years away, Keele University announced Wednesday after astronomers confirmed the discovery upon completing two years of observation.
Read more at www.grindtv.com/random/boy-discovers-new-planet-1000-light-years-away/#p15jMyzx2JgZCjQL.99

I think my brain snapped thinking about this one

Time travel and the single atom

Researchers have confirmed one of the most profound thought experiments of quantum physics. Cathal O’Connell explains.

cosmosmagazine.com/physical-sciences/time-travel-and-single-atom

"...if you offer a speeding helium atom two possible paths, the route it takes appears to be retroactively determined by the act of measuring the atom at the end of its journey..." 

Car hack uses digital-radio broadcasts to seize control

www.bbc.com/news/technology-33622298?ocid=socialflow_facebook

Several car infotainment systems are vulnerable to a hack attack that could potentially put lives at risk, a leading security company has said.

NCC Group said the exploit could be used to seize control of a vehicle's brakes and other critical systems.

The Manchester-based company told the BBC it had found a way to carry out the attacks by sending data via digital audio broadcasting (DAB) radio signals.

It coincides with news of a similar flaw discovered by two US researchers.

Chris Valasek and Charlie Miller showed Wired magazine that they could take control of a Jeep Cherokee car by sending data to its internet-connected entertainment and navigation system via a mobile-phone network.

Chrysler has released a patch to address the problem.

However, NCC's work - which has been restricted to its labs - points to a wider problem.

The UK's Society of Motor Manufacturers and Traders has responded by saying that car companies "invest billions of pounds to keep vehicles secure as possible".
Breached brakes

NCC demonstrated its technique to BBC Radio 4's PM programme at its offices in Cheltenham.

By using relatively cheap off-the-shelf components connected to a laptop, the company's research director, Andy Davis, created a DAB station.

Because infotainment systems processed DAB data to display text and pictures on car dashboard screens, he said, an attacker could send code that would let them take over the system.

Once an infotainment system had been compromised, he said, an attacker could use it as a way to control more critical systems, including steering and braking.

Depending on the power of the transmitter, he said, a DAB broadcast could allow attackers to affect many cars at once.

"As this is a broadcast medium, if you had a vulnerability within a certain infotainment system in a certain manufacturer's vehicle, by sending one stream of data, you could attack many cars simultaneously," he said.

"[An attacker] would probably choose a common radio station to broadcast over the top of to make sure they reached the maximum number of target vehicles."

Mr Davis declined to publicly identify which specific infotainment systems he had hacked, at this point.

Lab simulation

In many ways, modern cars are computer networks on wheels.

Mike Parris, of SBD, another company that specialises in vehicle security, said modern cars typically contained 50 interlinked computers running more than 50 million lines of code.

By contrast, he said, a modern airliner "has around 14 million lines of code".

Such technology allows the latest cars to carry out automatic manoeuvres. For example, a driver can make their vehicle parallel park at the touch of a button.

Mr Davis said he had simulated his DAB-based attack only on equipment in his company's buildings because it would be illegal and unsafe to do so in the outside world.

But he added that he had previously compromised a real vehicle's automatic-braking system - designed to prevent it crashing into the car in front - by modifying an infotainment system, and he believed this could be replicated via a DAB broadcast.

"If someone were able to compromise the infotainment system, because of the architecture of its vehicle network, they would in some cases be able to disable the automatic braking functionality," he said.
Jeep attack

On Tuesday, Wired magazine reported that two US security researchers had managed to remotely take control of a Jeep Cherokee's air-conditioning system, radio and windshield wipers while its journalist was driving the vehicle.

Mr Valasek - director of vehicle security research at IOActive - said that NCC's attack appeared to have similarities with his own.

"I mean that's essentially what we did over the cell [mobile] network - we took over the infotainment system and from there reprogrammed certain pieces of the vehicle so we could send control commands," he said.

"So, it sounds entirely plausible."

But he added that such exploits were beyond the reach of most criminals.

"It takes a lot of time skill and money," he said.

"That isn't to say that there aren't large organisations interested in it."

More details about both the NCC and the US team's research will be presented to the Black Hat security convention in Las Vegas next month.

The SpaceRip YouTube channel is pretty sweet: