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Invention – skin tight spacesuits help prevent astronaut bone problems
by Marshall Brain | December 14, 2010
It’s officially called the gravity loading countermeasures suit (GLCS presumably). The goal is to reduce bone loss and spinal elongation during long duration space flight. It is a skin-tight suit designed to be worn inside the space station. It elastically squeezes the body and the spine: See also: New Skintight Astronaut Suit Could Reduce Bone [...]
Anything in low earth orbit (like the space station, the space shuttle or the Hubble space telescope) is traveling 17,500 MPH. But how fast is that in real, down-to-earth terms? Here’s the answer: It’s a pretty amazing speed. It’s Los Angeles to Tokyo (approximately 5,400 miles) in 18 minutes: The space shuttle achieves that speed [...]
New “World of Warcraft” Expansion Goes Triple Platinum in 24 Hours
by Chris Pollette | December 14, 2010
“World of Warcraft” has been around a while now but the game has serious legs. Tom Magrino over at GameSpot wrote about last week’s launch of the newest expansion, called “World of Warcraft: Cataclysm.” Within 24 hours, the expansion sold 3.3 million copies, outstripping the success of the previous two expansion packs, which sold 2.4 and 2.8 million copies within 24 hours.
These days, you can build model cars out of all sorts of materials, from LEGO bricks to paper. In this episode, Scott and Ben take an enthusiastic look at papercraft cars that you can print out and put together.
Metrodome Roof Collapses – “A large section of the roof lay torn and whipping in the wind in the stadium’s north end zone later in the day, and snow that had fallen through the rip covered much of the field. Maki said workers were working with the manufacturer of the roof material on plans to [...]
You may not be that into dub music, but there’s a good chance you’ve heard the work of Scientist (real name Hopeton Brown). The reggae station in “Grand Theft Auto III” consisted of tracks from his classic 1981 album “Scientist Rids the World of the Evil Curse of the Vampires.” Oh yeah, he’s all about awesome, goofy titles.
Now Scientist has a new album for you and yes, it’s spaced-out enough to deserve mention here: “The Scientist Launches Dubstep Into Outer Space.” Those of you already in the know can skip the next two paragraphs because I’m going to quickly break down the basics behind dub and dubstep:
How Fusion Power Works -and- where fusion research stands today
by Marshall Brain | December 13, 2010
Human beings already have access to one fusion reactor. The sun is a gigantic fusion reactor that creates nearly all of the energy making life on earth possible. Sunlight provides the warmth that keeps water from freezing, and sunlight lets plants create the food that animals need. What if we could take the fusion principles [...]
It only takes a few episodes of Mad Men to understand that advertising is meant to elicit certain emotional responses from consumers. Don Draper excels at his job because he effectively infuses need and desire into products, no matter how frivolous. But toying with people’s consumer behavior has a more potent effect than driving them [...]
If you have read How Roller Coasters Work, you know that the basic principles of a roller coaster are very simple. You have a car rolling down a track under the influence of gravity. That simplicity means that it is possible to build roller coasters at home… And people do… This is a 180-foot home [...]
While controversy and allegations swirl around Julian Assange and Wikileaks, virtual warriors either siding with Wikileaks or opposing it are squaring off with their armies of infected computers around the world. They wage war against targets they’ve identified as possessing a conflicting philosophy from their own. Some people call such actions hactivism — using hacking tactics to push forward a particular agenda. Others just call it cyberwar.
Recent Postings by Category
BrainStuff
- Thank You and Best Wishes to Marshall Brain
- Contest – Design a $300 house and win $25,000
- How the Philtrum works – the place under your nose where your face comes together
The Coolest Stuff on the Planet
- Have a Coke and a Smile
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Keep Asking
- Why can a 5 foot 8 inch man dunk a basketball on a 10 foot rim while some people of taller stature can’t?
- What happens to our sun once it runs out of fuel?
- How do we know the age of the universe?
Stuff Mom Never Told You
- Who invented the Christmas card?
- How the Kinsey Report Fueled Whiskey Sales
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Stuff to Blow Your Mind
- Space Music: DJ Food and ‘The Search Engine’
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- Space Music: Jay-Z and Beyoncé to Film Music Video in Orbit
Stuff You Should Know
- The Southern Death Cult, the Maya and Georgia
- Deformed Baby Spider Brains
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The Stuff of Genius
CarStuff
- Why is NASA studying car safety?
- Tips for in-car Navigation Systems
- Tips for Using Bluetooth in the Car
How-to Stuff
- How to Swim with Dolphins (When Deep Water Terrifies You)
- How to Cure a Homemade Cookie Craving Without Turning on the Oven
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PopStuff
- PopStuff Show Notes: Episode 36: Now Available in 3-D
- PopStuff Show Notes: Episode 35: Let’s do brunch!
- PopStuff Show Notes: Episode 34: Play it again, Sam
Stuff They Don't Want You To Know
Stuff to Change the World
- Who will own the Arctic?
- Obesity: The New Global Crisis
- Bill Gates Makes For A Pretty Decent Cartoon
Stuff You Missed in History Class
- Butch Cassidy: Should we read between the lines?
- Are we rooting for D.B. Cooper?
- Party Time: A Look at Unconventional Politics
