The man The machine.........

Oh....how I wish I had a snowmobile more than anything else.........The best thing to own during winter........no restrictions on where to go...one is no longer limited by the roads and the weather......with a snowmobile no hill no plain and no forest is out of bound....it is an ultimate expression of power and freedom.......

.

M31

The sky has been very good in the night of August 3 to 4, 1764; & the constellation Andromeda was near the Meridian, I have examined with attention the beautiful nebula in the girdle of Andromeda, which was discovered in 1612 by Simaon Marius, & which has been observed since with great care by different astronomers, & at last by M. le Gentil who has given a very ample & detailed description in the volume of the Momoirs of the Academy for 1759, page 453, with a drawing of its appearance. I will not report here what I have written in my [observing] Journal: I have employed different instruments for examining that nebula, & above all an excellent Gregorian telescope of 30 pouces focal length, the large mirror having 6 pouces in diameter, & magnifying 104 times these objects: the middle of that nebula appeared rather bright with this instrument, without any appearance of stars; the light went diminishing up to extinguishing; it resembles two cones or pyramides of light, opposed at their bases, of which the axis was in the direction form North-West to South-East; the two points of light or the two summits are about 40 minutes of arc apart; I say about, because of the difficulty to recognize these two extreminties. The common base of the two pyramides is 15 minutes [of arc long]: these measures have been made with a Newtonian telescope of 4 feet & a half focal length, equipped with a micrometer of silk wires. With the same instrument I have compared the middle of the summits of the two cones of light with the star Gamma Andromedae of fourth magnitude which is very near to it, & little distant from its parallel. From these observations, I have concluded the right ascension of the middle of this nebula as 7d 26' 32", & its declination as 39d 9' 32" north. Since fifteen years during which I viewed & observed this nebula, I have not noticed any change in its appearances; having always perceived it in the same shape.

Image is taken from here.

Extract from
Mem. Acad. for 1771, p. 446-447 (first Messier catalog).
[p. 457] 1764.Aug. 3. RA: 7.26.32, Dec: 39. 9.32.B, Diam: 0.40.
The beautiful nebula in the girdle of Andromeda.

Binary

01010100011010000110111101110101011001110110100001110100
0111011101101111011101010110110001100100
01101101011000010110101101100101
01000001
01110000011011110111001101110100
0110100101101110
011000100110100101101110011000010111001001111001

The brother's were Wright !!!!!

From the earliest times, humans have had a fascination with the heavens. Many believed that the heavens were home to the gods. Religions related stories of airborne chariots and winged angels that descended from the heavens to speak to humans. Flying creatures that were half human and half beast were legendary, and birds and fantastic winged creatures pulled boats and other vehicles through the air.
Few moments in history have done more to capture the essence of the human spirit - freedom of the pursuit of dreams - than the Wright brother's historic first flight at Kitty Hawk, North Carolina.... twelve seconds that changed the world! And what twelve seconds they were...Mankind was no longer confined to the ground but could soar the vast heavens as gracefully as a bird without any limitations.
In the last one hundred years, and to a lesser extent for thousands of years, both aviation and spaceflight have played an important part in social history. Most would agree that this role has largely been positive. Aviation has made the world smaller and brought people closer together. It has provided an avenue for those with special skills and talents in countless areas to shine and to express themselves. It has improved the lives of many people. Spaceflight, too, had a positive impact on life in the 20th century. It has opened up the vastness of the Universe and if not exactly able yet to explain how life began, has provided us with substantial clues. It has, to a great extent, achieved what writers could only imagine a hundred years ago.

Agni

Do not look at Agni
as an entity directed upward
to deter the ominous
or exhibit your might.
It is fire
in the heart of an Indian.
Do not even give it
the form of a missile
as it clings to the
burning pride of this nation
and thus is bright.


Dr. A P J Abdul Kalam is the President of the Republic of India.

If you could be born again...

If you could be born again
where would you want to live?
well, I would like to live
where there may be sunshine
blue skies, stars at night and dreams
and there must be you that I love

well there might not be
sunshine and blue skies and
stars at night and dreams
where I live
but there must be you that I love
because you are the one for whom I live.

Crater Lake (1 of 3)

Finally I am blogging after a break of about 2 weeks. This weekend we (my brother and I) went to Crater Lake. Crater Lake is about 700 miles south of Seattle. We decided that instead of taking the shorter route along an interstate (highway) we will drive along the Pacific Coast Highway. The Pacific Coast Highway runs along the western coastline of the US from Washington (Olympic Peninsula) all the way down to California. We started Saturday morning and took our first break at Canon beach. Nestled between the Pacific Ocean and the Coast Mountain Range, Cannon Beach; is famed for its forested headlands, towering monoliths and miles of pristine, sandy beaches. Continuing south from Canon beach, our next stop was at Tillamook. Tillamook is the home of Tillamook cheese (a local brand which is quite good). So how can a visit to the home of a cheese company be complete without a visit to the cheese factory? It was really exciting to see the cheese being made (It was somewhat like the Aarey Milk Colony factory). With our stomachs full we made out way towards Crater Lake.

Crater Lake is located in southern Oregon on the crest of the Cascade Range, 100 miles (160 km) east of the Pacific Ocean. It lies inside a caldera, or volcanic basin, created when the 12,000 foot (3,660 meter) high Mount Mazama collapsed 7,700 years ago after a large eruption. The lake is approximately 5 miles (8 km) wide, and is surrounded by steep rock walls that rise up to 2,000 feet (600 meters) above the lake's surface. Following the collapse of Mount Mazama, lava poured into the caldera at several places even as the lake began to rise. These flows created underwater features as well as Wizard Island, a cinder cone that rises 764 feet (233 meters) above the lake and is surrounded by black volcanic lava blocks.

The dramatic color of Crater Lake is the product of its great depth, the purity and clarity of its water, and the way light interacts with water. Water molecules absorb the longer wavelengths of light better (reds, oranges, yellows, and greens). Shorter wavelengths (blues) are more easily scattered than absorbed. In the deep lake, some of the scattered blue light is redirected back up to the surface where we can see it. Around the edges where the water is less deep, some of the unabsorbed green light is reflected back up, too. Although the color of the lake can vary from day to day depending on wind, cloud cover, and the angle of the sun, the different shades of blue are always spectacular.

Since the lake is filled almost entirely by snowfall, it is incredibly pure. Sunlight is able to penetrate the waters of Crater Lake to great depths. Researchers using an instrument called a "Secchi disk" can easily determine lake clarity. They simply lower the 8-inch black and white disk into the water, and measure the depth at which the disk is no longer visible from the surface. For most lakes, readings deeper than 100 feet (30 meters) are rare, but Crater Lake holds a world record clarity reading of 142 feet (43.3 meters)!

We took a boat ride in the lake. The boat ride is offered by the National Park Service and is a two hour tour along the circumference of the lake. One has to climb down about 750 feet to reach the only accessible part of the lake. The water was extremely clear and had a dark shade of blue. I had never seen something like this before. In the evening we camped at the Mazama campgrounds. There was a ranger show that night which included a slide show of the mountain and information about the flora anf fauna on the mountain.

Park forests are composed mostly of conifers, although a few hardwood species can be found. Starting in the park’s lower elevations (about 4,500 feet or 1,370 meters), ponderosa pine forest is the first zone seen. The ponderosa zone gives way to lodgepole pine forest at about 5,000 feet (1,520 meters). Sometimes referred to as “dog’s hair forest” because of the dense, scraggly stands of thin lodgepoles, this zone covers vast areas. Mountain hemlocks become dominant at about 6,000 feet (1,830 meters). This zone has the final tall trees in the park and has limited underbrush. The next zone is almost purely whitebark pines and extends from about 7,500 feet (2,290 meters) to the top of Mt. Scott, the highest point in the park (8,929 feet or 2,721 meters). The whitebark pine zone is more an open woodland than a forest.

One thing is for sure, Crater Lake ranks amongst the most beautiful places I have ever seen.

Crater Lake (2 of 3)

Crater Lake (3 of 3)

Dark Matter Axions

For each of the stellar, galactic, and galaxy cluster/super cluster observations the basic principle is that if we measure velocities in some region, then there has to be enough mass there for gravity to stop all the objects flying apart. When such velocity measurements are done on large scales, it turns out that the amount of inferred mass is much more than can be explained by the luminous stuff. Hence we infer that there is dark matter in the Universe. Dark matter (DM) candidates are usually split into two broad categories, Baryonic and Non-Baryonic with the second category being further sub-divided into (HDM) hot dark matter and cold dark matter (CDM) depending on their respective masses and speeds. CDM candidates travel at slow speeds (hence "cold") or have little pressure, while HDM candidates move rapidly (hence "hot").
Astrophysical observations increasingly suggest there's a large amount of cold dark matter in the universe, and the axion, a hypothetical elementary particle, is a compelling dark-matter candidate. Dark-matter axions normally have only feeble couplings to matter and radiation, but a RF cavity threaded by a magnetic field causes a few nearby halo axions to convert into microwave photons. These photons can then be detected with an exquisitely sensitive receiver, and several groups around the world search in this way for Milky Way halo axions at the upper end of their expected coupling range.
The research group at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory launched a high-sensitivity upgrade that exploits advances in low-noise quantum electronics. These upgraded receivers are by far the world's most sensitive to microwave radiation, having noise near the quantum limit. This upgraded experiment will be definitive, capable of detecting or ruling out the entire range of plausible dark-matter axion masses and couplings.

Summary of talk by Leslie Rosenberg at the University of Washington science colloquium.

Sarkar

One of the best movies I have seen so far...........amazing.....at last a hindi movie with no songs (the movie did not warrant any songs but with hindi movies ...) and Abhishek Bachan is simply superb. I was a bit apprehensive before watching the movie as may people had told me it is a copy of "Godfather"..with a bit of Mumbai politics. But Ram Gopal Verma has really done a great job..... fantastic....The best dialouge for me was in the end when Abhishek tells the CM "Main bhi to vohi cahata hoon"......
A good hindi move after a long time with excellent performances by all.

37 inches of rain in a day...that's crazy !!!!

What a day for Mumbai......it rained 37 inches in 21 hours.....that is the highest recorded rainfall in day for over a century in India. It even beat the previous record at Cherapunji, Assam. The rains have totally crippled the city rendering thousands stranded all over. It must be total chaos over there...no electricity (as power had been shut off), no communications. I remember when I was back home it had rained about 20 inches in a day..........and it was a mess. I can only imagine what it must be like now. Reports say that some places are under 12 feet of water...that’s entire ground floor...Reports from my neighborhood are surprisingly ok (considering the situation everywhere else)..the road link was cut because of waist high flooding, but there was no loss of life. Water did enter the ground floor apartments though.
One of my friends coming to US had to turn back (as did thousands of other traveller's) as all flights were cancelled. So were the trains and the roads were blocked too...the city was completely cut-off from the rest of the country....
well that's monsoon back home.....I am just hoping that life returns to normalcy as soon as possible.

How i yearn for the rains...

The last ten days have been an extremely dry and hot (for seattle) with temperatures in mid 80's. No rains and no clouds in sight...it is just burning down here....

Mount St. Helens

Today was my 5th visit Mount St. Helens. It is perhaps the most active volcano in continental North America.

The last major eruption occurred during May 1980. This eruption completely changed the landscape, converting the once richly forested region into a lunar like dead surface. Life has since begun to return to the mountain. But the mountain is very much active even today. St Helens remained pretty much dormant from 1980 until about 2004 when once again it shook to life, this time with steam and ash eruptions. Today the mountain is highly active with sporadic ash eruptions and almost continuous steam eruptions.

I had visited the mountain last year during the eruptions, in fact I was at the Johnston observatory when it was evacuated and closed. It has recently been reopened again. I visited St. Helens again this January and it was still steaming. In fact today morning there was a small ash eruption and steam eruptions continued throughout the day. We went to the windy ridge viewpoint today. You can also see the live Mount St. Helens web-cam here.

The photographs showing the comparison before and after the 1980 eruption have been taken from USGS/CVO archives.

Gene Transfer from Bacteria to Plants : Genetic Engineering in Nature

Agrobacterium tumefaciens, a common soil bacterium causes the destructive plant disease, crown gall, characterized by the formation of tumorus overgrowths at the site of infection. These overgrowths result from the transfer of DNA and proteins from Agrobacterium into plant cells where the DNA is integrated into the plant genome, and expressed, leading to the synthesis of plant growth regulators and food for the bacteria. This transfer of DNA from a prokaryote to a eukaryote is the only recognized natural example of trans-kingdom gene transfer. Indeed, most tobacco plants contain Agrobacterium genes that resulted from an infection in the distant past. Interestingly, the transfer mechanism used by Agrobacterium is common to the mechanism used by many human pathogens to transfer proteins into human cells, thereby causing disease. This natural genetic engineer has been exploited to genetically transform agriculturally important plants to confer resistance to a wide range of harmful pests, such as insects and viruses, as well as to herbicides. Agrobacterium can transfer DNA into many other eukaryotes including algae, fungi and human cells in the laboratory. Other bacteria, besides Agrobacterium are now being developed to genetically engineer plants and other organisms. What many biologists once thought could never happen in Nature is, in fact, a rather common occurrence and its mechanism is far more interesting than was ever envisioned.

Summary of talk by Dr.Eugene Nester at the University of Washington science colloquium.

Harry Potter

Atlast ...the sixth book in the series Harry Potter and the half blood prince is out. I finished reading it (yes...i am harry potter fan). I guess the story gets more exciting , but I liked the first three books more.

Lazy weekend

Monday...and back to work...this weekend was really slow...overcast and dull weather... atleast i got some work done...watched "Batman Begins" on saturday...found it ok...i liked the joker one better.

Freedom :- By Vinit Ogale

A look at Freedom :- Vinit Ogale

What is freedom ? The right to be free, the state of being free ? Which of course forces us to ask free from what ? As we think about it, it suddenly dawns upon us that freedom is not really easy to understand, much less define. On looking up its definition we see that freedom is "liberation from slavery or restraint or from the power of another". So is that really freedom? Who then truly is free? Is freedom then just another yard spun old wives tale. No, it is not so. Is your freedom so fragile that it can be shattered into a million pieces by simple act of restraint. Do you rob you child of its freedom when you force him to eat spinach at dinner.
The true meaning of freedom, I believe is simply the power to think. No man, beast or machine can ever strip you of your freedom. Each and every person has within him the power to free himself. Placing someone in a cell can never imprison his mind. Covering his eyes can not curtail his sight. But convince him to stop thinking and you have imprisoned him for eternity.
This leads us to religion and religious instruction. So often, we see around us, someone saying that earth is flat, pigs can fly and not going to church is heretic. Do they stop and think "Why?". Of course, they say,because the orange catholic vedas or the Dela Lama says so. Please understand here that I am not attacking what the orange vedas or Dela Lama says. In fact I hold both in high regard because they like all free people represent and embody independent thought. But the written word no matter how ancient or widely accepted can never replace what you think. If you read something and agree with it then you still remain free. But once you start justifying your actions by resting on the orange catholic vedas and not the pillars of independent thought, you throw away your priceless freedom just so that you no longer need to take the effort to think.

Mt.Baker (Day 2)

Sunday was a perfect day for hiking. We went hiking along the trails starting from the Heather Meadows area. Located along the upper reaches of the Mt.Baker byway this spectaular subalpine setting offers summer day use recreation along a network of scenic trails. We took the Bagely lakes trail and continued on to the Chain lakes trail. The Bagely lakes trail is a short 1.5 mile loop around the Heather Meadows, while the Chain lakes trail is about a 6 mile loop. It has an elevation gain of about +1700 ft /-1700 ft. We then went up to Artist Point, which offers stunning views of Mt.Baker and Mt.Shuksan

Mt.Baker (Day 1)

This weekend we (me and my brother) went camping to Mt.Baker national forest. The Mt. Baker-Snoqualmie National Forest in Washington State extends more than 140 miles along the western slopes of the Cascade Mountains from the Canadian border to the northern boundary of Mt. Rainier National Park. We camped at Douglas Fir campgrounds. Our campground was on banks of North Fork Nooksack river.....It was simply awesome. We left on Friday night reaching Baker early Saturday morning. After setting up our camp we drove up to Austin pass..The highest point accessible by vehicle. On the way we took a short detour to Nooksack falls. This falls plumments more than 100 feet over rocky outcrops. At Austin pass we ran into some bad weather and it was cold and covered in clouds....So all we could see was clouds and clouds....But that too was superb. So we returned back to camp...and chilled out.
Unfortunately we did not get a chance to see the Tempe comet as I had hoped too.

Deep Impact

NASA's Deep Impact spacecraft is set to intercept the comet Tempe1. Impact with the comet is scheduled for 1:52 a.m. EDT, July 4 (10:52 p.m. PDT, July 3). Deep Impact consists of a subcompact-car-sized flyby spacecraft and an impactor, about the size of a washing machine. The dual spacecraft carry three imaging instruments, two on the flyby and one on the impactor. The impactor has an auto-navigation system that will make final corrections to its flight path just minutes before the scheduled collision. Scientists hope the resulting crater will expose fresh material from below the comet's surface and subsurface. Comets are time capsules that hold clues about the formation and evolution of the solar system. They are composed of ice, gas and dust, primitive debris from the solar system's distant and coldest regions that formed 4.5 billion years ago. Deep Impact will be the first space mission to probe beneath the surface of a comet and reveal the secrets of its interior.

Altough the chances are low I am hoping to catch a glimpse of the comet with my telescope (ORION StarMax™ 102mm EQ Compact "Mak"). I am going to Coho campgrounds in the Olympic National Park which should be a good site if the sky is clear. The comet will be located in our southwestern skies, just a bit above the star Spica, in the constellation of Virgo. You can find Spica by first finding Jupiter -- extremely bright in the west -- and then looking "left" towards the south. More information can be found here.

New Backpack

I got myself a new back pack today (88ltr capacity)......i think i will use it next weekend......planing to go to the Olympic National Park (Kalaloch Beach) this weekend.......today it was quite hot here with temp peaking at about 77 F....hopefully the weather stays the same through the weekend

About the Universe

In the begining the Universe was created. This has made a lot of people very angry and has been widely regarded as a bad move.

My First Blog

Finally got around to creating a blog.......I am planing to pen my summer treks and hikes if I dont get too lazy.....So far I have been to North Cascades National Park, Mt.Baker National Forest, and Mt Rainier.