NASA’s Phoenix spacecraft having trouble analyzing soil samples

September 1st, 2022

Sunday, June 8, 2008

NASA has stated that the Mars Phoenix lander is having trouble analyzing soil samples that its robotic arm is collecting. According to NASA, the soil appears to be too clodded to pass through screens on the way to Phoenix’s Thermal and Evolved-Gas Analyzer (TEGA).

Images taken by the lander’s camera shows that the robotic arm has dumped a large portion of soil over the TEGA, but it failed to register any soil which might have passed through the screens leading into the analyzer. The screen is designed to let through particles up to one-millimeter (0.04 inch) across while keeping out larger particles, in order to prevent clogging a funnel pathway to a tiny oven inside. An infrared beam crossing the pathway checks whether particles are entering the instrument and breaking the beam. It is now believed that the particles are either too large to pass through the screen, or the soil is too clumpy.

“I think it’s the cloddiness of the soil and not having enough fine granular material. In the future, we may prepare the soil by pushing down on the surface with the arm before scooping up the material to break it up, then sprinkle a smaller amount over the door,” said Ray Arvidson of Washington University located in St. Louis, Missouri. Arvidson is the Phoenix team’s science lead researcher for Saturday and digging czar for Phoenix’s mission.

NASA also plans to use a shaker inside the TEGA to shake any material or samples longer than previously planned in an attempt to break up the larger particles and clumps. Phoenix already utilized this method on Friday June 6, shaking the soil for five minutes before dumping it onto the screen. NASA plans to tell Phoenix to shake the material a little longer in order for the soil to be tested.

While scientists ponder ways to fix the issue, TEGA will not be analyzing any samples. Instead Phoenix is expected to have completed tasks today such as horizontally extending a trench where the lander dug two practice scoops earlier this week, and taking additional images of a small pile of soil that was scooped up and dropped onto the surface during the second of those practice digs.

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Bolivian President-Elect takes 50% pay cut to aid social programs

August 29th, 2022

Monday, January 2, 2006

So more staff can be hired for Bolivia’s education, health and social programs, President Elect Evo Morales announced that he and his cabinet will take a 50% pay cut. The 46-year-old leader slashed his future salary of about $3600 a month to $1800.

Raising Bolivia from its situation as one of the poorest countries in the world is a primary intention of the president elect. “It’s a question of sharing the country’s situation among us all.” said Morales. “This is a democratic revolution and we will answer the Bolivian people’s call.”

Cabinet ministers and all 157 members of Morales’ party that were elected to Congress will also take a 50% pay cut, Morales said. The salaries of 157 substitute congressmen will be eliminated.

Morales, who is known across the country as “Evo”, is Bolivia’s first native Indian president. Growing up in poverty has marked his politics. He often says, “For a handful of people there is money, for the others, repression.”

Evo will soon move from his rented single room of a shared house to Bolivia’s presidential palace.

Morales also met with business and civic leaders on Tuesday in a conciliatory meeting. Morales said his government would create a stable legal and economic environment to attract investment and create jobs which was applauded by the Bolivian elite.

“I do not have a professional education, but it is important that we co-operate. You have the professional capacity, I have the social consciousness”.

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‘Jelly bellies’ memo costs Florida police chief his job

August 28th, 2022

Thursday, November 2, 2006

Winter Haven, Florida police chief Paul Goward was tired of seeing fat hanging out over the belts of some of his officers. So he posted a memo to encourage the so-called ‘jelly bellies’ to get in shape.

The memo, entitled ‘Are You A Jelly Belly?’ didn’t single anyone out, and, apart from the title, didn’t call anyone names.

Goward, a former deputy police chief in Wichita, wrote “If you are unfit, do yourself and everyone else a favor. See a professional about a proper diet and a fitness training program, quit smoking, limit alcohol intake…Don’t mean to offend, this is just straight talk. I owe it to you.”

It provided a list of 10 reasons cops should get fit. Goward said that overweight cops poorly represent the profession, are liable to ‘poop out’ when chasing suspects, and may have to use a higher degree of force.

In the end, Goward resigned from his position as police chief.

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How To Learn Data Science

August 28th, 2022

Brief about Data Science Learning

Learning data science can be hard, but it doesn’t have to be impossible. You just need to know what you’re getting into. I’ll share with you some tips that will help you get started. It’s important that you realize this isn’t for everyone, and there is a lot of competition out there. However, if you’re willing to stick with it, you’ll reap the rewards in no time.

You need to think long and hard about what type of formal education you’re going to need. There are many types, so you need to decide what’s best for you. If you like college, then you’ve probably figured out what type of formal education you need. If not, you might want to consider taking classes online or through an institution. No matter what you choose, there is enough to cover this topic that you’ll be prepared.

What to Study ?

Next, you need to figure out what you want to study. This can be done by listing your interests and defining the tools and materials that you’ll use. You might want to do a little bit of analysis as well, such as looking at existing data sets or trying to predict the future. It’s really up to you.

Once you know what you’re going to do, you can start thinking about how to get started. You can take a course at your local college. Some colleges even offer online courses for learning. If you prefer the written word, you can always read books on the subject or check out websites to see data sets and other examples.

If you’ve already got some education, you can read up on specific subjects and begin studying. This can be done at home, on the Internet, or in a library. There are many ways you can learn. The fastest way, of course, is to download eBooks on the subject and begin learning immediately. You’ll save money and get instant results.

Some good learning resources

You can also learn online or through video tutorials. There are many websites offering tutorial type courses on how to learn data science. These courses are designed to be self-directed or interactive. They usually involve learning scientific concepts using specific software applications. You might find that the best courses are those that combine text with video tutorials. I particularly would refer these two websites as I have been a contributor myself in their content. Imurgence forself paced data science courses and Integrumlitera for One on One machine learning courses.

These programs are designed to give you hands-on experience with actual data science projects. Some are based on experiments you might do at home. Others are more project based than anything else. Whatever you choose, you need to be aware that learning this way is just that: learning. Don’t become so confident in your understanding that you think you understand it all.

Remember that as you learn you need to keep things interesting. Keep re-thinking things and questioning yourself. Be willing to accept that things don’t always work the way you expected them to. You’ll find that the more questions that you ask and the more independent data you collect, the more you’ll learn about data science in the process. The better you get at it, the more value you will earn.

While the science part of this is important, remember that you’re also learning to communicate. In the beginning, you should probably use a visual tool to make simple expressions and plots. Over time you can probably move beyond that. It’s okay if you don’t know everything right from the beginning. You should be able to figure out what to write in your own words. You don’t need to understand everything right now, but you should gather some knowledge at each step of the way.

Once you have some initial data, try to backtest it. This means looking at how your system or application performs against a known set of standards. This lets you see what kind of effect you may have had if you tweaked the system to its maximum potential. If you find that it still performs poorly, consider changing your approach.

Parting Views

Finally, you want to find out if there are other people who are learning the same things as you. This is where message boards and forums become useful. Find others with the same goals as you and ask for tips and advice.

There is a lot involved in understanding how to learn data science. However, once you have some preliminary knowledge, you can proceed with confidence. You will be ready to take on more advanced tasks. And even if you never go beyond a basic program, having the basic foundation will help you be prepared to move forward when you choose. This holds true for almost every subject you might choose to study.

Venezuela opens granite processing facility in Bolívar

August 27th, 2022

Monday, February 18, 2013

Venezuela’s government has opened a granite processing plant in the state of Bolívar, with the intention of providing about 25% of the granite required nationwide.

Ricardo Menéndez, vice president of the Productive Economic Area, said Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez has yearned for the creation of this project to empower Venezuelan construction. Granito Bolívar is reportedly the most modern Venezuelan granite plant, not consuming community water or electricity, and is also the largest, with a daily capacity to supply enough material for use in construction of about 820 houses.

Menéndez said, “These granite blocks are the natural resources of our country, are the wealth we have as a country and often [some] simply decided to remove this richness from our country and take them to other countries” ((es))Spanish language: ?Esos bloques de granito son la riquezas naturales de nuestro país, son las riquezas que tenemos como patria y que muchas veces sencillamente esas riquezas decidieron sacarlas de nuestro territorio nacional y llevarlas a otros países.

According to Menéndez, with the help of a state plan, Venezuela intends to exploit its 40,000 million cubic meters or more of granite reserves, generating a set of factories. “[T]he central theme is that these plants, all these factories, are for the construction of socialism; that means using our potential, develop the value chain within the country and of course that yields benefits from the point of view of the production system’s organization…. [Granito] Bolívar is not only the vision that historically we had of exposing richness, but the industries, basic industries we have, that level of our workers in the basic industries and in addition the development of the potential we have in the state” ((es))Spanish language: ?el tema central es que estas plantas todas estas fábricas son para la construcción del socialismo, eso significa utilizar nuestras potencialidades, dessarrollar la cadena de valor dentro del país y por supuesto que eso genere beneficios desde el punto de vista de la organización del sistema productivo … Bolívar no solamente es la visión que históricamente se tuvo de exponer las riquezas, sino que son las empresas, las empresas básicas que tenemos, ese nivel de nuestros trabajadores de la empresas básicas y adicionalmente el desarrollo del potencial que tenemos en el estado.

For the construction of the plant, supplied by 23 quarries, the government of Bolívar provided about 30 million bolívares (US$4.7 million) and the national government €2.3 million (US$3 million). Bolívar reportedly has reserves of about 40,000 million tons of red, black, pink and white granite, sufficient for domestic demand for 200 years.

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Three accused of murdering Edmonton, Alberta convenience store clerks in robberies appear in court

August 27th, 2022

Tuesday, December 22, 2015

Yesterday, three people, all of whom had previous criminal arrests, appeared in court in Edmonton, Alberta, Canada, accused of first degree murder; they allegedly killed two Mac’s convenience store clerks during robberies at two different stores on Friday.

According to police, the victims were alone in their respective stores when the gunmen arrived. The clerks were shot dead, both within a short period of time, and the suspects left with a small amount of money. Karanpal Bhandu, one of the victims, was taken to hospital and died, while another, Ricky Cenabre, was found dead in the store’s storage room.

One 13-year-old boy briefly appeared in court yesterday, crying during the proceedings. His name cannot be disclosed. The next hearing in his case is set for January 4 next year. The boy has previously been charged with illegally carrying weapons, including nunchucks and bear spray, and robbery.

Another man accused, 27-year-old Colton Steinhauer, is supposed to appear again in court on January 11. He has allegedly violated his probation orders, and has been convicted of multiple crimes, including assault causing bodily harm.

The third man, 24-year-old Laylin Delorme, has repeatedly been convicted of crimes in recent years. For assault with a weapon he received six month prison sentences twice, once in 2010 and once in 2014, losing his right to own firearms. He has also previously been jailed for two years after being convicted of possessing drugs for trafficking. Delorme has previously posted images featuring firearms onto social media, including one captioned “ski mask on I’m coming for your ice, bare face I’m coming for your life”; Steinhauer has also posted similar posts onto his social media accounts. Delorme is also expected to appear in court on January 11.

Edmonton Police Chief Rod Knecht said the murders were “absolutely unnecessary”, “gratuitous”, and “evil.”

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Runaway EMU train collides with freight train in India

August 26th, 2022

Friday, May 1, 2009

At approximately 06:00 a.m. (00:30 GMT) Wednesday, between four and seven people were killed when an Electric Multiple Unit (EMU) passenger train crashed into a stationary freight train at Vyasarpadi Jeeva station, in Chennai, India. Between eleven and twenty persons were injured, and rushed to General Hospital in Chennai.

Officials are unsure of the number of persons aboard the passenger train, which was operated by an unknown person. “It is not clear who operated (it),” said S. Jayanth, acting general manager of Southern Railway. The operator of the EMU train was not in the train when it left 15 minutes to half an hour before the scheduled departure time. It is said some passengers did board the passenger train.

The EMU train ignored all signals, and drove about 7 kilometers (4 mi) at high speed, jumping tracks, before colliding with the goods train.

The driver of the goods train, Arumugam, has been confirmed as one of those who has died. The goods train was traveling between Arakkonam to Chennai. The motorman, guard and assistant jumped from the goods train sustaining fractures.

“We heard a loud noise and saw several compartments in flames. The smell emanating from bodies from the mangled coaches was nauseating,” said M.N. Selvi, a nearby resident.

The platforms at the Vyasarpadi Jeeva station were destroyed, and electrical cables were torn down. The EMU train caught fire in the collision destroying two compartments completely. The other compartments were thrown from the tracks. The freight train was loaded with oil tanks, however reports indicate that only the EMU train was set ablaze.

All train services were canceled for a time on one of the busiest rail lines of India. “Train services are disrupted due to the mishap but we hope to restore the services in two to three hours time,” an Indian Railways spokesperson.

Railways Minister Lalu Prasad announced that an inquiry will be held.

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Proseries Led: Agriculture Market And Leds

August 25th, 2022

byadmin

In order for swine and poultry production facilities to take advantage of energy-efficient LED lighting technology, they need a higher-quality agricultural LED luminaire that stands up to the rigors of their environments and power washing, yet are easy to install and maintain. Today’s producers recognize that energy-efficient LED lighting distribution is more even than fluorescent lighting and the color is a brighter white that is more user friendly in a barn environment. What’s more, LED technology generates more light with less heat, requiring less air conditioning. It means a reduction in the producer’s utility bill and its carbon footprint. Most utility companies also recognize the positive effects of energy-efficient lighting with rebates that financially support the transition to agricultural LED lights.

After retrofitting his 2,500-head swine production facility at Woodville Pork, Waseca, Minn., with the ProSeries LED Upgrade, Co-owner Chris Selthun raves about the time-savings. “We used to have to make a trip every week to buy CFLs or incandescent replacement lamps and deal with changing them out. Our 3,000-psi pressure washer is proof that the LED luminaire lives up to the product’s claim. In fact, when we added a new cold storage facility, there was no question about installing the ProSeries LED Luminaire. Plus, we figured with the rebate we’d see a three-year return on investment.”

Storm causes Southern Californian residents to evacuate

August 18th, 2022

Friday, January 22, 2010

A storm in the Los Angeles County, California area has caused reasons for residents in 2009 Station Fire burn areas to evacuate. Californians in these area braced themselves from mudslides and flash floods due to the expected 25 cm (10 in) of rain yesterday. The National Weather Service (NWS) predicted 3.8 cm (1.5 in) per hour in these fire-affected areas.

Charles Beck, Los Angeles Police Department chief, advised residents, “If a Los Angeles police officer comes to your door and tells you to leave: leave. We’re not asking you to leave because we think your lawn’s going to get dirty, we’re not doing it because your carpet’s going to get wet. We’re doing it because your life is at risk.”

Two days prior, the Los Angeles Coast, the NWS issued tornado warnings, a rarity, for the Whittier, South Los Angeles, and and Long Beach areas. There were reports of a tornado touching down at Sunset Beach in Orange County. The tornado reportedly lifted boats from the water. There were other reports of waterspouts in the Pacific Ocean.

Cal State Long Beach closed for the remainder of Wednesday afternoon and will reopen on Friday, January 22. Schools in the La Crescenta and La Cañada Flintridge areas were also closed yesterday.

In other areas of Los Angeles, the rain caused minor flooding and large puddles – storm drains overflowed. This storm hit strong from about 15:00 PST (2300 UTC) to about 16:30 PST (0030 UTC) Wednesday. It started again rather powerfully at about 17:10 PST (0110 UTC).

A Southern California resident preferring to remain unnamed said this in regards to the storm, “I felt that it was a wonderful change from the super hot weather,” in reference to the 26 °C (80 °F) plus temperatures leading into winter.

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Hundreds feared dead after Indian ferry boat capsizes

August 16th, 2022

Wednesday, May 2, 2012

A double-decker ferry capsized late Monday in the Brahmaputra River near Guwahati, India. The ferry was over capacity when a storm caused it to overturn and break in half. The ferry passengers were mostly women and children. Officials estimate there are at least 200 casualties. Inclement weather hindered rescue attempts and as of Tuesday, 103 bodies have been recovered. No life jackets or lifeboats were aboard the ferry at the time of the event.

According to officials, many of the bodies may have floated 25 miles down river to Bangladesh, due to strong currents. The river is a vital source of irrigation and transportation to the people along its coast. It is approximately 1,800 miles long, making rescue efforts difficult to pursue quickly. Rescuers are working around the clock in efforts to locate any remaining survivors.

About 150 passengers swam to a nearby shore. The remaining passengers are missing and are feared dead. Reports indicate this is one of the worst ferry accidents ever recorded in India. Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh issued a statement expressing his remorse over the death of the passengers and announcing that he would compensate the next of kin of all casualties Rs 200,000, or about $4,000 US dollars.

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