Technology, Books and Other Neat Stuff

"No one would have believed in the last years of the nineteenth century that this world was being watched keenly and closely by intelligences greater than man's and yet as mortal as his own; that as men busied themselves about their various concerns they were scrutinised and studied, perhaps almost as narrowly as a man with a microscope might scrutinise the transient creatures that swarm and multiply in a drop of water."

-- The War Of The Worlds, H.G. Wells

Except that it's the opening years fo the 21st century, the world in question is Mars, and our robots are a little on the dumb side. Still, it's certainly time for Mars to be scrutinised. The orbital elements are right for a fast transit, and over the next couple of months three missions are due to be launched, including three landers (two of which will be NASA rovers).

One of the lander missions is Britain's first planetary probe - the garden barbecue-sized Beagle 2. And it's due for launch today, as part of ESA's Mars Express mission. It's intended to run exobiology and atmospheric experiments, and has a very dramatic landing technique...

It seems odd to wish a pile of low budget electronics a safe journey, but I think it's appropriate.

Bon voyage, Beagle 2...

Kimoko has been a busy girl...

...can be found at the eclipse gallery on spaceweather.com (a rather useful site if you're interested in eclipses and auroras - tanais you may want to look out for an aurora tonight and tomorrow night!).

(link found on Diane Duane's blog)

(for tamaranth's benefit)

A BBC news article about a rise in the number of blue jellyfish off the Essex coast...