2014

Philae's trajectory on the surface of the comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko (Image ESA/Rosetta/MPS for OSIRIS Team MPS/UPD/LAM/IAA/SSO/INTA/UPM/DASP/IDA)

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The news hasn’t been officially released by ESA and the details have yet to be assessed after the analysis of the data sent by the lander Philae before it went into hibernation. Unofficially, one of the Philae’s instruments detected organic molecules in the tenuous atmosphere of the comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko created by the ice sublimation. Meanwhile, ESA has released the images captured by the Rosetta space probe that show Philae’s trajectory after it touched down for the first time on the comet’s surface.

For Us, The Living by Robert A. Heinlein (Italian edition)

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The novel “For Us, The Living” by Robert A. Heinlein was published for the first time in 2003.

Perry Nelson is driving his car when he has a blowout and goes off the road falling over a cliff. When he wakes up is rescued by Diana begins but for him a lot of confusion starts because the girl tells him that it’s January 7, 2086 me he had the accident on July 12, 1939.

In a century and a half, the American society changed enormously and sometimes for Perry Nelson it’s really difficult to adapt to new customs. To him, to get used to the new situation will mean above all to question his old beliefs. Social changes will be the most difficult for him to understand and accept.

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The Serbian tennis player Novak Djokovic has won the ATP Finals 2014 after Roger Federer had to withdraw before the start of the final. For Djokovic this is the third consecutive title of “Master” of tennis. Federer paid for the struggled semifinal with back problems that forced him to withdraw from the final.

Panoramic image of the surface of the comet 67P/Churyumov–Gerasimenko around the Philae lander (Image ESA/Rosetta/Philae/CIVA)

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After the understandable enthusiasm felt last Wednesday for the success of the Philae lander with its landing on the comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko, the team had to face the harsh reality. The area in which it ended up wasn’t the planned one and there it received much less light than expected. The consequence is that its batteries ran out of power a few hours ago making it hibernate. But before it worked for a few hours and transmitted a lot of data.

All this happened because the harpoons system that was supposed to anchor Philae to the ground didn’t work and the information gathered since then allowed to establish that it touched down three times before stabilizing. The instruments work but Philae was receiving much less sunlight than expected with serious consequences for the energy it had available for its instruments.

Bacteria of the species Escherichia Coli seen wih an electronic microscope (Image Rocky Mountain Laboratories, NIAID, NIH)

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A group of MIT researchers has modified the DNA of bacteria of the species Escherichia coli – or simply E. coli – and used them as memories. A system called SCRIBE (Synthetic Cellular Recorders Integrating Biological Events) allows to easily write and read stably recorded memories, making them suitable for applications such as medical and environmental sensors.