Categories
Places History

The Costs of Replicating Ancient Architectural Wonders Today

In “Original Copies“, Bianca Bosker looks at a current trend in China to recreate some of human’s civilization greatest architectural achievements. Various elite suburbs in the country feature a variety of world wonders, from a 108-foot copy of the Eiffel Tower to picturesque Venetian scenescapes.

Categories
Environment Climate Global Warming

Awkward Interview with Planet Earth (video)

A beautiful short sketch titled “Interview with Planet Earth” by the Irish sketch comedy group “Foil Arms and Hog”, addressing global warming and environmental issues in the group’s unique and funny style.

Categories
Astronomy

7 Biggest Stars in the Universe

What is the biggest star in the Universe? In fact, it is really hard to give an exact answer to this question since the universe is big, neighboring and the other galaxies are billions of light-years away from us. But, we can give it a try. Here are the top 7 biggest stars in the universe currently known by radius.

Categories
Astronomy Space Exploration

Top 21 Common Misconceptions about Space

There are countless misconceptions about space, fueled by science-fiction movies with poor science and sensational tabloid headlines. These myths distort our understanding of the universe. Here are 21 common space myths that we need to stop believing.

Categories
Life on Earth Animals Environment Plants

Rainforests of the World [Infographic]

Rainforests are the oldest living ecosystems and without a shadow of a doubt, the most vital habitats on Earth. They cover only 6% of the Earth’s surface but yet they contain more than half of the world’s plant and animal species. According to the current estimates, around 40% to 75% of all biotic species are indigenous (see notes 1) to the rainforests.

What’s more, there are probably millions of species of plants, insects, and microorganisms still undiscovered in tropical rainforests.

Categories
Space Exploration

Kessler Syndrome: Space junk can end space exploration [and destroy the modern way of life]

On October 4, 1957, the Soviet Union launched Sputnik 1, the first human-made object to orbit Earth. This event marks the beginning of humanity’s space exploration history. After that, humanity went to the moon, astronauts and cosmonauts performed countless spacewalks, and since the arrival of Expedition 1 on November 2, 2000, the International Space Station station has been continuously occupied. To date, this is the longest continuous human presence in space, having surpassed the previous record of 9 years and 357 days held by Mir.

But, maybe even more important, we launched thousands of artificial satellites into the Earth’s orbit. These artificial satellites shape our modern life: weather forecasts, broadcasting, communication, and GPS are just a few examples. But, there’s a side effect: just like here on the Earth, we are slowly filling the most important part just above us, with junk.  And this junk can end space exploration, and destroy our modern way of life. This (very possible) scenario known as the Kessler Syndrome, proposed by the American astrophysicist and former NASA scientist Donald J. Kessler in 1978.

Categories
Space Exploration Earth from Space

Spacewalker [Story of the First Spacewalk – Movie]

I recently watched the 2017 Russian film “The Spacewalker”. It tells the story of humanity’s first spacewalk. On March 18, 1965, Soviet cosmonaut Alexei Arkhipovich Leonov stepped out of the Voskhod 2 spacecraft into the void of space and became the first spacewalker ever.

Categories
Places

Albert Square, Manchester [Historical Painting vs Contemporary Photo]

Two images, two different times, almost the same composition: Albert Square – a public square in the center of Manchester, England; on the left, as depicted in a 1910 oil painting by the French impressionist painter Adolphe Valette (13 October 1876 – 1942). The Albert Memorial (left) and Gladstone statue (right) can be seen in the foreground. On the right a photo of the same spot in 2018. In the contemporary photo, there’s a taxi iğnstead of the horse cart in the old painting. And in both images, a man pushing a handcart at the exact same spot, and a horse carriage/car parked in front of the Albert Memorial. Beautiful.

Categories
Space Exploration Solar System

Lunar Landmarks meets Debussy’s “Moonlight” in this Amazing NASA Video

NASA has published an amazing video titled “Moonlight (Clair de Lune)”, which attempts to capture the mood of the French composer Claude Debussy’s (22 August 1862 – 25 March 1918) best-known composition, Clair de Lune (moonlight in French).

Categories
Space Exploration Animals Earth from Space Life on Earth

A cosmonaut’s view, just after launching a tiny satellite into the orbit

On August 15, 2018, two Russian cosmonauts aboard the International Space Station performed one of the longest spacewalks in the history of space exploration. During the spacewalk lasting 7 hours and 46 minutes, Expedition 56 Flight Engineers Sergey Prokopyev and Oleg Artemyev manually launched four small technology satellites and installed a German-led animal-tracking project named Icarus onto the Russian segment of the space station. Two of the satellites were only the size of tissue boxes.