LEGO Minifigs Stow Away on NASA's Juno Spacecraft Mission To Jupiter.

Okay, so they weren't really stowaways, but certainly not your expected passengers. The special cargo - three 1.5" tall aluminum LEGO® Minifigs- left earth on NASA's Juno deep-space probe on August 5th for a five-year mission to Jupiter as part of NASA and LEGO's Bricks In Space program, a joint partnership to inspire children and broaden awareness of the importance of planetary research.




above: the Lego Minifigures affixed to the Juno probe before take-off.


In Greek and Roman mythology, Jupiter drew a veil of clouds around himself to hide his mischief. From Mount Olympus, Juno was able to peer through the clouds and reveal Jupiter's true nature. Juno holds a magnifying glass to signify her search for the truth, while her husband holds a lightning bolt:



The third LEGO crew member is Galileo Galilei, who made several important discoveries about Jupiter, including the four largest satellites of Jupiter (named the Galilean moons in his honor). Of course, the miniature Galileo has his telescope with him on the journey:



The LEGO Minifigures will help get attention for Juno’s mission to improve understanding of our solar system’s beginnings by revealing the origin and evolution of Jupiter.


above: click to enlarge and get a better look at the Juno Spacecraft

The inclusion of the three mini-statues, or figurines, is part of a joint outreach and educational program developed as part of the partnership between NASA and the LEGO Group to inspire children to explore science, technology, engineering and mathematics.



Video of the August 5th launch (on which the minifigs were affixed to the space probe):


The spacecraft is expected to arrive at Jupiter in 2016. The mission will investigate the gas giant's origins, structure, atmosphere and magnetosphere. Juno's color camera will provide close-up images of Jupiter, including the first detailed glimpse of the planet's poles.

More information about Juno is available at: http://www.nasa.gov/juno and http://missionjuno.swri.edu. You can follow the mission on Twitter at http://www.twitter.com/nasajuno.

images courtesy of LegoSpace, NASA and Wired

Unearthly Commitment: Out Of This World Wedding Rings Made of Gold That Went To Space.

50 sets of rings known as SWR-50th Anniversary Collection were inspired by the 50th anniversary of first human space flight which took place on April 12, 1961. The collection will be created in cooperation with jewelry designers from all over the world.



On May 20, 7:24 (MDT) the first set of space wedding rings were sent in space in a suborbital sounding rocket in New Mexico, USA. The flight went smoothly and the professionally secured package containing one set of wedding rings and some gold reached the space and came to Earth sound and safe.


CREDIT: Bob Martin/KRQE Television

The first 10 sets of rings available now will be made from the gold that was flown in space in the same capsule as the first Space Wedding Rings SWR-001.


Each set of Space Wedding Rings will be assigned a unique serial number and engraved with the SpaceWed logo. The rings will be sold in custom designed, space-themed packaging and will include a Certificate of Space Flight, as well as documentation of the rocket launch.




From the beginning of June you will be able to place an ORDER for the RINGS AVAILABLE NOW or PRE-ORDER the rings which will go in space in the next flight by the end of 2011.


Space Wedding Rings

Thanks to Nishu from The Luxury Hub for the tip!

Branson Offers Green for Green

From BBC.co.uk

Branson launches $25m climate bid

Millions of pounds are on offer for the person who comes up with the best way of removing significant amounts of carbon dioxide from the atmosphere.

Virgin boss Sir Richard Branson launched the competition today in London alongside former US vice-president Al Gore.

A panel of judges will oversee the prize, including James Lovelock and Nasa scientist James Hansen.

Sir Richard said humankind must realise the scale of the crisis it faced.

"The Earth cannot wait 60 years," he said at the news conference. "I want a future for my children and my children's children. The clock is ticking."

He said if the planet was to survive, it was vital to find a way of getting rid of the greenhouse gas carbon dioxide.

He said he believed offering the $25m (£12.5m) Earth Challenge Prize was the best way of finding a solution.

Moral challenge

Overseeing the innovations are James Hansen, the noted climate scientist and head of the Nasa Institute for Space Studies; the inventor of Gaia theory James Lovelock; UK environmentalist Sir Crispin Tickell; and Australian mammalogist and palaeontologist Tim Flannery.

They are looking for a method that will remove at least one billion tonnes of carbon per year from the atmosphere.

Al Gore, the former presidential candidate turned environmental campaigner, is also on the judging panel.

He said: "It's a challenge to the moral imagination of humankind to actually accept the reality of the situation we are now facing.

"We're not used to thinking of a planetary emergency, and there's nothing in our prior history as a species that equips us to imagine that we, as human beings, could actually be in the process of destroying the habitability of the planet for ourselves."

His recent film, An Inconvenient Truth, focused on global warming.

Stuart Haszeldine, professor of geology at the University of Edinburgh, commented: "Richard Branson is ahead of the pack in getting to grips with CO2 in the atmosphere.

"His decisive action places shame on the dithering of the UK Treasury, who will not let British power companies build CO2 capture plants, in case they are too expensive.

"I hope all other businesses, large and small, follow his lead. Yes, it's true Branson's company may benefit eventually, but we will all benefit, by a cleaner, greener planet. We all share the same atmosphere."

Carbon capture and storage is already a key area of research.

Scientists have been looking into removing the greenhouse gas from the atmosphere and storing it in oil and gas fields, injecting it deep into the ocean, or chemically transforming it into solids or liquids that are thermodynamically stable.

However, these methods have raised concerns, notably because of the possibility of leakage from the storage sites and fears that C02 dissolved in large quantities in the ocean might harm marine ecosystems.

Other scientists are also looking at schemes that might "scrub" the air of CO2, collecting the gas for safe storage; but many critics say the energy required to achieve this would make such an approach self-defeating.

Sir Richard Branson has already pledged to invest $3bn (£1.6bn) in profits from his travel firms, such as airline Virgin Atlantic and Virgin Trains, towards research into renewable energy technologies.