Google Inc. is joining forces with space agencies around the world and the conservation organization Group on Earth Observations (GEO) to monitor deforestation rates using satellite imagery. Among the space agencies working on the program are NASA, the ESA, and the national space agencies of Japan, Germany, Italy, India, and Brazil.
The GEO is a global partnership of 80 governments and more than 50 organizations. Internet company Google currently collects satellite images for use in its Google Earth application, and will be providing satellite images to the project.
Images that were kept secret under President Bush have just been declassified by the Obama administration. These images reveal what scientists have predicted: “In recent years vast areas in high latitudes have lost their ice cover in summer months.”
Researchers in Brunei are studying the migration route and nesting habitat of Olive Ridley Turtles by monitoring the satellite transmitter of a recently-released female turtle.
The ability to track this turtle will help locate breeding and nesting grounds, so that conservationists can manage and protect these sensitive sites. By checking daily transmissions, researchers can determine the turtle’s route.
Attaching the transmitter to the turtle’s shell was done with a special glue and then covered with fiberglass, a common method used by researchers to track long-range migration habits of sea turtles.
The extraordinary nesting behavior of the Olive Ridley Turtle
Female Olive Ridley Turtles are responsible for one of the most unusual occurrences found in nature. In a phenomenon known as arribada (”arrival by sea”), it begins when groups of females congregate in the water near nesting sites.
The startling images were captured by NASA’s “AIM” satellite (Aeronomy of Ice in the Mesosphere), and show night clouds above 70 degrees north latitude on May 25. Since then, eyewitnesses on the ground have reported seeing the formations on June 6 over Northern Europe (see image after the jump).
When viewed from space, the mysterious clouds are known scientifically as Polar Mesospheric Clouds, or PMCs, when seen from the ground they are called Noctilucent or “night-shining” Clouds.
It’s another type of space race, to be the first company to get solar satellites into orbit.
U.S. companies are aggressively researching the technology, reports Yale 360. One firm called PowerSat in Washington state has filed for patents to link as many 300 shiny satellites together in space, beam the energy to one big satellite, then transmit the power back to Earth.
The star trek also includes using solar-powered thrusters to launch satellites into orbit 22,000 miles above our planet.
A California utility called PG&E also has signed a deal with Solaren for 200 megawatts of space-based solar power in 2016, according to The Wall Street Journal.
A Taurus XL rocket carrying a satellite intended to be using for monitoring carbon dioxide levels plunged back to Earth several minutes after taking off.
A covering for the satellite failed to release, and the rocket could not maintain its intended course with the extra weight. The satellite went down with the rocket in the ocean near Antarctica. It was designed as a remote orbiting carbon observatory that would revolve around the earth at a height of 400 miles.
Researchers plan to use satellites to predict the movements of an unusual culprit in China. Their target: a dangerous underwater snail.
Underwater snails don’t sound very menacing. But some snails carry a kind of flatworm parasite called schistosoma. The parasite causes schistosomiasis, the second most widespread tropical disease after malaria. In China’s largest freshwater lake, Poyang Lake, there are billions of these snails, each one no bigger than the tip of your pinky finger.
“There are huge signs there that tell people not to go into the lake. People know about the dangers of infection, but they have to touch the water to some extent. It’s part of their lifestyle,” said Motomu Ibaraki, the US-based leader of the research project.
With the help of satellites, scientists will be able to track which areas have water conditions favorable to the snails. By keeping tabs on the probable whereabouts of the disease-carrying snails, health officials can ramp up the battle against schistosomiasis, sometimes also called “snail fever”.
A scientist named Tim Bean, who is a PhD student at the University of California Berkeley writes the following on a website: “I expect that ‘Counting Rats from Space,’ the proposed title of my thesis, will become an international phenomenon, spawning everything from a board game to a Top 40 dance hall burner.”
His dream might soon come true. Bean is one of the primary researchers on a project that will use images from Israeli defense satellites to obtain an accurate population estimation for California’s endangered Giant Kangaroo Rat–a keystone species. The study will be the first to use satellites to research an endangered species.
This Friday, John C. Mankins, a former NASA employee who is an expert on space solar power will make a big announcement about a potentially huge alternative energy breakthrough.
The basic idea is that satellites in space will collect solar energy and beam it down to the earth. Apparently, Mankin was involved with a project that successfully demonstrated a wireless power transmission between two Hawaiian [...]
British scientists are preparing to launch a revolutionary satellite that will provide precise measurements of the earth’s gravitational field, which will in turn provide exact measurements of ocean currents. So why is that important? Well, ocean currents transport heat around the planet— and that means that the currents have a huge impact on the earth’s climate.
