It was soaked and covered in mud and hungry, cold and fifty thousand light-years away from home. A foreign sun gave an icy blue light and the double gravity of what it was used to, made every movement an agony of effort. But after tens of thousands of years, this angle of war had not changed. It was convenient for those of aviation, with their polished spaceships and their super weapons; but when it comes down to it, it is still up to the ground soldier, the infantry, to take a stand and hold it, with blood, palm to palm. Like this fucking planet of a star never heard of until they sent it to us. And now it was sacred ground because the enemy had also arrived. The enemy, the only other intelligent race in the Galaxy ... lousy cruel, loathsome monsters. The first contact had taken place near the center of the galaxy, after the slow and difficult colonization of a few thousand planets; and it had been war immediately; they had started shooting without even attempting a deal, a peaceful solution. And now, planet by planet, we had to fight, with teeth and nails. He was soaked and covered in mud and was hungry, cold and the day was bruised and swept by a violent wind that hurt his eyes. But the enemies tried to infiltrate and every outpost was vital. He was on the alert, the rifle ready. Fifty thousand light-years away from home, fighting over a foreign world and wondering if he would ever make it back home. And then he saw one of them crawling towards him. He took aim and fired. The enemy let out that strange, chilling verse that they all made, then he didn't move anymore. The verse, the sight of the corpse made him shiver. Over time, many had become accustomed to it, they didn't care anymore; but he doesn't. They were too lousy creatures, with only two arms and two legs, that skin of a sickening white and without scales.( Author. Frederick Brown, 1954)

After the recent publishing of our Head of Nation: https://asgardia.space/en/news/law-of-the-space-jungle-in-action I have got a crazy idea... what if Asgardia share with NASA, ESA, JAXA, CSA, CNSA and other agencies a blockchain-based space operations hyperledger in order to coordinate missions and future resources mining operations? Could be this technology suitable as tool to avoid fake claims and ensure a fair behavour of all stakeholders in space?

In the coming years the moon will see a consistent series of robotic and human explorations preparatory to building the first permanent base on the lunar soil. So a high-tech company is preparing a series of small satellites but with high performance levels to be inserted in the lunar orbit. These will be used to relaunch the data communications (voice, data, video, web) from the rover and tomorrow from the fixed installations, both robotic and with human presence. The particularity of these satellites is given by the possibility of recovering them from their orbits and inserting them in other orbits with greater ease. The program includes a network of satellites capable of covering the entire surface of the moon, as if it were a GPS network. more info Argotech online

If anyone still had doubts about climate change this hailstorm fell on 02 July 2019. The height of the hail mantle was 1.5 meters. Given the brevity of the phenomenon, its intensity and location according to some, the phenomenon was similar to a microburst of which you see the diagram in the photo.

There is a fake photo that has been running for many years on the net and, according to those who spread it in a culpable way, it would take three planets over the three Pyramids of Giza. It is a good gym for archaeoastronomist apprentices (or even for those with experience) to exercise critical sense and use their knowledge to expose this fake. Here are some demonstrations of the falsity of this photo. But first a little history: The photo was released in August 2012 and intended to announce that on December 3 of that year there would be precisely the planetary alignment in the photo that involved the planets Mercury, Saturn and Venus, claiming that the event is repeated every 2737 years. This already explains how the photo is false: the event had yet to take place! The planets are therefore not photographed but drawn. Probably born in the New Age context (we all remember the great outcry for that year, right?), The image chose to represent the planetary conjunction above the Pyramids. The photo has been reproposed practically almost every year, or at intervals of 2, in order to generate money through clickbaiting Having ascertained that the photo is a "fake" (in the sense that it is a drawing), we see some reasons for the falsity of this image that would resume Mercury, Venus and Saturn: 1) Mercury is at most about 22 ° from the Sun and therefore can only be seen during sunrise or sunset. In the photo the uniform blue sky is not compatible with this data 2) The difference in brightness between Venus and Saturn is 40 times, while the three dots in the photos are quite similar to each other 3) A large-field photograph cannot be taken in which Saturn or Mercury appear so bright, without other stars being visible. There is no trace in this photo, so it is not a real photo. 4) The photo was taken from South to North and to the North the planets are never seen from those latitudes 5) There is also a perspective problem: aligned planets are very suggestive but ... aligned when seen from where? It is clear that if you approach the Pyramids or move, the alignment shown in the photo will cease. Then? The particular point from which the photo was taken should have something special, but this is not talked about. And if it has nothing and you can move freely, then we can resume an alignment practically every time three planets appear in the sky: it will be more or less always possible to be able to place them prospectively each on top of a pyramid. So be careful not to take everything that is spread in ret with a sensationalistic tone, because in this way you will avoid running into buffaloes and various misinformation

34 years after the nuclear sun turned on in Chernobyl the situation has not changed as the short memory of mankind shows. At the beginning of the current month of April there was a fire in the contaminated bushes that have grown in the area since it was declared off limits for human life. The radioactive cloud that was triggered by the fires between 7 and 14 April hit the 'exclusion zone' of the Chernobyl nuclear disaster and did not just pass through Ukraine but reached much of Europe. Although the rate of occurrence was higher than normal, it would not be dangerous. This is revealed by a study by the French research centre ISRN. ISRN has made an estimate modelling the radioactivity removed by fire, which "would be of the order of 200 GBq released between 3 April 2020 at 12:00 and 13 April 2020 at 12:00". "The simulations carried out - writes IRSN - show a good agreement between the measurements provided by the Ukrainians and the modelling results. On this basis, the ISRN simulations indicate that the air masses from the area of the fires that occurred on 5 and 6 April were able to reach France on the evening of 7 April 2020". And again: "As of 14 April, these air masses still covered half the territory. The levels of radioactivity expected in France are extremely low, below 1 µBq / m 3 in caesium 137. The emissions occurring between 9 April and 11 April 2020 are the most significant according to modelling. The weather conditions prevailing until 14 April have favoured the transport of air masses from the area of these discharges to Belarus, southern Ukraine, eastern Romania and Bulgaria". And these air masses "reached with lower concentrations the Balkans and Italy, but not France". "In Kiev - writes ISRN - the largest volume of caesium 137 in the air was recorded for the period from 9 to 11 April 2020 with a measurement at 470 micro becquerel / cubic meter (µBq / m 3 ) (sample taken from 9 to 10 April) and another at 700 µBq / m 3 (sample taken from 10 to 11 April). A value of 1,200 µBq / m 3 in the night from 4 to 5 April 2020 was also reported by the State Scientific and Technical Centre for Nuclear and Radiological Safety of Ukraine, but has not been confirmed. These values are significantly higher than the values normally measured in caesium 137 in the air in Kiev 4 and attest to the passage of air masses marked by radioactivity. However, they remain moderate and without health consequences. In the exclusion zone of Chernobyl there is much higher air contamination due to the proximity of the measuring devices to the burnt area". The levels reached 1000 uBq in Kopachi '11 April, 2,600 in Chernobyl/Kirov on the same day, 42,000 in the Krohodsky Peninsula on 12 April, up to 180,000 near the power plant (also due to the very high background radiation in the area). "Low radiation" However, IRSN minimizes the radiological impact. "For a firefighter who intervened for 100 hours in the exclusion zone in an environment with a volume activity of 1 Bq / m 3 (or 1,000,000 µBq / m 3 ) caesium 137 and 1Bq / m 3 strontium 90 (higher hypothesis than the measurements made in the area), the calculated dose corresponding to the inhalation of radioactive smoke from the fire is about 13 micro sievert (µSv). It should be noted that this dose is much lower than that resulting from the external exposure of firefighters to radiation emitted from contaminated soil, which, in the exclusion zone, is often much higher at 1 µSv / h. This is consistent with estimates made in the past by Ukrainian scientists indicating that the doses received by firefighters due to inhalation of smoke following fires are of the order of 1% of the dose received from exposure to soil radiation". The study continues: "For a resident of Kiev exposed for a few days to levels of radioactivity comparable to those measured by Ukrainian organizations in the city - it is stated - the dose received by an adult by inhalation is less than 1 nano sievert (1 nSv = 0.001 µSv) which is an extremely low value". Contaminated food The IRSN completed its assessment by considering the exposure due to ingestion of contaminated food in Ukraine, close to the disaster areas, from the radioactive ashes transported in the smoke plume. The assessment was carried out assuming the consumption of 500 grams of leafy vegetables (worst case) per day for two months 9 . "The dose for the adult - concludes IRSN - would reach after 30 months of consumption 30 µSv for strontium 90 and 15 µSv for caesium 137. This exposure remains low".This does not mean that low values are not detrimental to that part of the population that has a naturally increased sensitivity to the toxic elements released.

At the end of 2018 is Caspar Henderson's book of barely imaginable beings, which describes some somewhat bizarre but really existing creatures, such as the thorny devil, the sea butterfly or the water bear. “A bestiary of the twenty-first century,” reads the original title, but that will soon be very similar to that of the twentieth century: the Book on the beings imagination, published by Jorge Luis Borges in 1967, because soon all those animals will no longer exist. The issue, however, is much more alarming: within a few decades about 75% of living species will disappear from the Earth. In other words: the sixth mass extinction is underway. Already five times in 540 million years – the majority of the living beings disappeared from the planet: the last time 65 million years ago, in the most famous episode in the collective imagination is linked to the extinction of the dinosaurs, although involved also many species of plants, primitive fish, and bacteria. A mass extinction is a biotic transition that has a relatively short Geological duration, in which the Earth's ecosystem undergoes a profound change and due to causes of different origin is linked to the increase in the concentration of carbon in the atmosphere and in the oceans. According to the forecasts of Daniel Rothman – the geophysical nature of the Mit in Boston, who has compared the carbon cycle in the periods in which they occurred the other mass extinctions – some years there is a increase in values that trigger the process of extinction, by 2100 it will reach its apex and will take about ten thousand years to find a new balance. The most dramatic aspect is that for the first time in billions of years, human beings are causing the abnormal increase in carbon concentration. According to a recent Wwf study, in the last 40 years man has eliminated 60% of other living species and statistics go hand in hand with the increase in Co2. This is the biggest biodiversity crisis since we have existed: we lose three thousand species every year, three every hour, with an extinction rate a hundred times higher than normal, according to Science Advance. As if that were not enough, about 30% of vertebrates are decreasing in number of individuals and in geographical expansion. 
According to the Iucn (International Union for Conservation of Nature), which cyclically draws up the Red List of species at risk, a quarter of mammals and an eighth of birds are now at risk of extinction. We currently know about two million animal and plant species, but it is estimated that in the deep ocean or tropical forests there are tens of millions more unknown and endangered species. The sixth mass extinction is called an Extinction of the Holocene, the geological era that started around 11700 years ago, that the last few decades, according to a thesis shared by almost the entire scientific community, has given way to a new phase, that of the Anthropocene, the geological era in which human activities are significantly changing and irreversible territorial structures, ecosystems and the climate on planet Earth. One of the main causes that have triggered the mass extinction, there is of course the global warming, where the data every day are the most alarming: the last five years have progressively been the warmest ever recorded (and will always be worse), and in 2018, the oceans have reached record temperatures, and of course the ice cap in Antarctica melts with a speed six times faster than forty years ago, according to a report released by the journal Pnas (Proceedings of the national academy of sciences) more or less the same day in which Japan surrendered himself to the international agreements to restore the hunting of whales (which, however, in the meantime, continue to die full of plastic in the stomach: an end and a more disturbing danger that we do, we human beings). Data that can no longer be called alarming, but it would be fair to consider apocalyptic, also come from statistics on meat consumption, the abuse of which has been closely linked to gas emissions and the increase in the greenhouse effect. Speaking of consequences that only appear to seem more futile, because of global warming, we may soon find ourselves even without beer or coffee. For more than a decade we have been talking about the progressive disappearance of butterflies or bees, and recently also about catastrophic data and the very serious consequences related to the disappearance of many species of insects, which show how the extinction is ongoing every minute that passes, in every habitat. Probably many of us will live long enough to see the disappearing species of animals or insects that were not at risk until a few years ago and that we have studied in school or seen in the cartoons: why, if it was not clear, unlike all the other mammals, the amount of humans on Earth continues to grow. And by doing so, we'll be alone, a fate far worse than extinction. On the website of the IPCC (International Panel of Climate Change ) are available the latest reports related to the expected effects of the temperature increase of 1.5 °C

It is an old psychology test, very basic, but useful because it allows us to understand a mechanism of the human mind. Looking at the cartoons below you can see both an old and a young girl try to frame them. Well you have seen something that is not there. However, the mind has seen what it wanted to see, in fact someone sees the old woman first and someone sees the young girl first. Each mind is in its own right. Particularly stressful situations can occur in flight, so even an expert pilot can see in a cloud with an unusual shape a UFO, a light moving still exchanging it for a UFO when, instead, it is the refraction that alters the perception of the position or still see some on-board command in the correct position even if it is not (unfortunately it has already happened) and these illusions can make us smile, but they can cause catastrophic effects depending on the context in which we find ourselves. The National Transportation Safety Board has worked several times because of these illusions.

ZBLAN is an heavy-metal glass fiber has lower transmission losses than other common fiber optics, very important for quantum networks, but it is difficult to make due to gravity-causing imperfections to its structure. MIS (Made in Space) produced a 3D printer now on board for ISS (International Space Station) will colaborate with Thorlab to make ZBLAN in micro-gravity. https://www.photonics.com/Articles/Out-of-This-World_Fiber_Optics/a61271 https://www.photonics.com/Articles/Out-of-This-World_Fiber_Optics/a61271

All life forms on Earth are made up of molecules whose supporting structure is always made up of carbon atoms. But in the context of exobiology, the science that studies how life has evolved on our planet and how it could develop in other places in the universe, forms of life based on other elements have been hypothesized.What seems the best alternative to carbon is silicon (the main component of sand). But the silicon atom could not form the long chains that instead characterize carbon-based life; in addition, the compounds formed by silicon with hydrogen (a key element for life) dissolve in water. Phosphorus and nitrogen seem more interesting, but they would work well only in a world with decidedly alien characteristics. In an ammonia atmosphere, for example, plants based on phosphorus and nitrogen could emit hydrogen instead of oxygen. And the corresponding animals could breathe it and burn the sugars by emitting phosphorus and nitrogen. Other elements have also been analyzed: arsenic, chlorine, sulfur. But due to their scarcity and their high reactivity, they do not seem to be able to form stable enough complex molecules. What exobiological forms do we think of meeting?

Ticking away the moments that make up a dull day you fritter and waste the hours in an off hand way kicking around on a piece of ground in your home town waiting for someone or something to show you the way Tired of lying in the sunshine, stayng home to watch the rain you are young and life is long and there is the time to kill today an then one day you find ten years have got behind you no one told you when to run, you miss the starting gun . And you run and you run to catch up with the sun but it's sinking and racing around to come up behind you again the sun is the same in the relative way , but you 're older shorter of breath and one day closer to death. every year is getting shorter, never seem to find the time plans that either come to naught or half a page of scribbed lines hanging on in quiet desperation is the english way the time is gone the song is over thought I'd something more to say Pink Floyd 1973 March 1

Hey! Asgardians! There is a small app to install on your smartphones to stay up to date on what's happening up there at the ISS (and all you can admire). Some examples 1) Japan sea; 2)The last launch of Sojuz ( 2020 April 09) to carrie part of new crew of ISS; 3) Northern Europe; 4) Sunrise on Austral continent. 5) Northern America a look to aurora borealis. His name ISS LIVE now. Look on Play store

The planet we live on is dynamic, impetuous and often destructive. But it is also a planet that knows how to give natural spectacles to the limit of the incredible. The sky is then a color palette and the base of the artist who creates imaginative shapes. Clouds are a science or rather a part of science called meteorology and the play of temperature and humidity of the air, the particular currents of that specific place give us panoramas that remain etched in the mind of those present at the show.