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By Jay, on December 21st, 2010% Well I have this photograph. I just pulled one of the later ones out of the stack of about 400 total. There will be more once I have some time to sift through them all. What I’ll probably do is take the best 2 or 3 and toss them on Flickr where this one is:
Total Sagittarius – Raleigh, North Carolina
Enjoy. It was a little hazy out there in the bitter cold but I think I managed. There still hasn’t been the need for frostbite amputation of the fingers yet. This guy was on a Canon 400D with a Tamron AF70-200mm Di [f/2.8 - ISO100 - 70-200mm:188mm for 2.0 seconds].
By Jay, on December 19th, 2010% 
Well well well. The time is now again. During the early morning hours of Tuesday December 21, there will be a total eclipse of the moon. It will be visible in North America, but I’ll get to that in a moment.
You often see all kinds of words like ecliptic, node, umbra, penumbra, etc. when reading or learning about lunar eclipses. The only two words we really need to concern ourselves with are the penumbra and the umbra. Both of these refer to two distinct shadows cast by Earth into outer space by light emanating from the Sun. Let’s, for the sake of ease, keep these descriptions simple.
The penumbra is a cylindrical shadow. It’s diffuse and lighter in shade. The reason for the light diffusion is because the Sun, despite looking small from 93 million miles away, is very large compared to Earth. So there is some scattering of light from all the points of light all over the exterior of the Sun.
The umbra, on the other hand, is a cone-shaped shadow inside the penumbra cylinder. It’s base is on Earth and it’s tip is a point of convergence in space. The umbra is a more concentrated shadow; . . . → Read More: Total Lunar Eclipse – December 21, 2010
By Jay, on December 2nd, 2010% A friend of mine just forwarded this Yahoo! News article to me. The first thought I had was how these bacterial strains could be grown as cultures and employed at hazardous waste sites for biochemical remediation of arsenic in soil and groundwater. Pretty cool.
Arsenic-munching germ redefines “life as we know it” By Maggie Fox, Health and Science Editor Maggie Fox, Health And Science Editor WASHINGTON (Reuters)
A strange, salty lake in California has yielded an equally strange bacterium that thrives on arsenic and redefines life as we know it, researchers reported on Thursday.
The “Tufa” formations will slowly be re-submerged into the briny water where they were formed by an underwater chemical reaction between submerged fre Getty – The ‘Tufa’ formations will slowly be re-submerged into the briny water where they were formed by an underwater …
The bacteria do not merely eat arsenic — they incorporate the toxic element directly into their DNA, the researchers said.
The finding shows just how little scientists know about the variety of life forms on Earth, and may greatly expand where they should be looking for life on other planets and moons, the NASA-funded team said.
“We have cracked open the door . . . → Read More: In the News: Arsenic and Bacteria
By Jay, on October 18th, 2010% I’ve gotten two, shall we say, nastygrams regarding my mix-n-matching of Imperial Units and International Standard [SI] Units. What can I say? I live in the United States of America. We have two. It’s not an arrogant attitude, despite what you think. We have two. It’s just a fact of life.
There are those on this planet that would love to turn Earth into one happy family of nation states, and getting the world onto one measurement unit platform is one step. These people probably don’t bake their own food or drive themselves around town. If they did, they’d know about cups, teaspoons, tablespoons, miles, and a whole host of other measurements. Golf. Now golf is an entirely different matter as those running this imaginary world of nation states probably do play golf themselves. I really want to see one of these people sally up to the third hole, ask Hobbs or Jeeves for a 7 Iron, and state,
I like to play 134 meters soft so as to lay-up on the green nice and easy, my dear old chaps.
Right. Aside from getting laughed at for the duration of the next 15 holes of golf, Hole 3 is 147 . . . → Read More: Impale Mail: Measurement Units
By Jay, on October 13th, 2010% What is most important in science? Is it the destination, product, or answer we arrive at? Or, is it the method and means by which we arrive there? Some would say the former whereas, others would argue it’s the latter. Others may say both coalesced together in some strange voodoo-like or even abstract metaphysical “understanding” is the most important.
Say I sit down at my computer, fired up one of the many different computer modeling applications I use, and attempted to answer a geology question. After performing several model runs and a detailed sensitivity analysis I conclude there is ultimately a small set of finite, distinct answers. How would it make you feel if I told you afterward that the answer I gave you did not have the highest probability, yet I changed the model input parameters such that that answer came up more frequently? I forced the answer by forcing, obscuring, or even manipulating the raw data used for the methods that led to that answer.
What I did in the example above falls into the age-old category of scientific ethics. I wish to share with you a letter. By now this is old news in the scientific community; however, . . . → Read More: Science: The Destination or the Journey?
By Jay, on October 12th, 2010% 
So much to read and so little time. In addition, looking much more closely inside the Raleigh Beltline for some geology-related places is heating up. I want to talk a lot more about this photograph soon.
0208732534
Some call it 0208732534. I call it the United States Geological Survey’s [USGS] stream gauge on Pigeon House Creek at Cameron Village. They are calling for rain here later in the week, so I would like to go back up here and take a few photographs during high flow stream conditions. Until then…
By Jay, on September 5th, 2010% Yesterday I did a little recon of the Fall Zone. What is the Fall Zone? On a map it’s a line; however, that’s not entirely accurate as it’s more of a band. Essentially, it’s the boundary between two distinct regions of bedrock, called physiographic provinces. At the transition of the two rock types, there is a low rise in the landscape and any rivers that cross the Fall Zone generally contain rapids, riffles, whitewater, and waterfalls.
The Fall Zone from New Jersey to Texas – from CSRA, 2010
The Fall Zone is a pretty big deal. The whole zone stretches from southern New Jersey to Texas. In the Southern Atlantic States, the Fall Zone marks the boundary between the metamorphic rocks of the Piedmont Province and the sedimentary rocks of the Coastal Plain. The Piedmont rocks are more resistant to weathering and erosion compared to the softer Coastal Plain rocks, hence the waterfalls and rapids in the rivers that cross the Fall Zone.
View facing west along US-70 toward Nuese River near Selma, NC – photo by J. Sents
The significance of the Fall Zone goes back to Colonial American time. The early waves of . . . → Read More: Fall Zone Recon
By Jay, on September 3rd, 2010% To be honest, I was sort of hoping for more of an impact this far inland from Hurricane Earl. Maybe not as bad as Fran or Hugo, but something. The folks that live out on the Outer Banks probably took some damage but they’re used to and can handle quite a bit way out there.
Oh well. The 2010 Atlantic Hurricane Season still has quite a bit of life. I really wanted to get some swollen streams around here to examine something with you. We have this type of regolith, or highly weathered bedrock, that rests right above the actual bedrock surface in the Piedmont of North Carolina. Sometimes referred to as Partially Weathered Rock, or more commonly Saprolite, I wanted to evaluate if this material shows evidence of weathering and erosion, or if it tends to weather in place, in the stream banks anyhow.
I’ll need some water chugging down these streams for that. Unfortunately, the only times this summer we’ve had the types of heavy rainfall required have been very late at night. Fret not. There’s plenty of Hurricane Season left. Hopefully, we get some good rain on a day I can run over to a stream near . . . → Read More: So No Hurricane Earl
By Jay, on August 22nd, 2010% I’m planning a little hike. First, it’s been about 20 years since I’ve done anything like this and that was Algonquin Peak in the Adirondack Mountains of New York. We went up the back side through Avalanche Pass and along Colden Lake. Second, and this is the big one, my health is not in the greatest of shape. It’s a long story but I will say it involved an Emergency Room visit. Yay for me! During my stay at the luxurious WakeMed Raleigh Campus facility, the doctors all said I’d never be able to do anything like this again. Right. We’ll see about that.
This trip is a little more serious than just going over to Yates Mill and hiking. Therefore, I’ve begun “training” so to speak. Since there isn’t anything in the way of surface relief around Raleigh, I basically go downtown late at night for a break in my work and climb the stair wells in parking garages repeatedly. My calves and and thighs feel pain so something’s got to be working there.
I’m looking forward to not only this level of accomplishment and exercise, but making it home safe and sound so I can post some details . . . → Read More: Grandfather Mountain – North Carolina
By Jay, on May 30th, 2010% Thanks to those that have served in the Armed Forces. You and your families’ sacrifices to America are appreciated. I hope you all have a wonderful day tomorrow.
As for me, I’m going to try and get out tomorrow and do a little local geology. It just rained pretty heavy here at the end of last week, so now that the stream levels have fallen back to normal flow there is a place north of Raleigh that I’d like to go to and take some photographs of some sand and gravel deposits.
UPDATE: I did get up to Lassiter Mill and found some good stuff; however, I’ve got some weather coming and may have to suspend computer activities until the lightning storm passes.
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