Free Republic

Using NASA’s Van Allen Probes, new research reveals that the Van Allen radiation belts contain a nearly impenetrable barrier that prevents the fastest, most energetic electrons from reaching Earth.The Van Allen belts are a collection of charged particles, gathered in place by Earth’s magnetic field. They can wax and wane in response to incoming energy from the sun, sometimes swelling up enough to expose satellites in low-Earth orbit to damaging radiation. The discovery of the drain that acts as a barrier within the belts was made using NASA’s Van Allen Probes, launched in August 2012 to study the region. A...

The current state of this technology is really promising. They use a technique called therapeutic hypothermia, which lowers the temperature of a person by a few degrees...With the lowered temperature, a human’s metabolism decreases and they fall unconscious into a torpor. ... A few years ago, SpaceWorks Enterprises delivered a report to NASA on how they could use this therapeutic hypothermia for long duration spaceflight within the Solar System. Currently, a trip to Mars takes about 6-9 months. And during that time, the human passengers are going to be using up precious air, water and food. But in this torpor...

Ancient Mass Extinctions Caused by Cosmic Radiation, Scientists Say Scott Norris for National Geographic News April 20, 2007 Cosmic rays produced at the edge of our galaxy have devastated life on Earth every 62 million years, researchers say. The finding suggests that biodiversity has been strongly influenced by the motion of the solar system through the Milky Way and of the galaxy's movement through intergalactic space. Mikhail Medvedev and Adrian Melott, both of the University of Kansas, presented their new theory at a meeting of the American Physical Society earlier this month. The theory offers the first explanation for a...