ipanda.com: 24hrs Chinese online channel on giant pandas

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It’s probably the only such 24-hour online reality show in the world where the stars are not men and women out to prove their intelligence or guts but cuddly giant pandas going about their daily lives in gardens reserved for them. The new panda online channel – ipanda.com -- was officially launched in Beijing on Tuesday amid officials of the Communist Party of China (CPC), NGOs working on animal protection and foreign diplomats. It’s the world’s only round-the-clock and real time live broadcast of giant pandas. The panda is unique to China and the channel’s goal, as state media described it on Tuesday, was to convey the idea of “peace, friendliness and the greater public good.” The China Network Television (CNTV), a state-owned entity, has installed 28 high-definition video cameras in five garden areas at the Chengdu Research Base of Giant Panda Breeding in southwest China’s Sichuan province to follow the animals, hugely popular worldwide for their cute looks and soft nature. A fully equipped on-site television control room will ensure that the directors will be able to watch and switch between the different cameras. “Program directors will pick 11 cameras that capture the best footage for broadcast online,” CNTV officials told state-run Xinhua news agency. “Apart from live broadcasts, ipanda.com will also offer a new 30-minute panda-themed program each day and panda documentaries produced by CNTV, all on demand. These programs can also be watched via mobile terminals and will be available in both Chinese and English,” it said. Viewers will have the option of choosing from six categories including “garden for adult pandas”, “kindergarten” and “mother and child”. Giant pandas are one of the world's most endangered species. About 1,600 pandas live in the wild, mostly in the mountains of Sichuan, while more than 300 live in captivity. Source: Hindustan Times, Image: flickr.com

Read More........→March 16, 2014

Quadrantid meteor shower to be seen overnight on Jan 3, 4: Watch Live

The annual Quadrantid meteor shower will occur overnight on January 3 and 4. The Quadrantids (QUA) are one of the heaviest meteor showers. If you watch the northern part of the sky dome you will see meteor flares twice a minute.

According to a popular belief, if you wish upon a shooting star your wish will come true. During a meteor shower a number of meteors are observed to radiate from one point of the night sky. The point from where the Quadrantid meteors appear to radiate is located within the extinct constellation Quadrans Muralis. On modern star charts, this radiant is located where the constellations Hercules, Boötes, and Draco meet in the sky. Meteors, which are small parts of a tail of the disintegrated comet, move along their orbit and cross the Earth orbit once a year, Vladimir Surdin, astrophysicist of the Steinberg Astronomy institute under the Moscow State University, says. "Approaching the Sun comets lose their outer shell. Evaporation of gas occurs and the comet loses dust layers. When those small dust particles enter Earth atmosphere at a speed of more than 40 km per second and their air friction causes meteor flares. None of those particles reaches Earth and that is why they do not pose danger to us of aircraft." With every

Video streaming by Ustream (Watch live webcast of the Quadrantid meteor shower from Wednesday to Friday (Jan. 2 to 4) as provided by scientists at NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center. The view will come from an all-sky camera outside the space center in Huntsville, Ala. The camera is light-activated, and will switch on at nightfall each night. 
During daytime hours, the webcast will show recorded views of past meteor showers. When the webcast begins, the Ustream feed will appear in the space,

meteor shower the Earth receives several tons of comet matter which is later discovered in the Antarctic ice in the form of small burned balls. By studying these traces it is possible to determine the structure of the areas of the Solar System where comets were formed. Even meteor flares are of great scientific values Vladimir Surdin says. "Flares of comet particles show their chemical composition. By taking photos of the spectrum with lines of different chemical components we learn what these dust particles were made of and respectively the composition of their parent body." Before comet particles burn in the atmosphere they pass through the route of the International Space Station (ISS) and numerous satellites. An attack of a meteor shower leaves microscopic hollow spots on the skin of ISS, Vladimir Surdin continues. "No cases have been registered yet when a spacecraft skin was seriously damaged by small meteorites. But they damage the illuminators - they became less transparent and the solar power panels start generating less electricity. That is why it is better for the ISS not to encounter them and to make a turn to let most of the particles pass it by." The intensity of Quadrantid meteor showers is different every year. It is difficult to say how strong the shower will be this time because comet matter is distributed along its orbit very unevenly, Igor Volkov, astrophysicist of the Steinberg Astronomy institute under the Moscow State University, says. "Usually the point where the core of the comet nucleus was has a condensation of particles. The Earth does not always cross the same part of the shower. In case of a maximum close-in of the Earth and the former comet nucleus the heaviest meteor showers occur." This was the case in 1966 with a Leonid meteor shower when up to 30 stars flared up every second. That meteor shower made it into textbooks. Though, such phenomena are very rare. Gradually shooting star showers such as Quadrantid, Leonid and others (about 20 are known) will get weaker. This decline process will take hundreds and even thousands years. But that does not mean that our remote descendants won’t have an opportunity to watch meteor showers. New comets will close the Sun losing its matter and this means that new meteor rains will emerge. Source: Voice of Russia

Read More........→January 03, 2013