In the interview linked above they talk about the first and second photos taken from balloons. Below is the earliest surviving, but the second photo taken from a balloon. It's titled City of Boston as the Flying Goose sees it by James Wallace Black 1860.
This is a relatively old Science Friday , but I found it while researching scientific ballooning for a lecture I'm giving tomorrow. It's an interview with Richard Holmes about his book, Falling Upwards: How we took to the air. It's really a great book and I'd also suggest checking out his other books as well. In there Richard has amazing stories about the popularity of ballooning and balloon exhibitions, fascinating stories of scientists risking their lives to collect data and push the boundaries of human exploration, and some very cool science/art collaborations. In the interview linked above they talk about the first and second photos taken from balloons. Below is the earliest surviving, but the second photo taken from a balloon. It's titled City of Boston as the Flying Goose sees it by James Wallace Black 1860. They also talked about how ballooning inspired many science fiction writers, including Edgar Allen Poe. Poe carried off a similar hoax to that of the War of the Worlds, publishing fictitious journals of an amazing balloon journey. I might have to spend the day reading these journals... all in the name of preparing for my lecture of course :)
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Last night I gave a public lecture at the Keene NH library with the Amateur Astronomy group and it was so much fun! Such a great audience with a lot of great questions and conversations. I'm afraid I may have talked their ears off. It was also a great excuse for me to be able to show photos and movies of the aurora, which I don't often get to do. If you missed the talk, no worries. I've posted the presentation under about me/papers and talks and put some movies here. Thanks again Keene Library and Amateur Astronomy group! This is a bit of an old video, but still very cool. Below there is a movie from an all sky camera from Kiruna Sweden, where we hope to launch from for the third BARREL campaign. This paper is a bit special to me as it is from my thesis. It is a follow on from my 2010 paper on the occurrence rates of electromagnetic ion cyclotron waves (EMIC), the runts of the Ultra Low Frequency (ULF) waves found in the magnetosphere. Most ULF waves are much larger and have a longer period. That said, EMIC waves are much larger and slower than many other waves found in the magnetosphere, like the dawn chorus.
This current paper looks at the local cold plasma population found during EMIC waves under different geomagnetic conditions (like looking at the local humidity during different types of weather found around the world). We found that the local cold plasma density is statistically greater when EMIC waves are observed than when they are not. We also found that we didn't observe EMIC waves on strong local negative density gradients. Now you may be wondering why do we care. If you are a plasma physicist you care because this is interesting to note when looking into the generation of EMIC waves and their ability to resonate with local radiation belt electrons. If you are not a plasma physicist, then you still care... in a big picture kind of way. Our communication systems and technology are susceptible to the effects of geomagnetic activity or weather. EMIC waves can affect the population of particles in space that can cause damage to satellites and when precipitated into the upper atmosphere, change atmospheric chemistry possibly leading to climate changes and may disrupt some communication systems. However, EMIC waves are a relatively localized phenomena and their ultimate impact is still debated. Understanding the conditions under which they occur will hopefully lead to us better understanding their importance in space weather. This, like most of science, is one small step forward. I hope you enjoy the paper! |
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