Thursday, July 17, 2008


What is creating the strange texture of IC 418? Dubbed the Spirograph Nebula for its resemblance to drawings from a cyclical drawing tool, planetary nebula IC 418 shows patterns that are not well understood. Perhaps they are related to chaotic winds from the variable central star, which changes brightness unpredictably in just a few hours. By contrast, evidence indicates that only a few million years ago, IC 418 was probably a well-understood star similar to our Sun. Only a few thousand years ago, IC 418 was probably a common red giant star. Since running out of nuclear fuel, though, the outer envelope has begun expanding outward leaving a hot remnant core destined to become a white-dwarf star, visible in the image center. The light from the central core excites surrounding atoms in the nebula causing them to glow. IC 418 lies about 2000 light-years away and spans 0.3 light-years across. This recently released false-color image taken from the Hubble Space Telescope reveals the unusual details.

Today's Jumble (7/17/08):


GNUST = STUNG; SHIWK = WHISK; UNMUTA = AUTUMN; PORTIM = IMPORT

CIRCLED LETTERS = STISUUIT

When the cleaner ruined the lawyer's outfit, he faced a - - -

"SUIT SUIT"


Today is Yellow Pig Day -it is a mathematician's holiday celebrating yellow pigs (is there such a thing!?!), and the number 17. It is celebrated annually since the early 1960's, primarily on college campuses, and primarily by mathematicians. On campus, Yellow Pig Cake and Yellow Pig Carols are tradition! It's also Wrong Way Corrigan Day. Douglas “Wrong Way” Corrigan was an American aviator who, in 1938, after a transcontinental flight from Long Beach, California, to New York, he flew from Floyd Bennett Field in Brooklyn, New York, to Ireland, even though he was supposed to be returning to Long Beach. He claimed that his unauthorized flight was due to a navigational error, caused by heavy cloud cover that obscured landmarks and low-light conditions, causing him to misread his compass.


Other things on this day in history:


180 - Twelve inhabitants of Scillium in North Africa executed for being Christians. This is the earliest record of Christianity in that part of the world.
1203 - Fourth Crusade captures Constantinople by assault; the Byzantine emperor Alexius III Angelus flees from his capital into exile.
1453 - Hundred Years' War: Battle of Castillon - The French under Jean Bureau utterly defeat the English under the Earl of Shrewsbury, who is killed in the battle in Gascony
1686 - A meeting takes place at Lüneburg between several Protestant powers in order to discuss the formation of an 'evangelical' league of defence, called the 'Confederatio Militiae Evangelicae', against the Catholic League.
1762 - Catherine II becomes tzar of Russia upon the murder of Peter III of Russia.
1771 - Bloody Falls Massacre: Chipewyan chief Matonabbee traveling as the guide to Samuel Hearne on his Arctic overland journey, massacre a group of unsuspecting Inuit.
1791 - Members of the French National guard under the command of General Lafayette open fire on a crowd of radical Jacobins at the Champ de Mars, Paris, during the French Revolution, killing as many as 50 people.
1794 - The sixteen Carmelite Martyrs of Compiegne are executed 10 days prior to the end of the French Revolution's Reign of Terror.
1815 - Napoleonic Wars: In France, Napoleon surrenders at Rochefort, Charente-Maritime to British forces.
1856 - The Great Train Wreck of 1856, occurs in Fort Washington, Pennsylvania killing over 60 people.
1899 - NEC Corporation is organized as the first Japanese joint venture with foreign capital.
1917 - King George V of the United Kingdom issues a Proclamation stating that the male line descendants of the British royal family will bear the surname Windsor.
1918 - By order of the Bolshevik Party and carried out by Cheka, Emperor Nicholas II of Russia, his immediate family, and retainers were murdered at the Ipatiev House in Ekaterinburg, Russia.
1918 - RMS Carpathia, the ship that rescued the 705 survivors from the RMS Titanic, is sunk off Ireland by the Unterseeboot 55 with 5 lives lost.
1933 - After successfully crossing the Atlantic ocean, the Lithuanian research aircraft Lituanica crashes in Europe under mysterious circumstances.
1936 - Spanish Civil War: An Armed Forces rebellion against the recently-elected leftist Popular Front government of Spain starts the Spanish civil war.
1944 - Port Chicago disaster: Near the San Francisco Bay, two ships laden with ammunition for the war explode in Port Chicago, California, killing 320.
1944 - World War II: Napalm incendiary bombs were dropped for the first time by American P-38 pilots on a fuel depot at Coutances, near St. Lô, France
1945 - World War II: Potsdam Conference - At Potsdam, President Harry S. Truman, Soviet leader Joseph Stalin, and British Prime Minister Winston Churchill, the three main Allied leaders, begin their final summit of the war. The meeting will end on August 2.
1951 - Western New England College in Springfield, Massachusetts is chartered.
1955 - Disneyland televises its grand opening in Anaheim, California
1962 - Nuclear testing: The "Small Boy" test shot Little Feller I becomes the last atmospheric test detonation at the Nevada Test Site.
1968 - Revolution in Iraq when Abdul Rahman Arif was overthrown and the Ba'ath Party installed as the governing power in Iraq with Ahmed Hassan al-Bakr as the new Iraqi President.
1973 - King Mohammed Zahir Shah of Afghanistan is deposed by his cousin Mohammed Daoud Khan while in Italy undergoing eye surgery.
1975 - Apollo-Soyuz Test Project: An American Apollo and a Soviet Soyuz spacecraft dock with each other in orbit marking the first such link-up between spacecraft from the two nations.
1976 - History of East Timor: East Timor was annexed, and became the 27th province of Indonesia.
1976 - The opening of the Summer Olympics is marred by 25 African teams boycotting the New Zealand team
1979 - Nicaraguan president General Anastasio Somoza Debayle resigns and flees to Miami.
1981 - Hyatt Regency walkway collapse in Kansas City, Missouri killing 114 people and injuring more than 200 caused by structural failure.
1989 - First flight of the B-2 Spirit Stealth Bomber.
1996 - Off the coast of Long Island, New York, a Paris-bound Boeing 747 carrying TWA flight 800 explodes, killing all 230 on board.
1997 - The F.W. Woolworth Company closes after 117 years in business.
1998 - Papua New Guinea earthquake: A tsunami triggered by an undersea earthquake destroys 10 villages in Papua New Guinea killing an estimated 3,183, leaving 2,000 more unaccounted for and thousands more homeless.
1998 - A diplomatic conference adopts the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court, establishing a permanent international court to prosecute individuals for genocide, crimes against humanity, war crimes, and the crime of aggression.
2000 - An F2 tornado ripped through Guelph, Ontario during the later portions of the evening.
2007 - TAM Airlines (TAM Linhas Aéreas) Flight 3054 crashed upon landing during rain in São Paulo. This is Brazil's deadliest aviation accident to date with an estimated 199 deaths.

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