Anthony Kendall

Deep beneath the plains of central Texas lies a catacomb of tunnels once meant to house the most expensive physics experiment ever devised. That experiment, the Superconducting Supercollider, would have revolutionized our understanding of the physical world by giving us our first glimpse of the “God Particle.” And, proposed during the Cold War, it would have been a monument to the technological and scientific prowess of the Western world.

But in 1993 after investing over $2 billion dollars into the project, President Clinton and Congress cancelled it entirely. Highly sophisticated machinery and laboratories were simply sold to the highest bidder, and thousands of acres of empty land were parceled off and sold as well. All that now remains are 200,000 square feet of still-vacant factories and labs, and over 30 km of carved-rock tunnels slowly filling with water.

Read the rest of this Article ▶

If there truly is some extraterrestrial Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy it would undoubtedly list a total solar eclipse as one of the sights to see while taking a break from probing Earth’s natives. Total solar eclipses, called totality for short, are pretty rare here on Earth; a casual observer might see only one or two during their lifetime.

Since the Earth is the only planet we have ever known, we can’t really appreciate how truly lucky we are. The odds of the size of a planet’s moon exactly matching the apparent size of its sun are pretty low. If the moon is too large, it blocks the majestic solar corona visible during totality. If it is too small, then all solar eclipses would be annular, allowing a ring of the sun’s light to pass . The “Goldilocks” combination of Moon and Sun sizes on Earth makes totality possible, and unique in our solar system.

But alas, this beautiful phenomenon is ephemeral, at least in the geologic sense. The lunar disc shrinks slightly every year as the Moon recedes from the Earth; the chance of a total solar eclipse decreases correspondingly. Somewhere near 1 billion years from now, the last total solar eclipse will grace whatever residents of Earth there may be.

Read the rest of this Short ▶

Natural disasters are tragedies that usually strike randomly and infrequently – unless you happen to live in the Huang He River (colonially referred to as the Yellow River) valley in China. In the space of just over 50 years between 1887 and 1943, some 10 million people drowned or died of famine and disease as the result of catastrophic floods.

While particularly deadly, those floods were nothing new to the Huang He. Since 600 BC, the Chinese have recorded over 1,500 floods, earning it the name “China’s Sorrow.” Across the world there are rivers with valleys more populous, the Yangtze for instance. And there are those that flood more often, like the Nile. And there are rivers that carry far more water than the Huang He, such as the Amazon. So why is the Huang He so deadly?

Read the rest of this Article ▶

Yellowstone National Park is a wonder of the natural world. Its geysers, hot springs, and bubbling mud pools are some of the most impressive examples of geologic activity, and amaze even those who have never visited the park (including myself). Yellowstone became the first National Park in the world when President Grant set it aside for all of posterity in 1872. The dawning of the age of the automobile brought a huge surge of interest in the park, and was the inspiration for the Yogi Bear cartoon.

But those early visitors, and the scientists who came just as eagerly, had no idea what they were really coming to see. It wasn’t until the late 1960s that Bob Christiansen, a geologist with the US Geological Survey (USGS) began to realize that the cliffs surrounding the park were really the rim of volcanic caldera. A volcanic caldera forms when the ground collapses because the magma beneath it erupted. Why did it take geologists so long to recognize Yellowstone for what it is? Because usually volcanic calderas are at most 2-4 km in diameter. The cliffs of the Yellowstone caldera stand 65 kilometers apart.

Read the rest of this Article ▶

Few species on Earth communicate as frequently and effectively as human beings, and none so majestically or ubiquitously as whales. Immersed in an environment rich in sound but poor in light, whales and dolphins developed complex communication systems that they use to mate, feed, socialize, and navigate. The “vocabulary” of some types of whales such as the beluga and humpback is expansive, and rivals most non-humans creatures. Others can communicate over vast distances across the abyss. And, while not strictly communication, many dolphin and whale species use advanced echolocation to hunt and navigate.

The means and ends of these communications are most astounding to humans perhaps because we are accustomed to viewing communication as a sign of intelligence, and probably most people believe that humans are the only truly intelligent species on this planet. One way scientists attempt to quantify the intelligence of a species is to measure the ratio between brain size and body mass and compare it to that of a human. While no species matches human brain proportionately, some whale species come very close. Scientists do not agree on the exact level of intelligence of whales, but there are some truly astounding examples of whale communication that provide strong evidence in their favor.

Read the rest of this Article ▶