https://github.com/GyanD/codexffmpeg/releases/tag/2023-03-05-git-912ac82a3c

RSID: <<2024-08-01T23:31Z MFSK-32 @ 9265000+1500>>
 

Welcome to program 364 of Shortwave Radiogram.

I'm Kim Andrew Elliott in Arlington, Virginia USA.

Here is the lineup for today's program, in MFSK modes as noted:

  1:44 MFSK32: Program preview (now)
  2:52 MFSK32: Plans for world-first space-based energy grid
  6:28 MFSK64: 'Dark oxygen' created without photosynthesis?
  9:33 MFSK64: This week's images*
28:34 MFSK32: Closing announcements

* with image(s)
 

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From New Atlas:

World-first space-based energy grid outlined by Star Catcher

By Michael Irving
July 28, 2024

Star Catcher Industries has secured US$12.25 million in seed
funding for its ambitious plan to build the world's first
"space-based energy grid." A network of satellites would gather
energy from the Sun and beam it at higher concentrations to other
satellites in orbit.

Collecting energy from sunlight makes even more sense in space –
you get a constant stream of energy 24/7, without being at the
mercy of the weather or taking up valuable land. It's no surprise
then that efforts are ramping up to capture sunlight from orbit
and beam it down to the surface.

Star Catcher, however, has another idea. Rather than dealing with
the challenge of getting the energy back to Earth, the startup
plans to use that energy to power other satellites more
efficiently.

The Star Catcher Network would comprise a series of Power Node
satellites that capture ambient solar energy, concentrate it, and
beam it to the solar panels of other satellites. The company
claims each node could provide up to 150 kW of transmission
capacity, even sending power to multiple satellites
simultaneously. The organizations running the receiving
satellites simply provide the "orbital elements" to Star Catcher
so they can track them and supply them with power.

The client's satellites wouldn't need to be retrofitted with
anything for this to work – Star Catcher claims the concentrated
solar energy they're beaming out is compatible with existing
solar arrays, allowing them to generate five to 10 times more
energy than they would directly from the Sun themselves.

From a business perspective, Star Catcher and the client
organizations would enter into a contract that outlines the
amount of energy sent, the concentration (0.1 to 10 Suns) and how
often they need it. Clients can be on a pay-as-you go model, with
Star Catcher saying it should roughly halve their energy costs.

There isn't a whole lot of technical detail on how exactly all
this would work – for now Star Catcher seems focused on funding.
But the company does plan to launch an in-orbit demonstration in
late 2025, followed by a commercial service deployment.

https://newatlas.com/energy/world-first-space-based-energy-grid-star-catcher/
 

Shortwave Radiogram now changes to MFSK64 ...


 

RSID: <<2024-08-01T23:36Z MFSK-64 @ 9265000+1500>>
 

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From National Public Radio:

Scientists may have discovered 'dark oxygen' being created
without photosynthesis

By Joe Hernandez, Regina G. Barber
July 24, 2024

Researchers scouring the lightless landscape of the Pacific Ocean
floor think they've observed "dark oxygen" being created there,
potentially challenging commonly held beliefs about how oxygen is
produced on Earth.

Until now, it was thought that oxygen was created only through
photosynthesis, a process that requires sunlight. But the
discovery casts doubt on that theory and raises new questions
about the origins of life itself.

"I think we therefore need to revisit questions like: where could
aerobic life have begun?" said Andrew Sweetman, a professor with
the Scottish Association for Marine Science in Oban, Scotland, in
a news release.

The research team led by Sweetman published its findings Monday
in an article in the journal Nature Geoscience.

The scientists aren't certain how oxygen is created at such dark
depths, but they believe it's being produced by electrically
charged minerals called polymetallic nodules, which range in size
from a small particle to about the dimensions of a potato.

These nodules — "effectively batteries in a rock," Sweetman said
— may use their electric charge to split seawater into hydrogen
and oxygen in a process called seawater electrolysis.

"The conventional view is that oxygen was first produced around
three billion years ago by ancient microbes called cyanobacteria
and there was a gradual development of complex life thereafter,"
said the director of the Scottish Association for Marine Science,
Nicholas Owens, in the news release. "The potential that there
was an alternative source requires us to have a radical rethink."

Researchers conducted tests on the seafloor and also collected
samples to test aboveground, and they came up with the same
result: that oxygen levels increased near the polymetallic
nodules.

Seawater can be split into hydrogen and oxygen with 1.5 volts of
electricity, which is the amount in a AA battery. Researchers
found that some of the nodules possessed as much as 0.95 volts of
electricity, and multiple nodules together produced even higher
voltages.

The discovery could impact deep-sea mining

Polymetallic nodules contain metals such as manganese, nickel and
cobalt, which can be used to make the lithium-ion batteries used
in consumer electronics, appliances and electric vehicles.

Franz Geiger, a Northwestern University chemistry professor who
worked on the study, said in a separate news release that there
may be enough polymetallic nodules in an area of the Pacific
Ocean called the Clarion-Clipperton Zone to meet global energy
demands for decades after.

But he also said that mining would have to be conducted in a way
that did not eliminate oxygen for life forms in that part of the
ocean.

"We need to be really careful if it turns out that deep-sea
mining will become an opportunity that's being pursued ... that's
done on a level and at a frequency that is not detrimental to
life down there," Geiger told NPR.

Companies conducted exploratory missions for deep-sea mining in
the 1970s and '80s, he said, and recent research suggests that
those missions may have had repercussions on marine life in the
area for decades.

"A few years ago, a team of marine biologists went back to those
areas that were mined 40 years ago and found essentially no
life," Geiger said. "And then a few hundred meters over to the
left and right, where the nodules were intact, plenty of life."

https://www.npr.org/2024/07/24/nx-s1-5049587/scientists-dark-oxygen-without-hotosynthesis

See also:
https://www.space.com/deep-sea-dark-oxygen-from-metal-lumps-evidence-for-origins-of-life
 

This is Shortwave Radiogram in MFSK64

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This week's images ...


An unusual summer aurora over Kodiak, Alaska, July 30.
https://tinyurl.com/2d7fn7le ...

Sending Pic:198x152C;







Summer flowers in Chicago's Lincoln Park, July 31.
https://tinyurl.com/2bfsufxy ...


Sending Pic:127x205C








The 2024 Olympic men's skiff sailing at the Marseille Marina,
Marseille, France. https://tinyurl.com/2a8f7ran ...

Sending Pic:135x206C;








Burning power lines after the Park Fire tore through Forest
Ranch, California, July 25. https://tinyurl.com/24zewamw ...

Sending Pic:200x134C;









Firefighter battles the Park Fire near Chico, California, July
25. https://tinyurl.com/24zewamw ...

Sending Pic:204x140C;








The sun sets behind a forest burned by the Park Fire, east of
Payne Creek, California, July 27. https://tinyurl.com/24zewamw
...

Sending Pic:189x143C;








Flamingos feed at sunset on Lake Eber (along a migration route)
in Afyonkarahisar, Turkey. https://tinyurl.com/24m3rkae ...

Sending Pic:201x147C;
 

Raindrops on a prairie mallow in Basingstroke, England.
https://tinyurl.com/2855owga ...

Sending Pic:203x134C;








A Cardinal Flower (Lobelia) at Fahnestock State Park, New York.
https://tinyurl.com/2737ceyo ...

Sending Pic:124x209C;









A flower in Longfellow Gardens, Minneapolis.
https://tinyurl.com/29kqryxh ...

Sending Pic:200x144C;



 

Our painting of the week is "Upper Ojai" (valley in California)
by Susan K. Gut (b. 1970). https://tinyurl.com/27akn9zd ...


Sending Pic:214x170C;








Shortwave Radiogram returns to MFSK32 ...


 

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This is Shortwave Radiogram in MFSK32 ...


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I'm Kim Elliott. Please join us for the next Shortwave
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