Young Sun Paradox Says Life Should Not Have Happened?

Yep, you read that right. IO9 posted an article that for all intents says that due to the energy output of Sol's when it was much younger could not have warmed the Earth enough to have liquid water and there for making life all but impossible. But since Earth teems with life, there is a bit of a paradox. The young sun paradox.

This is approximately how it works. In the early days of the solar system, the sun's output was only about 70 of today's levels. This means that there was not enough energy to maintain a liquid water environment on Earth and absolutely no running water on Mars which we know is NOT the case. This paradox was first put forward in the 70s by the likes of Carl Sagan.

From the article:

• A Penn State research team .. has created a new computer model that can simulate the Sun's evolution under various different starting condition. What they're searching for is the right combination of starting elements and internal conditions that could support an old, largely disregarded explanation: that the Sun was once more massive than it is now, and a fierce solar wind shrunk it to its present size.

How much bigger....anywhere from 2% to 10%  larger than it's present size.  That would mean that despite a lower output, the additional size means that the energy reaching Earth and Mars was pretty much the same.  

Check out the article here

Demonstration of Water Droplets Orbit a Knitting Needle on the ISS

In this YouTube video we watch as astronaut Don Pettit performs a demonstration of the physics of electrical charges and spheres using of all things, knitting needles. The demonstration is instantly fascinating as Pettit releases small droplets along the length of the needle. You can instantly see the correlation to orbital mechanics even though Pettit takes great pains to caution that theses are static fields in operation and that objects orbiting a body in space are gravitational. Still, Pettit never fails to amaze and fascinate. Check this video out.

Lake Vostok's Surface Finally Reached

Long time listener Dan pointed me towards this AP article concerning ground breaking achievement by Russian scientists. Lake Vostok at 160 miles long and 30 miles wide, (similar in size to Lake Ontario) is on of the largest of nearly 400 subglacial lakes in Antarctica. Located about 800 miles east of the South Pole Vostock has been locked under more than two miles of ice for twenty million years. Biologist hope that the lake contains unchanged microbial lifeforms that date back millions of years.

Drilling on the site has been on and off since 1969.