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    Want to take a North American 365-day road trip where the average temp will always be 21c?

    Imagine that you really like days where the high temperature is 70°F and you wanted to plan a road trip where the temperature always hovers around 70°F. Well, I have done the planning for you. Since you cannot know what the temperature will be more than a week in advance (the current limit of decent forecasts), you have to go with Plan B; that is, look in a climate almanac. The go-to climate almanac for United States data is published by the National Center for Environmental Information (NCEI). The daily normal high temperature is computed for over 8,000 stations all across the United States. In addition, Environment Canada publishes monthly normals for stations across the great north. (Note: “normal” is a technical term that refers to a smoothed average for a 30-year period. It is close to an arithmetic average but not exactly the same.)

    @ us-climate.blogspot.ca
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    Why alien life will be robotic

    This will be especially true in space, which is a hostile place for biological intelligence. The Earth’s biosphere, in which organic life has symbiotically evolved, is not a constraint for advanced AI. Indeed it is far from optimal—interplanetary and interstellar space will be the preferred arena where robotic fabricators will have the grandest scope for construction, and where non-biological “brains” may develop insights as far beyond our imaginings as string theory is for a mouse.

    @ nautil.us
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    The box that build the modern world

    The container’s efficiency has proven to be an irresistible economic force. Last year the world’s container ports moved 560 million 20-foot containers—nearly 1.5 billion tons of cargo altogether. Though commodities like petroleum, steel ore, and coal still move in specially designed bulk cargo ships, more than 90 percent of the rest—everything from clothes to cars to computers—now travels inside shipping containers. “Reefer” containers, insulated and equipped with cooling units, carry refrigerated cargo and are plugged into power sources on ships or at dockside. Because the containers are all identical, any ship can move them.

    @ nautil.us
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    On human hibernation

    Scientists, like myself, who study this amazing physiological feat have reached the same conclusion: That is, all hibernating mammals use the same genetic architecture to hibernate. Hibernation happens from genes being turned on and off—much like a light switch—in very unique patterns throughout the year to modulate physiology. And, importantly, these genes are shared among the entire mammal family tree. They are not genes that evolved specifically for hibernation. Therefore, it seems as though all mammals—including humans—might actually have the genetic capacity for hibernation. It’s literally written in our DNA.

    @ hopesandfears.com
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    Air Force One is old.

    ​No, “Air Force One” is not actually a plane, but rather the callsign assigned to the plane the President of the United States is currently on. But the two planes that don the moniker most frequently are ancient, and while replacements are on the way, they won’t arrive for a while.

    According to The New York Times, the Department of Defense is currently trying to button up a contract for the next iteration of Air Force One mainstays. The current pair—first flown in 1987—are modified Boeing 747-200Bs, a model that was initially introduced way back in 1971 but hasn’t been in production since 1991. Replacement parts are no longer manufactured, leaving the Air Force with the trouble of having them custom made.

    @ popularmechanics.com
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    World’s first underground park – The Lowline

    The test lab was built with $225,000 raised on Kickstarter and sees 60 species of plants growing in conditions that simulate the underground space. It is only a fifth of the size of the trolley terminal site, which will use a system of pipes to funnel natural light, and magnify it to 30 times the intensity of regular sunlight.

    @ itsnicethat.com
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