If you're a long-time or native Tucsonan like me, you may have memories of Hector Vector Star Projector like I do from my first school field trip in second grade: An awe-inspiring, state-of-the-art projector rising majestically from beneath the planetarium floor, delivering full-dome images that transported me to Mars and other worlds.

While Hector still cuts a majestic and imposing figure for school groups and adults, he has sadly fallen behind the times - what with the miniaturization and high-definition quality of modern digital projectors.

If you want to get a glimpse of what the future of the Flandrau Planetarium could be, you have your chance for this weekend only. While the laser projector that treats fans to Pink Floyd and other music shows is out for repair, Flandrau will be showing demos of some new dome shows using a SkyScan digital projector, one of the best on the market.

All shows are free this weekend only, and are first-come, first-serve. The featured show is "Life: A Cosmic Story," which takes you on an immersive journey through cells and into galaxies, and is narrated by Jodie Foster:

There's also a cool kid's show, as well as "Voices in the Dark," an awesome music and animation show:

Full disclosure: I used to be in charge of marketing and digital for Flandrau (I helped bring back the Pink Floyd laser show - you're welcome). But if Tucson wants to ever get some cool new gear to get kids excited about science and blow their parents' minds with awesome shows, folks need to come out and show their support.

Show times are available at Flandrau's website.

The UA College of Science's spring lecture series on genomics continues tonight with Ecology and Evolutionary Biology Professor Michael Worobey talking about "The Genesis of the 1918 Spanish Influenza Pandemic." The teaser from the College of Science:

The Spanish influenza pandemic of 1918 was the most intense outbreak of disease in human history. It killed upwards of 50 million people (most in a six-week period) casting a long shadow of fear and mystery: nearly a century later, scientists have been unable to explain why, unlike all other influenza outbreaks, it killed young adults in huge numbers. I will describe how analyses of large numbers of influenza virus genomes are revealing the pathway traveled by the genes of this virus before it exploded in 1918. What emerges is a surprising tale with many players and plot lines, in which echoes of prior pandemics, imprinted in the immune responses of those alive in 1918, set the stage for the catastrophe. I will also discuss how resolving the mysteries of 1918 could help to prevent future pandemics and to control seasonal influenza, which quietly kills millions more every decade.

The free lecture at UA Centennial Hall starts at 7 p.m., but get there early—your fellow brainy Tucsonans typically fill every seat in the house. More details on the series here.

• NASA/JPL/University of Arizona
• Curiosity is making its way across Mars

The team behind the UA's HiRISE camera aboard the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter released an astonishing image that captures the tire tracks of the Curiosity rover that's tooling across Gale Crater. HiRISE Principal Investigator Alfred McEwen notes:

This image was acquired for color coverage of the region that the Curiosity rover may explore, but we acquired some extra RED (monochromatic) coverage of the rover tracks.

This image shows the entire distance traveled from the landing site (dark smudge at left) to its location as of 2 January 2013 (the rover is bright feature at right). The tracks are not seen where the rover has recently driven over the lighter-toned surface, which may be more indurated than the darker soil.

You can find out more about what Curiosity is up to here. Spoiler warning: The little robot is set to start using its laser to drill into some Mars rock.

BTW, what was with Danehy's weird aside about the space program in this week's issue? I wasn't happy to hear we were retiring the space shuttles (and I'd be happy to see NASA's budget increased), but the Curiosity mission is just one example of a healthy space program. Right here in Tucson, not that long ago, we put a different robot on the Arctic plains of Mars. The UA is working on the OSIRIS-REx spacecraft, which is going to grab a sample off an asteroid in a few years. And UA scientists are part of the team that's working on the James Webb Space Telescope, which will be replacing the Hubble in a few years. If that's not enough to inspire America to "again become a nation of people who dream and strive and reach," what is? (Given the scientific advances we make in this country, I don't think we've ever lost our ability to dream and strive and reach, although it'd be nice if more kids were interested in science, engineering and math.)

And Tom, please don't tell me that robot space exploration doesn't count. Given that you don't have qualms about robotic law enforcement, it would just be chauvinistic if you're anti-robot when it comes to outer space.

According to a study out of the University of Utah and published by the Journal of Experimental Biology, human hands evolved over time to be just as useful in conflict as they are in use of tools. In other words, they were made equally well to build and destroy.

From The Telegraph:

"The role aggression has played in our evolution has not been adequately appreciated," said Professor David Carrier, from the University of Utah.
"There are people who do not like this idea but it is clear that compared with other mammals, great apes are a relatively aggressive group with lots of fighting and violence, and that includes us. We're the poster children for violence."
The forces of natural selection that drove hands to become nimble-fingered also turned them into weapons, Prof Carrier believes.
"Individuals who could strike with a clenched fish (sic) could hit harder without injuring themselves, so they were better able to fight for mates and thus be more likely to reproduce," he said.

So when it comes down to it, we evolved to punch things better so we could have more sex. Works for professional fighters, I guess.

Glib comments aside, the article continues by going further in depth as to the mechanics of force as delivered by the human hand, noting that the force of a punch, over the same amount of surface area, is three times that of a slap, and the structural advantages a fist has to producing force, over a slap.

For the rest of the article, check out The Telegraph.

• P. Anninos
• Astronomers hope to watch as the black hole at the center of our Milky Way rips apart a mysterious cloud composed primarily of hydrogen gas sometime around July 2013. The image shows a computer simulation predicting how the cloud changes over time.

UA astronomy professor Feryal Ozel, who studies neutron stars and black holes, is in the midst of watching an enormous hydrogen cloud slide down the throat of a massive black hole in the center of the Milky Way galaxy.

Shelley Littin of the University Communications team tells us the plan:

The cloud is moving fast enough through space that Ozel and her colleagues predict it will create a shockwave in front of it when it approaches the black hole, like the supersonic boom heard when an airplane breaks the sound barrier, Ozel said. The shockwave should emit radiation observable through radio telescopes.

“Shortly after that we expect that the cloud is going to be basically wrenched apart,” Ozel said.

Astronomers can infer that the intense gravity of black holes absorbs material from objects that come too near, Ozel said, but normally aren’t able to see it happen in real time. The collision of the gas cloud with the black hole at the center of our own galaxy will give scientists a chance to learn about the environment of a black hole.

“It’s the first time we will be able to see a black hole having lunch,” Ozel said.

Because I am a terrible person, I don't generally find myself all that interested in stories about the environment. Yes, I try to do the right sort of things — reusing, recycling, I've been known to carpool and use public transportation, we bought a high MPG car, etc. — but I tune out a bit when the news switches over to news of that sort. I hope the world doesn't collapse upon itself during my lifetime or that of my children, but I also have a remarkably short attention span when it comes to that stuff. Again, I realize this is a fault of mine.

So, I wasn't terribly interested in seeing Chasing Ice, a documentary about the melting of the ice caps opening at the Loft this weekend, but geez, watching this footage of a chunk of iceberg nearly the size of Manhattan break off is pretty compelling film-making, right?

• Wiki Verbix
• Map of Romance Languages in Europe

Story by Brandon T. Bishop/Scicats

An international group of researchers used a new statistical approach to try to solve a long-disputed mystery—the birthplace of the Indo-European language family.

For many years, most linguists and archaeologists supported an area in the Eurasian steppe north of the Black Sea. A minority of scholars, however, favored an origin in central Anatolia in what is now modern Turkey.

English, Spanish, Russian, Hindi and many other languages in Europe and South Asia all share a common ancestor once spoken near the Black Sea. These languages, which belong to the Indo-European family, are now spoken on every continent. In fact, almost one of every two people on Earth speaks one of these languages.

It's a bit early on a Tuesday to get into a lengthy magazine feature, but this portrait of a girl born without the ability to feel pain is a fascinating read—one that you're bound to go back into throughout the day.

Check out an excerpt here from New York Times Magazine:

The girl who feels no pain was in the kitchen, stirring ramen noodles, when the spoon slipped from her hand and dropped into the pot of boiling water. It was a school night; the TV was on in the living room, and her mother was folding clothes on the couch. Without thinking, Ashlyn Blocker reached her right hand in to retrieve the spoon, then took her hand out of the water and stood looking at it under the oven light. She walked a few steps to the sink and ran cold water over all her faded white scars, then called to her mother, “I just put my fingers in!” Her mother, Tara Blocker, dropped the clothes and rushed to her daughter’s side. “Oh, my lord!” she said — after 13 years, that same old fear — and then she got some ice and gently pressed it against her daughter’s hand, relieved that the burn wasn’t worse.

. . .

A couple of nights after telling me the story about putting her hand in the boiling water, Ashlyn sat in the kitchen, playing with the headband that held back her long brown hair. We had all been drawing on napkins and playing checkers and listening to Ashlyn and Tristen sing “Call Me Maybe,” when all of a sudden Tara gasped and lifted the hair away from her daughter’s ears. She was bleeding beneath it. The headband had been cutting into her skin entire time we were sitting there.

Check it out—it's an incredible read, and well worth the time.

[New York Times Magazine - "The Hazards of Growing Up Painlessly"]

The appliance that heats your day-old Chinese food could hold the key to making solar energy mainstream. Engineers at Oregon State University have applied microwave heating to solar energy technology in a way that could lead to a manufacturing process that uses less energy and fewer resources.

The engineers opted for microwave heating—as opposed to conventional heating in an oven—to reduce the time it takes materials to bond into a working solar cell. While the reaction time with conventional heating can be anywhere from 30 minutes to 15 hours, microwave heating can achieve the same results in minutes or seconds, said head researcher Greg Herman.

This innovative approach, paired with a compound of non-toxic elements, enabled the OSU engineers to create thin-film photovoltaic products that turn sunlight into power.