CRACKS BEGINNING TO SHOW.

Beijing appears to have given the green light to relaxing portions of the draconian Covid-19 lockdown imposed on Shanghai. Per the Associated Press, “Some residents of Shanghai were allowed out of their homes as the city of 25 million eased a two-week-old shutdown Tuesday after videos posted online showed what was said to be people who ran out of food breaking into a supermarket and shouting appeals for help. About 6.6 million people will be allowed to leave their homes, but some must stay in their own neighborhoods, according to the online news outlet The Paper. The government said some markets and pharmacies also would reopen.” Couple of questions: Will the dam hold now that a trickle will be let through? Will Beijing continue to implement its Zero-Covid strategy (in reality, not in theory). https://bit.ly/3vemeCW

HOW HIGH? HIGH ENOUGH TO TOUCH THE SKY.

With the war in Ukraine straining NASA and Roscosmos, the American agency needs to get its astronauts into space somehow. Enter SpaceX and Elon Musk. Per Futurism, “NASA Commercial Crew program manager Steve Stich quipped that Crew-4 would be a “4-4-4” mission, launching NASA’s fourth SpaceX crew mission with a fourth booster in the fourth month of the year. What went unsaid is that 4/20 is probably more noteworthy, in the minds of much of the public but also that of Musk, who has long demonstrated a fondness for that particular weed-affiliated number.” With both SpaceX and Blue Origin available, it’s hard to see how NASA ever returns to relying on Russia to hitch a ride into space. https://bit.ly/3jxx01G

A NEW TYPE OF BRAIN.

A new era in telescope-based space exploration is on the horizon as efforts are now being made to consolidate future data collected by the next-gen telescopes slowly being deployed into space. Per the BBC, “A group of UK institutions is going to build a prototype “brain” to control the world’s biggest radio telescope. The Square Kilometre Array (SKA) will initially comprise 197 dishes and 130,000 antennas spread across South Africa and Australia. All will be linked and need to work in perfect harmony. The software now being developed for the purpose will be trialled on a small subset of the infrastructure before being rolled out across the network.” The SKA will join a series of next-generation telescopes coming online this decade, including the recently launched James Webb Space Telescope and the super-sized European Extremely Large Telescope (E-ELT). https://bbc.in/3NY9skC

THE ULTIMATE GUIDE TO FIGHTING CLIMATE CHANGE.

If you are a budding or even fully-realized climate change warrior but have some doubts as to the level of your expertise, fear not. You’ll soon have the reference book of reference books at your disposal. Per Smithsonian Magazine, “Environmental activist Greta Thunberg is publishing a guide to combating climate change, reports Jill Lawless for the Associated Press (AP). Titled The Climate Book, the volume—featuring contributions from more than 100 acclaimed writers, activists and scientists—will be released in Britain on October 27 and in the United States in early 2023. According to a list shared by Thunberg on Twitter, contributors include novelists Margaret Atwood and Amitav Ghosh, climate scientist Saleemul Huq, Kenyan environmentalist Wanjira Mathai, and World Health Organization chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus. As Lucy Knight reports for the Guardian, the 19-year-old activist will also offer her take on greenwashing, which occurs when companies make false or misleading claims about their “environmentally friendly” products and practices.” https://bit.ly/3JAKRPk

Thanks for reading. Let’s be careful out there.