Related papers: Navigating with the Kamal
This paper frames calculus as a global, centuries-long development rather than a subject that began only with Newton and Leibniz. Drawing on ideas from Greek, Indian, Islamic, and later European mathematics, it highlights how concepts like…
For more than 50,000 years, Indigenous Australians have incorporated celestial events into their oral traditions and used the motions of celestial bodies for navigation, time-keeping, food economics, and social structure. In this paper, we…
The development of digital humanities has opened new perspectives in the history of Islam: whether dealing with thin or sometimes vast source corpora (such as S\=ira, al-Tbar\=i, al-Dahab\=i, etc.), these tools allow us to approach texts…
This paper investigates an autonomous navigation method for spacecraft operating in the outer solar system, up to 250 AU from the Sun, using the parallactic shifts of nearby stars. These measurements enable estimation of the spacecraft…
A complete overview of the surrounding vehicle environment is important for driver assistance systems and highly autonomous driving. Fusing results of multiple sensor types like camera, radar and lidar is crucial for increasing the…
Advanced civilizations capable of interstellar travel, if they exist, are likely to have advanced propulsion methods. Spaceships moving at high speeds would leave a particular signature which could be detected from Earth. We propose a…
In order to show the principle viability of a recently proposed relativistic positioning method based on the use of pulsed signals from sources at infinity, we present an application example reconstructing the world-line of an idealized…
Rangefinders are instruments used for ballistics and for surveying in general. Here a short discussion of some of them, ranging from the ancient Rome to the modern methods.
We report field studies of the astronomical beliefs of two Indian tribes: the Banjaras and the Kolams. The Banjaras are an ancient tribe connected with the gypsies of Europe while the Kolams have been foragers until recently. They share…
We demonstrate experimentally a simple and easy-to-use technique aimed at measuring the complex orbital angular momentum spectrum of an arbitrary optical field making use of just polarization measurements. The technique can be applied to…
The rocket technology dates back as far as medieval China. Used initially for entertainment and religious practices over time rockets evolved into weapons and finally into means of transportation. Today, we are nearing the top of the…
SOUTH POL will be a survey of the Southern sky in optical polarized light. It will use a newly designed polarimetric module at an 80cm Robotic Telescope. Telescope and polarimeter will be installed at CTIO, Chile, in late 2012. The initial…
We created an introductory physics activity for undergrad students consisting in measuring by different methods the same physical quantity. It allows to confront students with questions of uncertainty, precision, and model versus theory.…
In 1492, for the first time, an unknown ocean opened up before sailors: weeks of navigation and no idea how to pinpoint their location. Since ancient times, navigators had known how to determine latitude by using the North Star, but the…
Earth's analemma is the lopsided figure eight marked out over a year by the position of the Sun in the sky observed at the same clock time each day. It shows how solar time deviates from clock time. The analemma's shape results from the…
Cultural Astronomy is interdisciplinary connecting the arts, humanities, social & physical sciences. Data collection methods and theories are used from many disciplines and meld with methods and theories within cultural astronomy. The…
Surface acoustic wave (SAW) is utilized in diverse fields ranging from physics, engineering, to biology, for transducing, sensing and processing various signals. Optical measurement of SAW provides valuable information since the amplitude…
We discuss the possibility of an autonomous navigation system for spacecraft that is based on pulsar timing data. Pulsars are rapidly rotating neutron stars that are observable as variable celestial sources of electromagnetic radiation.…
Here I am discussing a possible use of a Roman Dodecahedron, a bronze artifact of gallo-roman origin, for measuring distance. A dodecahedron, found at Jublains, the ancient Nouiodunum, dating from the 2nd or 3rd century AD, is used to…
General relativity predicts that clocks run more slowly near massive objects. The effect is small---a clock at sea level lags behind one 1000 m above sea level by only 9.4 ns/day. Here, we demonstrate that a measurement of this effect can…