National Women Inventors Month on February, 2025: Why is "Black History Month such a big deal?

February, 2025 is National Women Inventors Month 2025.

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Why is "Black History Month such a big deal?

Who is they? I mean this quite seriously.

The pronoun "they" when unattributed is a red flag that someone thinks of themselves as a powerless victim of the system.

In the case of Black History Month, the "they" is a "he": Carter G. Woodson.

"What we now call Black History Month was originated in 1926 by Carter Godwin Woodson as Negro History Week. The month of February was selected in deference to Frederick Douglass and Abraham Lincoln who were both born in that month.

The son of a slave, Carter G. Woodson was born in New Canton, Virginia on December 19, 1875. He began high school at the age of 20 and then proceeded to study at Berea College, the University of Chicago, the Sorbonne, and Harvard University, where he earned a Ph.D. in 1912.

Carter G. Woodson founded the Association for the Study of Negro Life and History in 1915 to train Black historians and to collect, preserve, and publish documents on Black life and Black people. He also founded the Journal of Negro History (1916), Associated Publishers (1922), and the Negro Bulletin (1937). Woodson spent his life working to educate all people about the vast contributions made by Black men and women throughout history. Mr. Woodson died on April 3, 1950 and Black History Month is his legacy.

Carter G. Woodson, however, would be sad to know that out of all the hundreds of Black men and women who produced so many substantial inventions (from the development of crop rotation, the traffic light, the mail box, gas mask, fountain pen, typewriter, telegraph, golf tee, automatic gear shift, commode toilet--- to the method of dry cleaning clothes, the electric lamp, and the automatic car coupler and air brake for the railroad) benefiting this country, only four Black inventors have been inducted into the National Inventors Hall of Fame in Akron, Ohio. "

Text By Frankie Cox for the United States Patent and Trademark Office

BTW the **** word is historical word " N E G R O "

How long will it be before we put a man / woman on Mars?

How long will it be before we put a man / woman on Mars?

NASA's current goal established by President Bush is by the year 2030.

However, there are lots of things to accomplish in order for that to be made a reality. The largest obstacle is money. Right now NASA's budget is $16.1 Billion. Comparing it to other government programs, like Welfare at $45 Billion, it's clearly not a high priority. And for historical reference, the budget for NASA during Apollo was 4% of the National budget. Today it is 0.0167%. And going to Mars is considerably more difficult than going to the moon.

Moon vs. Mars. For one, the obvious difference is distance. The moon is 240,000 miles away. Mars is about 50,000,000 miles away from us at the closest approach. The problem with distance is the time that it takes. The more time it takes the more stuff you need to take with you. A trip to the moon takes about 3 days. A trip to Mars with conventional rockets takes about 6 months (one way).

Aside from the massive amount of supplies you need to take for a long trip, there is the issue of radiation. The Moon missions are shorter in duration and the Earth provides a bit of protection for a significant portion of the flight by using it's magnetosphere to push away some of the radiation. But on your way to Mars there is no such natural protection. So we need to find a way to protect ourselves from that.

Lastly, I think communication is a big issue. Going to the moon, the delay for a signal going there and back is about 1.5 seconds. So while it's a little annoying if you are trying to have a real time conversation, it certainly isn't problematic. But going to Mars, at it's closest approach, it's about 6 minutes (one way). So to say Hi and reply with Hello, would take about 12 minutes. When Mars is opposite Earth, it's about 24 minutes one way. So saying hi and bye would take about 48 minutes. That can be problematic if a ground controller needs to tell an astronaut something about a loss of oxygen, or a valve that needs to be adjusted, etc...

Fortunately, there are some solutions for all of these problems. But they need to be built and tested. That costs money. And right now, the U.S. has spent close to $500 billion on a war (Whether you are for or against it, it's $500 billion that is gone). And it's really up to ourselves and the government we elect to determine what we need or want to do. Back to science...

The solutions that I find most promising for a mission to Mars include VASMIR, magnetic shielding, promethyus and Quantum Communication.

VASMIR is a plasma rocket (very similar to an Ion rocket). It creates plasma (very hot gas) and squirts it out using magnets to control the stream of plasma. The more electricity you pump into the magnet, the faster you can go. The plasma can be made from several different gases, and hydrogen is one of those gases. Hydrogen is coincidently a good insulator against radiation. So the gas tanks could surround the ship and add a layer of protection. With enough electricity, the inventor, Dr. Frank Chiang Diaz has told me that we can sustain 1 G of constant thrust (making the trip to Mars MUCH shorter - 22 days). However the current plan using less electricity would require about 3 and a half months. Still considerably shorter than conventional rockets.

Magnetic shielding is a means of creating a magnetic field around the space craft that is strong enough to deflect the radiation. Using electric magnets, the shape of the field can be shaped and not only protect the occupants, but also act like a solar sail, helping push along the space craft.

Promethyus is a project that's been put on hold at NASA because of lack of funding. But essentially it's nuclear reactors in space. Nuclear reactors are the most effiencient means of generating huge amounts of electricity. The electricity is needed to run VASMIR and the shield (as well as life support systems and science equipment).

Lastly, Quantum communication. Using a phenomenon called "entanglement", it's possible to create a pair of atoms that are linked such that what happens to one atom, the other will experience the same and more importantly at the exact same time, regardless of how far apart they are. Einstein called this "spooky action at a distance". This is a means of bypassing the speed of light so to speak. By sending the astronauts with one of the entangled sets, the device could relay information instantaneously back and forth to Earth. It doesn't require a "line of sight" either, so we wouldn't need to use the Deep Space Network of radio telescopes, except as a contengency. This technology would also drastically change the capabilities of computation within computers.

If you want more details, feel free to write me.

Who invented Gardasil?

Who invented Gardasil?

The research that led to the development of the vaccine began in the 1980s by groups at the University of Rochester, Georgetown University, and the US National Cancer Institute. In 1991 investigators at the University of Queensland found a way to form non-infectious virus-like particles (VLP), which could also strongly activate the immune system. However, these VLPs assembled poorly and did not have the same structure as infectious HPV. In 1993, a laboratory at the US National Cancer Institute was able to generate HPV16 VLPs that were morphologically correct. These VLPs were the basis for the HPV16 component of the Gardasil vaccine. The history of the discovery of this vaccine is described by McNeil. Upon commercialization of the vaccine, controversy involving intellectual property arose between the various groups that played a role in developing the vaccine.

Clinical trials

Merck & Co. conducted a Phase III study named FUTURE II. This clinical trial was a randomized double-blind study with one controlled placebo group and one vaccination group. Over 12,000 women aged 16–26 from thirteen countries participated in the study. Each woman was injected with either Gardasil or a placebo on Day 1, Month 2, and Month 6. In total, 6,082 women were given Gardasil and 6,075 received the placebo. Merck has tested the vaccine in several hundred 11- and 12-year-old girls.On February 27, 2006, the independent Data and Safety Monitoring Board recommended the clinical trials be terminated on ethical grounds, so that young women on placebo could receive Gardasil

Also on this date Saturday, February 1, 2025...