Tsana Dolichva's Blog

Those of you who follow this blog will have undoubtedly noticed that I don't post much any more. The number one reason for that is I've been in the throes of a PhD with very little desire to write about science/astronomy/astrophysics outside of work. Basically, blogging here stopped feeling like something fun to do and started to feel like more work, which is not what I wanted.

Defying Doomsday, an upcoming anthologyIf you've been paying close attention, you may have seen my book blog, which I...

I am a great believer in science for the sake of science. But a lot of politicians people aren't and need to be convinced of the merits of things like space travel and telescopes. To that end, here is an info graphic you can throw at the next person who tells you science is a waste of money. It's probably safer than throwing a punch.

Source: GreatBusinessSchools.org

I recently read (well, listened to) The Colours of Space by Marion Zimmer Bradley. You can read my proper review over at my book blog,  but here I wanted to discuss some of the science that popped up in the book.

The title of the novel — The Colours of Space — refers to the stars being much more brightly coloured when seen in space, as compared with when seen from inside the Earth's atmosphere. (There's another reference there to plot elements as well, which I won't spoil, but I read the...

This post is in response to a comment I got on my previous post "More thoughts on the importance of science in science fiction" where Shannon commented/asked (I'm only quoting the question-y part of her comment):

It really is a hard concept to grasp, the no-friction-in-space thing. I don't think I really get it - I'm not sure how to visualise it, for a start - but I don't understand how a space ship - of the super-advanced, sci-fi kind - can't slow down. I mean, it's mechanical and computerise...

Today I was directed to a blog post about how important science is in science fiction using the hideous crime against science example of Beth Revis's Across the Universe, which I blogged about here. (From the sound of it, the blog author may have read my post or someone else's similar reaction to the book.) The blog author asks how important is accurate science really, and is there a line? The rest of this post is based on my comment over there.

I think there is definitely a line. Stuff like f...

This  review is posted as part of my Australian Women Writers Challenge. I have cross-posted it from my review blog. I have now completed the Australian Women Writers Challenge for 2012, and you can read my de-brief here.

Blue Silence by Michelle Marquardt was originally published in 2002 and is sadly now out of print. Although I see it's in stock at Infinitas as of this writing. It was a winner of the George Turner Prize (as my edition proclaims on the cover).

The story opens when a myst...

This blog post was inspired by an email conversation with someone regarding the possibility of a planet having year-long (or half-year long) day/night cycles. The original question was whether this is even possible and whether such a planet would be habitable.

From a purely astronomical point of view, this is definitely possible. There's no reason why you couldn't have a slowly rotating planet at around the same distance from it's sun as Earth is (well any reasons that do exist are fairly theo...

Today I have another Ask Tsana post.

Brookelin asked:

Hi again, Tsana.

I was wondering - in an alternate universe, what would it take for a species to survive on Mars?

I know that it has some atmosphere, but not a whole lot. With the pressure being below the Armstrong limit, could there feasibly be large creatures (between collie and bear size) that could survive would have higher thresholds and what would they need to do so?

If the water on a human's tongue boils in space, would an alien creature...

Another ask Tsana question today. (And a relatively shortish response, sort of. Gasp!) Keep 'em coming, guys :-)

Anon asked:

How hard would it be to turn around in space... Say for some reason, Curiosity needed to turn around midflight and return to earth. Would BURNING fuel on some sort of reverse thruster work or would it have to make the trip to Mars, orbit the planet and break orbit to return

This is for a picture book that I feel impelled to be at least somewhat based in reality... which m...

I have another response to an "Ask Tsana" question today.

Brookelin asked:

I was wondering... with planets like Europa and possibly Ganymede, who possible have oceans, if humans made future settlements under said oceans, would the pressure from the water above counteract the effects of reduced gravity on the human body?

Interesting question. A preliminary point: it's Jupiter's moons Europa and Callisto that probably have sub-surface oceans (especially Europa), not Ganymede which is a solid rock...