James Ingram R&B Singer, Songwriter Dies At 66

On January 29th 2019, it was announced that James Ingram, R&B singer and songwriter had died, he was 66. He had suffered a long battle with brain cancer. He is most noted for the 1980s hits, "Just Once,' for which he won a Grammy, and "One Hundred Ways." Both songs were recorded for Quincy Jones' 1981 album, "The Dude." He won his second Grammy for "Ya Mo Be There," a duet with Michael McDonald, from his first solo album, "It's your Night," released in 1983.

Mr. Ingram was an Ohio native, born in Akron on February 16th, 1952. While growing up there, he taught himself to play piano and sang in his church's choir. He played in night clubs until age 18, when he became a member of the Akron based band, Revelation Funk. The band moved to LA in 1973, but after a lack of success, returned to Ohio a few yeas later. Mr Ingram, however, stayed behind and began to make a name for him self, writing songs and doing session work.

A late 70s gig with Leon Haywood led to work on Haywood's 1980 single, "Don't Push It, Don't Force It." That same year saw the release of the Lamont Dozier produced album by Zingara. Zingara was a quintet that featured Mr. Ingram on lead vocals on the minor 1980 R&B hit, "Love's Calling." The work began to pile up, as he co wrote the song "PYT," for Michael Jackson's, "Thriller." From there he would be featured on hits like, "Baby Come To Me," with Patty Austin, and "Some Where Out There," with Linda Ronstadt.

James Ingram is survived by his wife Debra and their six children.

Stop & Shop's Diverless Grocery Stores

On January 16th 2019, major northeast grocery store chain, Stop & Shop, announced that it will be testing its new driverless robotic grocery stores in the Boston area. The new venture is in partnership with a San Fransisco start up called Robomart. The self driving vehicles will act as mini convenient stores loaded with convenience items, produce, and meal kits. One could think of the vehicles as  Amazon Go stores on wheels.

Robomart will maintain and control the mini stores. If a consumer wants to place an order, they use an app to hail the autonomous vehicle. When the Stop & Shop mini store arrives, the consumer makes their choice, or choices from the items found within. Purchases are made through the use of RFID technology, which will recognize the items that have been chosen and the Robomart app will charge the consumer accordingly.

China Lands On The Far Side Of The Moon

On January 3rd 2019, China announced that it had successfully landed a spacecraft on the far side of the Moon, making it the first country to do so. The Chang'e 4 lander touched down in what is known as the Von Karman Crater at 2:26 GMT. The lander sent back the first close up images of the Moon's far side. They were transmitted back to Earth via a relay satellite called "Queqaio" or "Magpie Bridge," which was placed in orbit before the mission.

12 hours after the Chang'e 4 landed, a rover named Yutu 2 or Jade Rabbit 2 drove off the lander and began exploring the lunar surface. The Chang'e 4 lander also carried along a mini bioshpere which contained a small arabidopsis plant, which the Chinese hope will produce the first flower on the Moon. Cotton, rapeseed, and yeast are present there as well. The mission will also carry out the first astronomy observation from the Moon's far side.

New Horizons Reaches Ultima Thule

On January 2nd 2019, NASA announced that its space craft, New Horizons had reached "Ultima Thule," and released the first photos from the event. "Ultima Thule," is an object in what is known as the Kuiper Belt, orbiting at 4 billion miles from the sun. Those photos have revealed that what was once thought of as being shaped as a bowling pin is now being observed as a two spherical lobed rock, about 21 miles in diameter.

Dr. S. Alan Stern, the mission's team leader, believes that the object once known as MU69 2014, is "Two separate objects that are joined together," or what's known as a "contact binary." Images taken with New Horizons color camera revealed that "Ultima Thule" is reddish in color. As New Horizons flew by "Ultima Thule," it collected some 50 gigabits of data that the space craft will transmit back to Earth. The data download is expected to take about two years

Virgin Galactic Reaches Space

On December 13th 2018, Virgin Galactic announced that it had successfully flown its spacecraft to the edge of space, marking a milestone for the would be consumer space flight company. The spacecraft VSS Unity lifted off from the Mojave Air and Space Port in California, attached to the belly of a larger craft called the WhiteKightTwo, aka VMS Eve. At 43,000 feet, Unity was released from Eve as it fired its rocket motor, eventually achieving a velocity of Mach 2.9.

Pilots, Mark Stucky and Frederick Sturchow continued their rocket burn for 60 seconds, propelling the VSS Unity to an altitude of 54.1 miles, which is 1.4 miles above what NASA considers to the boundaries of space. At that height, it is possible to witness the stars against the background of the darkness of space. Then, with its tail folded it reentered the atmosphere, at supersonic speed, and glided back to the Space Port runway in the Mojave desert.

The OSIRIS-REx Space Craft Discovers Water On Asteroid Bennu

On December 10th 2018, NASA announced that its spacecraft, OSIRIS-REx has discovered water on the asteroid, Bennu. OSIRIS-REx, which was launched two years ago, arrived at its destination, on December 3rd, after a 1.2 billion mile journey. The spacecraft is within twelve miles of the asteroid's surface. The presence of water was detected by OSIRIS-REx's two on board spectrometers, OVIRS and OTES.

OSIRIS-REx which stands for, Origins, Spectral Interpretations, Resource Identification, Security-Regolith Explorer, is expected to slip into orbit around Bennu on December 31st 2018. The spacecraft's mission is to to grab a sizable sample of the asteroid and return it to Earth. After achieving an orbit of about one mile above the asteroid's surface, OSIRIS-REx is expected, at some point, to swoop down and tap Bennu.

At that point, the spacecraft will use its Touch-And-Go Sample Acquisition Mechanism (TAGSAM), to suck up a two once sample of material. That maneuver, which will not be an actual landing, is expected to last only about 5 seconds. OSIRIS-REx is then expected to stay in orbit around Bennu until 2021, before beginning its journey home. The spacecraft will bring its payload back to Earth, landing in a Utah desert in September 2023.

NASA's InSight Space Craft Lands On Mars

On Monday November 26th, NASA announced that it had successfully landed its InSight robot lander on the surface of Mars. InSight which stands for, Interior Exploration using Seismic Investigations, Geodesy and Heat Transport, reached the Martian surface at 11:52:29 Pacific Time after plunging through a thin Martian atmosphere. From its Elysium Planitia landing site, InSight will carry out its two year mission to probe beneath the surface of the Red Planet.

InSight is a three legged, stationary lander instead of a rover. Its stationary position will allow InSight to study the planet for the existence of seismic anomalies called, Mars quakes. To do this, InSight will deploy a seismometer from its robotic arm. The arm will also be used to deploy a self hammering nail that will drill down into Martian surface to a depth of 16 feet in order to determine the planet's temperature.