Monthly Archives: August 2017

Welcome Back! Thanks for stopping by.  
Please prepare for the new school year by learning a bit about your Homework Blog.

 A massive black hole has been discovered in our Milky Way Galaxy – Learn more

Watch the solar eclipse (safely) using the life stream from the Exoloratorium. The live stream will start on Monday August 21, 2017 at 9:00 am PST.

On August 21, 2017, beginning at 10:15 a.m. PDT, a total solar eclipse will sweep across the United States. The glorious sight of the fully eclipsed Sun will be visible along a 70-mile-wide path arching from Oregon to South Carolina.

People not in the path will experience a partial eclipse.
Safety: It is never safe to look directly at the sun. Please use the following information to make sure that you do not harm your eyes by staring directly at the sun.
Looking directly at the sun is unsafe except during the brief total phase of a solar eclipse (“totality”), when the moon entirely blocks the sun’s bright face, which will happen only within the narrow path of totality (https://go.nasa.gov/2pC0lhe (link is external)).
Eclipse glass
The only safe way to look directly at the uneclipsed or partially eclipsed sun is through special-purpose solar filters, such as “eclipse glasses” (example shown at left) or hand-held solar viewers. Homemade filters or ordinary sunglasses, even very dark ones, are not safe for looking at the sun; they transmit thousands of times too much sunlight.

Research conducted by Pomper and Chain (2017) shows that it takes longer to learn when you are distracted by irrelevant visual information.

We are able to eavesdrop on other information while learning; however, this extra stimulation slows learning. (July 5, 2017)

Abstract:

“Subjective experience suggests that we are able to direct our auditory attention independent of our visual gaze, e.g when shadowing a nearby conversation at a cocktail party. But what are the consequences at the behavioural and neural level? While numerous studies have investigated both auditory attention and visual gaze independently, little is known about their interaction during selective listening. In the present EEG study, we manipulated visual gaze independently of auditory attention while participants detected targets presented from one of three loudspeakers. We observed increased response times when gaze was directed away from the locus of auditory attention. Further, we found an increase in occipital alpha-band power contralateral to the direction of gaze, indicative of a suppression of distracting input. Finally, this condition also led to stronger central theta-band power, which correlated with the observed effect in response times, indicative of differences in top-down processing. Our data suggest that a misalignment between gaze and auditory attention both reduce behavioural performance and modulate underlying neural processes. The involvement of central theta-band and occipital alpha-band effects are in line with compensatory neural mechanisms such as increased cognitive control and the suppression of task irrelevant inputs.”