Month: August 2022

Enlarge / Annotations recording Galileo's discovery of the four moons of Jupiter, from the single-leaf manuscript in the collection of the University of Michigan. The library recently discovered the manuscript is a 20th-century forgery. (credit: University of Michigan Library)

Since 1938, one of the most prized items in the University of Michigan library's collection has been a rare manuscript page allegedly written by Galileo. But after an internal investigation,  the library's curators have concluded that the manuscript is in fact a fake—and most likely executed by a well-known 20th century forger. The curators were tipped off about the forgery by Georgia State historian Nick Wilding, who became suspicious of the manuscript's authenticity while working on a biography of Galileo.

“It was pretty gut-wrenching when we first learned our Galileo was not actually a Galileo,” Donna L. Hayward, interim dean of the University of Michigan’s libraries, told the New York Times. Nonetheless, the library opted for transparency and publicly announced the forgery. “To sweep it under the rug is counter to what we stand for,” Hayward said.

The single-leaf manuscript in question purported to be a draft of an August 24, 1609, letter that Galileo wrote to the Doge of Venice describing his observations with a telescope (occhiale) he had constructed. (The final letter is housed in the State Archives in Venice.) Galileo first heard of a marvelous new instrument for “seeing faraway things as though nearby” in a letter from a colleague named Paolo Sarpi, who had witnessed a demonstration in Venice. Unsatisfied with the performance of the available instruments, Galileo built his own, even learning to grind his own lenses to improve the optics.

Enlarge / HP Elite Dragonfly Chromebook.

Chromebooks are tired of being treated like second-class citizens.

Over the last decade, the developers of ChromeOS have attempted to evolve the operating system with features that could put it more on par with macOS and Windows. Google has been pushing Chromebooks as business machines, touting the purported simplicity and security benefits of their pared down operating system.

HP's new Elite Dragonfly Chromebook represents a ChromeOS device pushed to the limits, from its appearance to its components.

Enlarge / Skyrora announced this week it has completed a hot fire test of its XL rocket's second stage. (credit: Skyrora)

Welcome to Edition 5.07 of the Rocket Report! We are now just 11 days away from NASA's first attempt to launch its SLS rocket and Orion spacecraft. I've reported this story for more than 11 years and can hardly believe we've reached this moment. Starting Monday, I'll have a lot of coverage—good and bad—on Ars to put this moment into context. Be sure to check it out.

As always, we welcome reader submissions, and if you don't want to miss an issue, please subscribe using the box below (the form will not appear on AMP-enabled versions of the site). Each report will include information on small-, medium-, and heavy-lift rockets as well as a quick look ahead at the next three launches on the calendar.

Really—the Electron is going to Venus. Rocket Lab announced this week plans to self-fund the development of a small spacecraft and its launch on an Electron rocket. The craft will send a tiny probe flying through the clouds of Venus for about five minutes at an altitude of 48-60 km. Rocket Lab founder Peter Beck has joined up with several noted planetary scientists, including Massachusetts Institute of Technology professor Sara Seager, to design this mission, Ars reports.