Explorer

Canada's RADARSAT program has a long history, going back to experimenting with radar sensors onboard the Convair 580 aircraft, which is now in the collection of the Canada Aviation and Space Museum.

Last summer, the Canada Science and Technology Museum offered up access to its collection so that researcher Jennifer Thivierge could study “keypunch girls” — the women who punched holes in data cards and fed them into machines or tabulators, starting in the 1950s. The University of Ottawa’s Gazette writes about her findings, and what they say about gender discrimination within the field of computer science.

Researchers at MIT and the Max Planck Institute have developed a method for quick, on-site E. coli detection in food. While current food safety testing either requires days to complete or expensive equipment, this new method, paired with a smartphone and QR code, will make testing inexpensive and portable. The new detection process uses Janus emulsions, droplets consisting of two hemispheres of different densities. In water, the less dense, hydrocarbon hemisphere sits above the denser hemisphere

Intended to replace the Avro Canada CF-100, the CF-105 Arrow was a technical masterpiece at the forefront of aviation engineering during its time. The Canadian government believed, however, that the manned bomber threat was diminishing and that air defence could be better handled by unmanned BOMARC missiles. The contract was cancelled on February 20, 1959 while test flying was still in progress. By then five Arrows had flown. The government ordered all completed Arrows, related documentation