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The US and USSR had more than 60,000 nuclear warheads pointed at each other at the height of the Cold War. While the Non-Proliferation Treaty of 1970 and START in 1994 have shrunk that figure to around 26,000, nobody is really sure how many still exist?because nobody?s ever actually verified the number of warheads, just the delivery systems. But with a new zero-knowledge protocol, arms inspectors will soon know exactly what they?re dealing with.
Cuclear regulatory agencies like the International Atomic Energy Agency toe a difficult line. They must identify and confirm the presence of nuclear warheads without revealing or discovering any information about the delivery system that houses it or the chemical makeup of the nuclear material itself (which would violate any number of state secrets). This leaves inspectors in a bit of a quandary, how do you confirm the presence of a nuclear warhead without directly inspecting the device? A team of researchers from Princeton University Plasma Physics Laboratory (PPPL) and the Department of Energy found the answer in cryptography.
The system consists of a small steel probe, a high energy particle beam and two warheads?the one being verified and a ?golden warhead,? an identical model known to contain nuclear material. Inspectors bombard the golden warhead with high energy neutrons and record how many strike a particle detector situated on the other side of the missile. This provides a baseline reading with which the inspectors can compare readings from the unverified warhead. If the numbers match, the second warhead is a nuke. If the numbers differ, it?s a regular warhead.
As John Greenwald of the PPPL explains,
The neutrons that do reach the detectors are counted and added to the number that the host nation whose warheads are being inspected had ?preloaded? into the detectors. Inspectors would measure the total number of counts in the detectors without knowing how many had been preloaded. This total count could be straightforwardly tallied with non-electronic neutron counters such as the personal dosimeters used to measure exposure to radiation in nuclear power plants.
If the total number of counts matched the number that the parties had stipulated in advance, the warhead would be found to be a true one. But if the total differed from the stipulated number, the warhead would stand exposed as a spoof. To prevent cheating by preloading detectors in such a way that a spoof would pass the test, the inspector decides on the spot which preloaded detectors will be used on the ?golden warhead? and which on the item offered for inspection.
This approach can also be applied to batch testing. Inspectors gather a large number of warheads?including a few deployed missiles that are likely to be nukes?and compare their readings. If all the warheads read the same, they?re all confirmed as nukes.
The project is funded by a $100,000 grant from the U.S. State Department as well as another $162,500 from Global Zero. ?The goal is to prove with as high confidence as required that an object is a true nuclear warhead while learning nothing about the materials and design of the warhead itself,? said co-principal investigator, physicist Robert Goldston. The team hopes to begin full phase testing by the end of the year.
If the program proves successful, it will revolutionize non-proliferation efforts by removing one of the key impediments to inspection: the protection of state secrets.
[Princeton - Arms Control - Image: PPPL]
Source: http://gizmodo.com/princeton-nuke-detector-could-spot-world-ending-warhead-484526209
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Private joyrides and research trips to the edge of space just got closer to reality. Today Virgin Galactic's suborbital plane SpaceShipTwo fired its thrusters mid-air and completed its first rocket-powered test flight high over the Mojave desert.
The commercial space plane, docked to its carrier mothership WhiteKnightTwo, took off from the Mojave Air and Space Port in southern California at 14.02 UTC Monday. The pair rose to an altitude of about 14 kilometres, and then the carrier ship released SpaceShipTwo.
Moments later, test pilots Mark Stucky and Mike Alsbury triggered ignition of the rocket motor, which flared dramatically, prompting cheers and applause from spectators on the ground.
The engine burn lasted for 16 seconds. Under its own power, SpaceShipTwo climbed to 16.7 kilometres and accelerated to 1470 kilometres per hour ? just over the speed of sound ? before beginning its descent. The entire test flight lasted about 10 minutes and ended with a smooth landing back at the spaceport.
"Today's supersonic success opens the way for a rapid expansion of the spaceship's powered flight envelope, with a very realistic goal of full space flight by the year's end," Virgin Galactic founder Richard Branson said in a written statement. "We saw history in the making today and I couldn't be more proud of everyone involved."
Ultimately, the ship's rockets will fire for 70 seconds, allowing it to carry six passengers and two pilots to a maximum altitude of about 100 kilometres, the unofficial boundary between Earth's atmosphere and space. Passengers will experience about 5 minutes of weightlessness before returning to Earth.
For now the cost per seat is $200,000, but Branson hopes to see trips get more affordable as private space flight becomes routine.
"This is a big step forward," says Alan Stern, an astronomer at the Southwest Research Institute in Boulder, Colorado and founder of private moon mission company Golden Spike. He plans to fly on a future Virgin Galactic research flight, possibly as early as 2014 if all goes well. "Suborbital is going to make a space-access revolution for researchers, educators and private individuals. It's going to be transformational."
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Anwarullah Khan / AP
Badam Zari, (right) wearing a colorful headscarf, leaves the election office after filing her candidacy for parliament in Khar, capital of the Pakistani tribal area of Bajur, on Monday.
By Mushtaq Yusufzai, Producer, NBC News
PESHAWAR, Pakistan -- A housewife in Pakistan?s tribal belt has made history by becoming the first woman from the restive and conservative region to run for office.?
?The women in the Federally Administered Tribal Areas (FATA) have faced many challenges because of unnecessary restrictions on them and rigid tribal traditions,? Badam Zari, 38, said in a telephone interview from her native Bajaur, a district in Pakistan's semi-autonomous tribal region. ?I want to give voice to our voiceless women.?
Zari, who on Monday put her name on the ballot for the May 11 parliamentary elections, has her work cut out for her. Not only is she up against 44 other candidates, Bajaur is also home to militants who have waged war against state institutions, such as schools for girls and women.?
In 2008, Pakistan?s army launched a massive operation to evict militants from the area, with soldiers flushing out many of the militants in 2011. But while Pakistani forces have managed to establish an uneasy peace in Bajaur, problems facing women have not disappeared ? Pakistan is at the bottom of world maternal mortality and women?s literacy rankings.?
Pakistani troops say they want to rebuild Waziristan, a corner of Pakistan that has become a hotbed of military activity, with financial help from the U.S. and others. But in order to do that, they insist U.S. drone strikes on the area must end. NBC's Amna Nawaz was granted exclusive access to the region that had previously been off-limits to foreigners.
Zari said she is running for office to do something about these dismal conditions. ?
?Women in Pakistan in general, and those living in the remote tribal areas in particular, have been neglected,? said Zari, who is married to a school principal. The couple do not have children.
The candidate added that past parliamentarians had served their own interests and not those of the tribal population as a whole. She vows to try to stamp out endemic corruption and boost services, such as health care and schools. While being a strong supporter of women?s education, Zari herself has only completed the fifth grade.?
Fellow Bajaur?resident Dil Faraz Khan welcomed Zari?s move, and said that existing lawmakers were corrupt and had done ?nothing? for the community.?
?I was so happy today when I heard on local FM radio that a woman would contest election,? he said. ?This woman would be far better than those corrupt politicians.??
He worried, though, that Zari would have a difficult time competing against established politicians who bribed voters to get into office.
Although some of her fellow tribesmen welcomed Zari?s move, Sahibzada Shah Jehan argued that to campaign for office ran counter to tribal traditions.
"After Malala Yousafzai, most of the women are trying to do something that could help them get popularity across the world,? he said, referring to the Pakistani schoolgirl shot in the head by militants for promoting girls' education. ?But they ignore that their action could jeopardize their lives." ?
Related:
UN envoy condemns 'Malala-style' attack on Pakistani teacher
Tough neighborhood: Can Waziristan militancy be dismantled, and society built?
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We've seen an alarming number of stories about sex attacks on female travelers in recent weeks, from a Swiss tourist who was gang-raped in India?to an American student who was raped on a van in Rio de Janeiro.
It doesn't mean that women shouldn't visit foreign places or that no parts of those countries are safe. But women traveling in these areas should do so with extreme caution and a knowledge of the culture.
We rounded up eight popular tourist destinations where women should be extra cautious, based on reports from Human Rights Watch, the State Department, and crime reports in the media.
Source: http://www.businessinsider.com/dangerous-countries-for-women-to-travel-2013-4
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WASHINGTON - Hillary Clinton stepped out of the shadows tonight at an award ceremony held to recognize leaders from around the world who worked to improve the plight of women and featuring such guests as Nicholas Kristof and Vice President Joe Biden.
The event, Vital Voices' Global Leadership Awards, was the former secretary of state's second public appearances since she left her post at the end of January.
Clinton founded the original Vital Voices Democracy Initiative as first lady in 1997 with then-Secretary of State Madeleine Albright and has attended 11 of 12 such award ceremonies - every year except 2012 when she was traveling.
She reflected on her time as first lady, fighting for women's rights with former Chief of Staff Melanne Verveer by her side against problems that are far from over. She said today a map of the world shows "too many countries where women still face violence and abuse, too many political systems that treat women like second class or even worse.
"But that's not all the map shows. It's not what Melanne and I see," Clinton said. "When we look at the map we do see progress, because we know people who are making that progress against the most extraordinary odds every day, everywhere. We see the opportunities that are there to be seized. We see, we hear those vital voices."
Though some have speculated the high-profile Democrat could go head-to-head with Biden in a future primary election, Clinton said she was "delighted" that the vice president could be at the ceremony this year.
"Vice President Biden and I have worked together on so many important issues," she said. "One that is particularly close to his heart is the fight against domestic violence, and I know what a personal victory it was for him to see the Violence Against Women Act reauthorized last month."
Biden presented an award to the event's only male honorees, three brothers who run an NGO standing up for victims of human trafficking in India.
Before introducing the Kant brothers - Ravi, Nishi and Rishi - Biden declared that the U.S. government has an obligation to stand up for equal rights for women around the globe.
"In the end we know this is more than just policies and legislation," the vice president said. "We have to change fundamental norms and we have to let women around the world know that they aren't standing alone, that they don't have to accept their circumstances, because we won't accept it either."
Biden denounced practices like forced child marriage and sexual violence that occur around the world, calling them "barbaric." In Egypt, he said, we have a responsibility to support efforts to stop mistreatment of women.
"In each of these cases we have an obligation to act not just because we have a moral obligation, which should be self-evident to every human being, but because it's in all of our interests," Biden said. "Because again to quote my little sister, 'Peace, justice and equality can never be achieved when we use only half the brain power in the world.'"
Though neither Biden nor Clinton dropped any hints about future ambitions, a group of about 30 people gathered outside the Kennedy Center to urge Clinton to run for president in 2016.
The supporters and former campaign volunteers held signs imprinted with "Ready for Hillary," and some homemade signs reading things like "Power to the Pantsuit 2016," and "Hell Yea Hillary." They waved and shouted "2016 Hillary" as cars honked pulling into the Clinton event at the Kennedy Center this evening.
"It's going to happen, it's going to happen," Ray Anderson of Arlington, Va., said, "I think she'll run - she's got to save the country, right?"
The rally was organized by Ready for Hillary, a super PAC that launched recently and declared itself set to go should Clinton decide to run in the 2016 presidential campaign. Word was put out on local college campuses, Facebook as well as the super Pac's new website.
Supporters said they came out tonight to give Clinton the "little extra push" as she is making her decision whether to run.
"I am 99 percent sure, but that's why we're here - to make it 100 percent," McKayla Masen of Massachusetts answered, when asked whether she thinks Clinton will throw her hat into the ring. "It lets her know that people are supporting her."
Supporters out tonight predicted that if Clinton runs, in their opinion, she will win the White House.
"She's unbeatable," Jazmin Gargoum of D.C. declared.
Allida Black, chair of Ready for Hillary, is a professor at George Washington University's Elliott School of International Affairs and a long-time Hillary supporter. She said she believes "very, very strongly" that if ("when," according to Black) Clinton jumps in the ring, it is her job to have a base of eager supporters ready and waiting.
"Hillary is such a leader. I mean it's in her DNA she can't get rid of it," Black said. "The issues of my lifetime are the issues that she has spent her lifetime addressing, and one of the things that those of us who formed this organization believe is that she has the stamina, the wisdom, the shrewdness, the toughness and the hugest heart that this job requires."
Clinton's next speaking engagement is just days away. On Friday she is scheduled to address the Daily Beast's Women in the World Summit in New York.
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