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A convergence of climate, resource, technological, and economic stresses gravely threaten the future of humankind. Scientists have a special role in humankind\\\'s response, because only rigorous science can help us understand the complexities and potential consequences of these stresses. Diminishing the threat they pose will require profound social, institutional, and technological changes -- changes that will be opposed by powerful status-quo special interests. Do scientists have a responsibility to articulate the dangers of inaction to a broader event beyond simply publishing their findings in scholarly journals? Should they become more actively involved in the politics of global change?

Mutually unbiased bases (MUBs) have attracted a lot of attention the last years. These bases are interesting for their potential use within quantum information processing and when trying to understand quantum state space. A central question is if there exists complete sets of N+1 MUBs in N-dimensional Hilbert space, as these are desired for quantum state tomography. Despite a lot of effort they are only known in prime power dimensions. I will describe in geometrical terms how a complete set of MUBs would sit in the set of density matrices and present a distance between bases–a measure of unbiasedness. Then I will explain the relation between MUBs and Hadamard matrices, and report on a search for MUB-sets in dimension N=6. In this case no sets of more than three MUBs are found, but there are several inequivalent triplets.

I\'ll introduce a particular class of fundamental string configurations in the form of closed loops stabilized by internal dynamics. I\\\'ll describe their classical treatment and embedding in models of string cosmology. I\\\'ll present the quantum version and the semiclassical limit that provides a microscopic description of dipole black rings. I\\\'ll show the parametric matching between the degeneracy of microstates and the entropy of the supergravity solution.

Loop Quantum Gravity and Deformation Quantization Abstract: We propose a unified approach to loop quantum gravity and Fedosov quantization of gravity following the geometry of double spacetime fibrations and their quantum deformations. There are considered pseudo--Riemannian manifolds enabled with 1) a nonholonomic 2+2 distribution defining a nonlinear connection (N--connection) structure and 2) an ADM 3+1 decomposition. The Ashtekar-Barbero variables are generalized and adapted to the N-connection structure which allows us to write the general relativity theory equivalently in terms of Lagrange-Finsler variables and related canonical almost symplectic forms and connections. The Fedosov results are re-defined for gravitational gauge like connections and there are analyzed the conditions when the star product for deformation quantization is computed in terms of geometric objects in loop quantum gravity. We speculate on equivalence of quantum gravity theories with 3+1 and 2+2 splitting and quantum analogs of the Einstein equations.

In the \'second space age\', human spaceflight is no longer the domain of governments. Dream-chasing entrepreneurs and clever engineers are aggressively blazing new trails into the heavens and preparing the world for an era of space tourism, ultra fast point-to-point earth travel and even orbiting hotels. Having gained inside access into the top private space programs, science journalist Michael Belfiore will share his many insights on the history-making flights, the failures and fatalities, as well as the enduring passion and dreams of the real estate tycoons, dot-com billionaires, a video game programmer and other business mavericks for whom the sky is no longer the limit. They are fueling the highest-flying private rockets ever built, testing \"vertical dragsters\", and preparing to launch an inflatable space station - with the mock-up already in earth orbit. Can your ticket to ride be that far behind? space travel, human spaceflight, second space age, private space program, space tourism, orbiting hotel, entrepeneur, engineer, Rocketeers