HARD SCIENCE SUPERHERO



PHYSIC is an adventure of discovery where engineering and the scientific approach, rather than derring-do, save the day.



Ysenof engages the world in terms of elementary physics. He can manipulate matter and energy, but his focus on fundamentals fails with people. He could change the world, but needs help. Abby Skipper is a people person and mind reader. Special Agent John Clark sees connections. Pauline Morcet is indestructible and haunted by a violent alter ego. Together, they will find out what made them PHYSIC.



What do a Mars rover and Ysenof have in common? Curiosity's descendent, the Mars 2020 rover, will have an instrument, PIXL, that will scan at molecular resolution by inducing fluorescence with x-rays. Ysenof utilizes multi-photon stimulation to control the depth at which fluorescence occurs and to avoid unnecessary collateral damage.



Curious as to what the heck an FPGA is and why they are a useful tool for the NSA and for Ysenof? Read about Microsoft's Project Catapult and how it is using Field Programmable Gate Arrays to enhance the efficiency of Bing search at wired.com (Microsoft Supercharges Bing Search With Programmable Chips).



Wonder what it might be like to be PHYSIC? Check out the SCiO on Kickstarter to learn about how the light we cannot see contains useful information. The project proposes to use hand-held near-IR spectrometry technology and cloud-based big data analytics to give users a very small taste of what it is like to be PHYSIC.