Physics in the News

Sunday, June 29, 2014

Gravity is Driving Growth of the Universe

Astronomers Confirm from 600,000 Galaxies

via dailygalaxy

The Grandfather Paradox

The "grandfather paradox": Time travel raises the spectrum of possibly changing life events. Photo: Universal Studios — The “grandfather paradox”: Time travel raises the spectrum of possibly changing life events. Photo: Universal Studios

NASA ‘flying saucer’ Success: A better way to land on Mars?

via theguardian

NASA’s Robot Astronaut Inspiring Tech Advances Here on Earth

Aboard the International Space Station, astronaut Karen Nyberg indulges in a moment of levity with Robonaut 2. Image tweeted on June 28, 2013.

The Most Mathematically Perfect Day of the Year

The Paley graph of order 9 is a perfect graph, making it an appropriate object of veneration and study on June 28, a perfect day. Image: David Eppstein. (Credit: Wikimedia)

via scientificamerican

Delving into Dark Matter

Theory says there may be disk of it at center of galaxy. (Credit: Shutterstock) — Theory says there may be disk of it at center of galaxy.

via theepochtimes

Physics in the News

Saturday, June 28, 2014

The Space-Based Quantum Cryptography Race

: via technologyreview

Space football fever: NASA astronauts lose hair in World Cup bet (VIDEO)

STEREO probes operations will be curtailed for more than a year

Illustration of the positions of the two STEREO spacecraft show that they attain 180 degrees of separation in Feb. 2011, thus allowing the world to see the entire Sun for the first time. (Credit: NASA/STEREO/SSC)

via thewatchers

Oppenheimer’s Folly: On black holes, fundamental laws and pure and applied science

Einstein and Oppenheimer: Both men in their later years dismissed black holes as anomalies, unaware that they contained some of the deepest mysteries of physics (Image: Alfred Eisenstaedt, LIFE magazine)

via scientificamerican

Physicists Think They Can Solve the Mysteries of Quantum Mechanics, Cosmology, and Black Holes in One Go

Hubble Space Telescope image. (Credit: NASA, ESA, G. Illingworth, D. Magee, and P. Oesch (University of California, Santa Cruz), R. Bouwens (Leiden University), and the HUDF09 Team)

via scientificamerican

The Smallest Black Hole in the Universe (Synopsis)

A binary system containing a stellar-mass black hole called IGR J17091. The strong gravity of the black hole, on the left, is pulling gas away from a companion star on the right. This gas forms a disk of hot gas around the black hole, and the wind is driven off this disk(Credit: NASA/CXC/M.Weiss)

via scienceblogs.com

Physicists’ findings improve advanced material

A new technique developed by a Binghamton University physicist and his colleagues will improve the quality of flexible, conductive, transparent glass. — A new technique developed by a Binghamton University physicist and his colleagues will improve the quality of flexible, conductive, transparent glass. (Credit: NASA)

Physics in the News

Thursday, June 26, 2014

Confirmed: That Was Definitely the Higgs Boson Found at LHC

Candidate Higgs boson events from collisions between protons in the LHC. The top event in the CMS experiment shows a decay into two photons (dashed yellow lines and green towers). The lower event in the ATLAS experiment shows a decay into 4 muons (red tracks).[ — Candidate Higgs boson events from collisions between protons in the LHC. The top event in the CMS experiment shows a decay into two photons (dashed yellow lines and green towers). The lower event in the ATLAS experiment shows a decay into 4 muons (red tracks).(Credit: NASA)

via discovermagazine

Einsteins biggest blunder? The 25-year-old supernova that could change the speed of light forever

A time sequence of Hubble Space Telescope images, taken in the 15 years from 1994 to 2009, showing the collision of the expanding supernova remnant with a ring of dense material ejected by the progenitor star 20,000 years before the supernova. (Credit: NASA)

via extremetech

New Math Technique Improves Atomic Property Predictions to Historic Accuracy

Computational techniques developed by a team from NIST and IU could enable precise computation of atomic properties that are important for nuclear medicine, as well as astrophysics and other fields of atomic research. Image: Paco Ayala (Fotolia)

via sciencenewsline

We may have just glimpsed dark matter, about 240 million light years away

The Perseus galaxy cluster. — The Perseus galaxy cluster is one of the most massive objects in the universe, containing thousands of galaxies immersed in a vast cloud of multimillion degree gas. (Credit: NASA)

Supermassive black hole trio discovered

Two closely orbiting black holes in a galaxy about 4.2 billion light-years from Earth emit wavy jets, seen as a bluish spiral, while the third black hole in the trio is more distant, emitting linear jets off to the right.

Catching A Gravitational Wave

Monash and Warwick astronomers are searching for gravitational waves emitted by Scorpius X-1.

Clumped galaxies give General Relativity its toughest test yet

More than 600 000 galaxies from the BOSS survey were utilized to measure the strength of gravitational interactions of galaxies extremely far away from each other. This is a visual representation of that measurement; the amount that the circles are distorted, or squashed from perfect concentric rings, indicates the velocity that galaxies are falling towards each other and hence the strength of the gravitational interactions. Credit: BOSS/U. Portsmouth — More than 600 000 galaxies from the BOSS survey were utilized to measure the strength of gravitational interactions of galaxies extremely far away from each other. This is a visual representation of that measurement; the amount that the circles are distorted, or squashed from perfect concentric rings, indicates the velocity that galaxies are falling towards each other and hence the strength of the gravitational interactions. (Credit: BOSS/U. Portsmouth)

Physics in the News

Tuesday, June 24, 2014

Science and spacewalks on Space Station

This might look like a routine scientific experiment, but you’re actually looking at European Space Agency astronaut Alexander Gerst as he sets fire to samples of various solids aboard the International Space Station to see how they burn. This man truly has a wonderful job. (Credit: ESA)

Universe Shouldn’t Be Here, According to Higgs Physics

The BICEP2 telescope at twilight, which occurs only twice a year at the South Pole. The MAPO observatory (home of the Keck Array telescope) and the South Pole station can be seen in the background.

via livescience

SpaceX puts Falcon 9 rocket launch on hold until July

A SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket carrying a payload of Orbcomm communications satellites is seen at launch complex 40 after an attempted launch was scrubbed due to technical issues at the Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in Cape Canaveral, Fla.

Magic Island on Saturn’s Moon Performs Mysterious Vanishing Act

via guardianlv.com

Satellite Swarm Spots North Pole Drift

Swarm measurements of Earth’s magnetic field from June 2014. Blue areas show where it has weakened. (Credit ESA/DTU Space)

Greetings from Earth! NASA Spacecraft to Carry Message for Aliens

The Golden Record carried a message from Earth on board NASA's Voyager 1 and Voyager 2 missions. (Credit: NASA) — The Golden Record carried a message from Earth on board NASA’s Voyager 1 and Voyager 2 missions.
(Credit: NASA)

Physics in the News

Friday, June 20, 2014

Nasa Picks Out Prime Targets For Asteroid Grab

An artist's conception of two possible views of asteroid 2011 MD. (Image courtesy NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory) — An artist’s conception of two possible views of asteroid 2011 MD. (Image courtesy NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory)

via nau

Some Highly Scientific Data 🙂 Physics Invents the Emoticon

The end of an era: Just 18 percent of survey respondents report using the full-faced emoticon. — The end of an era: Just 18 percent of survey respondents report using the full-faced emoticon. (Credit

via theatlantic

If Spacetime Were a Superfluid, Would It Unify Physics—or Is the Theory All Wet?

Light from the Crab Nebula (shown here in a Hubble Space Telescope photo) limits the possibilities for fluid spacetime. NASA/ESA/ASU/J. Hester — Light from the Crab Nebula (shown here in a Hubble Space Telescope photo) limits the possibilities for fluid spacetime. (Credit:NASA/ESA/ASU/J. Hester)

via scientificamerican

Swiftly Moving Gas Streamer Eclipses Supermassive Black Hole

This is an illustration of the physical, spatial and temporal picture for the outflows emanating from the vicinity of the super massive black hole in the galaxy NGC 5548. The behavior of the emission source in five epochs is shown along the time axis. The obscurer is situated at roughly 0.03 light years (0.01 parsecs) from the emission source and is only seen in 2011 and 2013 (it is much stronger in 2013). Outflow component 1 shows the most dramatic changes in its absorption troughs. Different observed ionic species are represented as colored zones within the absorbers. Credit: Ann Feild/Space Telescope Science Institute

Dr. Ed Dowdye: Solar gravitation and solar plasma wave propagation on interaction – EU 2014

via thewatchers

Confirmed, finally: D-Wave quantum computer is sluggish

Jeremy Hilton, D-Wave's vice president of processor development, with one of the company's quantum computers. Screenshot by Nick Statt/CNET — Jeremy Hilton, D-Wave’s vice president of processor development, with one of the company’s quantum computers. Screenshot by Nick Statt/CNET

via cnet