Category Astronomy/Space

Discovering paths the chemicals of life likely took on Earth could make it possible to calculate probabilities of life on other planets. Credit: NASA/Ames/JPL-Caltech

The evolutionary path to first proteins may have been paved with relatively easy, small steps. Ancestors of the first protein molecules, key components of all cells, could have been bountiful on pre-life Earth, according to a new study led by researchers at the Georgia Institute of Technology, who formed hundreds of possible precursor molecules in the lab. Then they meticulously analyzed the molecules with latest technology and new algorithms.

They found that the molecules, called depsipeptides, formed quickly and abundantly under conditions that would have been common on prebiotic Earth, and with ingredients that would have ...

This composite image of the Crab Nebula was assembled with arbitrary color scaling by combining data from five telescopes spanning nearly the entire electromagnetic spectrum. (Image credits: NASA, ESA, NRAO/AUI/NSF and G. Dubner/University of Buenos Aires)

New research revealed that the entire zoo of electromagnetic radiation from the Crab nebula has its origin in one population of electrons and must be produced in a different way than traditionally thought. The results have implications for our understanding of how cosmic rays attain their incredible energies. Discovered more than 100 years ago and considered a potential health risk to airplane crews and astronauts, cosmic rays are believed to be produced by shock waves -eg. those resulting from supernova explosions...

LAMOST spectra of LAMOST-HVS1 (top), LAMOST-HVS2 (middle) and LAMOST-HVS3 (bottom). The inset in each panel shows the enlarged normalized blue-arm spectrum. Credit: Huang et al., 2017.

A group of Chinese astronomers has detected 2 new unbound hypervelocity stars located over 70,000 light years away. The discovery could help scientists better understand the nature of these peculiar stars. Hypervelocity stars (HVSs) are rare objects with velocities so great that they exceed the escape velocity of the galaxy. Astronomers believe that they originate near the center of the Milky Way galaxy by dynamical interactions between binary stars and the central massive black hole. While ordinary stars have velocities around 100 km/s, the velocities of HVSs can reach even 1,000 km/s.

Although scientists e...

The ALPHA team at the ALPHA facility, CERN. Credit: CERN

New research has enabled recent experiments to make the first measurement of the 1S – 2S atomic state transition in antihydrogen. A theoretical approach was developed for the ALPHA experiment at CERN, and provides the insight needed to make high precision spectroscopic measurements of the transition energy between the 1S and 2S energy levels. As a result, successful measurements have now been made to a precision of better than one part in a billion.

The research presented by Dr Rasmussen, Professor Niels Madsen, and Professor Francis Robicheaux, also points the way forward to even higher precision measurements of the properties of antihydrogen...