Category Astronomy/Space

Imagine being able to view microscopic aspects of a classical nova, a massive stellar explosion on the surface of a white dwarf star (about as big as Earth), in a laboratory rather than from afar via a telescope.

Cosmic detonations of this scale and larger created many of the atoms in our bodies, says MSU’s Christopher Wrede, who presented at the American Association for the Advancement of Science meeting. A safe way to study these events in laboratories on Earth is to investigate the exotic nuclei or “rare isotopes” that influence them. “Astronomers observe exploding stars and astrophysicists model them on supercomputers,” said Wrede, physics assistant professor, MSU...

A minor planet in the Solar System will officially be known as Bernardbowen from today after Australian citizen science project theSkyNet won a competition to name the celestial body. The minor planet was named by the International Centre for Radio Astronomy Research (ICRAR) in honour of their founding chairman Dr Bernard Bowen. Bernardbowen sits in the asteroid belt between Mars and Jupiter and takes 3.26 Earth years to orbit the Sun.

The minor planet was discovered on October 28, 1991, and until now has been known as (6196) 1991 UO4. Based at ICRAR, theSkyNet has been running since 2011 and sees citizen scientists donating their spare computing power to help Australian astronomers uncover the mysteries of the Universe...

The giant elliptical galaxy NGC 4472. Courtesy of David W. Hogg, Michael R. Blanton, and the Sloan Digital Sky Survey Collaboration.

The distribution of normal matter precisely determines gravitational acceleration in all common types of galaxies, a team led by Case Western Reserve University researchers reports. The team has shown this radial acceleration relation exists in nearby high-mass elliptical and low-mass spheroidal galaxies, building on last year’s discovery of this relation in spiral and irregular galaxies.

“This demonstrates that we truly have a universal law for galactic systems,” said Federico Lelli, formerly an astronomy postdoctoral fellow at Case Western Reserve University and currently a fellow at the European Southern Observatory...

SwRI scientists are studying the geology associated with the organic-rich areas on Ceres. Dawn spacecraft data show a region around the Ernutet crater where organic concentrations have been discovered (labeled “a” through “f”). The color coding shows the strength of the organics absorption band, with warmer colors indicating the highest concentrations. Credit: Image courtesy of NASA/JPL-Caltech/UCLA/ASI/INAF/MPS/DLR/IDA

Dawn spacecraft data suggest organic materials are native to the dwarf planet. NASA’s Dawn spacecraft recently detected organic-rich areas on Ceres. Scientists evaluated the geology of the regions to conclude that the organics are most likely native to the dwarf planet...