Category Astronomy/Space

ESO/M. Kornmesser METI aims to send messages to the potentially Earth-like exoplanet Proxima b, as imagined by an artist. Here it is orbiting the red dwarf star Proxima Centauri, the closest star to our solar system.

After decades of fruitless scanning the skies for alien messages, scientists say it’s time to try a basic rule of etiquette: Say “hello” first. A new San Francisco-based organization, METI, or Messaging Extra Terrestrial Intelligence, plans to send signals to distant planets, rather than waiting for them to call Earth. By the end of 2018, the project aims to send some conversation-starters via radio or laser signals to a rocky planet circling Proxima Centauri, the nearest star other than the sun, and then to more distant destinations, hundreds or thousands of light years away.

Image credit: X-ray: NASA/CXC/PSU/L. Townsley et al; Optical: UKIRT; Infrared: NASA/JPL-Caltech

Although there are no seasons in space, this cosmic vista invokes thoughts of a frosty winter landscape. It is, in fact, a region called NGC 6357 where radiation from hot, young stars is energizing the cooler gas in the cloud that surrounds them.This composite image contains X-ray data from NASA’s Chandra X-ray Observatory and the ROSAT telescope (purple), infrared data from NASA’s Spitzer Space Telescope (orange), and optical data from SuperCosmos Sky Survey (blue) made by the UK Infrared Telescope.

Located in our galaxy about 5,500 light years from Earth, NGC 6357 is actually a “cluster of clusters,” containing at least 3 clusters of young stars, including many hot, massive, luminous stars...

Image and inset of region surrounding Sagittarius A*. Credit: NASA/UMass/D.Wang et al. Inset: NASA/STSc

Scientists at Princeton University and PPPL have developed a rigorous new method for modeling the accretion disk that feeds the supermassive black hole at the center of our Milky Way galaxy. It provides a much-needed foundation for simulation of the extraordinary processes involved. Accretion disks are clouds of plasma that orbit and gradually swirl into massive bodies such as black holes – intense gravitational fields produced by stars that collapse to a tiny fraction of their original size. These collapsed stars are bounded by an “event horizon,” from which not even light can escape...

Yamazaki, C., Fujii, N., Miyazawa, Y., Kamada, M., Kasahara, H. et al. Title: The gravity-induced re-localization of auxin efflux carrier CsPIN1 in cucumber seedlings: spaceflight experiments for immunohistochemical microscopy Journal: Nature Microgravity DOI: 10.1038/npjmgrav.2016.30

Researchers in Japan have examined cucumber seedlings germinated under the very weak gravity – or microgravity – conditions of the International Space Station. Plants are experts in survival and can control the direction of their roots to maximize the use of resources around them. Using specialized cells, they can sense gravity and redistribute hormones, called auxins, to stimulate growth and allow vital features of the plant to develop...