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    Category Astronomy/Space

    Most Distant Massive Churning Galaxy Cluster Identified

    January 8, 2016, Categories  Astronomy/Space

    Astronomers have detected a massive, sprawling, churning galaxy cluster that formed only 3.8 billion years after the Big Bang. The cluster, shown here, is the most massive cluster of galaxies yet discovered in the first 4 billion years after the Big Bang. Credit: NASA, European Space Agency, University of Florida, University of Missouri, and University of California

    Astronomers have detected a massive, sprawling, churning galaxy cluster that formed only 3.8 billion years after the Big Bang. The cluster, shown here, is the most massive cluster of galaxies yet discovered in the first 4 billion years after the Big Bang. Credit: NASA, European Space Agency, University of Florida, University of Missouri, and University of California

    Formed only 3.8 billion years after the Big Bang it is 10 billion light yrs from Earth and potentially comprising thousands of individual galaxies, the megastructure is about 250 trillion times more massive than the sun, or 1,000 times more massive than the Milky Way galaxy. The cluster, IDCS J1426.5+3508 (or IDCS 1426), is the most massive cluster of galaxies yet discovered in the first 4 billion years after the Big Bang.

    IDC...

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    Lab Discovery Gives Glimpse of Conditions found on Other Planets

    January 8, 2016, Categories  Astronomy/Space

    Artist's concept (stock illustration). Credit: © Kerri McClellan / Fotolia

    Artist’s concept (stock illustration). Credit: © Kerri McClellan / Fotolia

    Scientists have recreated an elusive form of material that makes up much of the giant planets in our solar system, and the sun. Experiments have given a glimpse of a previously unseen form of hydrogen that exists only at extremely high pressures, >3 million times Earth’s atmosphere. Hydrogen – among the most abundant elements in the Universe – is thought to be found in this high-pressure form in interiors of Jupiter and Saturn.

    Researchers around the world have been trying for years to create this form of the element, known as the metallic state, which is considered to be the holy grail of this field of physics. It was 1st theorised to exist 80 years ago...

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    ‘Twins’ of Superstar Eta Carinae found in Other Galaxies

    January 7, 2016, Categories  Astronomy/Space

    Location of Eta twins in galaxies M51, M101, NGC 6946, and M83. Individual Image Credits: M51: NASA/ESA/Hubble Heritage Team (STScI/AURA); M101:NASA/ESA/K. Kuntz (JHU), F. Bresolin (U. Hawaii), J. Trauger (Jet Propulsion Lab), J. Mould (NOAO), Y.-H. Chu (U. Illinois, Urbana), Canada-France-Hawaii Telescope/ J.-C. Cuillandre/Coelum/, Jacoby, B. Bohannan, and M. Hanna/ NOAO/AURA/NSF; NGC 6946: NASA/ESA/STScI/R. Gendler/Subaru Telescope (NAOJ); M83: NASA/ESA/Hubble Heritage Team (STScI/AURA) Credit: NASA, ESA and R. Khan (GSFC and ORAU)

    Location of Eta twins in galaxies M51, M101, NGC 6946, and M83. Individual Image Credits: M51: NASA/ESA/Hubble Heritage Team (STScI/AURA); M101:NASA/ESA/K. Kuntz (JHU), F. Bresolin (U. Hawaii), J. Trauger (Jet Propulsion Lab), J. Mould (NOAO), Y.-H. Chu (U. Illinois, Urbana), Canada-France-Hawaii Telescope/ J.-C. Cuillandre/Coelum/, Jacoby, B. Bohannan, and M. Hanna/ NOAO/AURA/NSF; NGC 6946: NASA/ESA/STScI/R. Gendler/Subaru Telescope (NAOJ); M83: NASA/ESA/Hubble Heritage Team (STScI/AURA) Credit: NASA, ESA and R. Khan (GSFC and ORAU)

    Eta Carinae, the most luminous and massive stellar system within 10,000 light-yrs, is best known for an enormous eruption seen in the mid-19th century that hurled an amount of material at least 10X the sun’s mass into space...

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    ‘Seeing’ Black Holes with the Naked Eye

    January 7, 2016, Categories  Astronomy/Space

    An international research team reports that the activity of black holes can be observed as visible light during outbursts, and that flickering light emerging from gases surrounding black holes is a direct indicator of this. The team's results, published in Nature, indicate that optical rays and not just X-rays provide reliable observational data for black hole activity. Credit: Eiri Ono/Kyoto University

    An international research team reports that the activity of black holes can be observed as visible light during outbursts, and that flickering light emerging from gases surrounding black holes is a direct indicator of this. The team’s results, published in Nature, indicate that optical rays and not just X-rays provide reliable observational data for black hole activity. Credit: Eiri Ono/Kyoto University

    Black hole activity can be observed via visible rays. All you need is a 20 cm telescope to observe a nearby, active black hole. An international team reports the activity of black holes can be observed as visible light during outbursts, and that flickering light emerging from gases surrounding black holes is a direct indicator of this...

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