Space

Magnetic Explosions In The Distant Universe

A new theory to explain the high-energy gamma-ray emissions from collapsing stars has been put forward by an international team of researchers. Their results will be published shortly in the Monthly Notices of the RAS. Long duration gamma-ray bursts (GRBs) ...

Article - News Staff - Feb 10 2007 - 11:42pm

The Two Circuits Of Auroral Arcs

Giant electrical circuits power the magical open-air light show of the auroras, forming arcs in high-latitude regions like Scandinavia. New results obtained thanks to ESA's Cluster satellites provide a new insight into the source of the difference be ...

Article - Administrator - Mar 5 2008 - 1:29pm

The Colorful Demise Of A Sun-like Star

This NASA Hubble Space Telescope image shows the colorful "last hurrah" of a star like our Sun. The star is ending its life by casting off its outer layers of gas, which formed a cocoon around the star's remaining core. Ultraviolet light fr ...

Article - News Staff - Mar 6 2007 - 1:02am

NASA Mars Orbiter Sees Effects Of Ancient Underground Fluids

Liquid or gas flowed through cracks penetrating underground rock on ancient Mars, according to a report based on some of the first observations by NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter. These fluids may have produced conditions to support possible habit ...

Article - News Staff - Feb 16 2007 - 2:26am

First X-ray Detection Of A Colliding-wind Binary Beyond The Milky Way

Imagine two stars with winds so powerful that they eject an Earth's worth of material roughly once every month. Next, imagine those two winds colliding head-on. Such titanic collisions produce multimillion-degree gas, which radiates brilliantly in X- ...

Article - News Staff - Feb 16 2007 - 3:56pm

Earth From Space: Sandstorm Over The Mediterranean

A strong wind blows sand and dust across the Mediterranean Sea from the Libyan Desert, located in the northeast section of the Sahara Desert, to Sicily and the southern tip of the Italian Peninsula on 10 February 2007 in this Envisat image. Sandstorms are ...

Article - News Staff - Feb 16 2007 - 5:51pm

Secrets Of Dark Galaxies

Ghostly galaxies composed almost entirely of dark matter speckle the universe. Unlike normal galaxies, these extreme systems contain very few stars and are almost devoid of gas. Most of the luminous matter, so common in most galaxies, has been stripped aw ...

Article - News Staff - Feb 18 2007 - 12:50am

Universal Inflationary Theory Shows How All Comes From Nothing

There is no such thing as a free lunch, some say, but they would be wrong. In fact, the entirety of the universe defies them. According to Stanford physics Professor Andrei Linde, one of the architects of the inflationary theory, our universe (and all the ...

Article - News Staff - Feb 19 2007 - 11:03am

Integral Expands Our View Of The Gamma-ray Sky

Integral's latest survey of the gamma-ray universe continues to change the way astronomers think of the high-energy cosmos. With over seventy percent of the sky now observed by Integral, astronomers have been able to construct the largest catalogue y ...

Article - News Staff - Feb 20 2007 - 8:13pm

The Sky Through Three Giant Eyes

The ESO Very Large Telescope Interferometer, which allows astronomers to scrutinise objects with a precision equivalent to that of a 130-m telescope, is proving itself an unequalled success every day. One of the latest instruments installed, AMBER, has led ...

Article - News Staff - Feb 22 2007 - 1:44pm