Space

Comet ISON: A Tadpole Swimming In A Celestial Sea

In this Hubble Space Telescope composite image taken in April 2013, the sun-approaching Comet ISON floats against a seemingly infinite backdrop of numerous galaxies and a handful of foreground stars. The icy visitor, with its long gossamer tail, appears to ...

Article - News Staff - Aug 2 2013 - 8:32am

The Forces Controlling The Jets On Saturn's Moon Enceladus

The intensity of the jets of water ice and organic particles that shoot out from Enceladus, a moon orbiting Saturn, depends on its proximity to the ringed planet, according to data obtained by NASA's Cassini spacecraft. The finding adds to evidence th ...

Article - News Staff - Aug 4 2013 - 6:00am

Impacts Into Ancient Martian Ice Implicated In Double-Layered Ejecta Craters

There is a possible new explanation for a mysterious type of crater on the surface on Mars.  Double-layered ejecta craters (DLEs) are surrounded by debris excavated by an impactor  just like other craters. What makes DLEs different is that the debris form ...

Article - News Staff - Aug 5 2013 - 4:53pm

Cosmic Explosion From The Big Bang's Dark Ages Detected

Over 12 billion years ago, a star exploded and blasting its remains outward in twin jets at nearly the speed of light. Its glow was a million times brighter than its entire galaxy. After traveling across space for 12.7 billion years, that flash was seen b ...

Article - News Staff - Aug 6 2013 - 3:50pm

Get Ready For The Sun's Magnetic Pole To Flip

In the next few months, something big is going to happen- but don't worry if you miss it, in about 11 years, it will happen again. The sun's vast magnetic field is about to flip. The sun's magnetic field changes polarity approximately every ...

Article - News Staff - Aug 6 2013 - 5:20pm

The Young Universe- Wild Neutrinos And Our First Hundred Thousand Years

Detectives of both the amateur and occupational variety know that the best way to solve a mystery is to visit the scene where it began and look for clues. Cosmological detectives do that too, by trying to peer as far back to the Big Bang as possible. A ne ...

Article - News Staff - Aug 12 2013 - 12:49pm

PSR J1745-2900: A Magnetar At The Heart Of The Milky Way

Astronomers have discovered a pulsar at the center of our Milky Way and this magnetar-  a pulsar with extremely high magnetic fields of the order of 100 million (10 8) Tesla, about 1,000 times stronger than the magnetic fields of ordinary neutron stars- a ...

Article - News Staff - Aug 15 2013 - 9:51am

Zombie Vortices In Space

A new hypothesis by computational physicists states that "zombie vortices" help lead to the birth of a new star. They even find a way to make it about angular momentum, saying that variations in gas density lead to instability, which then genera ...

Article - News Staff - Aug 20 2013 - 6:33pm

Best Route To Alpha Centauri? Here's Your Cosmological GPS

If you're not convinced that Planet Nibiru is not hiding in an multiverse pocket of dark matter or you just want to know the best way to get to constellation Boötes so you can ask the residents of Gliese 526 if they got that email you sent from Lone ...

Article - Hank Campbell - Aug 21 2013 - 10:45am

Earth-Directed CME On The Way

On August 21st, 2013 at 1:24 am EDT, the sun erupted with an Earth-directed coronal mass ejection- CME- a solar phenomenon that can send billions of tons of particles into space and reach Earth one to three days later. These particles cannot travel throug ...

Article - News Staff - Aug 21 2013 - 9:30pm