Space

Chunky monkey galaxy to be put on South Beach diet, NASA says

This story about the "chubby" galaxy cluster Abell 1689 and dark matter made me laugh out loud. Here's the title: Chubby Galaxy Cluster Suggests Dark Energy Was Stronger Long Ago Then, later on in the story: The new dark matter map reveals t ...

Blog Post - Becky Jungbauer - Nov 14 2010 - 1:53pm

HIP 13044 B: Our Galaxy Gets A Planetary Immigrant

An exoplanet orbiting a star that entered our Milky Way from another galaxy has been detected by astronomers.  This Jupiter-like planet is unusual because it is orbiting a star nearing the end of its life and could be about to be engulfed by it.   Over the ...

Article - News Staff - Nov 18 2010 - 3:29pm

Gifts From The Sky

Every wonder what to get an astronomy fan for a present?  In this 365DOA Podcast, Emma the waitress and Sandy the diner roleplay the Meteorite Cafe.  Judging by that name, you can guess what we suggest.  Who can resist a rock older than the Earth?   Even b ...

Article - Alex "Sandy" Antunes - Nov 19 2010 - 3:09pm

NN Serpentis- Binary Star System More Like A Game Of Billiards

Astronomers using two decades of observations from many telescopes around the world have discovered an unusual star system which looks like, and may even once have behaved like, a game of snooker.  Or billiards, depending on which side of the pond you are ...

Article - News Staff - Nov 21 2010 - 11:00am

The Biggest And Smallest Satellites

The Nov 22 launch of the heaviest satellite known has everyone a twitter.   A Delta IV Heavy booster out of Kennedy put up NROL-32, a "classified spy satellite cargo for the U.S. National Reconnaissance Office". ...

Article - Project Calliope - Nov 23 2010 - 2:54pm

OGLE-LMC-CEP0227: Classical Cepheid Variables Mystery Solved?

Classical Cepheid Variables, commonly called Cepheids, are unstable stars larger and much brighter than the Sun which expand and contract in a regular way, taking anything from a few days to months to complete the cycle and the time taken to brighten and g ...

Article - News Staff - Nov 30 2010 - 11:03am

Massive Galaxies May Have Formed Much Earlier Than Predictions

Some of the universe's most massive galaxies may have formed billions of years earlier than current scientific models predict, according to findings in the Astrophysical Journal.  That conclusion was drawn because newly identified galaxies were five t ...

Article - News Staff - Nov 26 2010 - 4:00am

Melt Anything with the Sun mashup with Sun Steals Comets

MakeZine shows (not just tells, but shows) that 2 square meters of sunlight, focused, will melt anything on Earth and NASA points out that The Sun Steals Comets from Other Stars So I suggest the obvious mashup: Sun 'Chop Shop' Steals, Melts Come ...

Blog Post - Alex "Sandy" Antunes - Nov 26 2010 - 8:58pm

Pre-made CubeSats

A satellite as cute as a pumpkin, they are.  Ran into this neat post at NASAHackSpace about a Forbes report on Pumpkin Inc's pre-made CubeSats.  CubeSat itself is a specification, not a piece of off-the-shelf hardware, so Pumpkin decided to prebuild k ...

Article - Project Calliope - Dec 1 2010 - 7:54am

Red Dwarf Discovery Triples Number Of Stars In Universe

Small, dim stars known as red dwarfs have turned out to be much more prolific than previously thought, which means that the total number of stars in the universe is likely three times larger than realized.  Red dwarfs are relatively small and dim compared ...

Article - News Staff - Dec 1 2010 - 9:33pm