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Spitzer Sees Crystal ‘Rain’ in Outer Clouds of Infant Star

By Guest PostMay 30, 2011Scienceastronomers, bill danchi, charles poteet, clouds of gas, comets, constellation orion, crystals, deep impact missions, embryonic star, forsterite crystals, green mineral, herschel space observatory, hops 68, NASA, ohio, olivine, protostar, rain, solar system, spitzer space telescope, star, stardust, tom megeath, university of toledo, young stars

PASADENA, Calif. –– Tiny crystals of a green mineral called olivine are falling down like rain on a burgeoning star, according to observations from NASA’s Spitzer Space Telescope.

This is the first time such crystals have been observed in the dusty clouds of gas that collapse around forming stars. Astronomers are still debating how the crystals got there, but the most likely culprits are jets of gas blasting away from the embryonic star. (more…)

NASA’s WISE Mission Offers a Taste of Galaxies to Come

By Guest PostMay 28, 2011Scienceblue colors, california institute of technology, colorful galaxies, edward wright, flocculent galaxies, grand design spirals, ic 342, messier 51, messier 83, Milky Way, NASA, ngc 2403, ngc 5907, sky, spiral arms, tom jarrett, wide field infrared survey explorer mission, wise

PASADENA, Calif. — An assorted mix of colorful galaxies is being released today by NASA’s Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer mission, or WISE. The nine galaxies are a taste of what’s to come. The mission plans to release similar images for the 1,000 largest galaxies that appear in our sky, and possibly more.

“Galaxies come in all sorts of delicious flavors,” said Tom Jarrett, a WISE team member at the Infrared Processing and Analysis Center, California Institute of Technology, in Pasadena, who studies our Milky Way’s neighboring galaxies. “Our first sample shows what WISE is capable of. We can produce spectacular high-resolution images of the largest galaxies.” (more…)

Scientists Discover Fossil of Giant Ancient Sea Predator

By Guest PostMay 27, 2011Scienceancient sea predator, anomalocaridid creature, cambrian animals, cambrian explosion

Paleontologists have discovered that a group of remarkable ancient sea creatures existed for much longer and grew to much larger sizes than previously thought, thanks to extraordinarily well-preserved fossils discovered in Morocco. (more…)

Mars: Red Planet’s Rapid Formation Explains Its Small Size Relative to Earth

By Guest PostMay 27, 2011Scienceali pourmand, atmosphere, chemical behavior, chondrites, composition of chondrites, computer simulation, dauphas and pourmand, earth, embryos, enriqueta barrera, fine scale chronology, geophysicist, hafnium, lithophile elements, mantle of mars, mars, martian meteorites, national science foundation, nicolas dauphas, non volatile elements, nsf, radioactive decay, red planet, refractory, solar system, tungsten in meteorites, tungsten isotopic composition, university of chicago, xenon content

*Mars developed far more quickly than our blue planet*

Mars developed in as little as two to four million years after the birth of the solar system, far more quickly than Earth, according to results of a new study published in this week’s issue of the journal Nature.

The red planet’s rapid formation helps explain why it is so small, say the study’s co-authors, Nicolas Dauphas at the University of Chicago and Ali Pourmand at the University of Miami. (more…)

Just Four Percent of Galaxies Have Neighbors Like the Milky Way

By Guest PostMay 26, 2011Scienceanalyses of data, big bang, cdm, cold dark matter theory, computer model, formation of our galaxy, Galaxy, luminosity, magellanic clouds, Milky Way, nigel sharp, optical sky, risa wechsler, sdss, stanford university, universe

*Our home galaxy belongs to a rare subset among the billions that populate the cosmos*

How unique is the Milky Way?

To find out, a group of researchers led by Stanford University astrophysicist Risa Wechsler compared the Milky Way to similar galaxies and found that just four percent are like the galaxy Earth calls home. (more…)

Ants Give New Evidence for Interaction Networks

By Guest PostMay 25, 2011Culture, Scienceanna dornhaus, ant species, antennae, ants antennate, benjamin blonder, daniel wolf, dornhaus and blonder, evolutionary argument, Facebook, han jing, information, interaction networks, internet, kayla lauger, local grapevine, milan curry, paradigm, self directed networks, southern arizona, temnothorax rugatulus, trophallaxis, tuan cao, unique color code, university of arizona

*UA researchers have uncovered evidence in ant colonies suggesting that social networks may function differently than previously assumed.*

Be it through the Internet, Facebook, the local grapevine or the spread of disease, interaction networks influence nearly every part of our lives.

Scientists previously assumed that interaction networks without central control, known as self-directed networks, have universal properties that make them efficient at spreading information. Just think of the local grapevine: Let something slip, and it seems like no time at all before nearly everyone knows. (more…)

Replacing the Blue Bloods

By Guest PostMay 24, 2011Scienceblue bloods, endotoxin test, horseshoe crab blood, liquid crystal droplets, liquid crystals

Liquid crystal droplets could replace horseshoe crab blood in common endotoxin test

The Food and Drug Administration requires every drug they certify to be tested for certain poisons that damage patient health. The current gold standard for this is the limulus amoebocyte lysate (LAL) assay that involves using the blood of horseshoe crabs, which strangely enough is blue, to test for endotoxin, a substance commonly associated with many symptoms caused by bacterial infections. (more…)

Sharpening The Nanofocus: Berkeley Lab Researchers Use Nanoantenna to Enhance Plasmonic Sensing

By Guest PostMay 23, 2011Scienceantenna enhanced gas sensing, berkeley lab, biochemical agents, biosensing, catalytic processes, chemical or biological events, confinement of electromagnetic waves, double electron beam lithography, german ministry of research, Germany, gold nanoantenna, harald giessen, laura na liu, localized surface plasmon resonance, lspr, mario hentschel, metallic nanostructures, ming tang, nanocatalysts, nanofocus, nanoreactors, optical detection, palladium nanoparticle, particle level, paul alivisatos, plasmonics, plasmons, university of california, university of stuttgart, wavelength

Such highly coveted technical capabilities as the observation of single catalytic processes in nanoreactors, or the optical detection of low concentrations of biochemical agents and gases are an important step closer to fruition. Researchers with the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE)’s Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (Berkeley Lab), in collaboration with researchers at the University of Stuttgart in Germany, report the first experimental demonstration of antenna-enhanced gas sensing at the single particle level. By placing a palladium nanoparticle on the focusing tip of a gold nanoantenna, they were able to clearly detect changes in the palladium’s optical properties upon exposure to hydrogen. (more…)

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