Epoch – Shamskm.com

‘Sideline quasars’ helped to stifle early galaxy formation, says CU study

By Guest PostMarch 31, 2013Scienceastronomers, big bang, black holes, boulder, brightest quasars, caltech astronomer, cos, cosmic web, dark ages, david syphers, early universe, Epoch, fossil record, galaxy formation, gaseous material, gases in universe, generations of stars, helium atoms, helium gas, helium reionization era, Hubble Space Telescope, intergalactic global warming, intergalactic medium, ionizing radiation, lighthouse, maarten schmidt, michael shull, neutral helium gas, planetary sciences, plasma, quasar, quasi stellar, radio source, sideline quasars, stars or galaxies, swiss cheese, ultraviolet spectrograph, universe, university of colorado

University of Colorado Boulder astronomers targeting one of the brightest quasars glowing in the universe some 11 billion years ago say “sideline quasars” likely teamed up with it to heat abundant helium gas billions of years ago, preventing small galaxy formation.

CU-Boulder Professor Michael Shull and Research Associate David Syphers used the Hubble Space Telescope to look at the quasar — the brilliant core of an active galaxy that acted as a “lighthouse” for the observations — to better understand the conditions of the early universe. The scientists studied gaseous material between the telescope and the quasar with a $70 million ultraviolet spectrograph on Hubble designed by a team from CU-Boulder’s Center for Astrophysics and Space Astronomy. (more…)

Genetic Patterns of Deep-Sea Coral Provide Insights into Evolution of Marine Life

By Guest PostNovember 17, 2012Environment, Natureancient, barnacles, biodiversity, biogeography, bivalves, bryozoans, bubblegum coral, canyons, circulation model, climate change, continental slopes, coral, cryptic species, csiro, deep sea coral, early pliocene, eastern north pacific, Epoch, fjords, gastropods, gene flow, genetic diversity pattern, geological features, global warming, historical pattern, hypothesis, juan sanchez, late-miocene, marine life, marine organism, migration, migration pattern, moss animals, niwa, north atlantic, ocean acidification, oceanic circulation, organism, paragorga arborea, pattern, period, ph, red algae, santiago herrera, sea stars, seagrass, seamounts, South Pacific, southern indian, species, spiny dogfishes, timothy shank, trans arctic interchange, western north pacific, whoi

Patterns Also Shed Light on How Environmental Disturbances Affect Aquatic Organisms

The ability of deep-sea corals to harbor a broad array of marine life, including commercially important fish species, make these habitat-forming organisms of immediate interest to conservationists, managers, and scientists. Understanding and protecting corals requires knowledge of the historical processes that have shaped their biodiversity and biogeography.

While little is known about these processes, new research described in the journal Molecular Ecology helps elucidate the historical patterns of deep-sea coral migration and gene flow, coincident with oceanic circulation patterns and events. The investigators propose a scenario that could explain the observed evolutionary and present-day patterns in certain coral species. The findings can help scientists determine how climate change and other global processes have affected ocean habitats in the past and how they might do so in the future. (more…)

First Stars, Galaxies Formed more Rapidly than Expected

By Guest PostSeptember 9, 2012Scienceanalysis, anisotropy probe, Antarctica, astronomer, background, Berkeley, california, christian reichardt, cmb, cosmic microwave, cosmological evolution, data, earth axis, electron, Epoch, Galaxy, geographic, herschel satellite, high resolution, hydrogen atom, image, john carlstrom, kavli foundation, microwave, millimeter wavelength, national, neutral, neutral gas, oliver zahn, period, plasma, polar plateau, proton, radiation, reionization, s chandrasekhar, science foundation, south pole, star, telescope, ultraviolet light, universe, university, wilkinson

Analysis of data from the National Science Foundation’s South Pole Telescope, for the first time, more precisely defines the period of cosmological evolution when the first stars and galaxies formed and gradually illuminated the universe. The data indicate that this period, called the epoch of reionization, was shorter than theorists speculated — and that it ended early.

“We find that the epoch of reionization lasted less than 500 million years and began when the universe was at least 250 million years old,” said Oliver Zahn, a postdoctoral fellow at the Berkeley Center for Cosmological Physics at the University of California, Berkeley, who led the study. “Before this measurement, scientists believed that reionization lasted 750 million years or longer, and had no evidence as to when reionization began.” (more…)

NASA’s Spitzer Detects Comet Storm in Nearby Solar System

By Guest PostOctober 20, 2011Sciencealien solar system, almahata sitta meteorite, bright star in the northern sky, carey lisse, comets, dark seas, earth, Epoch, eta corvi, hailstorm, kuiper belt, late heavy bombardment, man in the moon, maria, NASA, solar system, spitzer space telescope

PASADENA, Calif. — NASA’s Spitzer Space Telescope has detected signs of icy bodies raining down in an alien solar system. The downpour resembles our own solar system several billion years ago during a period known as the “Late Heavy Bombardment,” which may have brought water and other life-forming ingredients to Earth.

During this epoch, comets and other frosty objects that were flung from the outer solar system pummeled the inner planets. The barrage scarred our moon and produced large amounts of dust. (more…)

Mammals Grew 1,000 Times Larger After the Demise of the Dinosaurs

By Guest PostNovember 27, 2010Scienceafrican elephant, body size patterns, deinotherium, dinosaurs, early pleistocene, eocene, Epoch, evolution of body size, extinction of dinosaurs, felisa smith, indricotherium, late-miocene, mammals, oligocene, saran twombly, united states, university of new mexico

*NSF enabled the assembly of an international, interdisciplinary team that was the first to quantitatively document body size patterns over the past 100 million years*

Researchers have demonstrated that the extinction of dinosaurs some 65 million years ago paved the way for mammals to get bigger, about a thousand times larger than they had been when dinosaurs roamed the earth. The study, released in the journal Science, is the first to quantitatively document the patterns of body size of mammals after the existence of dinosaurs.

About the Image: The largest land mammals that ever lived, Indricotherium and Deinotherium, would have towered over the living African Elephant. Indricotherium lived during the Eocene to the Oligocene Epoch (37 to 23 million years ago) and reached a mass of 15,000 kg, while Deinotherium was around from the late-Miocene until the early Pleistocene (8.5 to 2.7 million years ago) and weighed as much as 17,000 kg. Image credit: NSF RCN IMPPS (more…)

UMD-Led Team Begins Imaging Comet Hartley 2 with Deep Impact Spacecraft

By Guest PostSeptember 11, 20101 commentSciencecomet, comet shot, deep impact spacecraft, Epoch, epoxy, extrasolar planet observations and characterization, hartley 2, infrared spectrometer, kuiper astronomy prize, medium resolution instrument, michael a'hearn, mri, tempel 1, university of maryland

COLLEGE PARK, Md. — Some five years after its July 4th 2005 ‘comet shot’ was seen around the world, the Deep Impact spacecraft has begun regular imaging of a second comet target, Hartley 2. The spacecraft will continue imaging Hartley 2 during and after its closest approach on November 4, providing an extended look at the comet. However, there won’t be any fireworks this time as Deep Impact’s probe craft was destroyed in its deliberate 2005 collision with comet Tempel 1.

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Dinosaur-chewing mammals leave behind oldest known tooth marks

By Guest PostJune 24, 2010Scienceadrosaurid, alberta, aquatic reptile, canada, ceratopsid, champsosaurus, cleveland museum of natural history, deer, dinosaur, dinosaur-chewing mammals, Epoch, femur bone, journal paleontology, late cretaceous, mammalian tooth marks, marsupial, michael j. ryan, multituberculates, nicholas longrich, ornithischian, paleontologists, royal tyrrell museum of palaeontology, university of alberta laboratory for vertebrate palaeon, yale university

New Haven, Conn. — Paleontologists have discovered the oldest mammalian tooth marks yet on the bones of ancient animals, including several large dinosaurs. They report their findings in a paper published online June 16 in the journal Paleontology.

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The Bigga Snake

By ShamsFebruary 5, 2009ScienceColombia, Epoch, Paleocene, rainforest, snake, Titanoboa cerrejonensis

Scientists have just discovered, let’s say, (fortunately) met with the fossil of Titanoboa cerrejonensis (not with the living Giant).

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