Star goes boom, telescopes zoom
<p>Supernova in nearby Pinwheel Galaxy excites astronomers</p> <p> <span class="exclusive print">Web edition</span> : Tuesday, August 30th, 2011 </p> <p>Many people appreciate a good light show, but probably not as much as the astronomers who recently spied a rare cosmological treat.</p> <p>On August 24, telescopes at the Palomar Observatory in southern California captured a white dwarf star just 21 million light-years away ? the next state over, astronomically ? as it went supernova, exploding in a blaze of light. Scientists involved in the Palomar Transient Factory sky survey raced to record the detonation?s early death throes.</p> <p>?We think we found it probably 12 hours after it exploded,? says astronomer Mark Sullivan of the University of Oxford in England. ?The amazing thing for me is, that supernova exploded 21 million years ago. It?s taken light 21 million years to arrive. And we just happened to open up the telescope on that Wednesday night, and in came the photons.?<st
Star goes boom, telescopes zoom <p>Supernova in nearby Pinwheel Galaxy excites astronomers</p> <p> <span class="exclusive print">Web edition</span> : Tuesday, August 30th, 2011 </p> <p>Many people appreciate a good light show, but probably not as much as the astronomers who recently spied a rare cosmological treat.</p> <p>On August 24, telescopes at the Palomar Observatory in southern California captured a white dwarf star just 21 million light-years away ? the next state over, astronomically ? as it went supernova, exploding in a blaze of light. Scientists involved in the Palomar Transient Factory sky survey raced to record the detonation?s early death throes.</p> <p>?We think we found it probably 12 hours after it exploded,? says astronomer Mark Sullivan of the University of Oxford in England. ?The amazing thing for me is, that supernova exploded 21 million years ago. It?s taken light 21 million years to arrive. And we just happened to open up the telescope on that Wednesday night, and in came the photons.?<st
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POPSInvisible hand in invisible matter. Dark matter might not exist. Dr Famaey added, "If we account for our observations with a modified law of gravity, it makes perfect sense to replace the effective action of hypothetical dark matter with a force closely related to the distribution of visible matter." The implications of the new research could change some of the most widely held scientific theories about the history and expansion of the universe. Lead researcher Dr. Gianfranco Gentile at the University of Ghent concludes, "Understanding this puzzling conspiracy is probably the key to unlock the formation of galaxies and their structures." What about NASA's direct proof on dark matter's existance? Broken study? This is actually makes sense, but so far is a little hard to accept. Does anyone have any ideas about this?
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POPSFirst extra-galactic planet spotted in Andromeda The advantage of microlensing is that it works best for more distant objects so it's ideal for planet hunting in other galaxies. In theory, it should be possible to see Earth-sized objects in this way. The disadvantage is that microlensing is a relatively rapid, one-off event that lasts a few days at most. That makes observations difficult to verify. And today a new analysis from Ingrosso and co shows that this companion has a mass about 6 times that of Jupiter. That's heading into brown dwarf territory but it's also well within planetary territory too.
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