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"Everything should be as simple as it is, but not simpler", Albert Einstein
Browsing All Posts published on »December, 2011«
The physical basis of natural units and truly fundamental constants
Leonardo Hsua, Jong-Ping Hsua Abstract: The natural unit system, in which the value of fundamental constants such as c and h-bar are set equal to one and all quantities are expressed in terms of a single unit, is usually introduced as a calculational convenience. However, we demonstrate that this system of natural units has aphysical […]
NASA’s GRAIL-A Spacecraft few hours away from Moon
December 31, 2011
PASADENA, Calif. – NASA’s Gravity Recovery And Interior Laboratory (GRAIL)-A spacecraft is within 24 hours of its insertion burn that will place it into lunar orbit. At the time the spacecraft crossed the milestone at 1:21 p.m. PST today (4:21 p.m. EST), the spacecraft was 30,758 miles (49,500 kilometers) from the moon. Launched aboard the […]
Stephen Hawking seeks help to make voice heard
December 30, 2011
Graduate Assistant to Stephen Hawking The above post is expected to become available shortly, with a starting date around 20th-27th February 2012. The salary is expected to be in the region of £25k; the exact value will be confirmed in the near future. Disclaimer: This is not an official job applications page, however similar it may look! The […]
The Galactic Centre – A Laboratory for Starburst Galaxies (?)
December 30, 2011
Roland M. Crocker The Galactic centre – as the closest galactic nucleus – holds both intrinsic interest and possibly represents a useful analogue to star-burst nuclei which we can observe with orders of magnitude finer detail than these external systems. The environmental conditions in the GC – here taken to mean the inner 200 pc […]
Soyuz back in service after failed launch
December 29, 2011
By Jonathan Amos Five days after a failed launch, the Russian Soyuz rocket system has been pressed back into service. The vehicle successfully put six spacecraft in orbit for US satellite phone and data company, Globalstar. The Soyuz lifted away from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan at 1709 GMT, ejecting the last of the six […]
Feynman Path Integral approach …
December 27, 2011
… to electron diffraction for one and two slits, analytical results Mathieu Beau (STP-DIAS) In this article we present an analytic solution of the famous problem of diffraction and interference of electrons through one and two slits (for simplicity, only the one-dimensional case is considered). It can thus be considered a complement to a recent […]
Mobile Phone in Faraday Cage
December 27, 2011
M M J French A Faraday cage is an interesting physics phenomena where an electromagnetic wave can be excluded from a volume of space by enclosure with an electrically conducting material. The practical application of this in the classroom is to block the signal to a mobile phone by enclosing it in a metal can! […]
Type III Dyson Sphere of Highly Advanced Civilizations ….
December 27, 2011
… around a Super Massive Black Hole Makoto Inoue, Hiromitsu Yokoo We describe a new system for a society of highly advanced civilizations around a super massive black hole (SMBH), as an advanced Type III “Dyson Sphere“, pointing out an efficient usage of energy for the advanced civilizations. SMBH also works as a sink for […]
Inside Euler’s Head Or how to see a telescope through the walls of its dome
December 26, 2011
As night was falling over ESO’s La Silla Observatory in Chile on 20 December 2009, the sky was not yet dark enough for the telescopes to start observations. But conditions were perfect to perform a clever trick with the dome of the Swiss 1.2-metre Leonhard Euler Telescope: allowing us to peer inside with this photograph […]
LOFT, the Large Observatory For X-ray Timing
December 26, 2011
E. Bozzo, J. W. den Herder, M. Feroci, L. Stella, on the behalf of the LOFT consortium The Large Observatory For X-ray Timing, LOFT, was selected by the European Space Agency as one of the four Cosmic Vision M3 candidate missions to compete for a launch opportunity at the start of the 2020s. Thanks to […]
The Physics of Santa Claus
December 25, 2011
089:32:50 Mattingly: Apollo 8, Houston. [No answer.] 089:33:38 Mattingly: Apollo 8, Houston. 089:34:16 Lovell: Houston, Apollo 8, over. 089:34:19 Mattingly: Hello, Apollo 8. Loud and clear. 089:34:25 Lovell: Roger. Please be informed there is a Santa Claus. 089:34:31 Mattingly: That’s affirmative. You’re the best ones to know. -NASA The world is an awfully big place […]
NORAD and Satellite Technology Help Santa Deliver
December 24, 2011
According to the U.S. Department of Commerce Census Bureau, the world’s population is approximately 7 billion (6,979,978,073+) people. Santa Claus has had to adapt over the years to having less and less time to deliver gifts to more people. To better assure prompt deliveries and safe flights, higher technology systems are increasingly being used by […]
The Fine-Tuning of the Universe for Intelligent Life
December 23, 2011
Luke A. Barnes The fine-tuning of the universe for intelligent life has received a great deal of attention in recent years, both in the philosophical and scientific literature. The claim is that in the space of possible physical laws, parameters and initial conditions, the set that permits the evolution of intelligent life is very small. […]
Searching for Higgs: from LEP towards LHC
December 23, 2011
W.-D. Schlatter (CERN), P. M. Zerwas (DESY) After a brief introduction to the theoretical basis of the Higgs mechanism for generating the masses of elementary particles, the experimental searches for Higgs particles will be summarized, from bounds at LEP to inferences for LHC. The report will focus on the Standard Model, though some central results […]
The most amazing thing I have ever seen in space
December 22, 2011
Space Station Commander Captures Unprecedented View of Comet Ιnternational Space Station Commander Dan Burbank captured spectacular imagery of Comet Lovejoy as seen from about 240 miles above the Earth’s horizon on Wednesday, Dec. 21. Today Burbank described seeing the comet two nights ago as “the most amazing thing I have ever seen in space,” in […]
NASA Snow Cover Maps
December 22, 2011
NASA has released a video that highlights where snow graced the Earth every month for over the past ten years. http://youtu.be/WfHvujaE2hI Read more: dailygalaxy.com
A Horseshoe Einstein Ring from Hubble
December 22, 2011
Explanation: What’s large and blue and can wrap itself around an entire galaxy? A gravitational lens mirage. Pictured above, the gravity of a luminous red galaxy (LRG) has gravitationally distorted the light from a much more distant blue galaxy. More typically, such light bending results in two discernible images of the distant galaxy, but here […]
Distant Galaxy Bursts with Stars
December 22, 2011
This image shows one of the most distant galaxies known, called GN-108036, dating back to 750 million years after the Big Bang that created our universe. The galaxy’s light took 12.9 billion years to reach us. The galaxy was discovered and confirmed using the Subaru telescope and the W.M. Keck Observatory, respectively, both located atop […]
LHC reports discovery of its first new particle
December 22, 2011
The Large Hadron Collider (LHC) on the Franco-Swiss border has made its first clear observation of a new particle since opening in 2009. Known as Chi-b (3P), it is a boson – the label given to particles that can carry the forces of nature. The as-yet unpublished discovery isreported on the Arxiv pre-print server. The […]
What Higgs result means for dark matter conspiracy
December 21, 2011
RECENT hints of a featherweight Higgs boson don’t just take us nearer to a complete standard model of physics. The results affect a possible link between the Higgs and dark matter, the invisible stuff making up 80 per cent of the universe’s matter. The Higgs is the last remaining hole in the standard model, the […]
Celestial Bauble Intrigues Astronomers
December 21, 2011
With the holiday season in full swing, a new image from an assembly of telescopes has revealed an unusual cosmic ornament. Data from NASA’s Chandra X-ray Observatory and ESA’s XMM-Newton have been combined to discover a young pulsar in the remains of a supernova located in the Small Magellanic Cloud, or SMC. This would be […]
‘New metal type’ at Earth’s core
December 20, 2011
The composition of the Earth’s core remains a mystery. Scientists know that the liquid outer core consists mainly of iron, but it is believed that small amounts of some other elements are present as well. Oxygen is the most abundant element in the planet, so it is not unreasonable to expect oxygen might be one […]
At Last, Earth-Sized Alien Worlds
December 20, 2011
space.com NASA Discovers First Earth-size Planets Beyond Our Solar System NASA’s Kepler mission has discovered the first Earth-size planets orbiting a sun-like star outside our solar system. The planets, called Kepler-20e and Kepler-20f, are too close to their star to be in the so-called habitable zone where liquid water could exist on a planet’s surface, […]
New evidence for complex molecules on Pluto’s surface
December 20, 2011
Southwest Research Institute (SwRI) The new and highly sensitive Cosmic Origins Spectrograph aboard the Hubble Space Telescope has discovered a strong ultraviolet-wavelength absorber on Pluto’s surface, providing new evidence that points to the possibility of complex hydrocarbon and/or nitrile molecules lying on the surface, according to a paper recently published in the Astronomical Journal by […]
SOFIA Observatory Peers Into Heart of Orion Nebula
December 20, 2011
This graphical representation from the SOFIA Science Center compares two infrared images of the heart of the Orion nebula captured by the FORCAST camera on the SOFIA airborne observatory’s telescope with a wider image of the same area from the Spitzer space telescope. (SOFIA image — James De Buizer / NASA / DLR / USRA […]
Solar flares as harbinger of new physics
December 20, 2011
K. Zioutas, M. Tsagri, Y. Semertzidis, T. Papaevangelou, E. Georgiopoulou, A. Gardikiotis, T. Dafni This work provides additional evidence on the involvement of exotic particles like axions and/or other WISPs, following recent measurements during the quietest Sun and flaring Sun. Thus, SPHINX mission observed a minimum basal soft X-rays emission in the extreme solar minimum […]
Moon, Saturn and Spica
December 19, 2011
The Moon and two bright companions line up across the southeast before dawn tomorrow. The closer of the Moon’s companions is Spica, the leading light of the constellation Virgo. It’s to the left or lower left of the Moon. The other is the planet Saturn, which is to the left of Spica. Saturn is the […]
An early explanation of the periodic table
December 19, 2011
Lars Vegard and X-ray spectroscopy Helge Kragh The Norwegian physicist Lars Vegard may have been the first to propose electron configurations for all the chemical elements, from hydrogen to uranium, on the basis of quantum atomic theory. This he did in papers of 1918-1919 in which he argued that the principal quantum number corresponded to […]
Mystery of car battery’s current solved
December 19, 2011
Chemists have solved the 150 year-old mystery of what gives the lead-acid battery, found under the bonnet of most cars, its unique ability to deliver a surge of current. Lead-acid batteries are able to deliver the very large currents needed to start a car engine because of the exceptionally high electrical conductivity of the battery […]
NASA | RXTE Detects ‘Heartbeat’ Of Smallest Black Hole Candidate
December 19, 2011
http://youtu.be/YlHS-JlkYPI This animation compares the X-ray ‘heartbeats’ of GRS 1915 and IGR J17091, two black holes that ingest gas from companion stars. GRS 1915 has nearly five times the mass of IGR J17091, which at three solar masses may be the smallest black hole known. A fly-through relates the heartbeats to hypothesized changes in the […]
Why Detecting a Parallel Universe May be Impossible
December 19, 2011
Are there parallel universes? And how will we know? Researchers from the universities of Calgary and Waterloo in Canada and the University of Geneva in Switzerland have published a paper this week in Physical Review Letters explaining why we don’t usually see the physical effects of quantum mechanics and why it may be impossible to […]
The Milky Way panorama
December 18, 2011
This magnificent 360-degree panoramic image, covering the entire southern and northern celestial sphere, reveals the cosmic landscape that surrounds our tiny blue planet. This gorgeous starscape serves as the first of three extremely high-resolution images featured in the GigaGalaxy Zoom project, launched by ESO within the framework of the International Year of Astronomy 2009 (IYA2009). The […]
Did Poincaré discover Special Relativity?
December 18, 2011
Poincaré and Special Relativity Emily Adlam Henri Poincare’s work on mathematical features of the Lorentz transformations was an important precursor to the development of special relativity. In this paper I compare the approaches taken by Poincare and Einstein, aiming to come to an understanding of the philosophical ideas underlying their methods. In section (1) I […]
Capturing video at the speed of light
December 18, 2011
…. One trillion frames per second MIT Media Lab researchers have created a new imaging system that can acquire visual data at a rate of one trillion frames per second. That’s fast enough to produce a slow-motion video of light traveling through objects. Video: Melanie Gonick. http://youtu.be/EtsXgODHMWk Read also: How to make the Slowest Slow-Motion Video […]
Top 10 breakthroughs for 2011
December 17, 2011
…. according to physicsworld.com 1st place: Shifting the morals of quantum measurement 2nd place: Measuring the wavefunction 3rd place: Cloaking in space and time 4th place: Measuring the universe using black holes 5th place: Turning darkness into light 6th place: Taking the temperature of the early universe 7th place: Catching the flavour of a neutrino […]
Primordial Planets Explain Interstellar Dust, the Formation of Life
December 16, 2011
…. and Falsify Dark Energy Carl H. Gibson (University of California at San Diego), N. Chandra Wickramasinghe (Cardiff University and Buckingham University, UK), Rudolph E. Schild (Harvard University) Hydrogravitional-dynamics (HGD) cosmology of Gibson/Schild 1996 predicts proto-globular-star-cluster PGC clumps of Earth-mass planets fragmented from plasma at ~0.3 Myr. Protogalaxies retained the ~0.03 Myr baryonic density existing […]
Time in the 10,000-year clock
December 15, 2011
Danny Hillis, Rob Seaman, Steve Allen, Jon Giorgini The Long Now Foundation is building a mechanical clock that is designed to keep time for the next 10,000 years. The clock maintains its long-term accuracy by synchronizing to the Sun. The 10,000-Year Clock keeps track of five different types of time: Pendulum Time, Uncorrected Solar Time, […]
A gas cloud on its way toward the super-massive black hole in the Galactic Centre
December 14, 2011
Researchers have spotted a giant gas cloud spiralling into the supermassive black hole at our galaxy’s centre. Though it is known that black holes draw in everything nearby, it will be the first chance to see one consume such a cloud. As it is torn apart, the turbulent area around the black hole will become […]
Closest Type Ia Supernova in Decades Solves a Cosmic Mystery
December 14, 2011
Early close-ups of a Type Ia supernova allow Berkeley Lab scientists and their colleagues to picture its progenitor and infer how it exploded Type Ia supernovae (SN Ia’s) are the extraordinarily bright and remarkably similar “standard candles” astronomers use to measure cosmic growth, a technique that in 1998 led to the discovery of dark energy […]
Building a Massive Neutrino Hunter Beneath the Mediterranean
December 14, 2011
The second-biggest structure in human history will seek to answer deep cosmic mysteries Neutrinos may or may not move faster than light, but regardless, they’re special little things. They speed through the planet, and through you, and through everything; but, chargeless and puny, they interact with their surroundings so minimally that other particles hardly take […]
Is Dark Energy Falsifiable?
December 14, 2011
Carl H. Gibson (University of California at San Diego), Rudolph E. Schild (Harvard University) Is the accelerating expansion of the Universe true, inferred through observations of distant supernovae, and is the implied existence of an enormous amount of anti-gravitational dark energy material driving the accelerating expansion of the universe also true? To be physically useful […]
Update on the Standard Model Higgs searches in ATLAS and CMS
December 13, 2011
The main conclusion is that the Standard Model Higgs boson, if it exists, is most likely to have a mass constrained to the range 115.5-131 GeV by the ATLAS experiment, and 115-127 GeV by CMS 13 December 2011. In a seminar held at CERN today, the ATLAS and CMS experiments presented the status of their […]
Einstein-Podolsky-Rosen-Bohm laboratory experiments
December 13, 2011
Data analysis and simulation H. De Raedt, K. Michielsen, F. Jin Data produced by laboratory Einstein-Podolsky-Rosen-Bohm (EPRB) experiments is tested against the hypothesis that the statistics of this data is given by quantum theory of this thought experiment. Statistical evidence is presented that the experimental data, while violating Bell inequalities, does not support this hypothesis. […]
Lunar Eclipse Dec 2011: Threading the Needle on the Transamerica Pyramid!
December 13, 2011
Predicting exactly where to stand to have the moon strike the top of the Transamerica Pyramid in San Francisco. Each second of video translates into 2 minutes of time, so the 5 seconds of video represents 10 minutes of moon movement. Using eclipse predictions, lunar elevation angle and compass direction, I used the height of […]
The Tacoma Narrows Fallacy
December 12, 2011
Teach your teacher: the collapse of the Tacoma Narrows bridge WASN’T resonance. And I defer all arguments to the elocution of Profs. Billah and Scanlon:http://www.ketchum.org/billah/Billah-Scanlan.pdf Vortex shedding video: http://youtu.be/JI0M1gVNhbw?t=2m12s Tacoma Bridge video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3mclp9QmCGs http://youtu.be/6ai2QFxStxo
Early Black Holes Grew Big Eating Cold, Fast Food
December 12, 2011
PITTSBURGH — Researchers at Carnegie Mellon University’s Bruce and Astrid McWilliams Center for Cosmology have discovered what caused the rapid growth of early supermassive black holes – a steady diet of cold, fast food. Computer simulations, completed using supercomputers at the National Institute for Computational Sciences and the Pittsburgh Supercomputing Center and viewed using GigaPan […]
Largest-Ever Simulation of the Universe Revealed
December 12, 2011
The latest computer model of the cosmos involves 400 billion particles in a box about two thirds of the volume of the universe Back in 1970, Jim Peebles at Princeton University carried out a ground-breaking experiment. He used the new-fangled technology of computing to simulate the behaviour of a cluster of galaxies under the force […]
December 31, 2011
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