News Archive for December 2016

The distorted galaxy in the simulation (main image) results from a collision and merger between two galaxies. Astronomers think such a merger could be the reason why SPT0346-52 is having such a boom of stellar construction. Once the two galaxies collide, gas near the center of the merged galaxy (shown as the bright region in the center of the simulation) is compressed, producing a burst of new stars. The composite inset shows X-ray data from Chandra (blue), short wavelength infrared data from Hubble (green), infrared light from Spitzer (red) at longer wavelengths, and infrared data from ALMA (magenta) at even longer wavelengths. There is no blue at the center of the image, showing that Chandra did not detect any X-rays that could have signaled the presence of a growing black hole. Image credit: X-ray – NASA / CXC / University of Florida / J. Ma et al; optical – NASA / STScI; infrared – NASA / JPL-Caltech; radio – ESO / NAOJ / NRAO / ALMA; simulation - Simons Foundation / Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation / Flatiron Institute / Caltech / C. Hayward & P. Hopkins.

Astronomers Find Hyper-Starburst Galaxy 12.7 Billion Light-Years Away

Dec 9, 2016 by News Staff

Astronomers have used CSIRO’s Australia Telescope Compact Array (ATCA) and NASA’s Chandra X-ray Observatory to show that a recently-discovered lensed...

This view from Cassini was obtained about half a day before its first close pass by the outer edges of Saturn’s main rings during its penultimate mission phase. The view shows part of the giant, hexagon-shaped jet stream around the planet’s north pole. Each side of the hexagon is about as wide as Earth. A circular storm lies at the center, at the pole. The image was taken with Cassini’s wide-angle camera on Dec. 3, 2016, at a distance of about 240,000 miles (390,000 km) from Saturn. Image credit: NASA / JPL-Caltech / Space Science Institute.

Cassini Beams Back Spectacular Images from Its First ‘Ring-Grazing’ Orbit

Dec 9, 2016 by News Staff

NASA’s Cassini orbiter has beamed back its first photos of the gas giant Saturn and the planet’s major moons since beginning the so-called ‘ring-grazing’...

The feathered tail of a coelurosaur preserved in mid-Cretaceous amber from Kachin State, Myanmar. Image credit: Lida Xing et al, doi: 10.1016/j.cub.2016.10.008.

Feathered Dinosaur Tail Found Encased in Mid-Cretaceous Burmese Amber

Dec 9, 2016 by News Staff

An international team of paleontologists from China, Canada and the United Kingdom has discovered the tail of a non-avian theropod dinosaur (likely a coelurosaur)...

This transmission electron micrograph depicts a number of variola virions. Image credit: Fred Murphy & Sylvia Whitfield / CDC.

New Genetic Research Rewrites Evolutionary History of Smallpox

Dec 8, 2016 by News Staff

New research suggests that smallpox may not be an ancient disease but a much more modern killer that went on to become the first human disease eradicated...

Artificially grown bismuth crystal illustrating the stairstep structure, with a 1 cm3 cube of bismuth metal. Image credit: Heinrich Pniok / CC BY-NC-ND 3.0.

Scientists Observe Superconductivity in Single Crystals of Pure Bismuth

Dec 8, 2016 by News Staff

According to a team of researchers at the Tata Institute of Fundamental Research (TIFR) in Mumbai, India, pure bismuth — a semimetal with a rhombohedral...

Composite view of L2 Puppis in visible light. Image credit: Kervella et al / CNRS / University of Chile / Observatory of Paris / LESIA / ESO / ALMA.

Massive Planet-Like Object Found Circling Nearby Red Giant Star

Dec 8, 2016 by News Staff

A team of astronomers has discovered a giant object — an enormous, Jupiter-like exoplanet or a low-mass brown dwarf — orbiting an ageing red...

According to Alan Scoboria et al, many people are prone to remembering events that never happened. Image credit: Geralt.

Researchers: Half of People Believe Fake Facts

Dec 8, 2016 by News Staff

Around 50% of us are susceptible to believing we’ve experienced fictitious events, according to an international team of researchers led by Dr. Alan...

A giant of a moon appears before a giant of a planet undergoing seasonal changes in this natural color view of Titan and Saturn from NASA’s Cassini spacecraft. Image credit: NASA / JPL-Caltech / SSI.

Saturn’s Moons May Be Younger than Previously Thought

Dec 7, 2016 by News Staff

New data from NASA’s Cassini spacecraft reveal that Saturn’s moons may be younger than previously thought. A giant of a moon appears before a giant...

This image illustrates the beginning stages of an influenza infection and shows what happens after the influenza viruses enter the human body. Image credit: Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Scientists Find Long-Sought-After Mechanism that Creates Immunity to Influenza A Virus

Dec 7, 2016 by News Staff

An international team of researchers from Australia, China and the United States has shown for the first time that RNA interference is active in the response...

This map of dark matter was obtained from data from the KiDS survey, using ESO’s VLT Survey Telescope. It reveals an expansive web of dense (light) and empty (dark) regions. This image is one out of five patches of the sky observed by KiDS. The invisible dark matter is seen rendered in pink, covering an area of sky around 420 times the size of the full Moon. This image reconstruction was made by analyzing the light collected from over 3 million galaxies more than 6 billion light-years away. The observed galaxy images were warped by the gravitational pull of dark matter as the light traveled through the Universe. Some small dark regions, with sharp boundaries, appear in this image. They are the locations of bright stars and other nearby objects that get in the way of the observations of more distant galaxies and are hence masked out in the map as no weak-lensing signal can be measured in these areas. Image credit: Kilo-Degree Survey Collaboration / H. Hildebrandt & B. Giblin / ESO.

Deep Space Images Shed More Light on Dark Matter

Dec 7, 2016 by News Staff

An international research team led by Dr. Massimo Viola from the Leiden Observatory and Dr. Hendrik Hildebrandt from the Argelander-Institut für Astronomie...

Artist rendition of NASA’s TIMED spacecraft. The satellite is orbiting at 388 miles (625 km) and viewing in the anti-sunward limb direction. Image credit: NASA.

NASA’s TIMED Satellite Finds Hot Atomic Hydrogen in Earth’s Thermosphere

Dec 7, 2016 by News Staff

Using data from NASA’s TIMED satellite, scientists have discovered the existence of hot atomic hydrogen atoms in the thermosphere (from about 56 to 311...

This graphic shows the closest approaches of Cassini’s final two orbital phases. Ring-grazing orbits are shown in gray (at left); Grand Finale orbits are shown in blue. The orange line shows the spacecraft’s Sept. 2017 final plunge into Saturn. Image credit: NASA / JPL-Caltech.

NASA’s Cassini Orbiter Makes Its First ‘Ring-Grazing’ Dive

Dec 6, 2016 by News Staff

On Dec. 4, 2016 at 8:09 a.m. EST (5:09 a.m. PST), NASA’s Cassini spacecraft made its first close dive past the outer edges of Saturn’s rings. This...

Wadi Faynan, where J.P. Grattan et al found evidence of ancient pollution caused by bead making and/or repeated combustion of copper ores in hot fires. Image credit: University of Waterloo.

World’s Very First Polluted River? Scientists Find Evidence of Ancient Metallurgical Activity in Jordan

Dec 6, 2016 by News Staff

A research team led by Liverpool John Moores University scientists has discovered what could be the world’s very first polluted river, contaminated 7,000...

Bathochordaeus charon and its ‘house’ in Monterey Bay: giant larvaceans use their oikoplastic cells to secrete complex filters or ‘houses’ that allow them to concentrate and feed on particles; a ‘house’ consists of a large, diaphanous outer structure as well as a smaller, more convoluted and bi-lobed inner structure that functions as a filter; together these serve to concentrate appropriately-sized food particles from the surrounding water; in situ, larvaceans in the genus Bathochordaeus are often visible from several meters away because their houses may span a meter in longest dimension. Image credit: MBARI.

Mysterious Deep-Sea Animal Rediscovered after 116 Years

Dec 6, 2016 by Natali Anderson

Bathochordaeus charon — an extremely rare species of giant larvacean — has been rediscovered, more than a century after the only previous known...

Astronaut Bruce McCandless II, STS 41-B mission specialist, participates in a historical spacewalk. He is pictured a few meters away from the cabin of the Earth-orbiting Space Shuttle Challenger. This spacewalk represented the first use of a nitrogen-propelled, hand-controlled device called the Manned Maneuvering Unit (MMU), which allows for much greater mobility than that afforded previous space walkers who had to use restrictive tethers. Image credit: NASA.

Researchers Identify Cause of Visual Impairment in Long-Duration Mission Astronauts

Dec 6, 2016 by News Staff

Astronauts on long-duration flights experience visual impairments due to volume changes in cerebrospinal fluid, the clear fluid that helps cushion the...

Distribution of the atmospheric ammonia concentration in June, July, and August 2008 at 9.3 mile (15 km) height as observed by MIPAS. Bright areas are measurement gaps due to high cloud cover. Image credit: Michael Höpfner / Karlsruhe Institute of Technology.

Ammonia Detected in Earth’s Upper Troposphere

Dec 5, 2016 by Enrico de Lazaro

Ammonia, a compound of nitrogen and hydrogen with the formula NH3, has been found for the first time in the upper troposphere of our planet. Distribution...

Egyptian Queen Nefertari playing senet, one of the world’s earliest known board games; a painted depiction in the tomb of Nefertari, the Valley of the Queens, Thebes, Egypt.

Mummified Remains Identified as Queen Nefertari, Pharaoh Ramesses II’s Royal Spouse

Dec 5, 2016 by News Staff

A pair of mummified knees on display in the Egyptian Museum in Turin, Italy, belongs to Egyptian Queen Nefertari, the favorite wife of Pharaoh Ramesses...

Fossils of the left and right elytra of the Ball’s Antarctic tundra beetle (Antarctotrechus balli): the left elytron, 2.36 mm in length, is designated as the paratype. A small part of the right elytron of the same individual is attached along the suture near the apex. The siltstone matrix is visible along the outer margin near the apex. The small rhomb-shaped crystals on the surface are authigenic calcite; the right elytron is designated as the holotype; the elytron is 2.40 mm in length; the base is deformed by a crack and concealed by sediment grains; a small part of the left elytron of the same individual is still attached along the suture near the base. Image credit: A.C. Ashworth / T.L. Erwin.

Miocene Ground Beetle Fossils Found in Antarctica

Dec 5, 2016 by News Staff

Fossilized forewings (elytra) from two individuals, discovered at the Oliver Bluffs on the Beardmore Glacier, revealed the first ground beetle species...

This image from the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope shows the highly inclined spiral galaxy NGC 4388. Image credit: NASA / ESA / Hubble.

Hubble Captures Spectacular Image of Spiral Galaxy NGC 4388

Dec 5, 2016 by Enrico de Lazaro

The NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope has taken a colorful photo of NGC 4388, an active spiral galaxy at the core of the Virgo Cluster. This image from the...

B.H.C. Emonts et al found that the Spiderweb, a massive galaxy in the center of a distant protocluster, is forming from a large reservoir of molecular gas. In this artist’s conception of the protocluster, the protogalaxies are shown in white and pink, and the blue indicates the location of the carbon monoxide gas. Image credit: M. Kornmesser / ESO.

Astronomers Witness Birth of Massive Cluster Galaxy

Dec 3, 2016 by Enrico de Lazaro

Massive galaxies may grow from cold molecular gas that condenses as stars rather than forming in violent mergers, according to an international team of...

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