News Archive for June 2022

Color images of NGC 1309 both before and after SN 2012Z. Image credit: NASA / ESA / Hubble / McCully et al., doi: 10.3847/1538-4357/ac3bbd.

Hubble Finds Half-Exploded Star in NGC 1309

Jun 24, 2022 by News Staff

There are different types of supernova explosions. Type Ia supernovae, also known as thermonuclear supernovae, occur in binary star systems. To trigger...

Single filament of Ca. Thiomargarita magnifica. Image credit: Jean-Marie Volland.

Newly-Discovered Species of Bacterium is Visible to Naked Eye

Jun 24, 2022 by Natali Anderson

Cells of most bacterial species are around 2 micrometers in length, with some of the largest specimens reaching 750 micrometers. The newly-discovered species,...

BepiColombo captured this view of Mercury on June 23, 2023 as the spacecraft flew past the planet for its second of six gravity assist maneuvers at Mercury. This image was taken at 09:51:07 UTC by the Mercury Transfer Module’s Monitoring Camera 3, when the spacecraft was 1,406 km from the surface of Mercury. Closest approach of 200 km took place shortly before, at 09:44 UTC. In this view, north is up. While clearly a heavily cratered region, this image also highlights some of Mercury’s volcanic history. Mercury’s smooth plains were formed by volcanic eruptions of runny lavas that spread across the planet 3.7 billion years ago -- such as the plains visible between BepiColombo’s high-gain antenna and towards Mercury’s limb. The eruptions that formed these plains did not commonly build volcanoes that we are familiar with on Earth. The floor of the 125-km-wide Heaney crater (next to BepiColombo’s high-gain antenna in the centre of this image) is covered in smooth volcanic plains, and a small mound is illuminated. This is a rare example of a candidate volcano on Mercury, which will be an important target for BepiColombo’s high resolution imaging suite once in orbit. North of Heaney, past the high-gain antenna, is the 105-km-wide Amaral crater with a clearly defined rim and a central peak cluster. The region surrounding Amaral is pockmarked with so-called secondary craters caused by material ejected from Amaral during its formation re-impacting onto the surface nearby. This texture is common around fresh craters on Mercury. Image credit: ESA / BepiColombo / MTM.

BepiColombo Makes Its Second Gravity Assist Flyby of Mercury

Jun 24, 2022 by News Staff

BepiColombo, a joint endeavor between the European Space Agency (ESA) and the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA), captured beautiful views of the...

Life reconstruction of Vampyronassa rhodanica. Image credit: Rowe et al., doi: 10.1038/s41598-022-12269-3.

Vampire Squid’s Ancestor was Active Hunter, New Study Suggests

Jun 23, 2022 by News Staff

Vampyronassa rhodanica is an ancient species of cephalopod that lived in the Jurassic oceans some 164 million years ago. Life reconstruction of Vampyronassa...

Schematic illustration of the quasi-elastic reaction investigated by Duer et al. Top: quasi-elastic scattering of the helium-4 (4He) core from a helium-8 (8He) projectile off a proton target in the laboratory frame. The length of the arrows represents the momentum per nucleon (the velocity) of the incoming and outgoing particles. Zbeam is the beam axis. Bottom: the equivalent p-4He elastic scattering in their center-of-mass frame, where we consider reactions at backward angles close to 180°. In this frame, the momentum of the proton balances that of 4He, Pp=−P4He, that is, the proton is four times faster than 4He. Image credit: Duer et al., doi: 10.1038/s41586-022-04827-6.

Physicists Observe Elusive Four-Neutron System: Tetraneutron

Jun 23, 2022 by Enrico de Lazaro

Physicists using the Superconducting Analyzer for Multi-particles from Radio Isotope Beams (SAMURAI) in Japan have experimentally observed a resonance-like...

External morphology of Stylobates calcifer with host hermit crab Pagurodofleinia doederleini. The upper (A) and posterior (B) views and the marginal views of the right and left sides (C, D, respectively) of the living specimen. The upper and marginal views (E, F, respectively) of the preserved specimen. Scale bars - 5 mm. Image credit: Yoshikawa et al., doi: 10.1086/719160.

New Species of Symbiotic Sea Anemone Discovered Off Coast of Japan

Jun 23, 2022 by Natali Anderson

Scientifically named Stylobates calcifer, the new sea anemone species lives in a symbiotic relationship with a species of hermit crab called Pagurodofleinia...

An artist’s reconstruction of Homo heidelbergensis making a flint handaxe. Image credit: Gabriel Ugueto.

Early Humans were Present in Southeast Britain 620,000 Years Ago

Jun 23, 2022 by News Staff

The archaeological site of Fordwich in northeast Kent, England, reveals the presence of Acheulean hominins — possibly Homo erectus or Homo heidelbergensis...

On May 27, 2022, DART’s high-resolution camera DRACO captured this image of Vega, a young massive star located 25 light-years away in the constellation of Lyra. Image credit: NASA / Johns Hopkins Applied Physics Laboratory.

NASA’s DART Spacecraft Focuses on Vega

Jun 23, 2022 by News Staff

Since its launch on November 24, 2021, NASA’s Double Asteroid Redirection Test (DART) spacecraft has journeyed toward its September 26, 2022 encounter...

Map of sulfur dioxide (a) band depth and (b) band area for all four Hubble visits. Image credit: NASA / JPL / Bjorn Jonsson / Becker et al., doi: 10.3847/PSJ/ac69eb.

Hubble Explores Surface of Europa in Mid-UV

Jun 22, 2022 by News Staff

The new mid-ultraviolet (UV) maps of Europa, created using data from the Space Telescope Imaging Spectrograph (STIS) instrument aboard the NASA/ESA Hubble...

A head of a marble statue found at the Antikythera shipwreck. Image credit: Nikos Giannoulakis.

Antikythera Shipwreck Yields New Trove of Artifacts

Jun 22, 2022 by Enrico de Lazaro

Marine archaeologists have recovered a number of new artifacts, including a head of a Marble statue and numerous items from the ship’s equipment, from...

Field photograph of the pathologic ovum-in-ovo egg documented from the Lameta Formation of village Padlya, Dhar District, Madhya Pradesh, India. Two slightly partially broken circular eggshell outlines can be seen with broken eggshell fragments within. A crescent-shaped gap is characteristically present in the upper right part of the egg. Image credit: Dhiman et al., doi: 10.1038/s41598-022-13257-3.

Unique Titanosaur Egg-Inside-Egg Found in India

Jun 22, 2022 by Enrico de Lazaro

Paleontologists have found a fossilized egg within another egg — a condition known as ovum-in-ovo — of a titanosaurid dinosaur in central India....

Hackmanite turns purple under UV irradiation, and the color fades back to white in a few minutes under regular white light. Image credit: Mika Lastusaari.

Natural Aluminosilicate Minerals Change Color Under UV Light

Jun 22, 2022 by News Staff

Hackmanite, tugtupite, and scapolite change their color from white to purple, pink, and blue, respectively, under UV irradiation, according to a team of...

This impressive view of Charon was captured on July 14, 2015. Charon’s color palette is not as diverse as Pluto’s; most striking is the reddish north (top) polar region, informally named Mordor Macula. Image credit: NASA / Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory / Southwest Research Institute.

New Research Sheds Light on Origin of Charon’s Red Polar Cap

Jun 21, 2022 by News Staff

The thin methane atmosphere of Pluto’s biggest moon, Charon, undergoes ‘explosive’ pulsations owing to the Pluto-Charon’s system’s near sideways...

Graphene related materials are extensively used to reinforce polymers. Image credit: Empa / Chortarea et al., doi: 10.1016/j.jhazmat.2022.129053.

Study: Dust of Graphene-Related Materials Is Not Harmful

Jun 21, 2022 by News Staff

Graphene-related materials (GRMs) are often used to reinforce polymers. In small concentrations of up to 5% (weight), they can significantly enhance the...

Venus in real colors, processed from Mariner 10 images. Image credit: Mattias Malmer / NASA.

Sulfur-Metabolizing Aerial Life Cannot Explain Composition of Venus’ Atmosphere, Scientists Say

Jun 21, 2022 by News Staff

In new research, a team of scientists at the University of Cambridge has tested the ‘life in the Venusian clouds’ hypothesis. Jordan et al. demonstrate...

The Wreck of H.M.S. Gloucester off Yarmouth, 6 May 1682, by Monamy Swain, c. 1780. Image credit: National Maritime Museum, London.

340-Year-Old Wreck of British Frigate Gloucester Found

Jun 21, 2022 by News Staff

A team of professional divers has discovered the wreck of Gloucester — which sank on May 6, 1682 while carrying James Stuart, duke of York, later...

A schematic view of the history of the accretion disk and the flyby object: the three plots starting from the bottom left are snapshots from the numerical simulation, capturing the system right at the flyby event, 4,000 years after, and 8,000 years after, respectively; the top right image is from the ALMA observations, showing the disk with spirals and the two objects around it, corresponding to the system at 12,000 years after the flyby event. Image credit: Lu et al., doi: 10.1038/s41550-022-01681-4.

ALMA Images Spiral Protostellar Disk near Milky Way’s Center

Jun 21, 2022 by News Staff

Using the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA), astronomers have discovered a massive accretion disk with two spiral arms around a 32-solar-mass...

An artist’s impression of the HD 33142 planetary system, which is located 397 light-years away in the constellation of Lepus. Image credit: Sci-News.com.

Three Massive Planets Orbit Nearby Giant Star HD 33142

Jun 20, 2022 by Natali Anderson

An international team of astronomers, using the radial velocity (RV) method, has discovered a third planet in the planetary system HD 33142. An artist’s...

Schematic overview of the mechanism of action of the implemented snake venom proteins. Ecarin, a procoagulant snake venom protein bypasses the activation of series of clotting factors via intrinsic and extrinsic clotting pathway and directly activates prothrombin to thrombin thereby producing a fibrin blood clot. Once the clot is formed, clot breakdown (fibrinolysis) is initiated by the activation of plasminogen mainly by tissue plasminogen activator (tPA), forming active plasmin which proteolytically acts on the fibrin blood clot. Textilinin, an antifibrinolytic snake venom protein binds to plasmin with high specificity and inhibits the action of plasmin, stabilizing the fibrin blood clot. Image credit: Yegappan et al., doi: 10.1002/adhm.202200574.

Researchers Create Snake Venom Hydrogel that Rapidly Stops Uncontrolled Bleeding

Jun 20, 2022 by News Staff

The newly-developed rapid wound sealant is composed of two snake venom proteins: ecarin, which rapidly initiates blood clotting, and textilinin, which...

As a metallic asteroid such as Psyche cooled and solidified, iron volcanoes may have erupted onto its surface. Image credit: Elena Hartley.

ALMA Creates Detailed Maps of Main-Belt Asteroid Psyche

Jun 20, 2022 by News Staff

The Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array located on the Chajnantor Plateau in Chile allowed the acquisition of temperature images of (16) Psyche,...

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