Using data from NASA's Interstellar Boundary Explorer (IBEX) spacecraft, an international team of researchers has measured neutral "alien" particles entering our solar system from interstellar space. A suite of studies published in the Astrophysical Journal provide a first look at the constituents of the interstellar medium, the matter between star systems, and how they interact with our heliosphere.
Feb 1, 2012 - 4:05:06 PM
A potent follow-up solar flare, which occurred Friday (Jan. 17, 2012), just days after the Sun launched the biggest coronal mass ejection (CME) seen in nearly a decade, delivered a powerful radiation punch to Earth's magnetic field despite the fact that it was aimed away from our planet.
Feb 1, 2012 - 3:44:51 PM
In 2010, the Japanese spacecraft Hayabusa completed an exciting although nail-biting mission to the asteroid Itokawa, successfully returning samples to Earth after first reaching the asteroid in 2005; the mission almost failed, with the spacecraft plagued by technical problems. The canister containing the microscopic rock samples made a soft landing in Australia, the first time that samples from an asteroid had been brought back to Earth for study.
SUNSPOT, NM - Hydrogen molecules may act as a kind of energy sink that strengthens the magnetic grip that causes sunspots, according to scientists from Hawaii and New Mexico using a new infrared instrument on an old telescope.
Feb 1, 2012 - 3:34:18 PM
During the past few years, CERN physicist Dragan Hajdukovic has been investigating what he thinks may be a widely overlooked part of the cosmos: the quantum vacuum.
Feb 1, 2012 - 3:25:18 PM
BOULDER - A new international study may answer contentious questions about the onset and persistence of Earth’s Little Ice Age, a period of widespread cooling that lasted for hundreds of years until the late 19th century.
Feb 1, 2012 - 2:27:55 PM
Around 1630 BC, a super-volcano blew apart the Aegean island of Santorini, an event so violent that some theorists say it nurtured the legend of Atlantis.
Feb 1, 2012 - 12:51:58 PM
Space radiation most likely caused the demise of a Russian Mars probe that got stuck in Earth orbit shortly after launch and ultimately crashed back to the surface earlier this month, Russia's Federal Space Agency chief said today (Jan. 31), according to media reports.
Jan 31, 2012 - 1:38:23 PM
For the very first time, a NASA spacecraft has detected matter from outside our solar system — material that came from elsewhere in the galaxy, researchers announced today (Jan. 31).
Jan 31, 2012 - 1:19:51 PM
A special project to search for pulsars has bagged the first student discovery of a millisecond pulsar – a super-fast spinning star, and this one rotates about 324 times per second. The Pulsar Search Collaboratory (PSC) has students analyzing real data from the National Radio Astronomy Observatory’s (NRAO) Robert C. Byrd Green Bank Telescope (GBT) to find pulsars. Astronomers involved with the project said the discovery could help detect elusive ripples in spacetime known as gravitational waves.
Jan 31, 2012 - 10:58:07 AM
Exoplanet discoveries are happening at a frenetic pace, and some of the latest newly discovered worlds are sometimes described as “Earth-Like” and “potentially habitable.”
Jan 31, 2012 - 10:55:15 AM
Ever since the Apollo era, scientist have known that the Moon had some kind of magnetic field in the past, but doesn’t have one now. Understanding why is important, because it can tell us how magnetic fields are generated, how long they last, and how they shut down. New studies of Apollo lunar samples answer some of these questions, but they also create many more questions to be answered.
Jan 31, 2012 - 10:51:55 AM
On Tuesday, January 31, asteroid 433 Eros will come closer to Earth than it has in 37 years, traveling across the night sky in the constellations Leo, Sextans and Hydra. At its closest pass of 16.6 million miles (26.7 million km) the relatively bright 21-mile (34-km) -wide asteroid will be visible with even modest backyard telescopes, approaching magnitude 8, possibly even 7. It hasn’t come this close since 1975, and won’t do so again until 2056!
Jan 30, 2012 - 10:29:26 AM
For a long time now, evidence has continued to indicate that Mars was once a water world – near-surface groundwater, lakes, rivers, hot springs and, according to some planetary models, even an ancient ocean in the northern hemisphere. That last one in particular has been a subject of intense debate; some scientists see evidence for it while others do not. Even if it was there, it may have been a warm ocean or it may have been colder, like the polar seas here on Earth.
Jan 30, 2012 - 10:25:56 AM
In a paper published today in the journal Nature Physics, the team shows that the missing electrons are swept away from the planet by a tide of solar wind particles during periods of heightened solar activity.
Jan 29, 2012 - 9:30:54 PM
