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News of Astronomy, Space, Science, & Technology

Table of Contents

Astronomy Picture of the Day

Image: The Giant Globular Cluster Omega Centauri

The Giants of Omega Centauri

Astronomy Picture of the Day May 1 2008

Globular star cluster Omega Centauri is some 15,000 light-years away and 150 light-years in diameter.

Packed with about 10 million stars, Omega Cen is the largest of 200 or so known globular clusters that roam the halo of our Milky Way galaxy.

This intriguing color picture combines a visible light image of the cluster in blue hues with infrared image data from the Spitzer Space Telescope. The Spitzer data includes images in two infrared bands, one shown in green and one in red. Both infrared bands are sensitive to light from the cool, giant stars in the cluster.

Adding the red and green colors together creates yellow, showing off the cluster's giant stars as yellow spots. Of course, red spots also indicate cool, giant stars in the image, but some of the red spots are even more distant background galaxies. Also known simply as Red Giant Stars, they represent a stage in the life-cycle of stars more evolved than our own Sun, a stage the Sun will reach in about 5 billion years.

Dust grains formed in the atmospheres of cool, giant stars are ultimately involved in the formation of other stars and planets.

See Astronomy Picture of the Day for links to further info.

NASA Image of the Day

Image: Saturn and Its Rings in Ultraviolet Light

In Ultraviolet Light

NASA Image of the Day Download time: May 1 2008 7:59 AM ET

One of a series, this image of Saturn was taken when the planet's rings were at their maximum tilt of 27 degrees toward Earth. Saturn experiences seasonal tilts away from and toward the sun, much the same way Earth does. This happens over the course of its 29.5-year orbit. Every 30 years, Earth observers can catch their best glimpse of Saturn's South Pole and the southern side of the planet's rings.

Between March and April 2003, researchers took full advantage to study the gas giant at maximum tilt, using NASA's Hubble Space Telescope to capture detailed images of Saturn's Southern Hemisphere and the southern face of its rings.

The Space Shuttle

Nasa's space shuttle site - For the latest information see NASA human spaceflight page

For info on the Columbia investigation see the STS-107 Investigation Reference page.

The space shuttle in the Wikipedia

The latest news of STS-123 on Space.Com

Discovery to Roll Out Tomorrow (Saturday)

NASA's Space Shuttle Discovery To Move To Launch Pad Saturday

SpaceRef Top Stories Download time: May 1 2008 7:58 AM ET

Space shuttle Discovery is scheduled to roll out to Launch Pad 39A at NASA's Kennedy Space Center, Fla., on Saturday, May 3, as preparations for the STS-124 mission move forward. Discovery is targeted to lift off May 31 on a 13-day mission to the International Space Station.

The first motion of the shuttle out of Kennedy's Vehicle Assembly Building is scheduled for 12:01 a.m. EDT.…

The Global Environment

Global climate change, the ozone layer, and other world environmental issues

Global warming in the Wikipedia

A NASA reference article on global warming

Global Warming FAQs:

US National Climate Data Center
Natural Resources Defense Council
Union of Concerned Scientists
Skepticism About Global Warming from Brian Carnell's Skepticism.net
See Wikipedia for both sides of the debate

Information on abrupt climate change (Could something like the "Day After Tomorrow" scenario happen?)

Science @ NASA
The Weather Underground
Abrupt Climate Change FAQ from the Union of Concerned Scientists
The Wikipedia on abrupt climate change
Abrupt Climate Change: Inevitable Surprises — free online book from the National Academies Press

Ozone Layer FAQs:

Ozone Hole FAQ from The Weather Underground
Ozone Depletion FAQs from faqs.org

China Now Worst Carbon Emitter

China now No. 1 CO2 offender

USATODAY.com Science and Space - Top Stories Download time: May 1 2008 7:58 AM ET

China has overtaken the USA to become the world's No. 1 industrial source of carbon dioxide, the most important global-warming pollutant, according to a scientific study to be published today.

The study and two others — one recently published and another coming — agree that China's carbon-dioxide emissions surpassed those in the USA in 2006. That's decades earlier than had been predicted by the International Energy Agency four years ago.…

Postponing Global Warming

Ocean currents may offset global warming over coming decade

guardian.co.uk Science Download time: May 1 2008 7:59 AM ET

Global warming is set to stall over the next 10 years as natural variations in ocean currents counteract manmade climate change.

Researchers modelling the climate of Europe and North America found that a major ocean current that brings warm water northwards is set to weaken, potentially offsetting temperature rises caused by human activity.…

In a New Climate Model, Short-Term Cooling in a Warmer World

NYT > Science Download time: May 1 2008 7:58 AM ET

Climatologists will create decade-long climate forecasts, just as meteorologists craft weeklong weather forecasts.

Mars

Mars and Its Moons

Background information about Mars

NASA's Mars Rover site at JPL

A gallery of Spirit's images and slideshow

A gallery of Opportunity's images and slideshow

Google Mars

Mars Global Surveyor

Mars Odyssey

Mars Express orbiter

Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO)

Mars Phoenix Lander

Mars Science Laboratory (MSL)

Phoenix on Target Landing

Phoenix Lander Takes Aim at Martian Arctic

SPACE.com Download time: May 1 2008 7:59 AM ET

NASA's Mars-bound Phoenix spacecraft is gearing up for a landmark landing near the martian north pole this month to find out whether the region could have once supported microbial life.

Phoenix is on course for a planned May 25 touchdown in the martian arctic that, if successful, will mark the first powered landing on Mars since NASA's hefty Viking 2 lander set down in 1976. But first, the probe is expected to fire its thrusters several times in the next few weeks to fine-tune its flight path.

"It's scary how smooth it's been," said Barry Goldstein, Phoenix project manager at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) in Pasadena, Calif. "The vehicle has just been behaving beautifully."…

See SPACE.com for links to further info.

What Mars Microbe Fossils Might Look Like

What Mars Fossils Might Look Like

SPACE.com Download time: May 1 2008 7:59 AM ET

Fossil microbes found along an iron-rich river in Spain reveal how signs of life could be preserved in minerals found on Mars. The discovery may help to equip the next generation Mars rover with the tools it would need to find evidence of past life on the planet.

The Rio Tinto arises from springs west of Seville. These springs percolate up through iron ores that were deposited by geothermal activity more than 200 million years ago. Spring water dissolves iron sulfide minerals from the ores, and this stains the river red. The iron sulfide minerals also dissociate to form sulfuric acid.

With a pH between 1.5 and 3, Rio Tinto is as sour as vinegar, yet it supports a surprising variety of life. Bacteria, algae, single-celled organisms called protists and fungi all thrive in the acid headwaters.…

See SPACE.com for links to further info.

Artificial Intelligence for Mars Express

Artificial Intelligence Boosts Science From Mars

ScienceDaily: Latest Science News Download time: May 1 2008 8:00 AM ET

Artificial intelligence (AI) being used at the European Space Operations Centre is giving a powerful boost to ESA's Mars Express as it searches for signs of past or present life on the Red Planet. Since January 2005, Mars Express has been using its sophisticated instruments to study the atmosphere, surface and subsurface of Mars, confirming the presence of water and looking for other signatures of life on and below the Red Planet's rocky terrain.

The spacecraft generates huge volumes of scientific data, which must be downloaded to Earth at the right time and in the correct sequence, otherwise data packets can be permanently lost when the limited on-board memory is overwritten by newly collected data.…

Spirit Low on Energy

Spirit's Dust Dilemma

Universe Today Download time: May 1 2008 7:59 AM ET

Steve Squyres and the Mars Exploration Rover team knew from the beginning that dust could cause a problem for the rovers, Spirit and Opportunity. When a thick layer of dust coats the solar panels, it blocks the sunlight that generates power for the six-wheeled robots. In the summer of 2007 a huge dust storm blanketed Mars, and deposited a fair amount of dust on solar panels of both rovers. Spirit, especially accumulated a lot of dust on its solar array. Currently, only about one-third of incoming sunlight is able to penetrate dust on Spirit's solar panels to be converted to electricity. As a result, Spirit is experiencing the lowest energy levels to date and accumulating a backlog of data waiting to be transmitted to Earth. If only a dust devil would come along…

Mars Rover Update

Mars Exploration Rovers Update: Spirit Powers into Winter, Opportunity "Shoulders" Injury

Planetary News Download time: May 1 2008 7:58 AM ET

With winter settling in on the southern hemisphere of the Red Planet, the Mars Exploration Rovers (MERs) spent April working on their respective science campaigns and hunkering down in brutally chilly nights that are seeing temperatures drop to around -95 degree Celsius. As the month comes to an end at Gusev Crater and Meridiani Planum, there is good news and there is bad news.

The good news is that Spirit's odds for survival seemed to improve significantly as the skies cleared dramatically over at Gusev Crater. Not only was the rover able to maintain better-than-anticipated power levels this past month, but the engineers "probably won't have to do anything extraordinary" to keep it alive, according to Jake Matijevic, chief of rover engineering.

"This is really significant," noted Steve Squyres, of Cornell University, the lead scientist for rover science, in an interview Monday.…

Jupiter

Jupiter and its moons

Background information about Jupiter

Better Understanding Jupiter's Rings

Jupiter's Rings Are Shaped By Interplay Of Sunlight And Shadow

ScienceDaily: Latest Science News Download time: May 1 2008 8:00 AM ET

Scientists from the University of Maryland and the Max-Planck Institute for Solar System Research in Germany appear to have solved a long-standing mystery about the cause of anomalies in Jupiter's gossamer rings.

In a new study published in the May 1 issue of Nature, they report that a faint extension of the outermost ring beyond the orbit of Jupiter's moon Thebe, and other observed deviations from an accepted model of ring formation, result from the interplay of shadow and sunlight on dust particles that make up the rings.…

The Cosmos

Stars, galaxies, nebulae, and cosmology

Also fundamental physics with possible astronomical or cosmological implications

Tutorials:

Big Bang   Inflation   The Cosmic Microwave Background   The Cosmic Dark Ages   Dark Matter   Dark Energy - For a more technical discussion go here.   Ask the Experts: What are dark matter and dark energy, and how are they affecting the universe? Measuring Stellar & Galactic Distances (difficult!)   Supernovas   Supernovas & Pulsars   Black Holes   Pulsars   Cosmology: the Observable Universe (moderately technical)   Cosmology (very difficult!)   

Podcast: Plasma Physics

Plasma Physics: From Black Holes to Radio Reception [Science Talk]

Scientific American Download time: May 1 2008 8:00 AM ET

Plasma plays a big role from the ionosphere to black holes. Stanford physicist Roger Blandford explains plasma and its connection to black holes in a conversation with Scientific American's JR Minkel. Plus, we'll test your knowledge of some recent science in the news. Web sites mentioned on this episode include www.snipurl.com/26dun-sciam1; www.snipurl.com/26dv2-sciam2; www.nybg.org/darwin…

See Scientific American for links to further info.

Martin Rees Discusses the Cosmos

We're the 'waste' from distant stars

guardian.co.uk Science Download time: May 1 2008 7:59 AM ET

Ever since the classical Greek era when earth, air, fire and water were believed to be the substance of the world, scientists have sought a unified picture of all the basic forces and building blocks of nature. They have sought the answer to the question: "What are we, and the world, made of?"

During the 20th century, we came to understand that the essence of all substances - their colour, texture, hardness and so forth - is set by their structure, on scales far smaller even than a microscope can see. Everything on Earth is made of atoms, which are, especially in living things, combined together in intricate molecular assemblages. And our scientific reach has now extended not only into the microworld of atoms, but much further out into the cosmos. The "vault of heaven" familiar to the ancients is, we now realise, an immensity of stars and galaxies extending for billions of light years.…

Brain Science

The Wikipedia article on the brain

The Wikipedia article on consciousness

Fewer Connections in the Older Brain?

The Aging Brain: Is It Less Connected? [Mind Matters]

Scientific American Download time: May 1 2008 8:00 AM ET

Time can wreak havoc on the brain. Age-related cognitive decline comes with a wide range of symptoms, from memory loss to problems with concentration. But what causes these symptoms? What happens in the brain of people as they age?

Jessica Andrews-Hanna and her colleagues at Harvard University, the University of Michigan and Washington University School of Medicine have explored the possibility that cognitive decline during aging results in part from a loss of coordination and communication among large-scale brain systems.…

See Scientific American for links to further info.

Energy

Policy, technology, and resources

Homes With Their Own Wind Power

'Small wind' power plants are blowing strong

Christian Science Monitor | Sci/Tech Download time: Apr 30 2008 7:12 AM ET

On a recent sunny afternoon Bob Loebelenz pauses to gaze 72 feet into the air at the spinning blades of his wind turbine, a small "clean, free electricity" smile creasing the corners of his mouth.

While giant wind turbines that supply power to utilities sprout along ridgelines across the United States, far smaller residential wind generators, like the one Mr. Loebelenz erected in 2003 to power his suburban Boston home, are still unusual in densely populated places.

That may be changing. Across the country signs are growing that "small wind" (a category that includes wind generators geared to supply a single home) is catching on in suburban and even urban settings.…

Aerospace

Aeronautical and space technology

The Buck Rogers Rocket Pack

The Trouble with Rocket Packs [Slideshow] [Extreme Tech]

Scientific American Download time: Apr 30 2008 7:12 AM ET

In the late 1940s the rocket pack—over the years also called the "rocket belt," "jump belt" and "jet vest"—became more than a comic book concept when engineers at the U.S. military's Redstone Arsenal in Huntsville, Ala., began experimenting with rockets that could be used to carry a person into the air and allow him or her to land safely again using their feet as landing gear. In 1952 inventor Thomas Moore, strapped tightly to his cylindrical backpack, hovered in the air for just a few seconds at Redstone, but it was enough to launch a series of campaigns to develop the technology that would bring personal flight to life.

These high-flying hopes were soon tempered by a number of limitations, most importantly the inability to keep a pilot in the air long enough to do anything militarily significant before running out of fuel. When the Redstone team's funding ran out, the next step fell to Bell Aerosystems in Niagara Falls, N.Y.…

The story is accompanied by a slide show

Technology

Making Robots More Companionable

Scientists Send Robots to Charm School [Features]

Scientific American Download time: Apr 30 2008 7:12 AM ET

With the invention of the Roomba vacuum cleaner, it is no longer far-fetched to imagine robots helping us carry out daily chores--not to mention more complex tasks such as assisting surgery. But nobody wants an unpleasant robot in his or her life--any more than one wants to be saddled with a disgruntled human helper. Enter robots with personality, capable of developing emotional relationships with humans.

Sound futuristic? Well, the future could be here sooner than you think. A consortium of researchers, psychologists and computer scientists has just launched a $13-million project dubbed "Living with Robots and Interactive Companions" (LIREC) to study interactions between humans and robots. The goal: to come up with information they can use to design robo-companions with whom people will feel comfortable. "What we are developing is a technology," says project coordinator Peter McOwan,  a computer science professor at Queen Mary, University of London, in England. "We believe it'll improve the quality of human life."…

An "Iron Man" Exoskeleton

Real-Life Iron Man: A Robotic Suit That Magnifies Human Strength [News]

Scientific American Download time: May 1 2008 8:00 AM ET

The prospect of slipping into a robotic exoskeleton that could enhance strength, keep the body active while recovering from an injury or even serve as a prosthetic limb has great appeal. Unlike the svelt body armor donned by Iron Man, however, most exoskeletons to date have looked more like clunky spare parts cobbled together.

Japan's CYBERDYNE, Inc. is hoping to change that with a sleek, white exoskeleton now in the works that it says can augment the body's own strength or do the work of ailing (or missing) limbs. The company is confident enough in its new technology to have started construction on a new lab expected to mass-produce up to 500 robotic power suits (think Star Wars storm trooper without the helmet) annually, beginning in October, according to Japan's Kyodo News Web site.…

See Scientific American for links to further info.

Here is a nice review of the new Iron Man movie starring Robert Downey Junior.

Electronics' 'missing link' found

BBC News | Technology | UK Edition Download time: May 1 2008 7:59 AM ET

Details of an entirely new kind of electronic device, which could make chips smaller and far more efficient, have been outlined by scientists.

The new components, described by scientists at Hewlett-Packard, are known as "memristors".

The devices were proposed 40 years ago but have only recently been fabricated, the team wrote in the journal Nature.

They have already been used to build novel transistors - tiny switches that are the building blocks of all chips.

"Now we have this type of device we have a broader palette with which to paint our circuits," Professor Stan Williams, one of the team, told the BBC last year.…

Scientists Discover Missing Electronic 'Element'

Wired Top Stories Download time: May 1 2008 7:59 AM ET

Scientists have speculated on a new type of electronic circuit element, the "memristor," for 37 years -- but haven't been able to create one until today.