http://phys.org/ en-us Phys.org internet news portal provides the latest news on science including: Physics, Nanotechnology, Life Sciences, Space Science, Earth Science, Environment, Health and Medicine. (Phys.org) —In the spring of the year 1006, one thousand and seven years ago this April, observers in China, Egypt, Iraq, Japan, Switzerland (and perhaps North America) reported seeing what might be the brightest stellar event in recorded history: a supernova ("SN1006") that was relatively close to Earth, only about seven thousand light-years away. It was reportedly so bright that it cast shadows at night. In 1965, radio astronomers identified the residue of this event, a so-called supernovae remnant, in the form of a sixty light-year diameter shell of glowing gas. Current models of the cataclysm find that it resulted when two white dwarf stars (each being a late stage of a star's life) merged together. http://phys.org/news285836945.html Space & Earth Mon, 22 Apr 2013 08:11:27 EST news285836945 (Phys.org) —Space weather is driven by the sun, which has a continually changing magnetic field. When this field accumulates excess energy, it can erupt and send energetic particles into space, sometimes toward Earth. Scientists believe that such violent emissions of charged particles, known as coronal mass ejections, are in part fueled by gusty space winds, or turbulence. http://phys.org/news285310145.html Space & Earth Tue, 16 Apr 2013 05:49:20 EST news285310145 (Phys.org) —The surface of Jupiter's moon Europa exposes material churned up from inside the moon and also material resulting from matter and energy coming from above. If you want to learn about the deep saltwater ocean beneath this unusual world's icy shell—as many people do who are interested in possible extraterrestrial life—you might target your investigation of the surface somewhere that has more of the up-from-below stuff and less of the down-from-above stuff. http://phys.org/news285233779.html Space & Earth Mon, 15 Apr 2013 09:00:05 EST news285233779 The radiation environment near the Moon could be damaging to humans and electronics on future missions. To characterize this potentially hazardous environment, the Cosmic Ray Telescope for the Effects of Radiation (CRaTER) on board the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter mission, which orbits at 50 kilometers (31 miles) above the Moon's surface, measures the radiation that would be absorbed by either electronic parts or human tissue behind the shielding of a spacecraft. http://phys.org/news284744766.html Space & Earth Tue, 09 Apr 2013 16:46:11 EST news284744766 Thirty-five years after its launch, Voyager 1 appears to have travelled beyond the influence of the Sun and exited the heliosphere, according to a new study appearing online today. http://phys.org/news283003807.html Space & Earth Wed, 20 Mar 2013 13:10:14 EST news283003807 The six science instruments that comprise the Particles and Fields Package that will characterize the solar wind and ionosphere of Mars have been integrated aboard NASA's Mars Atmosphere and Volatile EvolutioN (MAVEN) spacecraft. The spacecraft is on track for launch later this year. http://phys.org/news282487875.html Space & Earth Thu, 14 Mar 2013 13:52:11 EST news282487875 The National Aeronautics and Space Administration has awarded $4.4 million to a collaboration of scientists at five U.S. universities and NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center to help build a telescope for deployment on the International Space Station in 2017. http://phys.org/news281987831.html Space & Earth Fri, 08 Mar 2013 17:57:19 EST news281987831 Thanks to NASA's Cassini spacecraft which has been orbiting Saturn since 2004, scientists have been able to observe for the first time ever the seasonal atmospheric circulation direction change on Titan – an event which only happens once every 15 years and is never observable from Earth. Their findings are published today in Nature. http://phys.org/news273327277.html Space & Earth Wed, 28 Nov 2012 13:00:18 EST news273327277 (Phys.org)—In order to build the next generation of nuclear reactors, materials scientists are trying to unlock the secrets of certain materials that are radiation-damage tolerant. Now researchers at the California Institute of Technology (Caltech) have brought new understanding to one of those secrets—how the interfaces between two carefully selected metals can absorb, or heal, radiation damage. http://phys.org/news272269050.html Nanotechnology Fri, 16 Nov 2012 06:17:41 EST news272269050 (Phys.org)—Data from two ESA missions combine in a new view of the peculiar supernova remnant W44. The filamentary shell-like structure, detected by the Herschel Space Observatory at far-infrared wavelengths, is filled with hot gas that shines brightly in X-rays, as seen by the XMM-Newton X-ray Observatory. This composite image highlights how the complex morphology of this remnant has been shaped by its interaction with its parent molecular cloud, the star-forming region W48. http://phys.org/news272115055.html Space & Earth Wed, 14 Nov 2012 11:31:13 EST news272115055 (Phys.org)—Overnight on October 4-5, 2012, a mass of energetic particles from the atmosphere of the Sun were flung out into space, a phenomenon known as a coronal mass ejection. Three days later, the storm from the Sun stirred up the magnetic field around Earth and produced gorgeous displays of northern lights. NASA satellites track such storms from their origin to their crossing of interplanetary space to their arrival in the atmosphere of Earth. http://phys.org/news271412337.html Space & Earth Tue, 06 Nov 2012 08:19:08 EST news271412337 The surface of the giant asteroid Vesta is weathering in a way that appears to be completely different from any other asteroid yet visited, according to new data recorded by NASA's Dawn spacecraft. This new type of space weathering suggests that there's something about Vesta—perhaps its mineral composition or its position in the solar system—that makes its surface environment fundamentally different from other asteroids studied thus far. http://phys.org/news270922145.html Space & Earth Wed, 31 Oct 2012 17:09:17 EST news270922145 As they near the outer reaches of the solar system, for the past several years the two Voyager spacecraft have been sending back observations that challenge scientists' views of the physics at the edge of the heliosphere, the bubble created by charged particles flowing outward from the Sun. A new study looks at magnetic field fluctuations and cosmic ray intensity observed by Voyager I. http://phys.org/news270728916.html Space & Earth Mon, 29 Oct 2012 12:00:01 EST news270728916 (Phys.org)—Overnight on October 4-5, 2012, a mass of energetic particles from the atmosphere of the Sun were flung out into space, a phenomenon known as a coronal mass ejection. Three days later, the storm from the Sun stirred up the magnetic field around Earth and produced gorgeous displays of northern lights. NASA satellites track such storms from their origin to their crossing of interplanetary space to their arrival in the atmosphere of Earth. http://phys.org/news269107298.html Space & Earth Wed, 10 Oct 2012 17:01:50 EST news269107298 (Phys.org)—A new European meteorological satellite soared into space today, Sept. 17, with five environmental instruments aboard that were developed by the Polar Operational Environmental Satellites (POES) Project at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Md. These instruments were developed under a reimbursable agreement with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA). http://phys.org/news267175274.html Space & Earth Tue, 18 Sep 2012 08:21:24 EST news267175274 Researchers at the Institute of Food Research have tested a new technique to ensure fresh produce is free of bacterial contamination. http://phys.org/news267100059.html Biology Mon, 17 Sep 2012 11:28:04 EST news267100059 (Phys.org)—Researchers from the Electric and Magnetic Field Instrument Suite and Integrated Science (EMFISIS) team at the University of Iowa have released a new recording of an intriguing and well-known phenomenon known as "chorus," made on Sept. 5, 2012. The Waves tri-axial search coil magnetometer and receiver of EMFISIS captured several notable peak radio wave events in the magnetosphere that surrounds the Earth. The radio waves, which are at frequencies that are audible to the human ear, are emitted by the energetic particles in the Earth's magnetosphere. http://phys.org/news266827286.html Space & Earth Fri, 14 Sep 2012 07:41:35 EST news266827286 Why is Mars cold and dry? While some recent studies hint that early Mars may have never been wet or warm, many scientists think that long ago, Mars once had a denser atmosphere that supported liquid water on the surface. If so, Mars might have had environmental conditions to support microbial life. However, for some reason, most of the Martian atmosphere was lost to space long ago and the thin wispy atmosphere no longer allows water to be stable at the surface. Scientists aren't sure how or why this happened, but one way a planet can lose its atmosphere is through a process called 'sputtering.' In this process, atoms are knocked away from the atmosphere due to impacts from energetic particles. http://phys.org/news266751510.html Space & Earth Thu, 13 Sep 2012 10:38:37 EST news266751510 (Phys.org)—Since the dawn of the Space Age, mission planners have tried to follow one simple but important rule: Stay out of the van Allen Belts. The two doughnut-shaped regions around Earth are filled with "killer electrons," plasma waves, and electrical currents dangerous to human space travelers and their spacecraft. Lingering is not a good idea. http://phys.org/news265619848.html Space & Earth Fri, 31 Aug 2012 08:30:01 EST news265619848 There was probably no one looking forward to this morning with more anticipation than University of Alberta physics professor Ian Mann, when an Atlas rocket lifted a pair of NASA satellites into orbit from Cape Canaveral, Florida. http://phys.org/news265619252.html Space & Earth Fri, 31 Aug 2012 08:07:45 EST news265619252 (Phys.org) -- NASA's newest Mars mission, landing in three days, will draw on support from missions sent to Mars years ago and will contribute to missions envisioned for future decades. http://phys.org/news263139791.html Space & Earth Thu, 02 Aug 2012 15:26:18 EST news263139791 For the first time, researchers at Aalto University in Finland have located where the sounds associated with the northern lights are created. The auroral sounds that have been described in folktales and by wilderness wanderers are formed about 70 meters above the ground level in the measured case. http://phys.org/news261051254.html Space & Earth Mon, 09 Jul 2012 11:14:39 EST news261051254 (Phys.org) -- Data from NASA's Voyager 1 spacecraft indicate that the venerable deep-space explorer has encountered a region in space where the intensity of charged particles from beyond our solar system has markedly increased. Voyager scientists looking at this rapid rise draw closer to an inevitable but historic conclusion - that humanity's first emissary to interstellar space is on the edge of our solar system. http://phys.org/news258969371.html Space & Earth Fri, 15 Jun 2012 08:56:18 EST news258969371 The IceCube neutrino telescope encompasses a cubic kilometer of clear Antarctic ice under the South Pole, a volume seeded with an array of 5,160 sensitive digital optical modules (DOMs) that precisely track the direction and energy of speeding muons, massive cousins of the electron, which are created when neutrinos collide with atoms in the ice. The IceCube Collaboration recently announced the results of an exhaustive search for high-energy neutrinos that would likely be produced if the violent extragalactic explosions known as gamma-ray bursts (GRBs) are the source of ultra-high-energy cosmic rays. http://phys.org/news253971652.html Physics Wed, 18 Apr 2012 13:00:10 EST news253971652 Space scientists from the University of New Hampshire and multi-institutional colleagues report they have quantified levels of radiation on the moon's surface from galactic cosmic ray (GCR) bombardment that over time causes chemical changes in water ice and can create complex carbon chains similar to those that help form the foundations of biological structures. In addition, the radiation process causes the lunar soil, or regolith, to darken over time, which is important in understanding the geologic history of the moon. http://phys.org/news251383901.html Space & Earth Mon, 19 Mar 2012 13:51:52 EST news251383901 (PhysOrg.com) -- A curious correlation between the mass of a galaxy's central black hole and the velocity of stars in a vast, roughly spherical structure known as its bulge has puzzled astronomers for years. An international team led by Francesco Tombesi at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Md., now has identified a new type of black-hole-driven outflow that appears to be both powerful enough and common enough to explain this link. http://phys.org/news249582186.html Space & Earth Mon, 27 Feb 2012 16:23:25 EST news249582186 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. http://phys.org/news247329595.html Space & Earth Wed, 01 Feb 2012 14:40:06 EST news247329595 On Nov. 26th, Curiosity blasted off from Cape Canaveral atop an Atlas 5 rocket. Riding a plume of fire through the blue Florida sky, the car-sized rover began a nine month journey to search for signs of life Mars. http://phys.org/news243160422.html Space & Earth Thu, 15 Dec 2011 09:50:01 EST news243160422 The Radiation Assessment Detector, the first instrument on NASA's next rover mission to Mars to begin science operations, was powered up and began collecting data Dec. 6, almost two weeks ahead of schedule. RAD is the only instrument scheduled to collect science data on the journey to Mars. The instrument is measuring the energetic particles inside the spacecraft to characterize the radiation environment an astronaut would experience on a future human mission to the Red Planet. http://phys.org/news243015720.html Space & Earth Tue, 13 Dec 2011 16:22:07 EST news243015720 Earth's aurorae, or Northern and Southern Lights, provide a dazzling light show to people living in the polar regions. Shimmering curtains of green and red undulate across the sky like a living thing. New research shows that aurorae on distant "hot Jupiters" could be 100-1000 times brighter than Earthly aurorae. They also would ripple from equator to poles (due to the planet's proximity to any stellar eruptions), treating the entire planet to an otherworldly spectacle. http://phys.org/news230471330.html Space & Earth Thu, 21 Jul 2011 12:49:01 EST news230471330