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) -- Jay Pasachoff, Director of Hopkins Observatory, Chair of the Astronomy Department at Williams College and Field Memorial Professor of Astronomy, has written a commentary piece published in the journal Nature, urging stargazers everywhere to take advantage of the unique opportunity to study the Venus transit, which will occur June 5-6. It will be, he reminds readers, a once in a lifetime opportunity. http://phys.org/news256464158.html Space & Earth Thu, 17 May 2012 09:40:01 EST news256464158 Head outside on any clear night this week and you won’t be able to miss brilliant Venus decorating the western horizon. Right now it’s surrounded by a host of bright winter stars like Capella, Betelgeuse, Aldebaran and the Pleiades. But, don’t stop there. Use any type of optical aid and you’ll see the planet is in the crescent phase right now and bigger than Jupiter in apparent size! http://phys.org/news255342521.html Space & Earth Fri, 04 May 2012 09:29:19 EST news255342521 On 5 and 6 June this year, millions of people around the world will be able to see Venus pass across the face of the Sun in what will be a once-in-a-lifetime experience. http://phys.org/news255061362.html Space & Earth Tue, 01 May 2012 03:50:04 EST news255061362 May is the best time to try and spot one of the most enduring unsolved mysteries in our Solar System. Ashen Light is a faint glow allegedly seen on the unlit portion of Venus, during its crescent phase, similar to the earthshine often observed on the Moon, though not as bright. It is more commonly observed while Venus occupies the evening sky, as now, than when it is in the morning sky. But no one really knows for sure what causes it. http://phys.org/news254991216.html Space & Earth Mon, 30 Apr 2012 07:53:53 EST news254991216 A new study by Rice University scientists reveals that plants can use the sense of touch to fight off fungal infections and insects. The study, which will be published in the April 24 issue of Current Biology, finds that plant defenses are enhanced when plants are touched. http://phys.org/news253194290.html Biology Mon, 09 Apr 2012 12:45:01 EST news253194290 (PhysOrg.com) -- Researchers studying the planet Venus have found that despite a lack of a magnetic field, the planet has magnetotails, which on Earth are part of the process known as the Northern and Southern Lights. This, as the team describes in their paper published in Science, is due to the solar wind interacting with the planet's ionosphere. http://phys.org/news252915527.html Space & Earth Fri, 06 Apr 2012 07:19:25 EST news252915527 This week the second planet from the sun will pass directly in front of the Pleiades star cluster. It's a rare sunset conjunction that's easy to find with the unaided eye, but best seen through binoculars or a small telescope. http://phys.org/news252660822.html Space & Earth Tue, 03 Apr 2012 09:00:04 EST news252660822 (PhysOrg.com) -- Three months before the last transit of Venus this century, scientists are gathering at the Observatoire de Paris to finalise their observation plans in a workshop supported by the Europlanet Research Infrastructure and the EGIDE/PHC Sakura Program. http://phys.org/news250165948.html Space & Earth Mon, 05 Mar 2012 10:32:54 EST news250165948 Contrary to its alluring name, Venus is the planet from hell, with an atmosphere so hot, toxic and heavy that any visitor would risk being simultaneously melted, suffocated and crushed. http://phys.org/news249742920.html Space & Earth Wed, 29 Feb 2012 13:02:30 EST news249742920 (AP) -- Stargazers of the world are getting a treat this weekend. http://phys.org/news249241130.html Space & Earth Thu, 23 Feb 2012 17:39:12 EST news249241130 (PhysOrg.com) -- ESA’s Venus Express spacecraft has discovered that our cloud-covered neighbour spins a little slower than previously measured. Peering through the dense atmosphere in the infrared, the orbiter found surface features were not quite where they should be. http://phys.org/news248088580.html Space & Earth Fri, 10 Feb 2012 09:31:47 EST news248088580 (AP) -- The venus flytrap's struggle for survival in the wild along coast of the Carolinas faces an added threat from poachers looking to make a buck by uprooting and selling them. http://phys.org/news246723271.html Biology Wed, 25 Jan 2012 14:14:40 EST news246723271 The planets Venus and Jupiter will dominate the sky as darkness falls during January. Jupiter will be twice as bright as any star, and Venus will be four times brighter than Jupiter. http://phys.org/news244966294.html Space & Earth Thu, 05 Jan 2012 06:12:22 EST news244966294 (PhysOrg.com) -- Mohsen Shahinpoor, a professor of mechanical engineering at the University of Maine has created a robot version of the infamous bug eating Venus Flytrap, using a material he invented himself several years ago. Named ionic polymeric metal composite (IPMC), it's a nanomaterial that can be used to mimic muscle function. Shahinpoor describes in his paper published in Bioinspiration & Biomimetics, how he used this material to recreate the sensing and closing abilities of the Venus Flytrap. http://phys.org/news238927579.html Electronics Thu, 27 Oct 2011 09:46:36 EST news238927579 (PhysOrg.com) -- At first glance, a weather forecaster for Venus would have either a really easy or a really boring job, depending on your point of view. The climate on Venus is widely known to be unpleasant -- at the surface, the planet roasts at more than 800 degrees Fahrenheit under a suffocating blanket of sulfuric acid clouds and a crushing atmosphere more than 90 times the pressure of Earth's. Intrepid future explorers should abandon any hope for better days, however, because it won't change much. http://phys.org/news236366508.html Space & Earth Tue, 27 Sep 2011 18:22:38 EST news236366508 Japan said it had successfully test-fired the engine of its "Akatsuki" space probe in preparation for a renewed attempt to get it into orbit around Venus in 2015. http://phys.org/news234674638.html Space & Earth Thu, 08 Sep 2011 04:35:18 EST news234674638 (PhysOrg.com) -- The Spacecraft Assembly Facility of NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif., was constructed in 1961 to support NASA's Ranger and Mariner missions to the moon, Venus and Mars. http://phys.org/news224496540.html Space & Earth Fri, 13 May 2011 09:09:31 EST news224496540 Have you ever woken up at the crack of dawn, shuffled to the kitchen counter for your first cup of joe, only to discover that you're out of coffee beans? http://phys.org/news224249631.html Space & Earth Tue, 10 May 2011 12:34:23 EST news224249631 Four of the five planets visible to the unaided eye huddle quite close together in the pre-dawn sky next week, according to the editors of StarDate magazine. http://phys.org/news223896749.html Space & Earth Fri, 06 May 2011 10:32:45 EST news223896749 (PhysOrg.com) -- New analysis of images taken by ESA's Venus Express orbiter has revealed surprising details about the remarkable, shape-shifting collar of clouds that swirls around the planet's South Pole. This fast-moving feature is all the more surprising since its centre of rotation is typically offset from the geographical pole. The results of this study are published online in Science Express today. http://phys.org/news221410902.html Space & Earth Thu, 07 Apr 2011 16:02:07 EST news221410902 (PhysOrg.com) -- On March 29, 1807, German astronomer Heinrich Wilhelm Olbers spotted Vesta as a pinprick of light in the sky. Two hundred and four years later, as NASA's Dawn spacecraft prepares to begin orbiting this intriguing world, scientists now know how special this world is, even if there has been some debate on how to classify it. http://phys.org/news220695262.html Space & Earth Wed, 30 Mar 2011 09:14:58 EST news220695262 Despite its magnetic field, Earth is losing its atmosphere to space at about the same rate as planets that lack this protective barrier against the solar wind. Scientists now are beginning to question whether magnetic fields really are vital to helping a planet hold on to its atmosphere. http://phys.org/news219925168.html Space & Earth Mon, 21 Mar 2011 11:19:47 EST news219925168 A Japanese probe to Venus failed to reach orbit Wednesday and was captured by the sun's gravitational pull in a setback to Japan's shoestring space program, which will have to wait another six years to try again. http://phys.org/news211000301.html Space & Earth Wed, 08 Dec 2010 03:12:01 EST news211000301 (AP) -- A Japanese space probe sent to the thick clouds of Venus shut itself down, and its future looks as hazy as the planet it was built to study. http://phys.org/news210914349.html Space & Earth Tue, 07 Dec 2010 03:19:23 EST news210914349 (PhysOrg.com) -- A mysterious high-altitude layer of sulphur dioxide discovered by ESA's Venus Express has been explained. As well as telling us more about Venus, it could be a warning against injecting our atmosphere with sulphur droplets to mitigate climate change. http://phys.org/news210347005.html Space & Earth Tue, 30 Nov 2010 13:48:05 EST news210347005 An international team, including Jean-Loup Bertaux, CNRS senior researcher, has discovered a layer of sulfur dioxide (SO2) in the upper atmosphere of Venus. The researchers obtained this result using measurements performed by ESA's Venus Express spacecraft. They propose a new mechanism to explain this unexpected result. SO2 is of particular interest to them since this gas could be used to cool down the Earth via a geo-engineering process put forward by Chemistry Nobel Laureate Paul Crutzen. http://phys.org/news209139215.html Space & Earth Tue, 16 Nov 2010 14:14:06 EST news209139215 The Venus flytrap is a carnivorous plant luring insect prey with drops of liquid. The trap snaps shut like a steel jaw when an insect touches one of the very fine hairs within. The prey is caught – digestion begins. http://phys.org/news208430904.html Chemistry Mon, 08 Nov 2010 10:20:01 EST news208430904 The polar atmosphere of Venus is thinner than expected. How do we know? Because ESA's Venus Express has actually been there. Instead of looking from orbit, Venus Express has flown through the upper reaches of the planet?s poisonous atmosphere. http://phys.org/news205663248.html Space & Earth Thu, 07 Oct 2010 09:41:18 EST news205663248 High in an alpine meadow, Gesine Pufal, from the University of Wellington, New Zealand, crouched low to the ground and splashed some water from her water bottle on a low green plant cushion, then sat back waiting to see if something would move. Sound crazy? Many hikers passing by her may have thought so, but Pufal was trying to find potential plant species that possess a type of plant movement called hygrochasy. http://phys.org/news205083582.html Biology Thu, 30 Sep 2010 16:40:20 EST news205083582 Despite the great differences between the atmospheres of Venus and Earth, scientists have discovered that very similar mechanisms produce lightning on the two planets. The rates of discharge, the intensity and the spatial distribution of lightning are comparable, thus scientists hope to be able to better understand the chemistry, dynamics and evolution of the atmospheres of the two planets. These results were presented by Dr. Christopher Russell at the European Planetary Science Congress, on Thursday 23d September. http://phys.org/news204832802.html Space & Earth Mon, 27 Sep 2010 19:01:34 EST news204832802