Fastest star ever seen is moving at 8% the speed of light

In the center of our galaxy, hundreds of stars closely orbit a supermassive black hole. Most of these stars have large enough orbits that their motion is described by Newtonian gravity and Kepler's laws of motion. But a few ...

Laser beams reflected between Earth and moon boost science

Dozens of times over the last decade NASA scientists have launched laser beams at a reflector the size of a paperback novel about 240,000 miles (385,000 kilometers) away from Earth. They announced today, in collaboration ...

Shining a new light on biomimetic materials

Advances in biomimicry – creating biological responses within non-biological substances – will enable synthetic materials to behave in ways that were typically only found in Nature. Light provides an especially effective ...

Researchers demonstrate optical backflow of light

Researchers at Tel Aviv University have for the first time demonstrated the backflow of optical light propagating forward. The phenomenon, theorized more than 50 years ago by quantum physicists, has never before been demonstrated ...

Illuminating the world of nanoparticles

Scientists at the Okinawa Institute of Science and Technology Graduate University (OIST) have developed a light-based device that can act as a biosensor, detecting biological substances in materials; for example, harmful ...

Image: A ghost in the Pleiades

This ghostly image shows what can happen when an interstellar cloud passes too close to a star. Barnard's Merope Nebula, also known as IC 349, is a cloud of interstellar gas and dust traveling through the Pleiades star cluster ...

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