Revisiting the Veil Nebula

Deriving its name from its delicate, draped filamentary structures, the beautiful Veil Nebula is one of the best-known supernova remnants. It formed from the violent death of a star twenty times the mass of the Sun that exploded ...

The mystery of heavy elements in galactic cosmic rays

Scientists have used data from the Southwest Research Institute-led Magnetospheric Multiscale (MMS) mission to explain the presence of energetic heavy elements in galactic cosmic rays (GCRs). GCRs are composed of fast-moving ...

Planets can form in the galactic center

(Phys.org)—At first glance, the center of the Milky Way seems like a very inhospitable place to try to form a planet. Stars crowd each other as they whiz through space like cars on a rush-hour freeway. Supernova explosions ...

Fast and loud—how to create sonic booms and curious clouds

Growing up beneath the Concorde flight path, I learned early on that if you heard its characteristic roar overhead you had to look far towards the horizon to see it. If you were lucky, you would see Concorde first. You could ...

Rosetta witnesses birth of baby bow shock around comet

A new study reveals that, contrary to first impressions, Rosetta did detect signs of an infant bow shock at the comet it explored for two years – the first ever seen forming anywhere in the solar system.

The risks of low-speed impacts with liquids

When a solid object hits a liquid, the impact produces shock waves: a process that has long occupied engineers due to its implications for design of hydraulic systems or motors. KAUST researchers now show that impacts at ...

NASA's MMS finds first interplanetary shock

The Magnetospheric Multiscale mission—MMS—has spent the past four years using high-resolution instruments to see what no other spacecraft can. Recently, MMS made the first high-resolution measurements of an interplanetary ...

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