Cosmos (category filter × )

Huge black hole found, shouldn’t even exist

edition.cnn.com
  • Chinese scientists found an elusive type of black hole by studying X-rays in an attempt to find stars orbiting an invisible object.
  • LB-1 is a stellar black hole with a mass equal to 70 Suns, 15,000 light years away.
  • What’s interesting, is that the theoretical mass limit for this type of black hole was capped at 20 Suns before this discovery.
  • This throws a wrench into black hole theory, and explaining this phenomenon could be a crucial step towards new discoveries about black holes.
Bulleted by Michał Słupski
on November 29, 2019

NASA has found sugar in meteorites that crashed to Earth

edition.cnn.com
  • Analysis of 3 meteorites shows that they contain arabinose, xylose and ribose.
  • Ribose also exists in our RNA, which is additional proof that the ingredients for life on Earth may have come to our planet on meteorites.
  • This discovery is the first evidence of ribose in space, as well as the process of delivering sugar to Earth.
Bulleted by Michał Słupski
on November 22, 2019

Physicists Just Created the Most Detailed Simulation of the Universe in History

livescience.com
  • After over a year of simulations run on a 16,000-processor core supercomputer, the most detailed model of the Universe’s expansion has been created.
  • The model is ~230 million light-years wide, with tens of thousands of evolving galaxies.
  • Among the findings are new, previously unstudied, phenomena that were not explicitly programmed into the simulation.
  • The simulation shows exactly how galaxies formed from clouds of gas after the Big Bang.
Bulleted by Michał Słupski
on November 20, 2019

Kilometer-Long Space Tether Tests Fuel-Free Propulsion

scientificamerican.com
  • The Tether Electrodynamic Propulsion CubeSat Experiment (TEPCE) is bringing back a technology from the 90’s that could be used for star sailboats.
  • TEPCE consists of two minisatellites connected with a 1km ‘rope’, the experiment will determine how the device responds to Earth’s magnetic field in the ionosphere.
  • Success of this mission could bring about spacecrafts that don’t require fuel to move around Earth’s orbit.
  • It could also lead to a new generation of space-cleaning spaceships for getting rid of all the space junk currently floating in Earth’s orbit.
Bulleted by Michał Słupski
on November 8, 2019

First identification of a heavy element born from neutron star collision

eso.org
  • Astronomers detected strontium, a heavy element found naturally in Earth soil, is created during a neutron star merger.
  • This is the last piece in the search for the origin of the elements, confirming rapid neutron capture as the process that creates elements heavier than iron.
  • The discovery confirms that neutron stars are made of neutrons, and that rapid neutron capture occurs during neutron star mergers.
Bulleted by Michał Słupski
on October 25, 2019
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  • Science Science (55) Degeneration of neurons in rat brains stopped with pre- and probiotic treatment
  • Psychology Psychology (58) Kids with depressed parents have different brains
  • Cosmos Cosmos (28) Huge black hole found, shouldn’t even exist
  • History History (14) Humans survived off rodents in the mountains during the last ice age, study says
  • Society Society (59) Majority of anti-vaxx ads on Facebook are funded by just two organizations
  • Medicine Medicine (56) Young children have lower grades due to increased salt intake
  • Technology Technology (62) Magnetic Quantum Computing Circuit doesn’t need any electricity
  • Nature Nature (43) Single-cell organisms might be able to process information and make decisions