New window to universe

An artist’s impression of the Circinus X-1 system showing the binary (double) star system. Two stars orbit each other every 16.5 days in an elliptical orbit. The small white sphere is the neutron star — an extremely dense and compact remnant of an exploded star, only about 20 km in diameter.

When Earth was snowball

For decades, scientists have intended that the earth may once have been a “Snowball Earth,” and new research proposes oceans could have churned beneath an ice-covered Earth, possibly assisting to provide life with vital nutrients. When ice possibly swathed the entire world, the oceans underneath may have nevertheless surprisingly churned, potentially helping to provide life with vital nutrients, new research suggests.
For decades, scientists have proposed that the planet may once have been a “Snowball Earth,” with geological evidence suggesting ice reached all the way to the equator at least twice during the Neoproterozoic era (about 635 million to 750 million years ago)

Solar system-like planet

A team of astronomers, including Quinn Konopacky of the Dunlap Institute for Astronomy & Astrophysics, University of Toronto, has made the most detailed examination yet of the atmosphere of a Jupiter-like planet beyond our Solar System.

According to Konopacky, “We have been able to observe this planet in unprecedented detail because of the advanced instrumentation we are using on the Keck II telescope, our ground-breaking observing and data-processing techniques, and because of the nature of the planetary system.”

Prospect of Martian life?

If a microorganism were found on Mars, would anyone care?
NASA scientists announced on March 12 that the Red Planet could have supported ancient life  though they don’t yet have evidence that it did. A sample of rock drilled by the Curiosity rover revealed conditions that could have supported ancient microbes at some point in the distant past.
The news of even potential life made headlines, and there’s no doubt the discovery of actual microbial life on Mars would, too. But the impact of finding

Voyager now in solar system border

Voyager 1, launched in 1977 to explore the outer planets, has passed into a new region on its way out of the solar system, scientists said on Wednesday.

The spacecraft, now more than 11 billion miles (18 billion km) away, detected two distinct and related changes in its environment on August 25, 2012, scientists write in paper to be published in Geophysical Research Letters and emailed to Reuters on Wednesday.

The probe detected dramatic changes in the levels of two types of radiation, one that stays inside the solar system, the other which comes from interstellar space.