“Did an active sun kickstart life on Earth?”

 

solar burst

 

Our sun has been active this week. And its overall activity is increasing as it nears solar maximum, expected for the mid-2020s. But, even at maximum, solar activity is nothing now in contrast to the young sun’s activity during Earth’s formative years. During Earth’s first 100 million years, when the sun was only about 1/3 as bright as it is now, it popped off strong solar eruptions known as superflares about every three to 10 earthly days. Those superflares – powerful explosions on our star, with energies 10 thousand times greater than typical solar flares – occur today only about every 100 years. According to a new study – previewed online by NASA on May 2, 2023 – life might have arisen when solar particles from these events collided with gasses in Earth’s early atmosphere.

Read the full article here.

Link contributed by Gene Savoy, Jr.



“It’s official: Saturn is Losing its rings”

 

Saturn with rings

 

If you were to pick Saturn out of a lineup you’d probably recognize it by its iconic rings. They’re the biggest, brightest rings in our solar system. Extending over 280,000 km from the planet; wide enough to fit 6 Earths in a row. But Saturn won’t always look this way. Because its rings are disappearing.

Read the full article here



“NASA’s Curiosity rover spots a strange bone-like rock on Mars”

 

Bone-like structure on Mars

 

 

NASA‘s Curiosity rover has taken a picture of a strange Martian structure that one expert has dubbed the ‘most bizarre’ she’s ever seen.

Images snapped by the car-sized robot appear to show spikes protruding from a rock lying at the base of the 96 mile-long (154 km) Gale Crater.

They were taken using Curiosity’s mast camera and ChemCam on Martian day Sol 3786, or April 1, and have sparked speculation online as to what they may depict.

 

Read the full article here.

 



“Strong stellar winds create the butterfly nebula that makes people fall in love”

 

Butterfly Nebula

 

 

The butterfly nebula, also known as the Twin Jet Nebula, is a ѕtгіkіпɡ and beautiful astronomical object that is created by the powerful stellar winds of a dуіпɡ star. As the star nears the end of its life, it begins to shed its outer layers of gas, which are then Ьɩowп away by the star’s іпteпѕe winds.

The interaction between these winds and the surrounding interstellar gas creates the complex and intricate patterns of the butterfly nebula. The wings of the nebula are shaped by the interaction between the stellar winds and the surrounding gas, while the central region is thought to be shaped by the powerful magnetic fields of the dуіпɡ star.

Read the full article here.

 



“Oldest Homo sapiens fossil claim rewrites our species’ History”

 

Homo Sapiens from Morocco

 

Researchers say that they have found the oldest Homo sapiens remains on record in an improbable place: Morocco.

At an archaeological site near the Atlantic coast, finds of skull, face and jaw bones identified as being from early members of our species have been dated to about 315,000 years ago. That indicates H. sapiens appeared more than 100,000 years earlier than thought: most researchers have placed the origins of our species in East Africa about 200,000 years ago.

Read the full article here.

Link contributed by Mike McIntyre.



“Asteroid Phaethon Gets Weirder”

 

asteroid Phaethon

 

We’ve known for a while that asteroid 3200 Phaethon acts like a comet. It brightens and forms a tail when it’s near the sun. And it’s the source of the annual Geminid meteor shower, even though comets are responsible for most meteor showers. Scientists blamed Phaethon’s comet-like behavior on dust escaping from the asteroid as it’s scorched by the sun. However, a new study using two NASA solar observatories reveals that Phaethon’s tail is not dusty at all. In fact, it’s made of sodium gas.

Read the full article here.



“Stephen Hawking’s famous black hole paradox may finally have a solution”

 

Hawking's paradox black hole

 

One of physicist Stephen Hawking’s most famous paradoxes may finally be solved: Black holes may in fact hang onto information about the massive stars that created them, new research indicates.

This information may lurk in the radiation around black holes – colloquially known as “quantum hair” – and could, in theory, be retrieved to retell the origins of those black holes, the research suggests.

Read the complete story here.



“Hubble Telescope eyes aftermath of supernova in distant galaxy (video)”

 

galaxy with supernova

 

The Hubble Space Telescope has snapped a stunning image of a distant galaxy while on a quick break from its usual observations.

The latest Hubble photo captured a side view of the “amorphous” UGC 2890 galaxy, which lies 30 million light-years from Earth in the constellation Camelopardalis (The Giraffe). Like our own Milky Way, UGC 2890 is a spiral galaxy with a central bulge and a rotating star-studded disk.

Read the full article (with video) here.

 



“Einstein rings might help solve dark matter puzzle”

 

Einstein rings

Physicists believe most of the matter in the universe is made up of an invisible substance that we only know about by its indirect effects on the stars and galaxies we can see. We’re not crazy! Without this dark matter, the universe as we see it would make no sense.

Click here to read the full article.



“Supermassive black holes share a surprising link with subatomic gluon ‘color glass walls'”

 

massive black hole

Scientists have discovered a surprising connection between the supermassive black holes that dwell at the hearts of most galaxies and dense walls of subatomic particles called gluons.

In terms of size, they couldn’t be more different: Supermassive black holes can be billions of miles across, and the dense walls of gluons, known as color glass condensates (CGCs), are less than a billionth of a mile in diameter.

Click here to read the full article.