After a year of downtime to perform hardware upgrades, the Laser Interferometer Gravitational-Wave Observatory (LIGO) is ready for action and will turn on its twin detectors, one in Washington state and the other in Louisiana, on April 1. This time, it will also be joined by the Virgo collaboration based out of Italy, and possibly also by the KAGRA detector in Japan later in the year. Combined with the hardware upgrades, scientists expect these updates to allow LIGO to spot more observations ...read more
The Large Magellanic Cloud (LMC) and the Small Magellanic Cloud (SMC) are two of the most stunning naked-eye sights you can spot in the southern sky. Over the past few billion years, these two satellite galaxies of the Milky Way have been locked in a complex dance that has led to numerous interactions between them. And each time they get close, their gravitational forces disrupt the gas clouds within them, spawning the formation of thousands of new star clusters.
Now, astron ...read more
The last and only time astronomers got a close look at Neptune’s moon Triton was in 1989, when Voyager 2 sped by, taking images of just one side of the moon. But that brief encounter revealed plumes of material shooting out from a world so distant and cold that any activity was immediately fascinating. Scientists now think the moon has an underground ocean. This makes it a prime target for finding potential alien life in a frozen zone of the solar system well outside the standard ...read more
A few weeks ago, a spending bill passed by Congress included $100 million earmarked for NASA to develop nuclear thermal rocket engines. In spite of the ever-present backlash to nuclear material, it’s not uncommon when it comes to space exploration. The Curiosity rover is just one of many NASA missions powered by nuclear material, in this case, a multi-mission radioisotope thermoelectric generator (MMRTG) that converts heat from decaying plutonium-238 into electricity. But that's ...read more
With the warm weather upon us and the once-frozen plants coming back to life, springtime feels like a long-awaited oasis for most people. But for some, the resurgence of trees and grass can trigger seasonal allergies, and turn springtime into a sneezy, snotty mess. Instead of just popping your allergy meds and hoping for the best, a group of researchers think they may have just enabled a new approach to allergy relief.
Research published on March 19 in the journal Cornea shows how con ...read more
Author Vishay SinghPosted on Categories Discover Magazine