02.02.10 In Search of Life, Gravity Waves, and Everything.

Astronomers have added a key tool to their arsenal in probing the very early universe. LIGO, the Laser Interferometer Gravitational wave Observatory, is a pair of “observatories” one in Hanford, Washington, and one in Livingston, Louisiana that monitor the universe for that most exotic of beasts; gravity waves. Each L-shaped detector is comprised of two [...]

06.11.09:A New Type of Supernova?

Astronomers at  the University of California at Berkley may have added a new type of supernova to the list. Typical type I supernovae consist of a carbon-oxygen white dwarf accreting matter from a companion star until a runaway reaction occurs, while type II supernovae involve a collapse of a star perhaps nine times as massive [...]

25.10.09: In Search of a Mirror Universe.

There is one enduring mystery in cosmology that just won’t budge; namely, just what happened to all that pesky anti-matter that was presumably created during the Big Bang? Was it annihilated, only to leave the infinitesimally small faction of pedestrian “normal” baryonic matter that comprises the universe that we know and love, or are there [...]

11.10.09: Zooming in on Blazars.

Astronomers have recently utilized an enormous radio telescope to examine some of the most exotic objects in the universe; active galactic nuclei. Sometimes called “Blazars”, these distant galaxies are spewing huge jets of particles at amazing relativistic speeds. These emit immense energy across the electromagnetic spectrum. NASA’s Fermi Gamma Ray Space Telescope has identified [...]

4.10.9:A Gamma-Ray Burst for the Record Books.

A Gamma-ray burst from the primordial universe sent astronomers reeling earlier this year with the most distant sighting yet. The burst was picked up by NASA’s Swift spacecraft on April 23, 2009 at 3:55 EDT. E-mails and instant messages flew to observatories around the globe as astronomers raced to pin-point the fading afterglow. Dubbed GRB [...]

29.9.9:Hubble Spies a Galactic Jet.

The formerly ailing Hubble Space Telescope spied something remarkable earlier this year; a rapidly expanding jet around the massive galaxy M87. Dubbed HST-1, this blob of matter is the first object with a Hubble designation, and has been tracked for over seven years. Brighter than the galaxies’ own core, the gas knot is 214 light [...]

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