Heavens

For decades, astronomers have predicted the formation of galaxies using computer simulations, but with limited success. The galaxies that formed in previous simulations were often too massive, too small, too old and too spherical - nothing like actual galaxies.

An international team has developed a simulation of the universe in which realistic galaxies are created; their mass, size and age are similar to those of observed galaxies. Their similarity is caused by the simulation of strong galactic winds - gas winds that are blown from galaxies.

Severe weather in the form of tornadoes is not something people expect on Christmas week but a storm system on Dec. 23rd brought tornadoes to Mississippi, Georgia and Louisiana. NASA's RapidScat, which flies aboard the International Space Station, captured data on winds while NOAA's GOES satellite tracked the movement of the system. In addition, an animation of images from NOAA's GOES-East satellite showed the movement of those storms and other weather systems from Canada to South America from Dec. 21st to 24th.

A new analysis of a Martian rock that meteorite hunters plucked from an Antarctic ice field 30 years ago this month reveals a record of the planet's climate billions of years ago, back when water likely washed across its surface and any life that ever formed there might have emerged.

Scientists from the University of California, San Diego, NASA and the Smithsonian Institution report detailed measurements of minerals within the meteorite in the early online edition of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences this week.

The sun emitted a mid-level flare on Dec. 18, 2014, at 4:58 p.m. EST. NASA's Solar Dynamics Observatory, which watches the sun constantly, captured an image of the event. Solar flares are powerful bursts of radiation. Harmful radiation from a flare cannot pass through Earth's atmosphere to physically affect humans on the ground, however -- when intense enough -- they can disturb the atmosphere in the layer where GPS and communications signals travel.

In a recent study from Lund University in Sweden, researchers have used new technology to study extremely fast processes in solar cells. The research results form a concrete step towards more efficient solar cells.

The upper limit for the efficiency of normal solar cells is around 33 per cent. However, researchers now see a possibility to raise that limit to over 40 per cent, thereby significantly improving the potential of this energy source.

Auroras are the most visible manifestation of the sun's effect on Earth, but many aspects of these spectacular displays are still poorly understood. Thanks to the joint European Space Agency and NASA's Cluster mission combined with data from a past NASA mission called the Imager for Magnetopause-to-Aurora Global Exploration, or IMAGE, a particular type of very high-latitude aurora has now been explained.

A University of Southampton researcher has helped solve a long standing space mystery - the origin of the 'theta aurora'.

Auroras are the most visible manifestation of the Sun's effect on Earth. They are seen as colourful displays in the night sky, known as the Northern or Southern Lights. They are caused by the solar wind, a stream of plasma - electrically charged atomic particles - carrying its own magnetic field, interacting with the earth's magnetic field.

Although most of the water soaked into the ground in the 37 miles below the dam, the river's surface flow reached areas farther downstream that had been targeted for restoration, and groundwater revived vegetation along the entire route to the sea.

To paraphrase Mark Twain, the report of the Kepler spacecraft's death was greatly exaggerated. Despite a malfunction that ended its primary mission in May 2013, Kepler is still alive and working. The evidence comes from the discovery of a new super-Earth using data collected during Kepler's "second life."

"Like a phoenix rising from the ashes, Kepler has been reborn and is continuing to make discoveries. Even better, the planet it found is ripe for follow-up studies," says lead author Andrew Vanderburg of the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics (CfA).

ARLINGTON HEIGHTS, Ill. (December 18, 2014) - Discovering your child has a severe food allergy can be a terrible shock. Even more stressful can be determining what foods your child can and cannot eat, and constructing a new diet which might eliminate entire categories of foods.

According to a new study published in the Annals of Allergy, Asthma and Immunology, the scientific publication of the American College of Allergy, Asthma and Immunology (ACAAI), providing parents with detailed, individual advice from a dietician is a key component of effective food allergy care.

Big data may be the next new thing to hit the fashion industry's runways, according to a team of researchers.

By analyzing relevant words and phrases from fashion reviews, researchers were able to identify a network of influence among major designers and track how those style trends moved through the industry, said Heng Xu, associate professor of information sciences and technology, Penn State.

High-energy jets powered by supermassive black holes can blast away a galaxy's star-forming fuel, resulting in so-called "red and dead" galaxies: those brimming with ancient red stars yet containing little or no hydrogen gas to create new ones.

BELLINGHAM, Washington, USA - The first issue of the new Journal of Astronomical Telescopes, Instruments, and Systems (JATIS) has been launched by SPIE, the international society for optics and photonics. All articles will be freely available through the end of 2015 in the SPIE Digital Library. Mark Clampin, SPIE Fellow and James Webb Space Telescope Observatory Project Scientist at NASA Goddard Space Flight Center, is editor-in-chief.

NASA satellite instruments have observed a marked increase in solar radiation absorbed in the Arctic since the year 2000 - a trend that aligns with the steady decrease in Arctic sea ice during the same period.

A close look at the night sky reveals that stars don't like to be alone; instead, they congregate in clusters, in some cases containing as many as several million stars. Until recently, the oldest of these populous star clusters were considered well understood, with the stars in a single group having formed at different times, over periods of more than 300 million years.