Heavens

An international team of astronomers has made a measurement of a distant neutron star that is one million times more precise than the previous world's best.

The researchers were able to use the interstellar medium, the 'empty' space between stars and galaxies that is made up of sparsely spread charged particles, as a giant lens to magnify and look closely at the radio wave emission from a small rotating neutron star.

Ever wonder how often you fool your boss or in-laws by pretending to laugh at their dumb jokes?

The answer is probably just over one-third of the time, according to new research by a UCLA communication expert who has conducted research on fake laughs.

When your fake laughs fall short of convincing, tiny subtleties of your breathing are probably giving you away, suggests Greg Bryant, an associate professor of communication studies at UCLA.

It's a well-known fact that spending on health care has consistently grown faster than the rest of the U.S. economy. What's behind this trend is less certain. Economists point to two causes: the prevalence of diseases and conditions afflicting the U.S. population, or the rising costs of treating diseases. New research from American University Associate Professor Martha Starr and Virginia Tech Research Professor Ana Aizcorbe shows it is the latter, with higher prices for treatment accounting for 70 percent of growth in health care spending.

Maintaining or boosting your physical activity after age 65 can improve your heart's electrical well-being and lower your risk of heart attack, according to a study in the American Heart Association journal Circulation.

In heart monitor recordings taken over five years, researchers found that people who walked more and faster and had more physically active leisure time had fewer irregular heart rhythms and greater heart rate variability than those who were less active.

Terahertz imaging, which is already familiar from airport security checkpoints, has a number of other promising applications — from explosives detection to collision avoidance in cars. Like sonar or radar, terahertz imaging produces an image by comparing measurements across an array of sensors. Those arrays have to be very dense, since the distance between sensors is proportional to wavelength.

The melting of a rather small ice volume on East Antarctica's shore could trigger a persistent ice discharge into the ocean, resulting in unstoppable sea-level rise for thousands of years to come. This is shown in a study now published in Nature Climate Change by scientists from the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research (PIK). The findings are based on computer simulations of the Antarctic ice flow using improved data of the ground profile underneath the ice sheet.

Northwestern University researchers are the first to develop a new solar cell with good efficiency that uses tin instead of lead perovskite as the harvester of light. The low-cost, environmentally friendly solar cell can be made easily using "bench" chemistry -- no fancy equipment or hazardous materials.

In the movies, humans often fear invaders from Mars. These days, scientists are more concerned about invaders to Mars, in the form of micro-organisms from Earth. Three recent scientific papers examined the risks of interplanetary exchange of organisms using research from the International Space Station.

Tapah was downgraded from a tropical storm to a tropical depression and is located 239 nautical miles southeast of Iwo To. Tapah rapidly dissipated due to the effected of strong vertical windshear from the west and a sharp decreased in sea surface temperature. The storm is currently tracking northwest at 10 knots per hour and is expected to recurve to the northeast and accelerate. Maximum wave height is currently 10 feet. The storm will be monitored for signs of regeneration.

RICHLAND, Wash. – Killer whales and other marine mammals likely hear sonar signals more than we've known.

That's because commercially available sonar systems, which are designed to create signals beyond the range of hearing of such animals, also emit signals known to be within their hearing range, scientists have discovered.

Two teams of astronomers using the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope have discovered three distant exploding stars that have been magnified by the immense gravity of foreground galaxy clusters, which act like "cosmic lenses". These supernovae are the first of their type ever to be observed magnified in this way and they offer astronomers a powerful tool to check the prescription of these massive lenses.

Pasadena, CA— New work from a team of scientists including Carnegie's Josh Simon analyzed the chemical elements in the faintest known galaxy, called Segue 1, and determined that it is effectively a fossil galaxy left over from the early universe.

How hard can it be to make a wheel rotate in a machine? Very hard actually, when the wheel sits in one of those nano-small molecular machines that are predicted to be running our future machines. But before the molecular machines become part of our daily lives, researchers must be able to control them. A Danish/American research team have now solved part of this problem.

CAMBRIDGE, Mass. -- Out on the edge of the universe, 75,000 light years from us, a galaxy known as Segue 1 has some unusual properties: It is the faintest galaxy ever detected. It is very small, containing only about 1,000 stars. And it has a rare chemical composition, with vanishingly small amounts of metallic elements present.

North American winters can be harsh, so anything that wants to make it to summer has to be pragmatic about surviving the coldest months; and insects are no exception. Katie Marshall from The University of British Columbia, Canada, explains that as the days draw in, the larvae of the goldenrod gall fly (Eurosta solidaginis) shut down their metabolism and development and begin producing cryoprotectants ready to freeze solid to survive the winter months.