Heavens

Extremely precise measurements of distances are key in all techniques used to detect gravitational waves. To increase this precision, physicists have started using quantum effects linked with photons. A paper published in "Physical Review A" by Polish and German physicists shows that it is not necessary to use quantum light states more refined than the squeezed coherent states available currently.

Most stars do not form alone, but with many siblings that are created at about the same time from a single cloud of gas and dust. NGC 3572, in the southern constellation of Carina (The Keel), is one of these clusters. It contains many hot young blue-white stars that shine brightly and generate powerful stellar winds that tend to gradually disperse the remaining gas and dust from their surroundings.

The sun emitted a significant solar flare that peaked at 12:14 a.m. EST on Nov. 10, 2013. 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.

Washington, D.C.— Reconstructing the rise of life during the period of Earth's history when it first evolved is challenging. Earth's oldest sedimentary rocks are not only rare, but also almost always altered by hydrothermal and tectonic activity. A new study from a team including Carnegie's Nora Noffke, a visiting investigator, and Robert Hazen revealed the well-preserved remnants of a complex ecosystem in a nearly 3.5 billion-year-old sedimentary rock sequence in Australia. Their work is published in Astrobiology.

Tropical Cyclone 03A made landfall in Somalia and moved inland where it is dissipating over eastern Ethiopia today, Nov. 12. NASA's Aqua, Terra and TRMM satellites passed over the cyclone an captured images of 03A before and after it made landfall.

Somalia is located in the Horn of Africa and its coastline lies on the Arabian Sea and the Gulf of Aden. It is bordered by Ethiopia to the west, and Djibouti to the northwest.

Tropical Depression 30W formed in the northwestern Pacific Ocean basin and crossed into the Northern Indian Ocean from Nov. 8 to Nov. 10. By Nov. 12, NASA satellite imagery saw the ex-tropical depression coming back together.

On Nov. 10 at 03:30 UTC/Nov. 9 at 10:30 p.m. EDT, the Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer or MODIS instrument aboard NASA's Terra satellite showed the center of Typhoon Haiyan was just south of Hainan Island, China in the South China Sea. Later in the day, Haiyan moved north of Hainan Island and headed for a landfall in extreme northeastern Vietnam. Haiyan's maximum sustained winds were near 75 knots/86 mph/138.9 kph. At 1500 UTC/10 a.m. EDT on Nov. 10.

TORONTO, ON — Invisibility cloaking is no longer the stuff of science fiction: two researchers in The Edward S. Rogers Sr. Department of Electrical & Computer Engineering have demonstrated an effective invisibility cloak that is thin, scalable and adaptive to different types and sizes of objects.

Philadelphia – In order to evoke a true transformation, the U.S. health care system needs an audacious goal, one equivalent to President Kennedy's call for a man on the moon in 1962, says Ezekiel J. Emanuel, MD, PHD, Diane v.S. Levy and Robert M. Levy University Professor and chair of the Department of Medical Ethics and Health Policy at the University of Pennsylvania. In a Viewpoint published in the November 13 issue of the Journal of the American Medical Association, Emanuel recommends limiting the rate of per capita health care cost increases to that of the U.S.

The study helps to confirm the idea that the surface of Phobos contains tons of dust, soil, and rock blown off the Martian surface by large projectile impacts. Phobos' orbital path plows through occasional plumes of Martian debris, meaning the tiny moon has been gathering Martian castoffs for millions of years. That means a sample-return mission planned by the Russian space agency could sample two celestial bodies for the price of one.

Foams fascinate, partly due to their short lifespan. Foams change as fluid drains out of their structure over time. It is precisely their ephemeral nature which has, until now, prevented scientists from experimentally probing their characteristic dynamics further. Instead, foams have often been studied theoretically. Now, Nathan Isert from the University of Konstanz, Germany and colleagues, have devised a method of keeping foams in shape using a magnet, which allows their dynamics to be investigated experimentally, as recently described in EPJ E.

The sun emitted its sixth significant flare since Oct. 23, 2013, peaking at 11:26 p.m. EST on Nov. 7, 2013. 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.

To see how this event may affect Earth, please visit NOAA's Space Weather Prediction Center, the U.S. government's official source for space weather forecasts, alerts, watches and warnings.

Supernovae are intensely bright objects. They are formed when a star reaches the end of its life with a dramatic explosion, expelling most of its material out into space.

The subject of this new Hubble image, spiral galaxy NGC 6984, played host to one of these explosions back in 2012, known as SN 2012im. Now, another star has exploded, forming supernova SN 2013ek — visible in this image as the prominent, star-like bright object just slightly above and to the right of the galaxy's center.

NASA's Tropical Rainfall Measuring Mission or TRMM satellite captured an image of Haiyan just as it was crossing the island of Leyte in the central Philippines. Data was taken at 00:19 UTC (8:19 a.m. local) November 8, 2013 and showed the horizontal distribution of rain intensity within the Haiyan. Rain rates in the center of the swath were generated from the TRMM Precipitation Radar (PR), and those in the outer swath were from the TRMM Microwave Imager (TMI). The data was put together at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Md.

Now a remnant low pressure area, former Tropical Depression 30W may get new another life in another ocean. NASA's Aqua satellite captured an infrared image of the storm that showed strong circulation and persistent developing thunderstorms around its center.

Tropical Depression 30W moved through the Northwestern Pacific Ocean basin over the Philippines, past Vietnam and on Nov. 8, was entering the Andaman Sea, located in the eastern North Indian Ocean.