Heavens

The eerie glow that straddles the night time zodiac in the eastern sky is no longer a mystery. First explained by Joshua Childrey in 1661 as sunlight scattered in our direction by dust particles in the solar system, the source of that dust was long debated. In a paper to appear in the April 20 issue of The Astrophysical Journal, David Nesvorny and Peter Jenniskens put the stake in asteroids. More than 85 percent of the dust, they conclude, originated from Jupiter Family comets, not asteroids.

In addition to Lapen, the team includes Alan Brandon, an associate professor in UH's department of earth and atmospheric sciences, and their two post-doctoral researchers Minako Righter and John Shafer. Other collaborators were Brian Beard from the University of Wisconsin-Madison and NASA Astrobiology Institute, Vinciane Debaille from the University of Bruxelles and Anne Peslier, a research scientist at Jacobs Technology working at NASA Johnson Space Center.

An artificial pancreas system that closely mimics the body's blood sugar control mechanism was able to maintain near-normal glucose levels without causing hypoglycemia in a small group of patients. The system, combining a blood glucose monitor and insulin pump technology with software that directs administration of insulin and the blood-sugar-raising hormone glucagon, was developed at Boston University (BU). The first clinical trial of the system was conducted at Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH) and confirmed the feasibility of an approach utilizing doses of both hormones.

Light bounced off reflectors on the moon is fainter than expected and mysteriously dims even more whenever the moon is full. Astronomers think dust is a likely culprit, they report in a forthcoming issue of the journal Icarus.

Two new and independent studies have put Einstein's General Theory ofRelativity to the test like never before. These results, made using NASA's Chandra X-ray Observatory, show Einstein's theory is still the best game in town.

Each team of scientists took advantage of extensive Chandra observations of galaxy clusters, the largest objects in the Universe bound together by gravity. One result undercuts a rival gravity model to General Relativity, while the other shows that Einstein's theory works over a vast range of times and distances across the cosmos.

HOUSTON – (April 14, 2010) – Shifting work schedules can wreak havoc on a person's ability to get enough sleep, resulting in poor performance on the job.

Researchers funded by the National Space Biomedical Research Institute (NSBRI) have developed software that uses mathematical models to help astronauts and ground support personnel better adjust to shifting work and sleep schedules. Outside the space program, the software could help people who do shift or night work or who experience jet lag due to travel across time zones.

Harbour says it takes several weeks to months to see the tumor start to melt away, but in both ocular melanoma and retinoblastoma, the plaques usually deal the cancer a fatal blow.

Three research papers and a perspective published in PLoS Medicine this week highlight the importance of gathering accurate information on numbers of deaths, and suggest ways of improving estimates in countries where complete vital registration systems do not exist. In the first paper, Julie Rajaratnam from the University of Washington, and colleagues from Harvard University and the University of Queensland, provide an overview of current systems of methods of estimating deaths where death registration is incomplete.

TORONTO – Pseudobulbar affect (PBA) is a neurologic condition of involuntary, sudden and frequent episodes of laughing or crying and is quite common in patients with underlying neurologic diseases or injuries, especially those with multiple sclerosis (MS) and amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS). Now, a new investigational treatment may help stop these involuntary outbursts. The research will be presented as part of the late-breaking science program at the American Academy of Neurology's 62nd Annual Meeting in Toronto, April 10 – 17, 2010.

Montreal, April 13, 2010 – Allergies have become a widespread in developed countries: hay fever, eczema, hives and asthma are all increasingly prevalent. The reason? Excessive cleanliness is to blame according to Dr. Guy Delespesse, a professor at the Université de Montréal Faculty of Medicine.

Allergies can be caused by family history, air pollution, processed foods, stress, tobacco use, etc. Yet our limited exposure to bacteria concerns Dr. Delespesse, who is also director of the Laboratory for Allergy Research at the Centre hospitalier de l'Université de Montréal.

(Santa Barbara, Calif.) –– The discovery of nine new planets challenges the reigning theory of the formation of planets, according to new observations by astronomers. Two of the astronomers involved in the discoveries are based at the UC Santa Barbara-affiliated Las Cumbres Observatory Global Telescope Network (LCOGT), based in Goleta, Calif., near UCSB.

Water ice exists in large quantities in many small craters near the Moon's north pole, according to a new study.

Spudis et al. present initial results from the miniature synthetic aperture radar (Mini-SAR) experiment on board the Indian Chandrayaan 1 spacecraft, which mapped most of the area near the north pole of the Moon between February and April 2009. The Mini-SAR instrument collected data on the polarization of radio waves reflected off the lunar surface.

ESA's CryoSat-2 has delivered its first data just hours after ground controllers switched on the satellite's sophisticated radar instrument for the first time. CryoSat-2 was launched on 8 April and has been performing exceptionally well during these critical first few days in orbit.

The discovery of nine new transiting exoplanets is announced today at the RAS National Astronomy Meeting. When these new results were combined with earlier observations of transiting exoplanets astronomers were surprised to find that six out of a larger sample of 27 were found to be orbiting in the opposite direction to the rotation of their host star -- the exact reverse of what is seen in our own solar system.

Herschel's latest image reveals the formation of previously unseen large stars, each one up to ten times the mass of our Sun. These are the stars that will influence where and how the next generation of stars are formed. The image is a new release of 'OSHI', ESA's Online Showcase of Herschel Images.