Heavens

John Federici, a physics professor at NJIT, sees the use of terahertz rays as a critical technology in the defense against suicide bombers and other terrorist activities. Federici and his research team recently described experimental results from a digital video camera invented in their laboratory that uses a terahertz imaging system. One day such a device could be used to scan airport passengers quickly and efficiently. "Video-Rate terahertz Interferometric and Synthetic Aperture Imaging" appeared in Applied Optics (July, 2009).

Present-day gully activity on Mars provides new evidence for transient liquid water. Reiss et al. study images of the Russell crater dune field on Mars taken by the High Resolution Imaging Science Experiment from November 2006 to May 2009.

On Earth, lava flows react rapidly with oxygen and other elements in the atmosphere, changing their composition. On Venus, the process should be similar, though more intense because of the hotter, denser atmosphere, chiefly of carbon dioxide.

The unusual spiral galaxy, Messier 66, is located at a distance of about 35 million light-years in the constellation of Leo. Together with Messier 65 and NGC 3628, Messier 66 is one third of the Leo Triplet, a trio of interacting spiral galaxies, part of the larger Messier 66 group. Messier 66 wins out in size over its fellow triplets — it is about 100 000 light-years across.

ANN ARBOR, Mich.---For the first time, astronomers have directly observed the mysterious dark companion in a binary star system that has puzzled skywatchers since the 19th century.

Using an instrument developed at the University of Michigan, scientists have taken close-up pictures of Epsilon Aurigae during its eclipse, which happens every 27 years. "Close up" in this case is a relative term, but the images zoom in enough to show the shape of the dark object's shadow.

Using skills passed down through generations, Inuit forecasters living in the Canadian Arctic look to the sky to tell by the way the wind scatters a cloud whether a storm is on the horizon or if it's safe to go on a hunt.

Thousands of miles away in a lab tucked in Colorado's Rocky Mountains, scientists take data measurements and use the latest computer models to predict weather. They are two practices serving the same purpose that come from disparate worlds.

"We have found real evidence that the Sun still makes its presence felt on Triton, even from so far away. This icy moon actually has seasons just as we do on Earth, but they change far more slowly," says Emmanuel Lellouch, the lead author of the paper reporting these results in Astronomy & Astrophysics.

For the first time, a team of astronomers has imaged the eclipse of the star Epsilon Aurigae by its mysterious, less luminous companion star. Very high-resolution images, never before possible, have been published online today in the journal Nature Letters. Epsilon Aurigae has been known since 1821 as an eclipsing double star system, but astronomers have struggled for many decades trying to decipher the clues to what was causing these eclipses, which happen every 27 years.

Following yesterday's launch dress rehearsal and the debriefing today, the Russian State Commission has given the go-ahead to launch ESA's ice mission tomorrow at 15:57 CEST.

Today's go-ahead marks the last milestone along the road to launch the long-awaited CryoSat-2 satellite. By measuring the tiny variations in the thickness of ice floating in the polar oceans and changes in the vast ice sheets on land, the mission will provide scientists with hard evidence on the speed at which ice is diminishing.

Oslo, April 7, 2010: OptiNose, a leader in nasal drug delivery systems, is pleased to announce the publication in Cephalalgia of results from its Phase II clinical study investigating the efficacy and tolerability of its novel, intranasal drug/device product for the treatment of migraine.

Irvine, Calif., April 7, 2010 — Add insect-feeding birds, bats and lizards to the front lines of the battle against global climate change.

Summarizing the results of more than 100 experiments conducted on four continents, UC Irvine ecologist Kailen A. Mooney and colleagues found that these insect-gobbling animals increase plant growth by reducing the abundance of plant-feeding insects and the damage they do to the plant life that helps mitigate global warming.

BLOOMINGTON, Ind. -- Could our universe be located within the interior of a wormhole which itself is part of a black hole that lies within a much larger universe?

Such a scenario in which the universe is born from inside a wormhole (also called an Einstein-Rosen Bridge) is suggested in a paper from Indiana University theoretical physicist Nikodem Poplawski in Physics Letters B. The final version of the paper was available online March 29 and will be published in the print edition April 12.

The implementation of electronic health record systems may not be enough to significantly improve health quality and reduce costs. In the April 2010 issue of Health Affairs, researchers from the Mongan Institute for Health Policy at Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH) report finding that currently implemented systems have little effect on measures such as patient mortality, surgical complications, length of stay and costs. The authors note that greater attention may need to be paid to how systems are being implemented and used, with the goal of identifying best practices.

The human body has developed various mechanisms, through which it can protect itself against newly-developing cancer cells. For instance, killer-cells recognize and destroy altered cells in our organs every day. Once tumours have developed, they may be inhibited in growth by messenger substances from the immune system.

According to data from the Tropical Rainfall Measuring Mission, or TRMM satellite mostly light to moderate rain is falling in the latest tropical cyclone born in the waters of the Southern Indian Ocean. TRMM can measure rainfall from its vantage point in space as it orbits the Earth and forecasters will be using TRMM data to continue monitoring the storm's intensity.