Heavens

West Orange, NJ. August 11, 2014. Kessler Foundation researchers have identified an association between the built environment and disability-related outcomes for adults with physical impairments. The article, Disability and the built environment: an investigation of community and neighborhood land uses and participation for physically impaired adults, was published in the July issue of Annals of Epidemiology (doi: 10.1016/j.annepidem.2014.05.003).

Scientists hunting for life beyond Earth have discovered more than 1,800 planets outside our solar system, or exoplanets, in recent years, but so far, no one has been able to confirm an exomoon. Now, physicists from The University of Texas at Arlington believe following a trail of radio wave emissions may lead them to that discovery.

Once Super Typhoon Genevieve has now been downgraded to a tropical storm. The storm is located approximately 819 nautical miles west-northwest of Midway Island. It is currently tracking northwestward at 8 knots per hour over the past six hours. Maximum significant wave height is 32 feet. Maximum sustained winds 70 knots gusting to 85 knots, with winds of 34 knots or higher occur within 80 to 105 miles of the cente,r and winds of 64 knots or higher occur within 15 miles of the center. No landmasses are currently threatened by this storm.

The Central Pacific Hurricane Center has issued its 30th warning on Julio today at 1500 GMT. Julio's position at this point is 395 miles northeast of Honolulu, Hawaii moving northwest at 8 knots per hour. Julio is moving toward the northwest near 9 mph, 15 km/h. Maximum sustained winds are near 75 mph, 120 km/h, with higher gusts. Julio is expected to weaken slightly over the next 48 hours, down to tropical storm strength by tonight.

Once Super Typhoon Genevieve has now been downgraded to a tropical storm. The storm is located approximately 819 nautical miles west-northwest of Midway Island. It is currently tracking northwestward at 8 knots per hour over the past six hours. Maximum significant wave height is 32 feet. Maximum sustained winds 70 knots gusting to 85 knots, with winds of 34 knots or higher occur within 80 to 105 miles of the cente,r and winds of 64 knots or higher occur within 15 miles of the center. No landmasses are currently threatened by this storm.

The Southfork Complex fire began with a lightning strike on July 31, 2014. The complex of Murderers Creek South fire and the Buck Fork fire is located 20 miles southwest of John Day, Oregon and has affected 62,476 acres to date. The fire area experienced a shift in direction of the prevailing winds Sunday. There were short up-slope, up-canyon runs. At present there are 798 personnel fighting this fire complex.

At the ends of the Universe there are black holes with masses equaling billions of our sun. These giant bodies – quasars – feed on interstellar gas, swallowing large quantities of it non-stop. Thus they reveal their existence: The light that is emitted by the gas as it is sucked in and crushed by the black hole's gravity travels for eons across the Universe until it reaches our telescopes. Looking at the edges of the Universe is therefore looking into the past.

Researchers from Moscow Institute of Physics and Technology and the Space Research Institute of the Russian Academy of Sciences have reported registering three possible occasions of the total destruction of stars by supermassive black holes at the centers of galaxies.Details are given in an article by IldarKhabibullin and Sergei Sazonov, accepted for publication by the Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society journal(a preprint is available at http://www.arXiv.org.

Collaborative three-dimensional sketching is now possible thanks to a system known as Hyve-3D that University of Montreal researchers are presenting today at the SIGGRAPH 2014 conference in Vancouver. "Hyve-3D is a new interface for 3D content creation via embodied and collaborative 3D sketching," explained lead researcher Professor Tomás Dorta, of the university's School of Design. "The system is a full scale immersive 3D environment. Users create drawings on hand-held tables. They can then use the tablets to manipulate the sketches to create a 3D design within the space".

Astronauts suffer considerable sleep deficiency in the weeks leading up to and during spaceflight, according to the most extensive study of sleep during spaceflight ever conducted, published in The Lancet Neurology journal.

Fatigue and sleep deficiency are common complaints among astronauts, but this is the most comprehensive study to include both objective evaluation of sleep (via an actigraph, a device worn on the wrist which records sleep and wake cycles) and subjective evaluations (via a daily diary recording alertness and sleep quality).

Perhaps no aspect of 3D printing has captured the popular imagination more than personalized figurines with the facial features of real people. Now, researchers at Disney Research Zurich and the University of Zaragoza have developed a method that can incorporate an individual's hairstyle as well.

The researchers will present their new method at ACM SIGGRAPH 2014, the International Conference on Computer Graphics and Interactive Techniques in Vancouver, Aug. 10-14.

Perhaps no aspect of 3D printing has captured the popular imagination more than personalized figurines with the facial features of real people. Now, researchers at Disney Research Zurich and the University of Zaragoza have developed a method that can incorporate an individual's hairstyle as well.

The researchers will present their new method at ACM SIGGRAPH 2014, the International Conference on Computer Graphics and Interactive Techniques in Vancouver, Aug. 10-14.

Curtin University planetary scientists have shed some light on the bombardment history of our solar system by studying a unique volcanic meteorite recovered in Western Australia.

Captured on camera seven years ago falling on the WA side of the Nullarbor Plain, the Bunburra Rockhole Meterorite has unique characteristics that suggest it came from a large asteroid that has never before been identified.

A research team led by astronomers and astrophysicists at the University of Warwick have found that some of the Universe's loneliest supernovae are likely created by the collisions of white dwarf stars into neutron stars.

Dr Joseph Lyman from the University of Warwick is the lead researcher on the paper, The progenitors of calcium-rich transients are not formed in situ, published today by the journal Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society (to appear on astro-ph 8 August 2014).

Astronauts suffer considerable sleep deficiency in the weeks leading up to and during spaceflight, according to the most extensive study of sleep during spaceflight ever conducted, published in The Lancet Neurology journal.

Fatigue and sleep deficiency are common complaints among astronauts, but this is the most comprehensive study to include both objective evaluation of sleep (via an actigraph, a device worn on the wrist which records sleep and wake cycles) and subjective evaluations (via a daily diary recording alertness and sleep quality).