An international team of astronomers made the discovery with the Atacama Pathfinder Experiment telescope (APEX), situated on the 5000-metre-high Chajnantor plateau in the Chilean Andes. They observed a region in our galaxy close to the star Rho Ophiuchi, about 400 light-years away. The region contains very cold (around -250 degrees Celsius), dense clouds of cosmic gas and dust, in which new stars are being born. The clouds are mostly made of hydrogen, but contain traces of other chemicals, and are prime targets for astronomers hunting for molecules in space.
Heavens
Some 50 miles up in the sky begins a dynamic region of the atmosphere known as the ionosphere. The region is filled with charged particles created by extreme ultraviolet radiation from the sun. At the base of the ionosphere, charged particle motions create a global current called the "atmospheric dynamo." Generally moving in loops from the equator to the poles, the dynamo changes daily based on solar heating and magnetic activity – but what keeps it moving isn't well understood.
CHAPEL HILL, N.C. – Researchers in the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill/North Carolina State University Joint Department of Biomedical Engineering will be at the Kennedy Space Center for the last space shuttle launch of the NASA program as Atlantis departs for its final mission into Earth's orbit.
NASA's Hubble Space Telescope crossed another milestone in its space odyssey of exploration and discovery. On Monday, July 4, the Earth-orbiting observatory logged its one millionth science observation during a search for water in an exoplanet's atmosphere 1,000 light-years away.
CAMBRIDGE, Mass. -- The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) has mandated that by 2020, all commercial aircraft — and small aircraft flying near most airports — must be equipped with a new tracking system that broadcasts GPS data, providing more accurate location information than ground-based radar. In anticipation of the deadline, the FAA has also charged MIT researchers with leading an investigation of the system's limits and capacities.
Rising air temperatures in the Arctic region have led to an increase in rainfall and a decrease in snowfall, making the sea ice more susceptible to melting, a new Australian study has revealed.
The research was presented today by Dr James Screen from the University of Melbourne at the XXV International Union of Geodesy and Geophysics General Assembly in Melbourne.
The Arctic region is warming more rapidly than anywhere else on Earth.
Dr Jan Holte told the annual meeting of the European Society for Human Reproduction and Embryology, that if this model were to be applied in all fertility clinics, it had the potential to reduce the twin rates to the level of just under two percent seen in the normal population. Already, another four clinics have started to use the model.
For the first time, fertility experts have shown that, from the time that a woman starts trying to conceive, poor oral health can have a significant effect on the time to pregnancy.
Professor Roger Hart told the annual meeting of the European Society of Human Reproduction and Embryology that the negative effect of gum disease on conception was of the same order of magnitude as the effect of obesity.
As the Sun enters a period of low solar activity over the next 50 years, new research has calculated the probability of unusually cold winter temperatures occurring in the UK.
Last year, the same group of researchers, from the University of Reading, linked colder winters in Europe to low solar activity and predicted that the Sun is moving into a particularly low period of activity, meaning the UK will experience more cold winters in the future – potentially similar to those experienced in the Maunder minimum at the end of the 17th century.
This innovative design was inspired by one bird in particular, the swift. "We know that swifts are very manoeuvrable and they can glide very efficiently. So we thought these birds would be a very good starting point for an energy efficient flapping-wing MAV," says Mr. Thielicke.
While fixed wing MAVs are energy efficient, their manoeuvrability is low. The new design would allow the flapping wing MAV to glide, improving energy efficiency and ensuring good images but when needed it can also slow its flight and manoeuvre in confined spaces.
NASA's Aura Satellite has provided a view of nitrogen dioxide levels coming from the fires in New Mexico and Arizona. Detecting nitrogen dioxide is important because it reacts with sunlight to create low-level ozone or smog and poor air quality.
The fierce Las Conchas fire threatened the town and National Laboratory in Los Alamos, while smoke from Arizona's immense Wallow Fire and the Donaldson Fire in central New Mexico also created nitrogen dioxides (NO2) detectable by the Ozone Measuring Instrument (OMI) that flies aboard NASA's Aura satellite.
The sun and the solar system's rocky inner planets, including the Earth, may have formed differently than previously thought, according to UCLA scientists and colleagues analyzing samples returned by NASA's Genesis mission.
Scientists know what the universe looked like when it was a baby. They know what it looks like today. What they don't know is how it looked in its youth. Thanks to technological advances, however, scientists hope to complete the photo album and provide a picture of how the cosmos developed into the kind of place that could support life like that found on Earth.
They plan to gather these never-before-obtained insights with a potentially "game-changing" instrument that is expected to be 10,000 times more sensitive than the current state-of-the-art.
On June 10, 2011, NASA's Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter spacecraft pointed the LRO Camera NACs to capture a dramatic sunrise view of Tycho crater.
A very popular target with amateur astronomers, Tycho is located at 43.37°S, 348.68°E, and is about 51 miles (82 km) in diameter. The summit of the central peak is 1.24 miles (2 km) above the crater floor. The distance from Tycho's floor to its rim is about 2.92 miles (4.7 km).
GOES-13 is one of several satellites keeping track of Tropical Storm Arlene. Because GOES-13 monitors the eastern U.S. and the Atlantic, and Arlene is moving west, the GOES-11 satellite is going to pick up watching Arlene's movements. GOES-11 monitors the western U.S. and the eastern Pacific Ocean.