Heavens

New data from NASA's Chandra X-ray Observatory suggest a highly distorted supernova remnant may contain the most recent black hole formed in the Milky Way galaxy. The remnant appears to be the product of a rare explosion in which matter is ejected at high speeds along the poles of a rotating star.

The remnant, called W49B, is about a thousand years old as seen from Earth and located about 26,000 light-years away.

This part of the constellation of Sagittarius (The Archer) is one of the richest star fields in the whole sky -- the Large Sagittarius Star Cloud. The huge number of stars that light up this region dramatically emphasise the blackness of dark clouds like Barnard 86, which appears at the centre of this new picture from the Wide Field Imager, an instrument mounted on the MPG/ESO 2.2-metre telescope at ESO's La Silla Observatory in Chile.

Daejeon, Republic of Korea, 13 February 2013—The Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology (KAIST) and the Korea Railroad Research Institute (KRRI) have developed a wireless power transfer technology that can be applied to high capacity transportation systems such as railways, harbor freight, and airport transportation and logistics. The technology supplies 60 kHz and 180 kW of power remotely to transport vehicles at a stable, constant rate.

A new study using data from a pair of gravity-measuring NASA satellites finds that large parts of the arid Middle East region lost freshwater reserves rapidly during the past decade.

NASA's Aqua satellite passed over Cyclone Gino as the storm continues to wind up in the southern Indian Ocean, consolidating and strengthening. Infrared data shows the storm has strengthened but it is headed for cooler waters which will weaken it in coming days.

NASA and NOAA satellites have provided animations and images of the coupling of two low pressure areas that created the now historic winter-time nor'easter that brought more than two feet of snow to portions of the New England states on Feb. 8 and 9, 2013. NASA released an animation of NOAA satellite imagery that shows the lifetime of the historic nor'easter.

Irvine, Calif., Feb. 12, 2013 – Already strained by water scarcity and political tensions, the arid Middle East along the Tigris and Euphrates rivers is losing critical water reserves at a rapid pace, from Turkey upstream to Syria, Iran and Iraq below.

A group of researchers have designed a new fuzzy ontology-based system to help people in disagreement reach consensus. This system, which acts as a virtual moderator, is a step forward in the field on Artificial Intelligence. This tool can be useful in making everyday decisions –such as choosing a wine in a restaurant–, but it can also be helpful in complex negotiations between countries fighting for their interests in the European Union framework.

Chevy Chase, MD ––African-American women battling vitamin D deficiencies need the same dose as Caucasian women to treat the condition, according to a recent study accepted for publication in The Endocrine Society's Journal of Clinical Endocrinology & Metabolism (JCEM).

Although women with darker skin tones tend to have lower levels of the biomarker used to measure Vitamin D levels, called 25-hydroxyvitamin D or 25OHD, the study found that older African-American and Caucasian women responded in the same way when they received vitamin D supplements.

The fifteenth tropical cyclone of the Southern Indian Ocean season strengthened into a tropical storm today, Feb. 11, and NASA's Aqua satellite passed overhead hours after it reached tropical storm strength.

Tropical Cyclone Haley was forming quickly as NASA's Aqua satellite captured an image of the storm in the South Pacific Ocean.

On Feb. 9 at 2020 UTC (3:20 p.m. EST) the Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) instrument aboard NASA's Terra satellite captured a visible image of System 93P (known in Fiji as 14F). The MODIS image showed a circular center of circulation with banding features, two things that indicated that the low pressure area was quickly organizing. The next day, the low became Tropical Storm Haley.

On Feb. 9, 2013 at 2:30 a.m. EST, the sun erupted with an Earth-directed coronal mass ejection or CME, associated with a long duration C2.4-class flare. Experimental NASA research models, based on observations from the Solar Terrestrial Relations Observatory (STEREO) and ESA/NASA's Solar and Heliospheric Observatory, show that the CME left the sun at speeds of around 500 miles per second, which is a fairly typical speed for CMEs. Historically, CMEs at this speed are usually benign.

A low-carbon solution to high-carbon energy resources such as coal is proposed by their high efficient integration with either nuclear or renewable energy, which may figure out the strategic solution to China's future energy development. As a result, the research on "low-carbon hybrid energy system-- strategic solution and development patterns for China's future energy" has been published on SCIENTIC SINICA Chimica (in Chinese), No.1, 2013.

The Spitzer infrared data, collected repeatedly during a period of seven years, showed unusual outbursts in the brightness of the suspected binary protostar. Surprisingly, the outbursts recurred every 25.34 days, which is a very rare phenomenon.