cosmology
Latest
Supermassive black hole set a record for longest lunch ever
When a black hole eats a nearby star, the resulting X-rays typically fade within a year or so. That's why astronomers are excited about a giant black hole that's been shedding telltale radiation for close to 10 years.
This telescope is really just 10 Canon lenses strapped together
Hunting for extremely dim galaxies is especially difficult with single-lens telescopes. That's because, no matter how technologically advanced, the device's design cannot fully eliminate detail-obscuring scattered light from the resulting images. The University of Toronto's Dragonfly Telephoto Array, however, deftly avoids that issue. This array -- one of the smallest multi-lens astronomy telescopes in use today -- is comprised of 10 Canon 400mm f/2.8 L IS II USM telephoto lenses, each costing $10,000. What's more, each lens is coated in a unique subwavelength nanomaterial that drastically reduces light reflection within the optic. And, like its insect inspiration, the Dragonfly's ten eyes can work in concert with one another to further reduce unwanted illumination in the resulting image, bringing out otherwise unseen detail in cosmic structures. According to the University of Toronto spokesman Roberto Abraham, this $100,000 system is ten times as accurate as its nearest rival. [Image Credit: U of Toronto]
IBM's Mira supercomputer tasked with simulating an entire universe in a fortnight
A universe that only exists in the mind of a supercomputer sounds a little far fetched, but one is going to come to live at the Argonne National Laboratory in October. A team of cosmologists is using IBM's Blue Gene/Q "Mira" supercomputer, the third fastest in the world, to run a simulation through the first 13 billion years after the big bang. It'll work by tracking the movement of trillions of particles as they collide and interact with each other, forming structures that could then transform into galaxies. As the project's only scheduled to last a fortnight, we're hoping it doesn't create any sentient characters clamoring for extra life, we've seen Blade Runner enough times to know it won't end well.
Universe expansion: dark energy's out, anti-gravity's in, matter and antimatter still can't get along
Dark energy, we barely knew you, but before we ever found out if you were, in fact, the invisible hand pushing the cosmos apart, an Italian scientist ginned up a new theory that has anti-gravity doing the Yoko Ono to the universe's merry band of galaxies. Massimo Villata's theory assumes that both matter and antimatter have positive mass and energy density, which gets particles attracting particles and antiparticles attracting antiparticles through the force of gravity. To give dark matter the heave-ho from the galactic expansion equation, Villata supposes that the theory of general relativity applies in reverse to antimatter particles to create anti-gravity. And just as gravity pulls particles together, anti-gravity shoves them apart -- giving the universe its burgeoning waistline, no clown, king, or colonel required.
Stephen Hawking in space (space... space...)
Well-known theoretical physicist and all-around geek hero Stephen Hawking has told the press he plans to undertake a zero-gravity flight this year in preparation for a hopeful berth on Richard Branson's Virgin Galactic space tourist service when it launches in 2009. Hawking, who has the neurological disease amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, communicates via a blink-controlled computer and uses a high-tech wheelchair for mobility, making space flight somewhat challenging -- but Virgin Galactic spokesperson Stephen Attenborough said in a statement Monday that Branson is committed to working through the issues that need to be addressed in order to accomodate people with disabilities on his company's trips into suborbit. Cost of a two-hour suborbital spaceflight? $200,000. The look on the most famous cosmologist's face upon actually making it into space? Priceless.
