Perseus Spiral Arm of the Milky Way much closer than thought

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Our Milky Way galaxy as an observer located far above its plane would see it. Shown are the known spiral arms.
The Perseus spiral arm, the nearest spiral arm in the Milky Way outside the Sun's orbit, lies only half as far from Earth as some previous results had suggested. An international team of astronomers including scientists from the Max-Planck-Institut für Radioastronomie has recently achieved the most accurate distance measurement ever to the Perseus arm.


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All News summaries for December 16, 2005

Huge project to restore Everglades to be suspended

2 hours ago | User rating: not rated yet
(AP) -- Construction on a huge reservoir meant to help restore the Everglades will be put on hold over a lawsuit brought by a group that fears the water could be diverted for other purposes.

NASA Satellite Finds Interior of Mars Is Colder

May 15, 2008 | User rating: not rated yet
New observations from NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter indicate that the crust and upper mantle of Mars are stiffer and colder than previously thought.

Eccentric pulsar system challenges theories of binary formation

May 15, 2008 | User rating: not rated yet
An ongoing sky survey using the Cornell-managed Arecibo radio telescope in Puerto Rico has turned up a massive, fast-spinning binary pulsar with a mysterious elongated orbit, researchers say. The pulsar and ...

Astronomers use new model of dust in galaxies to remeasure the total energy output of stars in the universe

May 15, 2008 | User rating: not rated yet
Anyone gazing up on a dark clear night is greeted by the spectacle of thousands of powerful fusion reactors - the stars. These balls of extremely hot gas are generating unimaginably large quantities of energy. ...

Addressing the 'nitrogen cascade'

May 15, 2008 | User rating: not rated yet
While human-caused global climate change has long been a concern for environmental scientists and is a well-known public policy issue, the problem of excessive reactive nitrogen in the environment is little-known beyond a ...
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