http://www.physorg.com/ en-us Physorg.com internet news portal provides the latest news on science including: Physics, Nanotechnology, Life Sciences, Space Science, Earth Science, Environment, Health and Medicine. Herschel has carried out the first test observations with all its instruments, with spectacular results. Galaxies, star-forming regions and dying stars comprised the telescope's first targets. The instruments provided spectacular data at their first attempt, finding water, carbon and revealing dozens of distant galaxies. http://www.physorg.com/news166441799.html Space & Earth Fri, 10 Jul 2009 11:00:01 EST news166441799 (PhysOrg.com) -- The earliest stars in the universe formed not only as individuals, but sometimes also as twins, according to a paper published today in Science Express. By creating robust simulations of the early universe, astrophysicists Matthew Turk and Tom Abel of the Kavli Institute for Particle Astrophysics and Cosmology, located at the Department of Energy`s SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory, and Brian O'Shea of Michigan State University have gained the most detailed understanding to date of the formation of the first stars. http://www.physorg.com/news166375749.html Physics Thu, 09 Jul 2009 16:29:36 EST news166375749 An international team of researchers led by a UC Riverside astronomer has completed the largest ever survey designed to find very distant clusters of galaxies. http://www.physorg.com/news165601534.html Space & Earth Tue, 30 Jun 2009 17:26:07 EST news165601534 Summer session -- once a relatively small piece of the academic calendar -- is now a full-blown term for most colleges and universities, with more offerings, more students and more of an expectation that you can't graduate in a timely manner without it. http://www.physorg.com/news164637772.html Other Sciences Fri, 19 Jun 2009 15:20:04 EST news164637772 Astronomers have discovered new tidal debris stripped away from colliding galaxies. The research will be being presented during a press conference at the 214th annual American Astronomical Society meeting in Pasadena, California by Drs. Jin Koda at Stony Brook University, Long Island, New York; Nick Scoville of California Institute of Technology; Yoshiaki Taniguchi of Ehime University, Ehime, Japan; and, the COSMOS survey team. http://www.physorg.com/news163769548.html Space & Earth Tue, 09 Jun 2009 12:33:05 EST news163769548 How did we get here and where are we headed? These are some of life's biggest questions. To get the answers, one Kansas State University professor is doing the math. http://www.physorg.com/news163768550.html Other Sciences Tue, 09 Jun 2009 12:16:52 EST news163768550 Ohio State University researchers have found a way to measure distances to objects three times farther away in outer space than previously possible, by extending a common measurement technique. http://www.physorg.com/news163691271.html Space & Earth Mon, 08 Jun 2009 14:48:22 EST news163691271 Radio astronomers have directly measured the distance to a faraway galaxy, providing a valuable "yardstick" for calibrating large astronomical distances and demonstrating a vital method that could help determine the elusive nature of the mysterious Dark Energy that pervades the Universe. http://www.physorg.com/news163682693.html Space & Earth Mon, 08 Jun 2009 12:25:20 EST news163682693 Since its launch in 2004, NASA's Swift has detected more than 430 gamma-ray bursts. Roughly half of them are "dark" bursts that emit little or no visible light. Dense knots of dust in otherwise normal galaxies dim the light of a dark gamma-ray burst (center). The dust absorbs most or all of a burst's visible light but not higher-energy X-rays and gamma rays. Credit NASA/Swift/Aurore Simonnet Gamma-ray bursts are the universe's biggest explosions, capable of producing so much light that ground-based telescopes easily detect it billions of light-years away. Yet, for more than a decade, astronomers have puzzled over the nature of so-called dark bursts, which produce gamma rays and X-rays but little or no visible light. They make up roughly half of the bursts detected by NASA's Swift satellite since its 2004 launch. http://www.physorg.com/news163682108.html Space & Earth Mon, 08 Jun 2009 12:15:27 EST news163682108 (PhysOrg.com) -- Lee Smolin, author of the bestselling science book The Trouble with Physics and a founding member and research physicist at the Perimeter Institute for Theoretical Physics in Waterloo, Canada, writes exclusively in the June issue of Physics World explaining why theories of cosmology that suggest that our universe is just one of many - the so-called multiverse - and thus perpetuate the notion that time does not exist are flawed. http://www.physorg.com/news163328877.html Physics Thu, 04 Jun 2009 10:08:34 EST news163328877 (PhysOrg.com) -- A new technique for measuring the distances to supernovae more accurately than ever before has been developed by a team of scientists from Yale University, Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory and a consortium of French laboratories. http://www.physorg.com/news162219562.html Space & Earth Fri, 22 May 2009 14:00:02 EST news162219562 (PhysOrg.com) -- Using a special camera known as AzTEC developed by a research team led by Grant Wilson, astronomy professor at the University of Massachusetts Amherst, an international research group has imaged a set of ultra-massive galaxies that are thought to form the backbone of a super large structure, or collection of galaxies congregated together, in the very early universe. http://www.physorg.com/news162059711.html Space & Earth Wed, 20 May 2009 17:35:44 EST news162059711 Although engineers, scientists and manufacturers are still in the process of building all of the instruments that will fly aboard NASA's James Webb Space Telescope, they had to figure out long ago, how it was going to "unfold" in space. That's because the Webb Telescope is so big that it has to be folded up for launch. Now, animators have made that "unfolding" come to life in two new videos. http://www.physorg.com/news161446078.html Space & Earth Wed, 13 May 2009 15:08:31 EST news161446078 (AP) -- Using the power of pictures, the Hubble Space Telescope has snapped away at the mystery of the universe. http://www.physorg.com/news161184094.html Space & Earth Sun, 10 May 2009 14:22:10 EST news161184094 Imagine a time when the entire universe froze. According to a new model for dark energy, that is essentially what happened about 11.5 billion years ago, when the universe was a quarter of the size it is today. http://www.physorg.com/news161026176.html Physics Fri, 08 May 2009 18:30:17 EST news161026176 (PhysOrg.com) -- Two of the most sophisticated astronomical spacecraft ever built - Herschel and Planck - will be launched by ESA this month towards deep space orbits around a special observation point beyond the Moon`s orbit. http://www.physorg.com/news160929569.html Space & Earth Thu, 07 May 2009 15:40:34 EST news160929569 NASA's final mission to the 17-year-old Hubble Space Telescope, which begins May 11, will deliver a new instrument partly built by University of California, Berkeley, physicists to map the structure of the universe. http://www.physorg.com/news160925519.html Space & Earth Thu, 07 May 2009 14:32:47 EST news160925519 What happened in the first trillionth of a trillionth of a trillionth of a second after the Big Bang? Super-sensitive microwave detectors, built at the National Institute of Standards and Technology, may soon help scientists find out. http://www.physorg.com/news160546763.html Physics Sun, 03 May 2009 05:21:46 EST news160546763 (PhysOrg.com) -- Construction begins this month on a cutting-edge physics laboratory in northern Minnesota, supported by the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act. Congressman James Oberstar of Minnesota and Congressman Bill Foster of Illinois today are joining officials from the U.S. Department of Energy, Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory and the University of Minnesota to break ground for NOvA, the world`s most advanced neutrino experiment. http://www.physorg.com/news160405383.html Physics Fri, 01 May 2009 14:04:04 EST news160405383 (PhysOrg.com) -- It sounds like the plot of a sci-fi movie: rogue black holes roaming our galaxy, threatening to swallow anything that gets too close. In fact, new calculations by Ryan O'Leary and Avi Loeb (Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics) suggest that hundreds of massive black holes, left over from the galaxy-building days of the early universe, may wander the Milky Way. http://www.physorg.com/news160223196.html Space & Earth Wed, 29 Apr 2009 11:27:35 EST news160223196 (PhysOrg.com) -- Astronomers have found the most distant signs of water in the Universe to date. Dr John McKean of the Netherlands Institute for Radio Astronomy (ASTRON) will be presenting the discovery at the European Week of Astronomy and Space Science in Hatfield on Wednesday 22nd April. http://www.physorg.com/news159636334.html Space & Earth Wed, 22 Apr 2009 16:26:09 EST news159636334 (PhysOrg.com) -- A team of astronomers, led by Carnegie's Masami Ouchi, have discovered a mysterious, giant object that existed when the universe was only 800 million years old. Dubbed an extended "Lyman-Alpha blob," it is a huge body of gas. It is named Himiko for a legendary Japanese queen and stretches for 55 thousand light years, a record for that early point in time. Its length is comparable to the radius of the Milky Way's disk. http://www.physorg.com/news159634614.html Space & Earth Wed, 22 Apr 2009 15:57:41 EST news159634614 (PhysOrg.com) -- "In many ways, the standard model of cosmology works very well," Jose Cembranos tells PhysOrg. "However, there are very basic features that we just do not know. We have dark energy and dark matter. They dictate the evolution of late time cosmology. They both together constitute more than 95 percent of the energy content of the present Universe." If this is the case, why do we trust the standard model? It can`t explain such a large portion of the universe. http://www.physorg.com/news159444907.html Physics Mon, 20 Apr 2009 11:17:07 EST news159444907 (PhysOrg.com) -- A flare-up in a jet of matter blasting from a monster black hole is giving astronomers an incredible light show. http://www.physorg.com/news158939828.html Space & Earth Tue, 14 Apr 2009 14:57:53 EST news158939828 (PhysOrg.com) -- An astronomer at the University of St Andrews will use a powerful planet-hunting telescope to find out the true size of the Universe. http://www.physorg.com/news158857659.html Space & Earth Mon, 13 Apr 2009 16:08:34 EST news158857659 (PhysOrg.com) -- The fight over the new education and curriculum standards for the public schools in Texas has been long and publicized. Most of the publicity, though, focuses on the school board's focus on "intelligent design" as it relates to the biological question of evolution. Because evolution has long been contested in public schools, it is no real surprise that this has gotten the most play from the media. But one thing that hasn't been mentioned as much is the fact that the Texas school standards also remove mention of the age of the universe. Long-standing ideas of cosmology are being challenged as well. http://www.physorg.com/news158320278.html Other Sciences Tue, 07 Apr 2009 10:51:42 EST news158320278 (PhysOrg.com) -- Astronomers have discovered large galaxies some two thirds of the way back in time to the big bang. This surprising find casts doubt on theories of how the biggest galaxies form. http://www.physorg.com/news157910471.html Space & Earth Thu, 02 Apr 2009 17:01:40 EST news157910471 At sunset on Thursday, astronomers around the world will be limbering up for a 100-hour marathon aimed at celebrating the night sky and nurturing the Galileos of tomorrow. http://www.physorg.com/news157871372.html Space & Earth Thu, 02 Apr 2009 06:10:38 EST news157871372 About 100 million light-years away, in the constellation of Piscis Austrinus (the Southern Fish), three galaxies are playing a game of gravitational give-and-take that might ultimately lead to their merger into one enormous entity. http://www.physorg.com/news155309518.html Space & Earth Tue, 03 Mar 2009 13:32:45 EST news155309518 (PhysOrg.com) -- A team of astronomers, led by Loretta Dunne from the University of Nottingham, have found some very unusual stardust. In a paper to be published in Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society, Dr Dunne and her team find new evidence for the production of copious quantities of dust in the Cassiopeia A supernova remnant, the remains of a star that exploded about 300 years ago. http://www.physorg.com/news154709258.html Space & Earth Tue, 24 Feb 2009 14:48:14 EST news154709258