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The Incredible Shrinking Neutrino.

They are the most abundant particles in the universe, yet we barely know they exist. Neutrinos stream through everything, through walls, through planets and even through you…. in their billions every second, leaving no trace. We've known for decades that they have mass, but pinning down exactly how much has defeated physicists for years. Now, the most sensitive experiment ever built has pushed our knowledge to a new frontier, and what it found raises a profound question about why these ghostly particles are so extraordinarily light. from Universe Today https://ift.tt/bvLVwyr via IFTTT
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The Universe’s Most Powerful Telescope.

When a massive star explodes on the far side of the universe, the light from that explosion normally fades long before it reaches us. But occasionally, the universe conspires to help. A newly discovered supernova has been caught using the gravity of an entire galaxy as a natural magnifying glass, boosting its light by at least a hundred times and revealing a stellar death that would otherwise have been completely invisible. It is the most magnified supernova ever found, and it opens a remarkable new window onto the distant universe. from Universe Today https://ift.tt/lb9H1vS via IFTTT

The Zhamanshin Impact Event Was Likely Much More Destructive Than Thought

Around 900,000 years ago, an impactor slammed into modern-day Kazakhstan and excavated a crater about 14 km in diameter. It was the most recent hypervelocity impactor powerful enough to trigger a nuclear winter, but not an exinction. New research suggests the crater is almost twice as large, showing that the energy released by the impact was much greater than thought. from Universe Today https://ift.tt/xmdqskY via IFTTT

Two Monsters, One Galaxy, and a Collision 100 Years Away!

Deep in the heart of a distant galaxy, two monsters are locked in a death spiral and for the first time, they have been caught them in the act. A new study has confirmed the first close pair of supermassive black holes ever detected, orbiting each other every 121 days and closing in fast. If the models are right, they could collide within a century. from Universe Today https://ift.tt/4JYtDeI via IFTTT

A New Study Narrows the Search for Water on the Moon

A new study challenges old assumptions by revealing that water on the Moon likely came from multiple sources over billions of years, rather than from a single major deposit long ago. from Universe Today https://ift.tt/BqPMQ2G via IFTTT

Are Neutrinos Their Own Evil Twins? Part 2: The Weak Left-Hander

The weak nuclear force is the eccentric cousin of the four forces — the one that only shakes hands with left-handed particles. That bizarre preference turns out to be absolutely critical for stars, nuclear fusion, and the existence of most matter. And neutrinos love it. There's just one problem: neutrinos appear to only exist in one handedness, which makes no sense at all. from Universe Today https://ift.tt/pHUCvRZ via IFTTT

The Chip That Could Survive Venus

Every piece of electronics ever sent to Venus has been destroyed within hours of landing, cooked alive by surface temperatures hot enough to melt lead. Now a team of engineers at the University of Southern California has built a memory chip that laughs in the face of that heat, surviving temperatures hotter than molten lava and it started with a happy accident! from Universe Today https://ift.tt/vjcIFOP via IFTTT