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Small Trojan Asteroids Defy Expectations

Understanding the beginning of the solar system requires us to look at some very strange places. One such place is at the so-called “Trojan” asteroids that share Jupiter’s orbit in front of and behind it. But for a long time, these cosmic time capsules have held a mystery for astronomers: why are they color-coded? The populations of larger asteroids are very clear split into two distinct groups - the “reds” and the “less reds”, because apparently they’re all red to some extent. A new paper from researchers in Japan tried to solve this mystery by taking a close look at even smaller asteroids, and their findings, published in a recent edition of The Astronomical Journal, actually brings up a completely different question - why don’t smaller Trojan asteroids have the same color-coding? from Universe Today https://ift.tt/PYa7Dy3 via IFTTT

To Survive Deep Space, Astronauts May Owe a Debt to Microscopic Worms

Living long-term on the Moon means surviving the devastating toll that deep space takes on a human body. Astronauts in low gravity environments suffer muscle and bone loss, vision-altering fluid shifts, and heavy radiation exposure - all of which are incredibly hazardous to our biology. So, to help future lunar explorers survive, a new crew just arrived at the International Space Station (ISS). That might not sound surprising, except this crew is composed of worms. from Universe Today https://ift.tt/tbXZFIB via IFTTT

Watch This Dark Volcanic Ash Creep Across the Red Planet

Mars is well known as a static, frozen desert. We tend to think of the only thing changing on the surface of the Red Planet is due to the occasional dust storm. But if you look closely - and are willing to wait decades - you’ll see the planet is very much alive - at least in the environmental sense. The European Space Agency just released some spectacular new images from the High Resolution Stereo Camera (HRSC) on its Mars Express Orbiter, one of which shows a surprisingly “fast” geological change happening in Utopia Planitia. A dark, ominous-looking blanket of volcanic ash is actively creeping across the bright red sands - and it's moving (relatively) fast. from Universe Today https://ift.tt/CXuoepl via IFTTT

What Happens When Light Goes Boom? Part 2: The Crowd, the Molasses, and the Speed of Light (Sort Of)

Before Brad Bradington can sprint down the red carpet, we need to understand the crowd. Specifically, we need to understand why a crowd of atoms and molecules slows down light — and why that creates a loophole that changes everything. from Universe Today https://ift.tt/Lgs62ZG via IFTTT

Early Galaxies Were Surrounded by Huge Clouds of Hydrogen, and Astronomers Found a Whole Bunch!

Astronomers using data from the Hobby–Eberly Telescope Dark Energy Experiment (HETDEX) have discovered tens of thousands of gigantic hydrogen gas halos, called “Lyman-alpha nebulae,” surrounding galaxies 10 billion to 12 billion years ago. from Universe Today https://ift.tt/beO9mpz via IFTTT

What Happens When Light Goes Boom? Part 1: The Scientist Who Stared at a Glow

In 1934, a Soviet physicist named Pavel Cherenkov shone gamma rays into a bottle of water and noticed a faint blue glow. So had others before him. They all shrugged and moved on. Cherenkov didn't. What he found — by refusing to dismiss something he didn't understand — turned into one of the most useful phenomena in modern physics. from Universe Today https://ift.tt/8mvxQVX via IFTTT