Showing 20 articles starting at article 941

< Previous 20 articles        Next 20 articles >

Categories: Offbeat: Paleontology and Archeology, Space: The Solar System

Return to the site home page

     (via sciencedaily.com) 

Middle-aged stars can experience their own kind of midlife crisis, experiencing dramatic breaks in their activity and rotation rates at about the same age as our Sun, according to new research. The study provides a new theoretical underpinning for the unexplained breakdown of established techniques for measuring ages of stars past their middle age, and the transition of solar-like stars to a magnetically inactive future.

     (via sciencedaily.com) 

Astronomers have uncovered evidence of water vapor in the atmosphere of Jupiter's moon Ganymede. This water vapor forms when ice from the moon's surface sublimates -- that is, turns from solid to gas. Astronomers re-examined Hubble observations from the last two decades to find this evidence of water vapor.

     (via sciencedaily.com) 

A new approach to analysing the development of magnetic tangles on the Sun has led to a breakthrough in a longstanding debate about how solar energy is injected into the solar atmosphere before being released into space, causing space weather events. The first direct evidence that field lines become knotted before they emerge at the visible surface of the Sun has implications for our ability to predict the behavior of active regions and the nature of the solar interior.

     (via sciencedaily.com) 

Not a moonshot: Astronomers explore possibility of lunar observatory to better understand fundamental physics, astronomy and cosmology.

     (via sciencedaily.com) 

Any life identified on planets orbiting white dwarf stars almost certainly evolved after the star's death, says a new study that reveals the consequences of the intense and furious stellar winds that will batter a planet as its star is dying.

     (via sciencedaily.com) 

New high-resolution observations clearly show a moon-forming region around exoplanet PDS 70c. The observations have allowed astronomers to determine the ring-shaped region's size and mass for the first time.

     (via sciencedaily.com) 

Little is known about the weather at night on Venus as the absence of sunlight makes imaging difficult. Now, researchers have devised a way to use infrared sensors on board the Venus orbiter Akatsuki to reveal the first details of the nighttime weather of our nearest neighbor. Their analytical methods could be used to study other planets including Mars and gas giants as well.

     (via sciencedaily.com) 

A serendipitous flythrough of the tail of a disintegrated comet has offered scientists a unique opportunity to study these remarkable structures.

     (via sciencedaily.com) 

Physicists have described in fuller detail the sun's electric field. The researchers measured the flow of electrons streaming from the sun as the Parker Solar Probe spacecraft made its closest approach to date to our home star.

     (via sciencedaily.com) 

Last autumn, researchers reported finding the gas phosphine in trace amounts in Venus' upper atmosphere, raising the slim possibility of a biological signature. Now scientists say that the phosphine's chemical fingerprints support a different find: evidence of explosive volcanoes.

     (via sciencedaily.com) 

Researchers combined close-up observations of Jupiter's environment by NASA's satellite Juno, which is currently orbiting the planet, with simultaneous X-ray measurements from the European Space Agency's XMM-Newton observatory (which is in Earth's own orbit). The X-rays are part of Jupiter's aurora -- bursts of visible and invisible light that occur when charged particles interact with the planet's atmosphere. A similar phenomenon occurs on Earth, creating the northern lights, but Jupiter's is much more powerful, releasing hundreds of gigawatts of energy, enough to briefly power all of human civilization.

     (via sciencedaily.com) 

Tidal stresses may be causing constant icequakes on Saturn's sixth largest moon Enceladus, a world of interest in the search for life beyond Earth, according to a new study.

     (via sciencedaily.com) 

A new study disputes the prevailing hypothesis on why Mercury has a big core relative to its mantle. For decades, scientists argued that hit-and-run collisions blew away much of Mercury's rocky mantle and left the big, dense, metal core inside. But new research reveals that collisions are not to blame -- instead, the density, mass and iron content of a rocky planet's core is influenced by its distance from the sun's magnetic field.

     (via sciencedaily.com) 

A new analysis of Venus' surface shows evidence of tectonic motion in the form of crustal blocks that have jostled against each other like broken chunks of pack ice.

     (via sciencedaily.com) 

The long relationships between stars and the planets around them - including the Sun and the Earth - may be even more complex than previously thought. This is one conclusion of a new study involving thousands of stars using NASA's Chandra X-ray Observatory.

     (via sciencedaily.com) 

A team of researchers working with data collected by an Incoherent Scatter Radar (ISR) have examined the simultaneous impacts of thunderstorms and solar flares on the ionospheric D-region (often referred to as the edge of space).

     (via sciencedaily.com) 

For the first time, the boundary of the heliosphere has been mapped, giving scientists a better understanding of how solar and interstellar winds interact.

     (via sciencedaily.com) 

Not only the 11-year cycle, but also all other periodic solar activity fluctuations can be clocked by planetary attractive forces. With new model calculations, they are proposing a comprehensive explanation of known sun cycles for the first time. They also reveal the longest fluctuations in activity over thousands of years as a chaotic process.

     (via sciencedaily.com) 

Scientists have discovered a new, temperate sub-Neptune sized exoplanet with a 24-day orbital period orbiting a nearby M dwarf star. The recent discovery offers exciting research opportunities thanks to the planet's substantial atmosphere, small star, and how fast the system is moving away from the Earth.

     (via sciencedaily.com) 

The spectacularly colorful aurora borealis -- or northern lights -- that fills the sky in high-latitude regions has fascinated people for thousands of years. Now, a team of scientists has resolved one of the final mysteries surrounding its origin.