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Categories: Offbeat: Computers and Math, Offbeat: Space
Published Galactic bubbles are more complex than imagined
(via sciencedaily.com) Original source Astronomers have revealed new evidence about the properties of the giant bubbles of high-energy gas that extend far above and below the Milky Way galaxy's center.
Published A cocktail party of 3D-printed robot heads
(via sciencedaily.com) Original source Imagine a cocktail party full of 3D-printed, humanoid robots listening and talking to each other. That seemingly sci-fi scene is the goal of an augmented listening laboratory. With precise control over the simulated subjects, the researchers can adjust the parameters of the experiment and even set the machines in motion to simulate neck movements.
Published Scurrying centipedes inspire many-legged robots that can traverse difficult landscapes
(via sciencedaily.com) Original source Intrigued to see if the many limbs could be helpful for locomotion in this world, a team of physicists, engineers, and mathematicians are using this style of movement to their advantage. They developed a new theory of multilegged locomotion and created many-legged robotic models, discovering the robot with redundant legs could move across uneven surfaces without any additional sensing or control technology as the theory predicted.
Published The future of data storage lies in DNA microcapsules
(via sciencedaily.com) Original source Storing data in DNA sounds like science fiction, yet it lies in the near future. Experts expect the first DNA data center to be up and running within five to ten years. Data won't be stored as zeros and ones in a hard drive but in the base pairs that make up DNA: AT and CG. Such a data center would take the form of a lab, many times smaller than the ones today.
Published Neutron star's X-rays reveal 'photon metamorphosis'
(via sciencedaily.com) Original source A 'beautiful effect' predicted by quantum electrodynamics (QED) can explain the puzzling first observations of polarized X-rays emitted by a magnetar -- a neutron star featuring a powerful magnetic field, according to an astrophysicist.
Published Astronomers spot a star swallowing a planet
(via sciencedaily.com) Original source Scientists have observed a star swallowing a planet for the first time. Earth will meet a similar fate in 5 billion years.
Published Astronomers find distant gas clouds with leftovers of the first stars
(via sciencedaily.com) Original source Using ESO's Very Large Telescope (VLT), researchers have found for the first time the fingerprints left by the explosion of the first stars in the Universe. They detected three distant gas clouds whose chemical composition matches what we expect from the first stellar explosions. These findings bring us one step closer to understanding the nature of the first stars that formed after the Big Bang.
Published A touch-responsive fabric armband -- for flexible keyboards, wearable sketchpads
(via sciencedaily.com) Original source It's time to roll up your sleeves for the next advance in wearable technology -- a fabric armband that's actually a touch pad. Researchers say they have devised a way to make playing video games, sketching cartoons and signing documents easier. Their proof-of-concept silk armband turns a person's forearm into a keyboard or sketchpad. The three-layer, touch-responsive material interprets what a user draws or types and converts it into images on a computer.
Published What would the Earth look like to an alien civilization located light years away?
(via sciencedaily.com) Original source What would the Earth look like to an alien civilization located light years away? A team of researchers has used crowd-sourced data to simulate radio leakage from mobile towers and predict what an alien civilization might detect from various nearby stars, including Barnard's star, six light years away from Earth.
Published Self-folding origami machines powered by chemical reaction
(via sciencedaily.com) Original source Scientists have harnessed chemical reactions to make microscale origami machines self-fold -- freeing them from the liquids in which they usually function, so they can operate in dry environments and at room temperature.
Published A stormy, active sun may have kickstarted life on Earth
(via sciencedaily.com) Original source The first building blocks of life on Earth may have formed thanks to eruptions from our Sun, a new study finds. A series of chemical experiments show how solar particles, colliding with gases in Earth's early atmosphere, can form amino acids and carboxylic acids, the basic building blocks of proteins and organic life.
Published Quantum entanglement of photons doubles microscope resolution
(via sciencedaily.com) Original source Using a "spooky" phenomenon of quantum physics, researchers have discovered a way to double the resolution of light microscopes.
Published Sensor enables high-fidelity input from everyday objects, human body
(via sciencedaily.com) Original source Couches, tables, sleeves and more can turn into a high-fidelity input device for computers using a new sensing system.
Published Webb finds water vapor, but from a rocky planet or its star?
(via sciencedaily.com) Original source Astronomers used NASA's James Webb Space Telescope to study a rocky exoplanet known as GJ 486 b. It is too close to its star to be within the habitable zone, with a surface temperature of about 800 degrees Fahrenheit (430 degrees Celsius). And yet, their observations show hints of water vapor.
Published Astronomers detect 'nearby' black hole devouring a star
(via sciencedaily.com) Original source Astronomers have discovered a new 'tidal disruption event,' in which the center of a galaxy lights up as its supermassive black hole rips apart a passing star. The outburst is the closest tidal disruption event observed to date, and one of the first to be identified at infrared wavelengths.
Published Speedy robo-gripper reflexively organizes cluttered spaces
(via sciencedaily.com) Original source A new gripper robot grasps by reflex. Rather than start from scratch after a failed attempt, the bot adapts in the moment to reflexively roll, palm, or pinch an object to get a better hold.
Published Most massive touching stars ever found will eventually collide as black holes
(via sciencedaily.com) Original source A new study looked at a known binary star (two stars orbiting around a mutual center of gravity), analyzing starlight obtained from a range of ground- and space-based telescopes. The researchers found that the stars, located in a neighboring dwarf galaxy called the Small Magellanic Cloud, are in partial contact and swapping material with each other, with one star currently 'feeding' off the other. They orbit each other every three days and are the most massive touching stars (known as contact binaries) yet observed.
Published Direct image of a black hole expelling a powerful jet
(via sciencedaily.com) Original source Astronomers have observed, in one image, the shadow of the black hole at the center of the galaxy Messier 87 (M87) and the powerful jet expelled from it. Thanks to this new image, astronomers can better understand how black holes can launch such energetic jets.
Published Tunneling electrons
(via sciencedaily.com) Original source By superimposing two laser fields of different strengths and frequency, the electron emission of metals can be measured and controlled precisely to a few attoseconds. Physicists have shown that this is the case. The findings could lead to new quantum-mechanical insights and enable electronic circuits that are a million times faster than today.
Published Astronomers solve the 60-year mystery of quasars -- the most powerful objects in the Universe
(via sciencedaily.com) Original source Scientists have unlocked one of the biggest mysteries of quasars -- the brightest, most powerful objects in the Universe -- by discovering that they are ignited by galaxies colliding.