By combining the power of a "natural lens" in space with the capability of NASA's Hubble Space Telescope, astronomers made a surprising discovery—the first example of a compact yet massive, fast-spinning, disk-shaped galaxy that stopped making stars only a few billion years after the big bang.
Read MoreIf you’ve ever tried to get the best deal on a holiday, you will have noticed that airlines and hotels continually change their prices. What might cost a certain amount now, could be cheaper or more expensive tomorrow due to this “dynamic pricing” – used as a method to manage revenue. We have studied these pricing techniques in sectors including airlines and hotels to further understand and identify when it is best to book and get the best price.
Read MoreAfter 50 years of sending rockets, satellites, and payloads into orbit, humanity has created something of a “space junk” problem. Recent estimates indicate that there are more than 170 million pieces of debris up there, ranging in size from less than 1 cm (o.4 in) to a few meters in diameter. Not only does this junk threaten spacecraft and the ISS, but collisions between bits of debris can cause more to form, a phenomena known as the Kessler Effect.
Read MoreMost of Britain is experiencing a heatwave, with temperatures reaching up to 32℃. The public health watchdog for England has issued an amber health warning, advising people to take care in the hotter weather. But what does it mean for runners? Is it ever too hot to go for a run?
Read MoreElon Musk, the founder of SpaceX and Tesla, has released new details of his vision to colonise parts of the solar system, including Mars, Jupiter’s moon Europa and Saturn’s moon Enceladus. His gung ho plans – designed to make humans a multi-planetary species in case civilisation collapses – include launching flights to Mars as early as 2023.
Read MoreThe Kepler space telescope is surely the gift that keeps on giving. After being deployed in 2009, it went on to detect a total of 2,335 confirmed exoplanets and 582 multi-planet systems. Even after two of its reaction wheels failed, it carried on with its K2 mission, which has discovered an additional 520 candidates, 148 of which have been confirmed. And with yet another extension, which will last beyond 2018, it shows no signs of stopping!
Read MoreUsing the most powerful telescope ever sent to Mars, NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter caught a view of the Curiosity rover this month amid rocky mountainside terrain.
Read MoreSometimes you run across a grimy, tattered dollar bill that seems like it’s been around since the beginning of time. Assuredly it hasn’t, but the history of human beings using cash currency does go back a long time – 40,000 years.
Read MoreA NASA-led and NASA-sponsored study of potential future missions to the mysterious “ice giant” planets Uranus and Neptune has been released—the first in a series of mission studies NASA will conduct in support of the next Planetary Science Decadal Survey. The results of this and future studies will be used as the Decadal Survey deliberates on NASA’s planetary science priorities from 2022-2032. The study identifies the scientific questions an ice giant mission should address, and discusses various instruments, spacecraft, flight-paths and technologies that could be used.
Read MoreDid our Sun have a twin when it was born 4.5 billion years ago?Almost certainly yes -- though not an identical twin. And so did every other Sun-like star in the universe, according to a new analysis by a theoretical physicist from the University of California, Berkeley, and a radio astronomer from the Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory at Harvard University.
Read MoreNASA’s Kepler space telescope team has released a mission catalog of planet candidates that introduces 219 new planet candidates, 10 of which are near-Earth size and orbiting in their star's habitable zone, which is the range of distance from a star where liquid water could pool on the surface of a rocky planet.
Read MoreFor decades, scientists believed that the magnetic field lines coursing around newly forming stars were both powerful and unyielding, working like jail bars to corral star-forming material. More recently, astronomers have found tantalizing evidence that large-scale turbulence far from a nascent star can drag magnetic fields around at will.
Read MoreDo you hate vegetables? You’re not alone. About 20% of the population are “super-tasters”. Super-tasters have more taste buds than other people and are super sensitive to the bitter compounds found in some food and drinks, even at low concentrations. If you have inherited super-taster genes then cruciferous vegetables (flower vegetables in the cabbage family) like bok choy, broccoli, Brussels sprouts, cauliflower, radish, swede, turnip, and watercress will taste disgusting.
Read MoreElon Musk has never been one to keep his long-term plans to himself. Beyond the development of reusable rockets, electric cars, and revolutionizing solar power, he has also been quite vocal about establishing a colony on Mars within his lifetime. The goal here is nothing less than ensuring the survival of the human race by creating a “backup location”, and calls for some serious planning and architecture.
Read MoreDoes science inspire fiction or does it work the other way around? In the case of medical technology, the long-running TV and film series Star Trek has increasingly been inspiring researchers worldwide. Two teams were recently awarded the Qualcomm Tricorder X Prize for developing handheld devices that can diagnose a range of diseases and check a patient’s vital signs without invasive tests – inspired by Star Trek’s medical “tricorder” device.
Read MoreIf we want to know whether there is life beyond Earth then the quickest way to answer that question is to explore Mars. That exploration is currently being done by remote space probes sent from Earth.
Read MoreIn this classic Hubble image from 2000, the planetary nebula IC 418 glows like a multifaceted jewel with enigmatic patterns. IC 418 lies about 2,000 light-years from Earth in the direction of the constellation Lepus.
Read MoreEngineers working on NASA’s Orion kicked off summer with a series of important tests for some of the spacecraft’s critical safety systems. In the Utah desert, the skies over Arizona and the water at Johnson Space Center in Houston, the team is making sure Orion is safe from launch to splashdown.
Read MoreThe satellite Micius, launched from Jiuquan, China, in August last year, is unlike any other in the sky. While other satellites communicate with Earth using physics worked out by James Clerk Maxwell 150 years ago, Micius is the world’s first quantum-enabled satellite. And now, it has conclusively proved its quantum credentials.
Read MoreResearch reported last week found “even moderate drinking” could “damage the brain”. Considering 78% of Australians over 14 years old drink alcohol, this is understandably concerning information.
Read MoreUniversal-Sci - A Regularly updated selection of the most interesting news stories in the world of science. Including: Space, Physics, Biology, Health, Technology, and Environment.
