Space
Get flash to fully experience Pearltrees
The biggest planet of the new batch is HD 85512 b, which is 3.6 times the mass of Earth and can be found 36 light-years away in the Vela constellation. This discovery was made by The High Accuracy Radial Velocity Planet Searcher (HARPS), which is installed at the European Southern Observatory's 11.8ft La Silla Observatory in Chile. 'The detection of HD 85512 b is far from the limit of HARPS, and demonstrates the possibility of discovering other super-Earths in the habitable zones around stars similar to the sun,' said University of Geneva astronomer Michel Mayor. The European Southern Observatory, La Silla Paranal, Chile, South America Super-Earths, which range from Earth's mass to worlds 10 times more massive, are of particular interest to planet-hunters because it's thought that they could be even more conducive to the development of life than our own planet.
Scientists find 50 new planets and one of them could have alien life | Mail Online
BBC News - Meteorites delivered gold to Earth
A burst of meteorite impacts around 3.9 billion years ago delivered precious metals to Earth A study from the University of Bristol looked at some of the oldest rocks on Earth, demonstrating that gold was delivered by meteorites long after their formation. Any precious metals in the planetary mix would have gone with this iron and concentrated in the core, leaving the mantle devoid of elements such as gold, platinum, and osmium. But this is not what we observe. In fact, the silicate mantle has up to 1,000 times more gold than anticipated.NASA Spacecraft Data Suggest Water Flowing on Mars
PASADENA, Calif. -- Observations from NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter have revealed possible flowing water during the warmest months on Mars. "NASA's Mars Exploration Program keeps bringing us closer to determining whether the Red Planet could harbor life in some form,” NASA Administrator Charles Bolden said, “and it reaffirms Mars as an important future destination for human exploration." Dark, finger-like features appear and extend down some Martian slopes during late spring through summer, fade in winter, and return during the next spring. Repeated observations have tracked the seasonal changes in these recurring features on several steep slopes in the middle latitudes of Mars' southern hemisphere. "The best explanation for these observations so far is the flow of briny water," said Alfred McEwen of the University of Arizona, Tucson.
Meteorites tend to contain an excess of left-handed amino acids Now an Astrophysical Journal Letters paper shows how conditions around a far-flung star could favour the formation of one type over another. Amino acids are corkscrew-shaped molecules that can form twisted to the left or right, and chemistry does not inherently favour one corkscrew direction over another. But with very few exceptions, life on Earth makes use of the left-handed version. A famous experiment in 1952 showed how a spark across a soup of simple chemicals representing the primordial Earth could form amino acids - but like many that followed, it formed equal numbers of left- and right-handed types.
BBC News - 'Life chemicals' may have formed around far-flung star
This artist's conception provided by NASA/Jet Propulsion Laboratory-Caltech shows a newly discovered type of planet that wanders freely or follows very loose orbits. A(AP Photo/NASA JPL-Caltech) New Zealand researchers have helped discover a collection of Jupiter-sized free-floating planets that do not orbit stars. The discovery of these "exoplanets" -- published in tomorrow's edition of scientific journal Nature -- provides new knowledge about "lonely" planets wandering through distant solar systems, apparently with no star of their own to orbit.
Kiwi hand in space discovery | Otago Daily Times Online News Keep Up to Date Local, National New Zealand & International News
WE THINK of stars, even the failed ones called brown dwarfs, as being lethally hot. That picture has been confounded by a newly discovered brown dwarf - at room temperature. Like fully fledged stars, brown dwarfs form from collapsing gas clouds, but they are not massive enough to sustain nuclear reactions. Instead, they briefly shine red from the heat of formation, then fade. Still, the coolest known brown dwarfs are all hot enough to roast any spacefarers who venture too close.
Newly found brown dwarf is ultra-cool - space - 12 March 2011 - New Scientist
by Jeff Johnson The universe can be a very strange place. While groundbreaking ideas such as quantum theory, relativity and even the Earth going around the Sun might be commonly accepted now, science still continues to show that the universe contains things you might find it difficult to believe, and even more difficult to get your head around.
10 Strange Things About The Universe - Top 10 Lists | Listverse
WHAT happened before the beginning of time is—by definition, it might be thought—metaphysics. At least one physicist, though, thinks there is nothing meta about the question at all. Roger Penrose, of Oxford University, believes that the Big Bang in which the visible universe began was not actually the beginning of everything. It was merely the latest example of a series of such bangs that renew reality when it is getting tired out. More importantly, he thinks that the pre-Big Bang past has left an imprint on the present that can be detected and analysed, and that he and a colleague in Armenia have found it.
