Awesome new Jupiter close-up

Image via NASA/JPL-Caltech/SwRI/MSSS/Gerald Eichstädt/Seán Doran.

NASA’s Juno spacecraft captured this image of swirling clouds over Jupiter’s North-North Temperate Belt on October 29, 2018, as the spacecraft performed its 16th close flyby of Jupiter. At the time, Juno was about 4,400 miles (7,000 km) from the planet’s cloud tops, at a latitude of approximately 40 degrees north.

A NASA statement described the image:

Appearing in the scene are several bright-white “pop-up” clouds as well as an anticyclonic storm, known as a white oval.

Citizen scientists Gerald Eichstädt and Seán Doran created this color-enhanced image using data from the spacecraft’s JunoCam imager. JunoCam’s raw images are available for the public to peruse and to process into image products here.

The 2019 lunar calendars are here! Order yours before they’re gone. Makes a great gift.

Bottom line: Image of Jupiter’s clouds by NASA’s Juno spacecraft.

Via NASA

from EarthSky https://ift.tt/2OEyu8H

Image via NASA/JPL-Caltech/SwRI/MSSS/Gerald Eichstädt/Seán Doran.

NASA’s Juno spacecraft captured this image of swirling clouds over Jupiter’s North-North Temperate Belt on October 29, 2018, as the spacecraft performed its 16th close flyby of Jupiter. At the time, Juno was about 4,400 miles (7,000 km) from the planet’s cloud tops, at a latitude of approximately 40 degrees north.

A NASA statement described the image:

Appearing in the scene are several bright-white “pop-up” clouds as well as an anticyclonic storm, known as a white oval.

Citizen scientists Gerald Eichstädt and Seán Doran created this color-enhanced image using data from the spacecraft’s JunoCam imager. JunoCam’s raw images are available for the public to peruse and to process into image products here.

The 2019 lunar calendars are here! Order yours before they’re gone. Makes a great gift.

Bottom line: Image of Jupiter’s clouds by NASA’s Juno spacecraft.

Via NASA

from EarthSky https://ift.tt/2OEyu8H

Synchronized telescopes put limits on mystery bursts

Tile 107 – nicknamed the Outlier – is part of the Murchison Widefield Array (MWA), a radiotelescope located in an extremely sparsely populated, flat, semi-arid terrain in Western Australia. The MWA, and another telescope nearby, were used to study fast radio bursts. Image via Pete Wheeler/ICRAR.

Here’s a cool story we nearly missed. The International Centre for Radio Astronomy Research (ICRAR) described on October 29, 2018, the way in which two Australian radiotelescopes were synchronized, in order to study the mysterious fast radio bursts. These millisecond-scale bursts have perplexed astronomers ever since the first burst was discovered in 2007. They’re exceptionally bright, and they’re known to come from deep space. Dozens of them have now been found, but no one knows what causes them. The two telescopes – located side-by-side in the desert of Western Australia’s remote Murchison region – have now shed some light on the mystery, in a new paper published in the peer-reviewed Astrophysical Journal Letters.

The telescopes are the Murchison Widefield Array (MWA) and the Australian Square Kilometre Array Pathfinder (ASKAP), and they were synchronized to observe the same patch of sky, searching that area for fast radio bursts.

And indeed, in the published research, astronomers described how ASKAP did detect several extremely bright fast radio bursts, while the MWA – which scans the sky at lower radio frequencies – did not see anything, even though it was pointed at the same area of sky at the same time.

Artist’s concept of the second synchronized telescope, called the ASKAP radiotelescope, detecting a fast radio burst. Scientists don’t know what causes FRBs, but it must involve incredible energy — equivalent to the amount released by the sun in 80 years. Image via OzGrav, Swinburne University of Technology/ICRAR.

Lead author of the new work is Marcin Sokolowski of Curtin University. He said the fact that the fast radio bursts were not observed at lower frequencies by the MWA was highly significant:

When ASKAP sees these extremely bright events and the MWA doesn’t, that tells us something really unexpected is going on; either fast radio burst sources don’t emit at low frequencies, or the signals are blocked on their way to Earth.

Study co-author Ramesh Bhat, also of Curtin University, said it wasn’t easy to get the two telescopes pointed at the same area of sky at the same time. He said:

Fast radio bursts are unpredictable, so to catch them when both telescopes are looking in the same direction isn’t easy. It took many months of ASKAP and the MWA co-tracking the same area of sky, ensuring the best overlap of their views possible, to give us the chance at catching some of these enigmatic bursts.

The challenge was in making it all happen automatically, but it really paid off.

Artist’s concept of fast radio bursts (FRBs). Image via OzGrav, Swinburne University of Technology/ICRAR.

A third co-author, Jean-Pierre Macquart of Curtin University, said:

It’s really thrilling to have a clue about the origins of these incredible bursts of energy from outside our galaxy. The MWA adds an important piece of the puzzle and it was only made possible with this ‘technological tango’ between the two telescopes.

It’s an exciting development because it unites the two teams and it brings home the advantage of having the two telescopes at the same site.

Future coordination between the teams will also benefit other areas of astronomy, as complementary views from the two telescopes can provide a more complete picture of a situation.

Bottom line: Two telescopes in Australia were used to search the same patch of sky for fast radio bursts. One telescope saw them; the other didn’t, despite the fact that both were looking in the same place at the same time. This result sets some parameters on what might be causing the bursts and so sheds light on the mystery.

Source: No low-frequency emission from extremely bright Fast Radio Bursts

The 2019 lunar calendars are here! Order yours before they’re gone. Makes a great gift.

Via ICRAR

from EarthSky https://ift.tt/2Qyrc8b

Tile 107 – nicknamed the Outlier – is part of the Murchison Widefield Array (MWA), a radiotelescope located in an extremely sparsely populated, flat, semi-arid terrain in Western Australia. The MWA, and another telescope nearby, were used to study fast radio bursts. Image via Pete Wheeler/ICRAR.

Here’s a cool story we nearly missed. The International Centre for Radio Astronomy Research (ICRAR) described on October 29, 2018, the way in which two Australian radiotelescopes were synchronized, in order to study the mysterious fast radio bursts. These millisecond-scale bursts have perplexed astronomers ever since the first burst was discovered in 2007. They’re exceptionally bright, and they’re known to come from deep space. Dozens of them have now been found, but no one knows what causes them. The two telescopes – located side-by-side in the desert of Western Australia’s remote Murchison region – have now shed some light on the mystery, in a new paper published in the peer-reviewed Astrophysical Journal Letters.

The telescopes are the Murchison Widefield Array (MWA) and the Australian Square Kilometre Array Pathfinder (ASKAP), and they were synchronized to observe the same patch of sky, searching that area for fast radio bursts.

And indeed, in the published research, astronomers described how ASKAP did detect several extremely bright fast radio bursts, while the MWA – which scans the sky at lower radio frequencies – did not see anything, even though it was pointed at the same area of sky at the same time.

Artist’s concept of the second synchronized telescope, called the ASKAP radiotelescope, detecting a fast radio burst. Scientists don’t know what causes FRBs, but it must involve incredible energy — equivalent to the amount released by the sun in 80 years. Image via OzGrav, Swinburne University of Technology/ICRAR.

Lead author of the new work is Marcin Sokolowski of Curtin University. He said the fact that the fast radio bursts were not observed at lower frequencies by the MWA was highly significant:

When ASKAP sees these extremely bright events and the MWA doesn’t, that tells us something really unexpected is going on; either fast radio burst sources don’t emit at low frequencies, or the signals are blocked on their way to Earth.

Study co-author Ramesh Bhat, also of Curtin University, said it wasn’t easy to get the two telescopes pointed at the same area of sky at the same time. He said:

Fast radio bursts are unpredictable, so to catch them when both telescopes are looking in the same direction isn’t easy. It took many months of ASKAP and the MWA co-tracking the same area of sky, ensuring the best overlap of their views possible, to give us the chance at catching some of these enigmatic bursts.

The challenge was in making it all happen automatically, but it really paid off.

Artist’s concept of fast radio bursts (FRBs). Image via OzGrav, Swinburne University of Technology/ICRAR.

A third co-author, Jean-Pierre Macquart of Curtin University, said:

It’s really thrilling to have a clue about the origins of these incredible bursts of energy from outside our galaxy. The MWA adds an important piece of the puzzle and it was only made possible with this ‘technological tango’ between the two telescopes.

It’s an exciting development because it unites the two teams and it brings home the advantage of having the two telescopes at the same site.

Future coordination between the teams will also benefit other areas of astronomy, as complementary views from the two telescopes can provide a more complete picture of a situation.

Bottom line: Two telescopes in Australia were used to search the same patch of sky for fast radio bursts. One telescope saw them; the other didn’t, despite the fact that both were looking in the same place at the same time. This result sets some parameters on what might be causing the bursts and so sheds light on the mystery.

Source: No low-frequency emission from extremely bright Fast Radio Bursts

The 2019 lunar calendars are here! Order yours before they’re gone. Makes a great gift.

Via ICRAR

from EarthSky https://ift.tt/2Qyrc8b

Bacteria in huge indoor aquarium mirror ocean’s

Researchers have discovered that the bacteria in the water in a large exhibit at Georgia Aquarium are similar to those that exist naturally in the ocean.

Cleaning aquariums means cleaning the water of waste like ammonia, nitrites and nitrates. Bacteria help break down nitrogen compounds, and in a new study, published September 29, 2018 in the peer-reviewed journal Applied and Environmental Microbiology , researchers found some bacterial communities in the aquarium emulated those found naturally in oceans.

Frank Stewart, an associate professor of biological sciences at Georgia Tech was principal investigator of the study, which analyzed the water-cleaning abilities of two bacterial communities in the Ocean Voyager exhibit in Atlanta’s Georgia Aquarium. Ocean Voyager is he largest indoor oceanic exhibit in the United States, with nearly 6.3 million gallons (24 million liters) of constituted sea water and thousands of sea fauna, including whale sharks, manta rays and sea turtles. Stewart said in a statement:

It was phenomenal. I didn’t expect this. The microbial communities are seeded from microbes coming from the animals and their food in an aquarium that does not tap into the ocean. But these looked like natural marine microbial communities.

Georgia Aquarium life support experts (like Matthew Regensburger, left) wanted to know which bacteria were removing nitrates from the water of Ocean Voyager, the largest indoor oceanic aquarium in the US. Georgia Tech marine biochemists (Andrew Burns, center, and Zoe Pratte, right) discovered very natural bacterial colonies at work. Image via Georgia Tech.

To stay fresh, the aquarium water cascades through a series of cleaning processes. In the tank, as in oceans, bacteria break down excrement, ammonia and other waste, then the aquarium exhibit’s water flows through filters that remove more things, including nitrites.

The water also flows through special bacterial reactors, and by then it’s free from most everything but nitrates, which can become toxic if allowed to build up to high concentrations. In the reactors, colonies of bacteria, the focus of this study, break nitrates down.

The reactors, or “pads,” have nearly no oxygen and offer bacteria sulfur as food. So, anaerobic bacteria gather there to “eat” the sulfur and “breathe up” the nitrates to form nitrogen gas, which can bubble up to the atmosphere. Earth’s atmosphere is naturally about 78 percent nitrogen.

The researchers were surprised and pleased at the diversity of bacteria communities that they encountered in the two pads they studied. Eric Hall collaborated on the research and is Senior Director for Life Support Systems and Water Quality for the aquarium. Hall said:

What is really interesting is how many of a certain species exists in our system and especially finding out what they are doing. These microscopic creatures are not just hanging around but actually doing beneficial things for our water that we didn’t understand this thoroughly before.

You can read more about the varieties of bacteria the researchers found here.

The tall blue tanks are part of a bacterial reactor, where good anaerobic bacteria are breaking down nitrates, while Zoe Pratte, in the foreground gathers a water sample for an additional bacterial study. Image via Georgia Tech.

The 2019 lunar calendars are here! Order yours before they’re gone. Makes a great gift.

Source: Broad phylogenetic diversity associated with nitrogen loss through sulfur oxidation in a large public marine aquarium

Via Georgia Tech.

from EarthSky https://ift.tt/2Qx8vla

Researchers have discovered that the bacteria in the water in a large exhibit at Georgia Aquarium are similar to those that exist naturally in the ocean.

Cleaning aquariums means cleaning the water of waste like ammonia, nitrites and nitrates. Bacteria help break down nitrogen compounds, and in a new study, published September 29, 2018 in the peer-reviewed journal Applied and Environmental Microbiology , researchers found some bacterial communities in the aquarium emulated those found naturally in oceans.

Frank Stewart, an associate professor of biological sciences at Georgia Tech was principal investigator of the study, which analyzed the water-cleaning abilities of two bacterial communities in the Ocean Voyager exhibit in Atlanta’s Georgia Aquarium. Ocean Voyager is he largest indoor oceanic exhibit in the United States, with nearly 6.3 million gallons (24 million liters) of constituted sea water and thousands of sea fauna, including whale sharks, manta rays and sea turtles. Stewart said in a statement:

It was phenomenal. I didn’t expect this. The microbial communities are seeded from microbes coming from the animals and their food in an aquarium that does not tap into the ocean. But these looked like natural marine microbial communities.

Georgia Aquarium life support experts (like Matthew Regensburger, left) wanted to know which bacteria were removing nitrates from the water of Ocean Voyager, the largest indoor oceanic aquarium in the US. Georgia Tech marine biochemists (Andrew Burns, center, and Zoe Pratte, right) discovered very natural bacterial colonies at work. Image via Georgia Tech.

To stay fresh, the aquarium water cascades through a series of cleaning processes. In the tank, as in oceans, bacteria break down excrement, ammonia and other waste, then the aquarium exhibit’s water flows through filters that remove more things, including nitrites.

The water also flows through special bacterial reactors, and by then it’s free from most everything but nitrates, which can become toxic if allowed to build up to high concentrations. In the reactors, colonies of bacteria, the focus of this study, break nitrates down.

The reactors, or “pads,” have nearly no oxygen and offer bacteria sulfur as food. So, anaerobic bacteria gather there to “eat” the sulfur and “breathe up” the nitrates to form nitrogen gas, which can bubble up to the atmosphere. Earth’s atmosphere is naturally about 78 percent nitrogen.

The researchers were surprised and pleased at the diversity of bacteria communities that they encountered in the two pads they studied. Eric Hall collaborated on the research and is Senior Director for Life Support Systems and Water Quality for the aquarium. Hall said:

What is really interesting is how many of a certain species exists in our system and especially finding out what they are doing. These microscopic creatures are not just hanging around but actually doing beneficial things for our water that we didn’t understand this thoroughly before.

You can read more about the varieties of bacteria the researchers found here.

The tall blue tanks are part of a bacterial reactor, where good anaerobic bacteria are breaking down nitrates, while Zoe Pratte, in the foreground gathers a water sample for an additional bacterial study. Image via Georgia Tech.

The 2019 lunar calendars are here! Order yours before they’re gone. Makes a great gift.

Source: Broad phylogenetic diversity associated with nitrogen loss through sulfur oxidation in a large public marine aquarium

Via Georgia Tech.

from EarthSky https://ift.tt/2Qx8vla

What’s the youngest moon you can see?

View larger. | Extremely young moon – just over 15 hours, caught in daylight – caught on November 8, 2018 by Sarah Nordin at Telok Kemang Observatory in Port Dickson, Malaysia. Camera: Nikon D300s. Telescope: Takahashi TOA-150. Camera setting: ISO160_1/640s_RAW file. Congratulations, Sarah!

We received the photo above this week, from Sarah Nordin. It’s a very unusual photo of an extremely young moon – caught only 15 hours, 19 minutes after the instant of new moon. Be sure to click in and view it larger, to appreciate it.

It’s long been a sport among amateur astronomers to spot the youngest possible moons with optical aid, or with the eye alone. A new moon is more or less between the Earth and sun, crossing the sky with the sun during the day. A young moon is a moon some hours or days after the exact instant of new moon. Young moons are located some distance east of the sun on the sky’s dome (because the moon always moves eastward in orbit). Young moons appear to our eye as exceedingly slim crescents, likely illuminated by earthshine, seen low in the western sky for a brief interval after sunset.

Typically, you won’t see a moon less than about 24 hours on either side of new moon. But, if you try, you can see the moon with the eye alone much closer to the new phase. And, if you use optical aid, it turns out you can see the moon all the way until the moment of new moon. More about that below.

View larger. | Peter Lowenstein also caught this month’s very young moon (about mid-photo, just above the cloud bank) and Jupiter (to the upper left of the moon) with the camera, but not the eye alone, about half an hour after sunset on November 8, 2018, from Mutare, Zimbabwe. Peter said this was his youngest-ever moon, about 18-and-one-half hours old. Congratulations Peter!

On July 8, 2013, a new record was set for the youngest moon ever photographed (see photos on this page). Thierry Legault – shooting from in Elancourt, France (a suburb of Paris) – captured the July 2013 moon at the precise instant it was new, or most nearly between the Earth and sun for this lunar orbit. Legault’s image (above) shows the thinnest of lunar crescents, in full daylight (naturally, since a new moon is always near the sun in the sky), at 07:14 UTC on July 8, 2013. Legault said on his website:

It is the youngest possible crescent, the age of the moon at this instant being exactly zero. Celestial north is up in the image, as well as the sun. The irregularities and discontinuities are caused by the relief at the edge of the lunar disk (mountains, craters).

Youngest lunar crescent, with the moon’s age being exactly zero when this photo was taken — at the precise moment of the new moon – at 07:14 UTC on July 8, 2013. Image by Thierry Legault. Visit his website. Used with permission.

Here is Thierry Legault and his setup for capturing the youngest possible moon. See more photos and read more on his website.

So what is the youngest moon you can see with your eye alone?

How young a moon you can expect to see with your eye depends on the time of year and on sky conditions. It’s possible to see the youngest moons – the thinnest crescents, nearest the sunset – around the spring equinox. That would be March for the Northern Hemisphere or September for the Southern Hemisphere.

When Legault captured the image above, the sun and moon were separated only 4.4 degrees – about 9 solar diameters – on the sky’s dome. It is extremely difficult, and risky, to try to capture the moon at such a time. Not only is the sight of our companion world drowned in bright sunlight, but there is also a risk of unintentionally glimpsing the sun and thereby damaging one’s eyesight.

That’s why Legault used a special photographic setup to capture this youngest possible moon. He wrote:

In order to reduce the glare, the images have been taken in close infrared and a pierced screen, placed just in front of the telescope, prevents the sunlight from entering directly in the telescope.

A longstanding, though somewhat doubtful record for youngest moon seen with the eye was held by two British housemaids, said to have seen the moon 14 3/4 hours after new moon – in the year 1916.

A more reliable record was achieved by Stephen James O’Meara in May 1990; he saw the young crescent with the unaided eye 15 hours and 32 minutes after new moon. The record for youngest moon spotted with the eye using an optical aid passed to Mohsen Mirsaeed in 2002, who saw the moon 11 hours and 40 minutes after new moon.

Wow!

And, of course, optical aid enhances your young moon possibilities even more.

But Legault’s photograph at the instant of new moon? That record can only be duplicated, not surpassed.

View larger. | Very young moon like that you’re likely to see with the eye, as captured by EarthSky Facebook friend Susan Gies Jensen on February 10, 2013, in Odessa, Washington. Beautiful job, Susan! Thank you.

Bottom line: In our modern times, as astrophotographer Thierry Legault proved in 2013, it’s possible to capture a moon at the instant the moon is new. How about young moon sightings with the eye alone? The youngest possible moons, here.

Click here to check out Thierry Legault’s book on astrophotography.

from EarthSky https://ift.tt/2AY74Xu

View larger. | Extremely young moon – just over 15 hours, caught in daylight – caught on November 8, 2018 by Sarah Nordin at Telok Kemang Observatory in Port Dickson, Malaysia. Camera: Nikon D300s. Telescope: Takahashi TOA-150. Camera setting: ISO160_1/640s_RAW file. Congratulations, Sarah!

We received the photo above this week, from Sarah Nordin. It’s a very unusual photo of an extremely young moon – caught only 15 hours, 19 minutes after the instant of new moon. Be sure to click in and view it larger, to appreciate it.

It’s long been a sport among amateur astronomers to spot the youngest possible moons with optical aid, or with the eye alone. A new moon is more or less between the Earth and sun, crossing the sky with the sun during the day. A young moon is a moon some hours or days after the exact instant of new moon. Young moons are located some distance east of the sun on the sky’s dome (because the moon always moves eastward in orbit). Young moons appear to our eye as exceedingly slim crescents, likely illuminated by earthshine, seen low in the western sky for a brief interval after sunset.

Typically, you won’t see a moon less than about 24 hours on either side of new moon. But, if you try, you can see the moon with the eye alone much closer to the new phase. And, if you use optical aid, it turns out you can see the moon all the way until the moment of new moon. More about that below.

View larger. | Peter Lowenstein also caught this month’s very young moon (about mid-photo, just above the cloud bank) and Jupiter (to the upper left of the moon) with the camera, but not the eye alone, about half an hour after sunset on November 8, 2018, from Mutare, Zimbabwe. Peter said this was his youngest-ever moon, about 18-and-one-half hours old. Congratulations Peter!

On July 8, 2013, a new record was set for the youngest moon ever photographed (see photos on this page). Thierry Legault – shooting from in Elancourt, France (a suburb of Paris) – captured the July 2013 moon at the precise instant it was new, or most nearly between the Earth and sun for this lunar orbit. Legault’s image (above) shows the thinnest of lunar crescents, in full daylight (naturally, since a new moon is always near the sun in the sky), at 07:14 UTC on July 8, 2013. Legault said on his website:

It is the youngest possible crescent, the age of the moon at this instant being exactly zero. Celestial north is up in the image, as well as the sun. The irregularities and discontinuities are caused by the relief at the edge of the lunar disk (mountains, craters).

Youngest lunar crescent, with the moon’s age being exactly zero when this photo was taken — at the precise moment of the new moon – at 07:14 UTC on July 8, 2013. Image by Thierry Legault. Visit his website. Used with permission.

Here is Thierry Legault and his setup for capturing the youngest possible moon. See more photos and read more on his website.

So what is the youngest moon you can see with your eye alone?

How young a moon you can expect to see with your eye depends on the time of year and on sky conditions. It’s possible to see the youngest moons – the thinnest crescents, nearest the sunset – around the spring equinox. That would be March for the Northern Hemisphere or September for the Southern Hemisphere.

When Legault captured the image above, the sun and moon were separated only 4.4 degrees – about 9 solar diameters – on the sky’s dome. It is extremely difficult, and risky, to try to capture the moon at such a time. Not only is the sight of our companion world drowned in bright sunlight, but there is also a risk of unintentionally glimpsing the sun and thereby damaging one’s eyesight.

That’s why Legault used a special photographic setup to capture this youngest possible moon. He wrote:

In order to reduce the glare, the images have been taken in close infrared and a pierced screen, placed just in front of the telescope, prevents the sunlight from entering directly in the telescope.

A longstanding, though somewhat doubtful record for youngest moon seen with the eye was held by two British housemaids, said to have seen the moon 14 3/4 hours after new moon – in the year 1916.

A more reliable record was achieved by Stephen James O’Meara in May 1990; he saw the young crescent with the unaided eye 15 hours and 32 minutes after new moon. The record for youngest moon spotted with the eye using an optical aid passed to Mohsen Mirsaeed in 2002, who saw the moon 11 hours and 40 minutes after new moon.

Wow!

And, of course, optical aid enhances your young moon possibilities even more.

But Legault’s photograph at the instant of new moon? That record can only be duplicated, not surpassed.

View larger. | Very young moon like that you’re likely to see with the eye, as captured by EarthSky Facebook friend Susan Gies Jensen on February 10, 2013, in Odessa, Washington. Beautiful job, Susan! Thank you.

Bottom line: In our modern times, as astrophotographer Thierry Legault proved in 2013, it’s possible to capture a moon at the instant the moon is new. How about young moon sightings with the eye alone? The youngest possible moons, here.

Click here to check out Thierry Legault’s book on astrophotography.

from EarthSky https://ift.tt/2AY74Xu

Moon, Saturn, Taurid meteors this weekend

This weekend – Saturday, November 10, and Sunday, November 11, 2018 – you’ll find the moon and Saturn at early evening. More about the pair below. Also, the North Taurid meteors at their best at and around the midnight hour. For the fun of it, on our chart at top, we also show you the whereabout of the dwarf planet Pluto. You won’t see Pluto with the eye; it’s about 2,000 times fainter than the dimmest visible star.

The 2019 lunar calendars are here! Order yours before they’re gone. Makes a great gift.

About the North Taurids … A crescent moon in the west in the evening is a setting moon. So moonlight will not obstruct this year’s North Taurid meteor shower. The moon (along with the planet Saturn) will set by early to mid-evening, while the North Taurids will fly most abundantly for several hours, centered around 12:30 a.m. local time (the time on your clock no matter where you are on the globe). This shower offers perhaps five or so meteors per hour, but it’s known for producing fireballs. Click here for tips on watching the Taurids.

Joel Coombs captured this Taurid meteor on the night of November 3, 2018, from a site south of Las Vegas, Nevada.

About the moon and Saturn … At nightfall on November 10 and 11, look westward for the waxing moon. The ringed planet Saturn will be the bright “star” nearby. Although you can see Saturn with the eye alone, you need a telescope to view its glorious rings. Even a modest backyard telescope will do the trick.

November 2018 presents your last full month to observe Saturn in the evening sky. This golden world will become lost in the sun’s glare in December 2018. It’ll move over into the morning sky in early January 2019.

The moon, our closest celestial neighbor, resides a bit less than 250,000 miles (400,000 km) from Earth at present. Meanwhile, Saturn, the farthest world that we can easily see with the unaided eye, lodges at about four thousand times the moon’s distance from Earth. Click here to know the moon’s present distance from Earth, and click here to know Saturn’s present distance (in astronomical units) from the Earth and sun.

Watch the moon over the next several days as it goes eastward relative to the backdrop stars and planets of the zodiac. Even though the moon and Saturn move westward across the sky throughout the night – because of the Earth’s rotation – the moon continually moves eastward in front of the constellations of the zodiac. So, from one night to the next, you’ll find the moon in a more easterly position. This motion is due to the moon’s eastward orbital motion around Earth.

As the moon makes its monthly rounds through the zodiac, it’ll meet up with the red planet Mars in mid-November. In fact, if you at the right spot in the far southern part of the globe, you could watch the moon occult (pass in front of) Mars. From most of the globe, however, the moon will pass just south of Mars and no occultation will take place.

Click here to know the moon’s position upon the zodiac for right now or a chosen date.

You don’t have to wait until the moon meets up with Mars in mid-November to see this brilliant beauty of a planet. From the Northern Hemisphere, you’ll see Mars beaming away in the southern sky at nightfall. From the southern tropics, Mars appears almost straight overhead as darkness falls; and from southern temperate latitudes, Mars shines quite high in the northern sky.

As Mars sits low in the west, look for the radiant of the Taurid shower to climb highest up in the sky. If you trace all the Taurid meteors backward, you’d see that these meteors appear to come from the constellation Taurus the Bull.

As Earth rotates on its axis, Mars will move westward across the sky tonight. When the red planet sits low in the west at late night, the radiant of the North Taurid meteor shower will climb highest up for the night. Then, after the peak hours of the Taurid shower, look for the blazing planet Venus to rise into the eastern sky as darkness begins to give way to daybreak.

Bottom line: This weekend – November 10 and 11, 2018 – the waxing moon is back in the evening sky for all of us around the globe, serving as your guide to the planet Saturn. Later at night, watch for the North Taurid meteor shower.

from EarthSky https://ift.tt/2Fe0GQf

This weekend – Saturday, November 10, and Sunday, November 11, 2018 – you’ll find the moon and Saturn at early evening. More about the pair below. Also, the North Taurid meteors at their best at and around the midnight hour. For the fun of it, on our chart at top, we also show you the whereabout of the dwarf planet Pluto. You won’t see Pluto with the eye; it’s about 2,000 times fainter than the dimmest visible star.

The 2019 lunar calendars are here! Order yours before they’re gone. Makes a great gift.

About the North Taurids … A crescent moon in the west in the evening is a setting moon. So moonlight will not obstruct this year’s North Taurid meteor shower. The moon (along with the planet Saturn) will set by early to mid-evening, while the North Taurids will fly most abundantly for several hours, centered around 12:30 a.m. local time (the time on your clock no matter where you are on the globe). This shower offers perhaps five or so meteors per hour, but it’s known for producing fireballs. Click here for tips on watching the Taurids.

Joel Coombs captured this Taurid meteor on the night of November 3, 2018, from a site south of Las Vegas, Nevada.

About the moon and Saturn … At nightfall on November 10 and 11, look westward for the waxing moon. The ringed planet Saturn will be the bright “star” nearby. Although you can see Saturn with the eye alone, you need a telescope to view its glorious rings. Even a modest backyard telescope will do the trick.

November 2018 presents your last full month to observe Saturn in the evening sky. This golden world will become lost in the sun’s glare in December 2018. It’ll move over into the morning sky in early January 2019.

The moon, our closest celestial neighbor, resides a bit less than 250,000 miles (400,000 km) from Earth at present. Meanwhile, Saturn, the farthest world that we can easily see with the unaided eye, lodges at about four thousand times the moon’s distance from Earth. Click here to know the moon’s present distance from Earth, and click here to know Saturn’s present distance (in astronomical units) from the Earth and sun.

Watch the moon over the next several days as it goes eastward relative to the backdrop stars and planets of the zodiac. Even though the moon and Saturn move westward across the sky throughout the night – because of the Earth’s rotation – the moon continually moves eastward in front of the constellations of the zodiac. So, from one night to the next, you’ll find the moon in a more easterly position. This motion is due to the moon’s eastward orbital motion around Earth.

As the moon makes its monthly rounds through the zodiac, it’ll meet up with the red planet Mars in mid-November. In fact, if you at the right spot in the far southern part of the globe, you could watch the moon occult (pass in front of) Mars. From most of the globe, however, the moon will pass just south of Mars and no occultation will take place.

Click here to know the moon’s position upon the zodiac for right now or a chosen date.

You don’t have to wait until the moon meets up with Mars in mid-November to see this brilliant beauty of a planet. From the Northern Hemisphere, you’ll see Mars beaming away in the southern sky at nightfall. From the southern tropics, Mars appears almost straight overhead as darkness falls; and from southern temperate latitudes, Mars shines quite high in the northern sky.

As Mars sits low in the west, look for the radiant of the Taurid shower to climb highest up in the sky. If you trace all the Taurid meteors backward, you’d see that these meteors appear to come from the constellation Taurus the Bull.

As Earth rotates on its axis, Mars will move westward across the sky tonight. When the red planet sits low in the west at late night, the radiant of the North Taurid meteor shower will climb highest up for the night. Then, after the peak hours of the Taurid shower, look for the blazing planet Venus to rise into the eastern sky as darkness begins to give way to daybreak.

Bottom line: This weekend – November 10 and 11, 2018 – the waxing moon is back in the evening sky for all of us around the globe, serving as your guide to the planet Saturn. Later at night, watch for the North Taurid meteor shower.

from EarthSky https://ift.tt/2Fe0GQf

News digest – pink brain tumour drink, red meat tax, AI funding boost and misleading headlines on sleep

Glowing chemical may help surgeons remove brain tumours

A chemical dye that makes cancer cells glow pink could be used to help surgeons remove aggressive brain tumours, BBC News reports. The research was presented at the National Cancer Research Institute (NCRI) cancer conference in Glasgow. Brain tumour patients were given a drink containing chemicals that get taken up by fast-growing tumour cells. Researchers believe the dye could help brain surgeons distinguish between tumour cells and normal brain tissue during surgery.

Targeting stem cells early prevents bowel cancer in mice

The Mail Online suggests that treating stem cells before they develop into cancer cells could prevent bowel cancer in people with a high risk of developing the disease. But so far the findings, also presented at NCRI, have been in mice, so it’s too early to make the connection to people. Researchers found that stem cells in mice that had the potential to develop into cancer were killed by the cancer drug cisplatin.

Health Secretary promotes healthy lifestyle to increase life expectancy

Health Secretary Matt Hancock has said that more money should be spent on preventing disease. The new NHS prevention plan is about “helping [people] make better choices” and covers ambitions to halve childhood obesity by 2030 and diagnose 75% of cancers at stage one and two by 2028. Read the BBC’s report.

Brain tumour ‘liquid biopsy’ could be possible in future

Our scientists at the Cancer Research UK Cambridge Institute are one step closer to developing a liquid biopsy that can detect brain tumour DNA, says GEN News. Liquid biopsies are fluid samples such a blood or urine that are more easily obtained compared to traditional tissue biopsies. The latest study looked for tumour DNA in the liquid surrounding the brain. Read our blog post for the details.

Our scientists have found traces of brain tumour DNA in the liquid surrounding the brain. This is the first small step towards developing a liquid biopsy for brain tumours: https://t.co/V5vwUJboYI pic.twitter.com/vpVIqRtCfz

— Cancer Research UK (@CR_UK) November 6, 2018

AI investment to help cancer diagnosis

The Government is funding researchers in Yorkshire to develop a computer programme that could help doctors diagnose cancer, reports the BBC. Digital scanners have been installed in some NHS hospitals around England that will scan and analyse tissue samples to detect cancer. They say computer analysis could offer a quicker and more accurate way to diagnose cancer.

Screening lowers risk of breast cancer death

A study at Queen Mary University of London reported that people who attend breast cancer screening had a lower risk of dying from the disease. According to ITV News, the researchers suggest this could be because screening detects cancers at an early stage when they are more likely to respond to treatment. But, it is important that people are informed of both the benefits and harms of breast screening.

Red meat tax suggested

The BBC asks if there should be a tax on red and processed meat. This comes after scientists at Oxford University suggest that increasing prices could help people eat less of it. Eating lots of processed and red meat can have health implications, including an increased risk of bowel cancer.

And finally

Research suggesting woman who wake up early have a reduced risk of breast cancer sparked misleading headlines. Reports implied that the research, also presented at NCRI and funded by Cancer Research UK, suggests people should rearrange their sleeping pattern. Our piece in the Guardian explains why it’s not yet true to say that jumping out of bed at the crack of dawn will stop women developing the disease.

Lily

from Cancer Research UK – Science blog https://ift.tt/2AX16pV

Glowing chemical may help surgeons remove brain tumours

A chemical dye that makes cancer cells glow pink could be used to help surgeons remove aggressive brain tumours, BBC News reports. The research was presented at the National Cancer Research Institute (NCRI) cancer conference in Glasgow. Brain tumour patients were given a drink containing chemicals that get taken up by fast-growing tumour cells. Researchers believe the dye could help brain surgeons distinguish between tumour cells and normal brain tissue during surgery.

Targeting stem cells early prevents bowel cancer in mice

The Mail Online suggests that treating stem cells before they develop into cancer cells could prevent bowel cancer in people with a high risk of developing the disease. But so far the findings, also presented at NCRI, have been in mice, so it’s too early to make the connection to people. Researchers found that stem cells in mice that had the potential to develop into cancer were killed by the cancer drug cisplatin.

Health Secretary promotes healthy lifestyle to increase life expectancy

Health Secretary Matt Hancock has said that more money should be spent on preventing disease. The new NHS prevention plan is about “helping [people] make better choices” and covers ambitions to halve childhood obesity by 2030 and diagnose 75% of cancers at stage one and two by 2028. Read the BBC’s report.

Brain tumour ‘liquid biopsy’ could be possible in future

Our scientists at the Cancer Research UK Cambridge Institute are one step closer to developing a liquid biopsy that can detect brain tumour DNA, says GEN News. Liquid biopsies are fluid samples such a blood or urine that are more easily obtained compared to traditional tissue biopsies. The latest study looked for tumour DNA in the liquid surrounding the brain. Read our blog post for the details.

Our scientists have found traces of brain tumour DNA in the liquid surrounding the brain. This is the first small step towards developing a liquid biopsy for brain tumours: https://t.co/V5vwUJboYI pic.twitter.com/vpVIqRtCfz

— Cancer Research UK (@CR_UK) November 6, 2018

AI investment to help cancer diagnosis

The Government is funding researchers in Yorkshire to develop a computer programme that could help doctors diagnose cancer, reports the BBC. Digital scanners have been installed in some NHS hospitals around England that will scan and analyse tissue samples to detect cancer. They say computer analysis could offer a quicker and more accurate way to diagnose cancer.

Screening lowers risk of breast cancer death

A study at Queen Mary University of London reported that people who attend breast cancer screening had a lower risk of dying from the disease. According to ITV News, the researchers suggest this could be because screening detects cancers at an early stage when they are more likely to respond to treatment. But, it is important that people are informed of both the benefits and harms of breast screening.

Red meat tax suggested

The BBC asks if there should be a tax on red and processed meat. This comes after scientists at Oxford University suggest that increasing prices could help people eat less of it. Eating lots of processed and red meat can have health implications, including an increased risk of bowel cancer.

And finally

Research suggesting woman who wake up early have a reduced risk of breast cancer sparked misleading headlines. Reports implied that the research, also presented at NCRI and funded by Cancer Research UK, suggests people should rearrange their sleeping pattern. Our piece in the Guardian explains why it’s not yet true to say that jumping out of bed at the crack of dawn will stop women developing the disease.

Lily

from Cancer Research UK – Science blog https://ift.tt/2AX16pV

Astronomers find largest-yet galaxy proto-supercluster

An international team of astronomers using the VIMOS instrument of ESO’s Very Large Telescope have uncovered a titanic structure in the early universe. This galaxy proto-supercluster — which they nicknamed Hyperion — is the largest and most massive structure yet found at such a remote time and distance — only 2 billion years after the Big Bang. Image via ESO.

An international team of astronomers, using the European Southern Observatory’s (ESO) Very Large Telescope, haa identified a gigantic supercluster of galaxies forming in the early universe, just 2.3 billion years after the Big Bang.

The 2019 lunar calendars are here! Order yours before they’re gone. Makes a great gift.

A supercluster is a large group of smaller galaxy clusters or galaxy groups- among the largest-known structures of the cosmos.

The newly-discovered structure, which the researchers nicknamed Hyperion after a Titan from Greek mythology due to the immense size and mass of the proto-supercluster, is the largest and most massive structure to be found so early in the formation of the universe. The enormous mass of the proto-supercluster is calculated to be more than one million billion times that of the sun. This titanic mass is similar to that of the largest structures observed in the universe today, but finding such a massive object in the early universe surprised astronomers.

Olga Cucciati of Istituto Nazionale di Astrofisica is the first author of the discovery paper, accepted for publication in the peer-reviewed journal Astronomy & Astrophysics. Cucciati said in a statement:

This is the first time that such a large structure has been identified at such a high redshift, just over 2 billion years after the Big Bang. Normally these kinds of structures are known at lower redshifts, which means when the universe has had much more time to evolve and construct such huge things. It was a surprise to see something this evolved when the universe was relatively young!

Light reaching Earth from extremely distant galaxies took a long time to travel, giving us a window into the past when the universe was much younger. This wavelength of this light has been stretched by the expansion of the universe over its journey, an effect known as cosmological redshift. More distant, older objects have a correspondingly larger redshift, leading astronomers to often use redshift and age interchangeably. Hyperion’s redshift of 2.45 means that astronomers observed the proto-supercluster as it was 2.3 billion years after the Big Bang.

Located in the COSMOS field in the constellation of Sextans (The Sextant), astronomers identified Hyperion by analyzing the vast amount of data obtained from the VIMOS Ultra-deep Survey which provides a 3-D map of the distribution of over 10,000 galaxies in the distant universe.

The team found that Hyperion has a very complex structure, containing at least seven high-density regions connected by filaments of galaxies, and its size is comparable to nearby superclusters, though it has a very different structure.

Brian Lemaux is an astronomer from University of California, Davis and LAM, and a co-leader of the team behind this result. He said:

Superclusters closer to Earth tend to a much more concentrated distribution of mass with clear structural features. But in Hyperion, the mass is distributed much more uniformly in a series of connected blobs, populated by loose associations of galaxies.

This contrast, the astronomers say, is most likely due to the fact that nearby superclusters have had billions of years for gravity to gather matter together into denser regions — a process that has been acting for far less time in the much younger Hyperion.

Given its size so early in the history of the universe, astronomers expect Hyperion to evolve into something similar to the immense structures in the local universe such as the superclusters making up the Sloan Great Wall or the Virgo Supercluster that contains our own galaxy, the Milky Way.

Source: The progeny of a Cosmic Titan: a massive multi-component proto-supercluster in formation at z=2.45 in VUDS

Bottom line: A team of astronomers have identified a gigantic supercluster of galaxies forming in the early universe.

Via ESO

from EarthSky https://ift.tt/2OBa2F4

An international team of astronomers using the VIMOS instrument of ESO’s Very Large Telescope have uncovered a titanic structure in the early universe. This galaxy proto-supercluster — which they nicknamed Hyperion — is the largest and most massive structure yet found at such a remote time and distance — only 2 billion years after the Big Bang. Image via ESO.

An international team of astronomers, using the European Southern Observatory’s (ESO) Very Large Telescope, haa identified a gigantic supercluster of galaxies forming in the early universe, just 2.3 billion years after the Big Bang.

The 2019 lunar calendars are here! Order yours before they’re gone. Makes a great gift.

A supercluster is a large group of smaller galaxy clusters or galaxy groups- among the largest-known structures of the cosmos.

The newly-discovered structure, which the researchers nicknamed Hyperion after a Titan from Greek mythology due to the immense size and mass of the proto-supercluster, is the largest and most massive structure to be found so early in the formation of the universe. The enormous mass of the proto-supercluster is calculated to be more than one million billion times that of the sun. This titanic mass is similar to that of the largest structures observed in the universe today, but finding such a massive object in the early universe surprised astronomers.

Olga Cucciati of Istituto Nazionale di Astrofisica is the first author of the discovery paper, accepted for publication in the peer-reviewed journal Astronomy & Astrophysics. Cucciati said in a statement:

This is the first time that such a large structure has been identified at such a high redshift, just over 2 billion years after the Big Bang. Normally these kinds of structures are known at lower redshifts, which means when the universe has had much more time to evolve and construct such huge things. It was a surprise to see something this evolved when the universe was relatively young!

Light reaching Earth from extremely distant galaxies took a long time to travel, giving us a window into the past when the universe was much younger. This wavelength of this light has been stretched by the expansion of the universe over its journey, an effect known as cosmological redshift. More distant, older objects have a correspondingly larger redshift, leading astronomers to often use redshift and age interchangeably. Hyperion’s redshift of 2.45 means that astronomers observed the proto-supercluster as it was 2.3 billion years after the Big Bang.

Located in the COSMOS field in the constellation of Sextans (The Sextant), astronomers identified Hyperion by analyzing the vast amount of data obtained from the VIMOS Ultra-deep Survey which provides a 3-D map of the distribution of over 10,000 galaxies in the distant universe.

The team found that Hyperion has a very complex structure, containing at least seven high-density regions connected by filaments of galaxies, and its size is comparable to nearby superclusters, though it has a very different structure.

Brian Lemaux is an astronomer from University of California, Davis and LAM, and a co-leader of the team behind this result. He said:

Superclusters closer to Earth tend to a much more concentrated distribution of mass with clear structural features. But in Hyperion, the mass is distributed much more uniformly in a series of connected blobs, populated by loose associations of galaxies.

This contrast, the astronomers say, is most likely due to the fact that nearby superclusters have had billions of years for gravity to gather matter together into denser regions — a process that has been acting for far less time in the much younger Hyperion.

Given its size so early in the history of the universe, astronomers expect Hyperion to evolve into something similar to the immense structures in the local universe such as the superclusters making up the Sloan Great Wall or the Virgo Supercluster that contains our own galaxy, the Milky Way.

Source: The progeny of a Cosmic Titan: a massive multi-component proto-supercluster in formation at z=2.45 in VUDS

Bottom line: A team of astronomers have identified a gigantic supercluster of galaxies forming in the early universe.

Via ESO

from EarthSky https://ift.tt/2OBa2F4