Uncategorized
- Astronomy
Pulsar ages may need refiguring
New images taken by the Chandra X-ray Observatory confirm that a known pulsar, a rapidly spinning neutron star, was born in a supernova explosion that Chinese astronomers witnessed in 386 A.D. and call into question how astronomers traditionally compute the ages of pulsars.
- Astronomy
Cloudy puzzle on Uranus
Astronomers can’t explain the seemingly ephemeral nature of bright clouds seen on the northernmost sunlit edge of Uranus.
- Physics
Voltage flip turns magnetism on, off
Researchers in Japan have made a material whose inherent magnetism can be turned off and on electrically, as long as the material, a novel semiconductor, stays ultracold.
- Physics
Collider is cookin’, but is it soup?
By making the densest, hottest matter ever in a lab, smashups between fast-moving nuclei in the Relativistic Heavy Ion Collider are coming closer than ever to reproducing the superhot, primordial fluid that presumably filled the universe immediately after the Big Bang.
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If the studies done by Lene V. Hau and by Ronald Walsworth and Mikhail Lukin are correct, then are we saying that our current interpretation of space and time can be misinterpreted? For example, if light passes through cold sodium gas, the speed of light can be greatly slowed. If this is so, then can […]
- Physics
Light Stands Still in Atom Clouds
Ordinarily in continuous motion, light pulses come to a dead stop in specially prepared atom clouds.
- Health & Medicine
Found: Mutation for deadly nerve disorder
Two research teams have discovered the genetic mutation that causes familial dysautonomia, a lethal hereditary disease that causes nervous system damage.
- Health & Medicine
Radiation therapy keeps arteries clear
Two new studies add to the growing evidence that radiation treatment may keep arteries open longer after angioplasty.
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Cells have molecule for protein triage
A molecule called CHIP slates bad proteins for destruction and may lead to heart disease therapies.
- Chemistry
New technique makes water droplets sprint
A newly developed process encourages water droplets at the hydrophobic center of a wafer to speed outward to a water-friendly edge.
- Math
Quirks of video poker
Even with perfect play over a long time, unfavorable odds and limits on how much a gambler may win per machine make playing video poker into a losing game.
- Math
Reassessing an ancient artifact
The famous Mesopotamian clay tablet known as Plimpton 322 represents an ordered list of worked examples that a teacher would use to prepare a sequence of closely related questions about squares and reciprocals for student exercises.
