149,597,870,700 meters.
A new astronomical constant: 149,597,870,700 meters.
Tag: science
A new and very large study now suggests that — even though no one really knows why — acupuncture might actually be effective.
The uncertainty of science: A new and very large study now suggests that — even though no one really knows why — acupuncture might actually be effective.
The key mystery here is the lack of any explanation for why acupuncture seems to work. And without that explanation, a large number of doctors will justifiable still refuse to use it as a course of treatment.
Scientists have discovered well-preserved frozen woolly mammoth fragments deep in Siberia that may contain living cells.
Scientists have discovered well-preserved frozen woolly mammoth fragments deep in Siberia that may contain living cells.
“Progressive thinking and the rise of the anti-science left.”
From a liberal: “Progressive thinking and the rise of the anti-science left.”
Dry ice snow falls on Mars.
Astronomers have measured the most powerful magnetic field ever found around a star.
Astronomers have measured the most powerful magnetic field ever found around a star.
The star’s magnetic field is 20,000 times stronger than the Sun’s, and almost 10 times stronger than that detected around any other high-mass star. At about 35 times the Sun’s mass, the O-type star NGC 1624-2 lies in the open star cluster NGC 1624, about 20,000 light-years away in the constellation Perseus.
The view of Vesta in Dawn’s rear view mirror.
The view of Vesta in Dawn’s rear view mirror.
There’s a Light – We Choose to go to the Moon
An evening pause: A song by a band called There’s a Light, from their 2012 album Khartoum, expressing nicely in words, music, and images the human insistence on doing great things.
New computer models now suggest that the the habitable zone for life is far larger than previously estimated.
New computer models now suggest that the the habitable zone for life is far larger than previously estimated.
Mars’ clay minerals might have been formed by volcanic processes, not standing liquid water as generally believed.
The uncertainty of science: Mars’ clay minerals might have been formed by volcanic processes, not standing liquid water as generally believed, according to a new study.
Data collected by orbiting spacecraft show Mars’ clay minerals may instead trace their origin to water-rich volcanic magma, similar to how clays formed on the Mururoa atoll in French Polynesia and in the Parana basin in Brazil. That process doesn’t need standing bodies of liquid water. “The infrared spectra we got in the lab (on Mururoa clays) using a reflected beam are astonishingly similar to that obtained on Mars by the orbiters,” lead researcher Alain Meunier, with the University of Poitiers in France, wrote in an email to Discovery News. The team also points out that some of the Mars meteorites recovered on Earth do not have a chemistry history that supports standing liquid water.
If correct, this alternative explanation would mean that Mars was not that wet in the past, and would have been far less likely of ever having sustained life.
Fun with 9 volt batteries
An evening pause:
Climate changes on Mars are driven by the Sun.
Who would have thought? Climate changes on Mars are driven by the Sun.
Snark aside, the article describes how scientists have made a first attempt to link the visible layers of ice and dust at Mars’ north pole with expected past changes in climate due to the planet’s orbital variations around the Sun.