Rare And Unusual Rectangular Galaxy Found By Astronomers

The star gazers - from Australia, Germany, Switzerland and Finland - discovered the quirky cosmic phenomenon within a group of 250 galaxies some 70 million light years away.A rare rectangular galaxy with a striking resemblance to an emerald cut diamond has been discovered by astronomers.

‘In the Universe around us, most galaxies exist in one of three forms - spheroidal, disc-like, or lumpy and irregular in appearance,’ said Associate Professor Alister Graham from Swinburne University of Technology in Australia.

Associate Professor Alister Graham said ‘It's one of those things that just makes you smile because it shouldn't exist, or rather you don't expect it to exist.It's a little like the precarious Leaning Tower of Pisa or the discovery of some exotic new species which at first glance appears to defy the laws of nature.’ and he added the rare rectangular-shaped galaxy was a very unusual object.

However, the astronomers suspect it is unlikely that this galaxy is actually rectangular in shape. Instead, they believe that it may resemble an inflated disc seen side on, like a short cylinder.
Support for this scenario comes from observations with the giant Keck Telescope in Hawaii, which revealed a rapidly spinning, thin disc with a side-on orientation lurking at the centre of the galaxy. The outermost measured edge of this galactic disc is rotating at a speed in excess of 100,000 kilometres per hour (62,000mph).

‘One possibility is that the galaxy may have formed out of the collision of two spiral galaxies,’ said Swinburne's Professor Duncan Forbes, co author of the research. The unusually shaped galaxy was detected in a wide field-of-view image taken with the Japanese Subaru Telescope for Swinburne astrophysicist Dr Lee Spitler, who was actually using it to look for something else.

A widely held theory is that galaxies grow via mergers, most often as bigger galaxies consume their smaller companions. In fact, our Milky Way galaxy shows signs of recent snacking on one of its dwarf companions. The rectangular galaxy is something of a hybrid, though, because it shows characteristics of two established types of galaxy mergers.

Elliptical galaxies tend to lack the ingredients for making new stars, so computer simulations show that when two ellipsoids merge, the galaxies form similar—if less extreme—boxy shapes and have little star-forming activity.

By contrast, the models show that galaxies with lots of star-forming gases don't become rectangular after they merge, but they do exhibit fresh rounds of star formation. The Subaru image, however, revealed that LEDA 074886 has both a geometric outline and an inner disk of star formation. The unusual dwarf galaxy may therefore help astronomers model more complex types of galaxy mergers.

Ben Moore, a theoretical physicist at the University of Zurich and a study co-author, already had plans to model the formation of LEDA 074886 on a supercomputer later this year. Those simulations will help determine, for example, how long the galaxy will keep its boxy shape, Graham said. In space, diamonds aren't forever: Unless LEDA 074886 merges with yet another perfectly aligned galaxy, it may lose its well-defined corners over the next billion years.

Plate Sized Flying Robot To The Rescue

A dinner plate-sized robot capable of self-controlled flight will be the hands and eyes of humans in places too tricky or risky to access, or say you're out repairing fence when, you realize you forgot your box of Gripples back inside the house. Rather than waste time back-tracking, why not just have your flying boomerang-sized robot retrieve them for you?

That's the dream of Queensland University of Technology's Professor Peter Corke, who believes the robot, which weighs about a kilogram, will have a range of practical uses from farming to search and rescue. The robotics team is working on a similar scenario. They're developing small, eco-friendly flying robots that could be used as farmhands and/or sidekicks to help workers cover ground quickly or reach to those hard-to-reach places.

"Anywhere you want to look, where it is too dangerous or difficult to send a person, this kind of technology will be really useful". Creating a robot that is easy to control has been the main challenge for Prof Corke and his assistant, PhD student Inkyu Sa, at the robotics department."If somebody can't just pick it up and use it inside of 10 minutes, then I think we haven't done our job right," he said.

"You'll be able to put your suitcase on the ground, open it up and send the flying robot off to do its job," said Faculty of Built Environment and Engineering professor, Corke added, "These robots could fly around and deliver objects to people inside buildings and inspect things that are too high or difficult for a human to reach easily. Instead of having to lower someone down on a rope to a window on the seventh floor, or raise them up on a cherrypicker, you could send up the flying robot instead."

"I want this thing to be able to be used by anyone". While there are small flying devices already available, none have the ability to perceive and relate information like this one. "We're about the intelligence that sits on the flying machine that makes it possible to do somewhat complex tasks," Prof Corke said. The small four-bladed flying robot would be useful in any disaster situation, for example. "There's a lot of things we want to inspect that are inconveniently high," Prof Corke said.

The research team says they are using cost-effective technology to keep the robots affordable. Within the 2 year, they'd like to attach arms to the robot so it will be able to make repairs.

Alien City Could Be Found Out With Their Street Lights

If you look at the Earth from space, it's pretty clear that there's intelligent life here because you can pick out cities on the night side. Abraham Loeb, of Harvard University and Edwin Turner, from Princeton University, are saying that we might find other civilizations the same way.The reason is that the way we usually listen for aliens -- via radio signals -- may not work that well. One issue is that contrary to popular belief, TV transmissions don't travel all that far.

The proposal comes from Avi Loeb of the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics (CfA) and Edwin Turner of Princeton uni."Looking for alien cities would be a long shot, but wouldn't require extra resources. And if we succeed, it would change our perception of our place in the universe," says Loeb.

The plan relies on the assumptions that aliens would use artificial lighting when their location on their planet was turned away from their local star, as humans do. This might not be the case for various reasons, but at least some alien races – if there are a decent number out there – would seem likely to have illuminated cities or something like them.

The good thing about this is that, according to Loeb and Turner, exoplanets with such city/hive/beingness-assemblage lighted patches could potentially be picked out from the rest as the variation in total light emitted from it would show a different signature to that from one without lighted areas. Admittedly this would require telescopes more powerful than those now in service, but the pace of development in humanity's telescopes has been rapid in recent times and the wait for such instruments might not be impossibly long."It's very unlikely that there are alien cities on the edge of our solar system, but the principle of science is to find a method to check," says Turner.

City-spotting could be a better means of finding alien civilisations than traditional methods such as listening out for their radio transmissions. This used to be highly favoured, and our own habit of broadcasting radio, TV etc was thought likely to draw visitors to us, too

Nowadays, however, humanity is beginning to emit much less in the way of detectable radio waves as we make much more use of directional signals and cables to carry our comms and content. Unless an alien civilisation were fortunately/unfortunately placed in time and space it might never spot us by these means, and the same goes for us spotting them if the ETs should follow similar paths of development.But our city lights blaze brighter and more numerous every year, so it may well be that future SETI efforts will prefer to search for similar phenomena rather than trying to tune in to broadcast transmissions.

Space Rock Asteriod Comes between Earth & Moon Give Cluse About Formation Earth

The asteroid, which is known as 2005 YU55 and is orbit around the Sun, has not been this close to Earth in 200 years and will come closer to Earth than any of its size in the past 35 years. The giant lump of space rock, which is about the size of an aircraft carrier, will pass between Earth and the Moon on Tuesday, November 8.

The last time a similarly large rock passed by at such a short distance was in 1976 – but it went largely unnoticed because everybody – Nasa included – failed to notice it.Now astronomers who missed that event will have another chance of a close encounter as the enormous rock shoots by at about 11.30pm on Tuesday, November 8.It will not be visible to the naked eye but amateur astronomers stand a good chance of catching a glimpse of it provided they have a telescope at least 6in in diameter.

The scientists worked for the space administration’s Near Earth Object (NEO) programme, a team tasked with identifying comets, asteroids and meteors that potentially pose a threat to Earth. A normal day meant scanning their screens for small white dots in our solar system — the vast majority of which were either too far away to ever be a problem or so small they would burn up in our atmosphere long before they could ever do any serious damage. On that Monday morning, however, Chodas noticed an asteroid about the size of a truck beyond the moon’s orbit. It was on a collision course with Earth.

He called Chesley over. The pair estimated the asteroid to be about 5m (16ft) long and they reckoned they had about 19 hours before it hit.

Nasa scientists, who have officially classified the asteroid as a "near-earth object", will use a radar telescope to analyse exactly what it is made of and get a better idea where it came from. A spokesman said: "We hope to obtain images that should reveal a wealth of detail about the asteroid's surface features, shape, dimensions and other physical properties."

If the Americans like what they see 2005 YU55 could even become the site for another giant leap for mankind on its next fly-by in 2028, with Nasa aiming to put an astronaut on an asteroid within the next 20 years.2005 YU55 is one of 874 near-earth asteroids, and if it were to smash into Earth it would be powerful enough to wipe out a city the size of Bath, the Sunday Times reported. But Dr Emily Baldwin, deputy editor of Astronomy Now magazine, said it posed no threat.

She told the Sunday Times: "It is a great opportunity to make close-up, detailed observations. Studies of asteroids are important not only to learn about the potential threat an impact may have on Earth but also to understand the history of our solar system. "Analysing what the rock is made of could help scientists understand how our planet was formed, she added.

iPad And Angry Bird Goes Out Of Space

Guys its true, have u ever imagined that an iPad is gonna be taken away from the earth surface, that is gonna happen soon.

Kelly Humphries, NASA representative, revealed to space news website collectSPACE that two iPads are heading for the International Space Station (ISS) in the next few days.

The two iPads are being placed in an unmanned rocket along with other supplies for the two cosmonauts and one astronaut that are currently onboard the ISS. According to Humphries, the iPads will be used only for entertainment, and before the brand was chosen NASA teams had looked through a wide range of tablets and compared their benefits.

Next year, other tablets will probably join the iPads in space. So far, the ISS is like a little Apple fan club since, with two laptops from an unknown maker, there are a few iPods even from 2005 and two iPhone 4 handsets.

Oddly enough the latest shuttle will also transport an Angry Birds soft toy at the request of space personnel. Cosmonaut Anton Shkaplerov revealed the mystery: "At a time when [we] start weightlessness, about 10 minutes after launch, it will begin to float". The low-tech indicator for the zero gravity point is a tradition for astronauts and cosmonauts who use small charms all the time for this purpose.

UFO In Gagarin Said 2 eyewitness

Oh god now its in Russia too guys ya its true UFO sitting in Russia isnt it amazing there are lots and lots of UFO sitting in the present times so guys what do all you guys think of an UFO. certainly i dont have a clue do you guys have any then hit a mail to me guys. so okay now lets come to the main part.A total of six passenger planes have reported seeing a UFO near the town of Gagarin in western Russia.

A burning object, a smoke trail and six mysterious red dots were reportedly seen in the sky over two Russian towns.One, a pilot on a commercial flight from London to Moscow, claimed to see a 'burning object' followed by a trail of smoke going at high speed over the town, which was named after Yuri Gagarin, the first man in space.Hundreds of miles away in SIberia, six red dots were reportedly seen an hour after the Gagarin 'sightings'.
An hour later, six red dots were seen in the sky, hundreds of kilometres away in Siberia. "Leaving a supermarket with my daughter, I saw six moving red dots in the sky. First, it crossed the sky from west to east, then one flew separately, and the rest at some point stayed almost on the same spot," a witness, Andrey Filipov, said.

The Russian Defence Ministry denied any stray missiles or other military objects were in the vicinity of Gagarin at around 7.30pm local time last Thursday.

Mystery Closes Over A 2,000 Year Old Supernova

In 185 A.D., Chinese astronomers witnessed what they called a mysterious "guest star" that appeared in the sky and lingered for about eight months. It wasn't until the 1960s that scientists determined that this cosmic object was the first documented observation of a supernova that signaled the violent death of a distant star.Now, infrared views of the supernova from NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope and the Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer (WISE) reveal that the star explosion detonated inside a region of space that was relatively free of gas and dust. This allowed the star's explosion to travel out much farther and faster than expected, researchers said.

"This supernova remnant got really big, really fast," said Brian Williams, an astronomer at North Carolina State University in Raleigh, in a statement. "It's two to three times bigger than we would expect for a supernova that was witnessed exploding nearly 2,000 years ago. Now, we've been able to finally pinpoint the cause."Space telescope observations now suggest that before exploding, a wind of material from the star blew a cavity around it, into which the supernova could expand much more quickly.

The findings, published in the Astrophysical Journal, combine existing data from the Chandra X-ray telescope and the XMM-Newton Observatory with recent images from the US space agency Nasa's Spitzer and Wide-field Infrared Survey (Wise) telescopes.Both of these telescopes are sensitive to infrared light, giving a picture of the conditions of material that is at fairly low temperatures in the supernova remnant. The supernova, about 8,000 light-years away, is huge - if the infrared light it emits could be seen by our eyes, it would appear to be as large in the sky as the full Moon.

Taken together, the data show that the supernova initially expanded into a comparatively empty "cavity", meaning its material could quickly expand unimpeded.However, the case is not closed for RCW 86; these cavities are associated only with what are called core-collapse supernovas, but the Chandra and XMM-Newton observations show evidence of a great deal of iron in the remnant - associated instead with Type 1A supernovas.

"Now, with multiple observatories extending our senses in space, we can fully appreciate the remarkable physics behind this star's death throes, yet still be as in awe of the cosmos as the ancient astronomers.""Modern astronomers unveiled one secret of a two-millennia-old cosmic mystery only to reveal another," said Bill Danchi, a programme scientist for the Spitzer and Wise missions.

Dark Matter Mystery Stays Unsolved

A new study deepened the mystery of dark matter, as finding the dark matter in galaxies is spread out smoothly, according to media reports.The study was published Monday in the American scientific journal Astrophysical.Having analyzed the observations of two dwarf galaxies, Fornax and Sculptor, researchers from the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics found that there was no higher concentration in the center of the galaxy than anywhere else.

The finding goes completely against the current cosmological models, which suggest that dark matter should be clustered at the centers of galaxies."After completing this study, we know less about dark matter than we did before. Our measurements contradict a basic prediction about the structure of cold dark matter in dwarf galaxies," said Matt Walker, the study's lead author.Astronomers have one more reason to scratch their heads over the unseen material known as dark matter. Observations of two dwarf galaxies, Fornax and Sculptor, show the dark matter within them is spread out smoothly rather than heaped into a central bulge, contradicting cosmological models.

Researchers know dark matter comprises a far greater percentage of the universe than the ordinary matter making up things like people and stars. Because of this, the distribution of dark matter determines the structure of the cosmos. Galaxies form when they are attracted to and anchored by large clumps of dark matter.The dwarf galaxies Fornax and Sculptor are themselves made of 99 percent dark matter and only 1 percent normal matter. It is impossible to directly see the dark matter but, by observing the rotation of stars around each galactic center, researchers can detect its influence and map out its distribution.According to the current cosmological models, dark matter almost certainly exists, otherwise, galaxy clusters would have no sufficient gravity to hold themselves together.

While simulations suggest that the dark-matter density should increase sharply near the galactic centers, the recent observations found the dark matter spread relatively uniform throughout. Yet if these dwarf galaxies have no “clump” in their center, then what is pinning them in place?Scientists hoped the study on dwarf galaxies could make some breakthrough in dark matter hunting, because calculations suggest dwarf galaxies consisted of 99 percent dark matter.However, the new study has disappointed the researchers, as it has "drawn a big, frustrating blank", Dr. Alastair Wilkins from University of Bristol in Britain remarked in his blog.

Observations of other small galaxies have similarly failed to find a dense central dark matter core, a difficulty that has prompted astronomers to begin expanding their ideas on the mysterious substance.It is possible that dark matter might interact more with ordinary matter than currently thought, allowing the regular matter to stir up the dark matter and spread it out. Alternatively, dark matter might move faster than expected and therefore be less prone to clumping in galactic centers. Either case creates many further mysteries and problems for astronomers to keep mulling over.

NASA Satellite Falls Back On Earth

out of gas and out of control after two decades in space, plunged back into the atmosphere early Saturday, heating up, breaking apart and presumably showering chunks of debris along a 500-mile-long downrange impact zone.But NASA officials could not immediately confirm where or exactly when the satellite came down, saying only that re-entry occurred during a two-hour period."NASA's decommissioned Upper Atmosphere Research Satellite fell back to Earth between 11:23 p.m. EDT Friday, Sept. 23, and 1:09 a.m. EDT Sept. 24," the agency said in a statement released more than three hours -- two complete orbits -- after the predicted impact time.

"The satellite was passing eastward over Canada and Africa as well as vast portions of the Pacific, Atlantic and Indian oceans during that period," NASA said. "The precise re-entry time and location are not yet known with certainty."U.S. Strategic Command predicted the defunct UARS satellite would re-enter the atmosphere off the west coast of Canada.
(Credit: William Harwood/MacDoppler Pro)The Joint Space Operations Center at Vandenberg Air Force Base, Calif., reported that UARS entered the atmosphere over the Pacific Ocean, according to NASA spokesman Bob Jacobs, but the "precise time and locale aren't yet known."
Given the trajectory of the bus-size, 6.3-ton satellite, experts said it was unlikely any falling remnants would result in injuries or significant property damage. But there was no immediate confirmation as to how much debris might have reached the ground or where the debris "footprint" might be located.The centerpiece of a $750 million mission, the Upper Atmosphere Research satellite was launched from the shuttle Discovery at 12:23 a.m. EDT (GMT-4) on Sept. 15, 1991. The solar-powered satellite studied a wide variety of atmospheric phenomena, including the depletion of Earth's ozone layer 15 to 30 miles up.The long-lived satellite was decommissioned in 2005 and one side of its orbit was lowered using the last of its fuel to hasten re-entry and minimize the chances of orbital collisions that could produce even more orbital debris. No more fuel was available for maneuvering and the satellite's re-entry was "uncontrolled."

As with all satellites in low-Earth orbit, UARS was a victim of atmospheric drag, the slow but steady reduction in velocity, and thus altitude, caused by flying through the tenuous extreme upper atmosphere at some five miles per second.UARS' final trajectory as it neared the discernible atmosphere proved difficult to predict. The descent slowed somewhat Friday, presumably because the spacecraft's orientation changed. As the day wore on, the predicted impact time slipped from Friday afternoon to early Saturday."As of 10:30 p.m. EDT on Sept. 23, 2011, the orbit of UARS was 85 miles by 90 miles (135 km by 140 km)," NASA said in a 10:50 p.m. statement. "Re-entry is expected between 11:45 p.m. Friday, Sept. 23, and 12:45 a.m., Sept. 24, Eastern Daylight Time (3:45 a.m. to 4:45 a.m. GMT). During that time period, the satellite will be passing over Canada and Africa, as well as vast areas of the Pacific, Atlantic and Indian oceans. The risk to public safety is very remote."
The final update from U.S. Strategic Command, which operates a global radar network used to monitor more than 20,000 objects in low-Earth orbit, predicted entry around 12:16 a.m. EDT Saturday above the Pacific Ocean just west of Canada. But the prediction was uncertain by plus or minus two hours and at orbital velocities of 5 miles per second, just 10-minutes of uncertainty translates into 3,000 miles of uncertainty in position.Nick Johnson, chief scientist with NASA's Orbital Debris Program at the Johnson Space Center in Houston, told reporters last week he expected most of the satellite to burn up as it slammed into the dense lower atmosphere at more than 17,000 mph. But computer software used to analyze possible re-entry outcomes predicted 26 pieces of debris would survive to impact the surface in a 500-mile-long down-range footprint.

"We looked at those 26 pieces and how big they are and we've looked at the fact they can hit anywhere in the world between 57 north and 57 south and we looked at what the population density of the world is," he said. "Numerically, it comes out to a chance of 1-in-3,200 that one person anywhere in the world might be struck by a piece of debris. Those are obviously very, very low odds that anybody's going to be impacted by this debris."For comparison, some 42.5 tons of wreckage from the shuttle Columbia hit the ground in a footprint stretching from central Texas to Louisiana when the orbiter broke apart during re-entry in 2003. No one on the ground was injured and no significant property damage was reported.

PROMO VIDEO

guys this is just a simple promo video fa d blog i am stil working on better ones

ANTI-COLLISION SYSTEM FOR AIR CRAFTS

the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) has made compulsory that all the air crafts invariable of its size should be hooked up with a " GLOBAL POSITIONING SYSTEM ' (GPS) based tracking system before 2020 . these new GPS will help the air crafts with accurate location data unlike radar and will reduce or prevent all mid-air collision the FAA has organised a team of scientist and MIT researchers to submite a report on tis new device it is estimated about 10-12 small air craft crash due to location problems every year



the MIT researchers say that the biggest problem is the false alarm , every time an alarm is triggered there is only 50% possibility that it is true the GPS data is more reliable than the RADAR but GPS is also not accurate . even the communication channel of the air crafts for their location data is also not perfect . so the team is working in minimizing the risk of collision and improving the anti-collision system in all spheres . any ways if does makes some good thing to us humans then its got a green go signal