A Visual Journey Through the Wonders of the Universe
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Highlights and Discoveries from the Chandra X-Ray Observatory1
Highlights and Discoveries from the Chandra X-ray Observatory1 H Tananbaum1, M C Weisskopf2, W Tucker1, B Wilkes1 and P Edmonds1 1Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory, 60 Garden Street, Cambridge, MA 02138. 2 NASA/Marshall Space Flight Center, ZP12, 320 Sparkman Drive, Huntsville, AL 35805. Abstract. Within 40 years of the detection of the first extrasolar X-ray source in 1962, NASA’s Chandra X-ray Observatory has achieved an increase in sensitivity of 10 orders of magnitude, comparable to the gain in going from naked-eye observations to the most powerful optical telescopes over the past 400 years. Chandra is unique in its capabilities for producing sub-arcsecond X-ray images with 100-200 eV energy resolution for energies in the range 0.08<E<10 keV, locating X-ray sources to high precision, detecting extremely faint sources, and obtaining high resolution spectra of selected cosmic phenomena. The extended Chandra mission provides a long observing baseline with stable and well-calibrated instruments, enabling temporal studies over time-scales from milliseconds to years. In this report we present a selection of highlights that illustrate how observations using Chandra, sometimes alone, but often in conjunction with other telescopes, have deepened, and in some instances revolutionized, our understanding of topics as diverse as protoplanetary nebulae; massive stars; supernova explosions; pulsar wind nebulae; the superfluid interior of neutron stars; accretion flows around black holes; the growth of supermassive black holes and their role in the regulation of star formation and growth of galaxies; impacts of collisions, mergers, and feedback on growth and evolution of groups and clusters of galaxies; and properties of dark matter and dark energy. -
Wonders of the Universe
You loved your last book...but what are you going to read next? Using our unique guidance tools, Lovereading will help you find new books to keep you inspired and entertained. Opening Extract from… Wonders of the Universe Written by Professor Brian Cox & Andrew Cohen Published by Collins All text is copyright © of the author This Opening Extract is exclusive to Lovereading. Please print off and read at your leisure. For Mum, Dad and Sandra – none of this would have been possible without you Brian Cox For my dad, Geof Cohen (1943–2007) Andrew Cohen HarperCollins Publishers 77–85 Fulham Palace Road London W6 8JB www.harpercollins.co.uk Collins is a registered trademark of HarperCollins Publishers Ltd. Text © Brian Cox and Andrew Cohen 2011 Photographs, with the exception of those detailed on p255 © BBC Infographics, Design & Layout © HarperCollins Publishers 2011 By arrangement with the BBC The BBC logo is a trademark of the British Broadcasting Corporation and is under licence. BBC logo © BBC 1996 13 12 11 10 09 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 The authors assert their moral right to be identified as the authors of this work. All rights reserved. No parts of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior permission of the publishers. A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library. ISBN 978-0-00-739582-8 Collins uses papers that are natural, renewable and recyclable products made from wood grown in sustainable forests. -
The Parallels and Reversals in Chaco, Hubble, and Facebook
YEARNING TO BE THE CENTER OF EVERYTHING WHEN WE ARE THE CENTER OF NOTHING: THE PARALLELS AND REVERSALS IN CHACO, HUBBLE, AND FACEBOOK Barry Vacker and Genevieve Gillespie Forthcoming in: Telematics and Informatics, Special Edition on “The Facebook Phenomenon” AUTHORS Barry Vacker, Ph.D. Associate Professor Department of Broadcast, Telecommunications and Mass Media Temple University 2020 N. 13th St. Philadelphia, PA 19122 Genevieve Gillespie Student Temple University Philadelphia, PA 19122 ABSTRACT Humans have long sought to map their place in the cosmos and then situate their selves at the center of the universe. These patterns are displayed at three radically different sites — the Sun Dagger in Chaco Canyon, the Hubble Space Telescope, and social media and Facebook. Drawing from Marshall McLuhan, this article will theorize the parallels and reversals in these sites, where cosmological discoveries of the expanding universe have been countered by technological innovations involving electronic screens, such that social media counters space telescopes, cyberspace counters outer space, and Facebook counters Hubble. Perhaps the “revolution” of social media merely parallels other cultural reversals, all of which seek to return humans to the center of the universe, when we are the center of nothing. And this desire and delusion to be at the center of everything lies at the heart of contemporary issues facing the global civilization. 1. INTRODUCTION Humans are the only species on Earth to store information outside their bodies — from cave paintings to cinema to cyberspace, petroglyphs to photographs to 3D simulations, books to libraries to the internet. From our minds, we have extended a complex technological system around the planet and into the universe. -
Second AGILE Catalogue of Gamma-Ray Sources?
A&A 627, A13 (2019) Astronomy https://doi.org/10.1051/0004-6361/201834143 & c ESO 2019 Astrophysics Second AGILE catalogue of gamma-ray sources? A. Bulgarelli1, V. Fioretti1, N. Parmiggiani1, F. Verrecchia2,3, C. Pittori2,3, F. Lucarelli2,3, M. Tavani4,5,6,7 , A. Aboudan7,12, M. Cardillo4, A. Giuliani8, P. W. Cattaneo9, A. W. Chen15, G. Piano4, A. Rappoldi9, L. Baroncelli7, A. Argan4, L. A. Antonelli3, I. Donnarumma4,16, F. Gianotti1, P. Giommi16, M. Giusti4,5, F. Longo13,14, A. Pellizzoni10, M. Pilia10, M. Trifoglio1, A. Trois10, S. Vercellone11, and A. Zoli1 1 INAF-OAS Bologna, Via Gobetti 93/3, 40129 Bologna, Italy e-mail: [email protected] 2 ASI Space Science Data Center (SSDC), Via del Politecnico snc, 00133 Roma, Italy 3 INAF-Osservatorio Astronomico di Roma, Via di Frascati 33, 00078 Monte Porzio Catone, Italy 4 INAF-IAPS Roma, Via del Fosso del Cavaliere 100, 00133 Roma, Italy 5 Dipartimento di Fisica, Università Tor Vergata, Via della Ricerca Scientifica 1, 00133 Roma, Italy 6 INFN Roma Tor Vergata, Via della Ricerca Scientifica 1, 00133 Roma, Italy 7 Consorzio Interuniversitario Fisica Spaziale (CIFS), Villa Gualino - v.le Settimio Severo 63, 10133 Torino, Italy 8 INAF–IASF Milano, Via E. Bassini 15, 20133 Milano, Italy 9 INFN Pavia, Via Bassi 6, 27100 Pavia, Italy 10 INAF–Osservatorio Astronomico di Cagliari, Via della Scienza 5, 09047 Selargius, CA, Italy 11 INAF–Osservatorio Astronomico di Brera, Via E. Bianchi 46, 23807 Merate, LC, Italy 12 CISAS, University of Padova, Padova, Italy 13 Dipartimento di Fisica, University of Trieste, Via Valerio 2, 34127 Trieste, Italy 14 INFN, sezione di Trieste, Via Valerio 2, 34127 Trieste, Italy 15 School of Physics, University of the Witwatersrand, 1 Jan Smuts Avenue, Braamfontein stateJohannesburg 2050, South Africa 16 ASI, Via del Politecnico snc, 00133 Roma, Italy Received 27 August 2018 / Accepted 12 March 2019 ABSTRACT Aims. -
Sodium and Potassium Signatures Of
Sodium and Potassium Signatures of Volcanic Satellites Orbiting Close-in Gas Giant Exoplanets Apurva Oza, Robert Johnson, Emmanuel Lellouch, Carl Schmidt, Nick Schneider, Chenliang Huang, Diana Gamborino, Andrea Gebek, Aurelien Wyttenbach, Brice-Olivier Demory, et al. To cite this version: Apurva Oza, Robert Johnson, Emmanuel Lellouch, Carl Schmidt, Nick Schneider, et al.. Sodium and Potassium Signatures of Volcanic Satellites Orbiting Close-in Gas Giant Exoplanets. The Astro- physical Journal, American Astronomical Society, 2019, 885 (2), pp.168. 10.3847/1538-4357/ab40cc. hal-02417964 HAL Id: hal-02417964 https://hal.sorbonne-universite.fr/hal-02417964 Submitted on 18 Dec 2019 HAL is a multi-disciplinary open access L’archive ouverte pluridisciplinaire HAL, est archive for the deposit and dissemination of sci- destinée au dépôt et à la diffusion de documents entific research documents, whether they are pub- scientifiques de niveau recherche, publiés ou non, lished or not. The documents may come from émanant des établissements d’enseignement et de teaching and research institutions in France or recherche français ou étrangers, des laboratoires abroad, or from public or private research centers. publics ou privés. The Astrophysical Journal, 885:168 (19pp), 2019 November 10 https://doi.org/10.3847/1538-4357/ab40cc © 2019. The American Astronomical Society. Sodium and Potassium Signatures of Volcanic Satellites Orbiting Close-in Gas Giant Exoplanets Apurva V. Oza1 , Robert E. Johnson2,3 , Emmanuel Lellouch4 , Carl Schmidt5 , Nick Schneider6 , Chenliang Huang7 , Diana Gamborino1 , Andrea Gebek1,8 , Aurelien Wyttenbach9 , Brice-Olivier Demory10 , Christoph Mordasini1 , Prabal Saxena11, David Dubois12 , Arielle Moullet12, and Nicolas Thomas1 1 Physikalisches Institut, Universität Bern, Bern, Switzerland; [email protected] 2 Engineering Physics, University of Virginia, Charlottesville, VA 22903, USA 3 Physics, New York University, 4 Washington Place, New York, NY 10003, USA 4 LESIA–Observatoire de Paris, CNRS, UPMC Univ. -
New Type of Black Hole Detected in Massive Collision That Sent Gravitational Waves with a 'Bang'
New type of black hole detected in massive collision that sent gravitational waves with a 'bang' By Ashley Strickland, CNN Updated 1200 GMT (2000 HKT) September 2, 2020 <img alt="Galaxy NGC 4485 collided with its larger galactic neighbor NGC 4490 millions of years ago, leading to the creation of new stars seen in the right side of the image." class="media__image" src="//cdn.cnn.com/cnnnext/dam/assets/190516104725-ngc-4485-nasa-super-169.jpg"> Photos: Wonders of the universe Galaxy NGC 4485 collided with its larger galactic neighbor NGC 4490 millions of years ago, leading to the creation of new stars seen in the right side of the image. Hide Caption 98 of 195 <img alt="Astronomers developed a mosaic of the distant universe, called the Hubble Legacy Field, that documents 16 years of observations from the Hubble Space Telescope. The image contains 200,000 galaxies that stretch back through 13.3 billion years of time to just 500 million years after the Big Bang. " class="media__image" src="//cdn.cnn.com/cnnnext/dam/assets/190502151952-0502-wonders-of-the-universe-super-169.jpg"> Photos: Wonders of the universe Astronomers developed a mosaic of the distant universe, called the Hubble Legacy Field, that documents 16 years of observations from the Hubble Space Telescope. The image contains 200,000 galaxies that stretch back through 13.3 billion years of time to just 500 million years after the Big Bang. Hide Caption 99 of 195 <img alt="A ground-based telescope&amp;#39;s view of the Large Magellanic Cloud, a neighboring galaxy of our Milky Way. -
Annual Report 2019
Annual Report 2019 IRAM Annual Report 2019 Published by IRAM © 2020 Director of publication Karl-Friedrich Schuster Edited by Cathy Berjaud, Frédéric Gueth With contributions from: Sébastien Blanchet, Edwige Chapillon, Antonio Córdoba, Isabelle Delaunay, Paolo Della Bosca, Eduard Driessen, Bertrand Gautier, Olivier Gentaz, Bastien Lefranc, Santiago Navarro, Roberto Neri, Juan Peñalver, Jérôme Pety, Francesco Pierfederici, Christophe Risacher, Miguel Sánchez Portal, Murielle Serlet, Karl-Friedrich Schuster, Karin Zacher Contents Introduction 4 Highlights of research with the IRAM telescopes 6 30-meter telescope 18 NOEMA 25 Grenoble headquarters 33 Frontend Group 33 Backend Group 37 Superconducting Devices Group 39 Mechanical Group 41 Computer Group 44 Science Software 45 IRAM ARC Node 47 Outreach 47 Personnel & Finance 50 Annexes 54 Telescope schedules 54 Publications 74 Committees 94 4 Introduction This annual report has been edited during complicated times of the corona virus epidemy but this should not distract us from looking back on 2019 which was thoroughly positive for IRAM although at the same time not without new challenges. The year 2019 was rich of important events and scientific results. In fact, NOEMA and powerful new instruments at the 30-meter telescope produce so much high-quality data that we are clearly entering in a new phase of how science is done with the IRAM facilities. At the same time IRAM users have started now to fully embrace the possibilities which are available through large programs and their significant impact on all fields of millimetre wave astronomy. The required infrastructure to treat the very important data flows which are generated through large programs and the ever-increasing performance of the IRAM instruments is now reaching a mature status with the direct optical fibre connections from the observatories to the Granada office and the Grenoble headquarter, the upgraded infrastructure in data storage and computing and finally the very significant advances in data reduction software. -
Asymmetric Type-Ia Supernova Origin of W49B As Revealed from Spatially Resolved X-Ray Spectroscopic Study Ping Zhou1,2 and Jacco Vink1,3
A&A 615, A150 (2018) Astronomy https://doi.org/10.1051/0004-6361/201731583 & © ESO 2018 Astrophysics Asymmetric Type-Ia supernova origin of W49B as revealed from spatially resolved X-ray spectroscopic study Ping Zhou1,2 and Jacco Vink1,3 1 Anton Pannekoek Institute, University of Amsterdam, PO Box 94249, 1090 GE Amsterdam, The Netherlands e-mail: p.zhou,[email protected] 2 School of Astronomy and Space Science, Nanjing University, Nanjing 210023, PR China 3 GRAPPA, University of Amsterdam, PO Box 94249, 1090 GE Amsterdam, The Netherlands Received 17 July 2017 / Accepted 23 March 2018 ABSTRACT The origin of the asymmetric supernova remnant (SNR) W49B has been a matter of debate: is it produced by a rare jet-driven core- collapse (CC) supernova, or by a normal supernova that is strongly shaped by its dense environment? Aiming to uncover the explosion mechanism and origin of the asymmetric, centrally filled X-ray morphology of W49B, we have performed spatially resolved X-ray spectroscopy and a search for potential point sources. We report new candidate point sources inside W49B. The Chandra X-ray spectra from W49B are well-characterized by two-temperature gas components ( 0:27 keV + 0.6–2.2 keV). The hot component gas shows a large temperature gradient from the northeast to the southwest and is over-ionized∼ in most regions with recombination timescales 11 3 of 1–10 10 cm− s. The Fe element shows strong lateral distribution in the SNR east, while the distribution of Si, S, Ar, Ca is relatively× smooth and nearly axially symmetric. -
The Supernova Remnant W49B As Seen with H.E.S.S
PUBLISHED VERSION H.E.S.S. Collaboration: H. Abdalla … R. Blackwell … P. DeWilt … J. Hawkes … J. Lau … N. Maxted … G. Rowell … F. Voisin … et al. The supernova remnant W49B as seen with H.E.S.S. and Fermi-LAT Astronomy and Astrophysics, 2018; 612:A5-1-A5-10 © ESO 2018 Originally published: http://dx.doi.org/10.1051/0004-6361/201527843 PERMISSIONS https://www.aanda.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=863&Itemid=2 95 Green Open Access The Publisher and A&A encourage arXiv archiving or self-archiving of the final PDF file of the article exactly as published in the journal and without any period of embargo. 19 September 208-18 http://hdl.handle.net/2440/112084 A&A 612, A5 (2018) Astronomy DOI: 10.1051/0004-6361/201527843 & c ESO 2018 Astrophysics H.E.S.S. phase-I observations of the plane of the Milky Way Special issue The supernova remnant W49B as seen with H.E.S.S. and Fermi-LAT? H.E.S.S. Collaboration: H. Abdalla1, A. Abramowski2, F. Aharonian3,4,5, F. Ait Benkhali3, A. G. Akhperjanian5; 6,y, T. Andersson10, E. O. Angüner7, M. Arrieta15, P. Aubert24, M. Backes8, A. Balzer9, M. Barnard1, Y. Becherini10, J. Becker Tjus11, D. Berge12, S. Bernhard13, K. Bernlöhr3, R. Blackwell14, M. Böttcher1, C. Boisson15, J. Bolmont16, P. Bordas3, J. Bregeon17, F. Brun26,??, P. Brun18, M. Bryan9, T. Bulik19, M. Capasso29, J. Carr20, S. Casanova21,3, M. Cerruti16, N. Chakraborty3, R. Chalme-Calvet16, R.C. G. Chaves17,22, A. Chen23, J. Chevalier24, M. Chrétien16, S. -
The Meanings of Style in Documentaries About Science
Accepted pre-publication version Published at: Science in Context 31(1), 39–59 (2018). doi:10.1017/S0269889718000042 © Cambridge University Press 2018 Configuring Epistemic Authority: the Significance of Film Style in Documentaries About Science Felicity Mellor (Science Communication Unit, Imperial College London, UK) Abstract Among the many limitations of the deficit model of science communication is its inability to account for the qualities of communication products that arise from creative decisions about form and style. This paper examines two documentaries about the nature of time – Patricio Guzmán’s Nostalgia for the Light and the first episode of the BBC’s Wonders of the Universe series – in order to consider how film style inflects science with different meanings. The analysis pays particular attention to the ways in which authority is assigned between film author, narrator and depicted subjects and the degree to which different film styles promote epistemological certainty or hesitancy. Mellor, Configuring Epistemic Authority, Science in Context 1 Introduction In March 2011, the BBC launched a new science documentary series, Wonders of the Universe, presented by the Manchester University particle physicist Brian Cox. Cox and the BBC had already enjoyed widespread success with an earlier series, which had led, among other things, to Cox being awarded an OBE1 in the Queen’s Birthday Honours the previous summer. The new series met with mixed reviews, however. For instance, writing a few months after the first broadcast, cosmologist John Peacock noted that the series had drawn a number of complaints about its use of music and dramatic scenery. Arguing that such “artistry” risked obscuring the beauty intrinsic to science itself, Peacock concluded: “Cox’s programme could have worked as well, if not better, if it had been more of a serious documentary – if it had included more science” (Peacock 2011). -
Arxiv:2108.08823V1 [Gr-Qc] 19 Aug 2021
Photon rings of spherically symmetric black holes and robust tests of non-Kerr metrics Maciek Wielgus∗ Black Hole Initiative at Harvard University, 20 Garden Street, Cambridge, MA 02138, USA and Center for Astrophysics j Harvard & Smithsonian, 60 Garden Street, Cambridge, MA 02138, USA (Dated: September 23, 2021) Under very general assumptions on the accretion flow geometry, images of a black hole illuminated by electromagnetic radiation display a sequence of photon rings (demagnified and rotated copies of the direct image) which asymptotically approach a purely theoretical critical curve – the outline of the black hole photon shell. To a distant observer, these images appear dominated by the direct emission, which forms a ring whose diameter is primarily determined by the effective radius of the emitting region. For that reason, connecting the image diameter seen by a distant observer to the properties of the underlying spacetime crucially relies on a calibration that necessarily depends on the assumed astrophysical source model. On the other hand, the diameter of the photon rings depends more on the detailed geometry of the spacetime than on the source structure. As such, a photon ring detection would allow for the spacetime metric to be probed in a less model-dependent way, enabling more robust tests of General Relativity (GR) and the Kerr hypothesis. Here we present the photon ring structure of several spherically symmetric black hole spacetimes and perform comparisons with the Schwarzschild/Kerr case. We offer our perspective on future tests of the spacetime metric with photon rings, discussing challenges and opportunities involved. I. INTRODUCTION Additionally, the observable ring-like direct emission fea- ture is commonly conflated with the critical curve in the The observational appearance of a black hole (BH) has literature. -
Arxiv:1011.0731V1 [Astro-Ph.HE] 2 Nov 2010 Ae)Cnb Oprdesl Otertclpredictions
Submitted to ApJ A Preprint typeset using LTEX style emulateapj v. 11/10/09 USING THE X-RAY MORPHOLOGY OF YOUNG SUPERNOVA REMNANTS TO CONSTRAIN EXPLOSION TYPE, EJECTA DISTRIBUTION, AND CHEMICAL MIXING Laura A. Lopez1, Enrico Ramirez-Ruiz1, Daniela Huppenkothen2. Carles Badenes3,4, David A. Pooley5 Submitted to ApJ ABSTRACT Supernova remnants (SNRs) are a complex class of sources, and their heterogeneous nature has hindered the characterization of their general observational properties. To overcome this challenge, in this paper, we use statistical tools to analyze the Chandra X-ray images of Galactic and Large Magellanic Cloud SNRs. We apply two techniques, a power-ratio method (a multipole expansion) and wavelet-transform analysis, to measure the global and local morphological properties of the X-ray line and thermal emission in twenty-four SNRs. We find that Type Ia SNRs have statistically more spherical and mirror symmetric thermal X-ray emission than core-collapse (CC) SNRs. The ability to type SNRs based on thermal emission morphology alone enables, for the first time, the typing of SNRs with weak X-ray lines and those with low resolution spectra. Based on our analyses, we identify one source (SNR G344.7−0.1) as originating from a CC explosion that was of unknown origin previously; we also confirm the tentative Type Ia classifications of G337.2−0.7 and G272.2−3.2. Although the global morphology is indicative of the explosion type, the relative morphology of the X-ray line emission within SNRs is not: all sources in our sample have well-mixed ejecta, irrespective of stellar origin.