cooling the climate!

A new study has shown that there are ways of cooling the climate. Just a few simple things can help with global warming and help with deaths that happen each year from air pollution.

There is many green house gases and the two big ones would be carbon dioxide and methane. Carbon can stay in the atmosphere for hundreds of years yet methane usually only lasts for 12 years. If we start to reduce the methane in our atmosphere it can help start to eliminate the climate change problem. By starting to eliminate the methane it could also help with the soot in the air which could help lower the global temperature by a whole Fahrenheit by the time of 1250. By also eliminating the soot in the atmosphere it could also eliminate between 0.7-4.7 million deaths per year!

2012 Apocolypse

NASA has taken notice of all the rumors swirling around the potential Apocolypse on the 21st of Decemeber this year. Supposedly a massive meteor, Nibiru, is hurtling through space headed for Earth, the sun is going to overheat as it enters it's next solar cycle, or the planets are going to allign and cause some sort of natural disaster. It is almost common knowledge that these accusations are false, but some of the people claiming these things seem to have evidence. One of them even released a fake statement from NASA about the possible disasters that will occur. Don Yeomans, a senior research scientist, took the time to ease everyone who is panicking about these claims, though very sarcastically. He takes time to outline the lack of evidence to back up all of these claims.

Nibiru has not been found by any telescope, and with our current technology could be detected if it was actually close enough to hit the earth.

The sun experiences an 11 year old cycle where the solar flares and sun spots vary in activity. A new cycle is set to begin within the next year, but the increased solar activity that comes along with a new sun cycle will not affect the Earth at all. We know this because these solar cycles have been occurring for as long as the sun has existed.

The claims that a planetary alignment will cause the Apocolypse are entirely false, because not only are the planets not aligning any time in the next few decades, this happens quite regularly in astronomical time and nothing on Earth is effected.

Overall, the world might end in 2012, but it definetly isn't related to space related. Thanks NASA for placating my fears.

http://www.nasa.gov/topics/earth/features/yoemans20091110.html

Thermonuclear Behavior of Unique Neutron Star Detected

A neutron star near the center of our galaxy erupted with a plethora of X-ray bursts that were powered by a number of thermonuclear explosions that took place on the star's surface. This behavior was captured over a month, scientists say behavior of this sort has not yet been observed, making this neutron star unique, at least to earthly observation.

This neutron star is a part of a binary system; orbiting a star much like our sun. The star has been classified as a pulsar, because of its regular pulses of observable radiation. The star's incredibly strong magnetic fields produce hot spots that rotate with the star, and increase it's X-ray pulses. The star rotates 11 times every second, and the star and it's counter-part orbit each other once every 21 hours. Three days after the source of the strong radiation bursts was discovered, scientists witness something amazing; a three-minute-long X-ray burst caused by a thermonuclear explosion.

The neutron star continuously draws matter from the surface of it's sun-like partner, coating it in a layer of hydrogen and helium. When this layer builds to a specific depth, the gas undergoes a huge thermonuclear explosion; resulting in the large bursts of X-ray radiation that are so unique to this system. Scientists theorize that the accretion rate, the flow of fuel to the pulsars surface, allows for continuous and stable thermonuclear explosions. There's only one question now; why is this system so unique, what makes it behave the way it does?

I found this article particularly intriguing due to the unique nature of the pulsar in its binary system. I also researched pulsars for my final project, which added to the draw of the article. I also find the unique discovery itself quite interesting; I actually want to know where the origin of this strange phenomena lies.

Solar Storm Strikes Earth

A series of solar storm burst from the sun this week, sending a flurry of electrically charged particles into Earth’s magnetic field. Thus far there has been no real damage caused by the storm, but more are on the way. The Sun is currently partially through an 11-year storm cycle which can cause problems here on Earth.

The solar activity from our Sun has changed the shape of the Earth’s magnetosphere, resulting in a geomagnetic storm. These storms will likely cause very noticeable side effects on Earth. Solar storm forecasts predict very strong solar wind activity in 2013 before the storms die down.

This article was interesting to me because I often hear about solar flares and things like that. I was hoping this article would be a little more informational about solar storms, but it interested me nonetheless.

http://www.astromart.com/news/news.asp?news_id=1255

GJ1214b

     A new planet was found in the Milky Way by astronomers that is like no planet ever found before; GJ1214b is made up almost completely of water. Not only is the planet it's self made up of water, but as well as the atmosphere. The strange part of this planet though is that the water is not in a liquid form. A lot of the water is in a steam or ice form. The planet weighs about seven times more then earth does, and has much more water then our planet has. The astronomer looking at it said that this planet is special because of how dense it is. Right now, the astronomers continue to observe the atmosphere to try and understand it more.
     I found this article to be cool, but also very vague. The astronomers at Harvard are still learning a lot more about the planet and are just sharing their findings as they go along. The cool part is how dense this planet made of water is. We will hear more about it soon, I'm sure!

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/02/28/science/gj1214b-new-planet-in-milky-way-revels-in-steam-and-ice.html?_r=1&scp=5&sq=astronomy&st=cse

Herschel Finds Oceans of Water in Disk of Nearby Star

Scientists have found cold water vapor enveloping a dusty disk around a star named TW Hydrae. This star is about 10 million years old and realtively close to us at only 175 light years away. The disk itself is about 200 times bigger than the distance between the Sun and Earth. As the new solar system evolves, icy comets will most likely deposit all of their water that they contain on to newly created worlds giving rise to oceans. Astronomers think that this discovery could give light to how planets with abundant oceans could form.

Winds of a Stellar-Mass Black Hole

Astronomers using NASA's Chandra X-ray Observatory have found the fastest wind yet discovered blowing off a disk around a stellar-mass black hole. The winds are moving at ab

out 20 million mph, nearly 10 times faster than ever previously recorded. The black hole is a binary system in which a sun-like star orbits it. It is found in the bulge of the Milky Way galaxy, about 28,000 light years away from Earth.

Stellar-mass black holes are born when giant stars collapse. They typically have between five and ten times the mass of the sun. The wind speed in IGR J17091(the stellar-mass blake hole) matches some of the fastest winds generated by super-massive black holes, objects millions or billions of times more massive. The astronomers also found that the wind may be carrying away more material than the black hole is capturing. The high speed for the wind was estimated from a spectrum made by Chandra in 2011. Ions emit and absorb distinct features in spectra, which allow scientists to monitor them and their behavior. A Chandra spectrum of iron ions made two months earlier showed no evidence of the high-speed wind, meaning the wind likely turns on and off over time. This result has importance for understanding how this type of black hole behaves.

This article interested me because I had no idea that there could be weather like this, and even less so in space. I was also fascinated to learn how it is possible to measure wind speeds in space.

http://www.astromart.com/news/news.asp?news_id=1253