What would an extraterrestrial intelligence need to observe Earth, long-term, from nearby? Materials, a firm anchor, concealment? Earth’s co-orbital objects, or quasi-satellites, might be the ideal place to “lurk.” Source: https://earthsky.org/space/alien-lurker-probes-co-orbital-asteroids-earth…
Tag: preprint
Found: 3 black holes due to collide
Take one minute to watch a video of a system of 3 galaxies – called SDSS J0849+1114 – all orbiting each other a billion light years from Earth. Each galaxy contains a supermassive black hole, which are circling each other, about to collide. Source: https://earthsky.org/space/sdss-j08491114-3-black-holes-due-to-collide…
Unusual Type II supernova discovered in NGC 1068
An international team of astronomers reports the discovery of an unusual Type II supernova in the galaxy NGC 1068, as part of the DLT40 survey. The newly detected event, designated SN 2018ivc, exhibits rapidly changing light curve, what is uncommon for stellar explosions of this type. The findings are detailed in a paper published September 16 on the arXiv preprint server….
AI Takes On Earthquake Prediction
After successfully predicting laboratory earthquakes, a team of geophysicists has applied a machine learning algorithm to quakes in the Pacific Northwest. From a report: In May of last year, after a 13-month slumber, the ground beneath Washington’s Puget Sound rumbled to life. The quake began more than 20 miles below the Olympic mountains and, over the course of a few weeks,…
Physicists Release Step-by-Step Instructions For Building a Wormhole
schwit1 quotes Space.com: A recent paper, published to the preprint journal arXiv on July 29, has found a way to build an almost-steady wormhole, one that does collapse but slowly enough to send messages — and potentially even things — down it before it tears itself apart. All you need are a couple of black holes and a few infinitely long…
Habitable type planets found around nearby small mass star
A team of researchers from several European countries and one from Chile has found evidence of three possibly habitable exoplanets circling the star GJ1061. In their paper uploaded to the arXiv preprint server, and soon to be published in Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society, the group describes their study of the star system and what they found. Source: https://phys.org/news/2019-08-habitable-planets-nearby-small-mass.html…
Three runaway stars believed to be survivors of thermonuclear explosions
A team of researchers with members from Germany, the U.K. and the U.S. has found what they describe as three stars that are example remnants of thermonuclear explosions. They have written a paper describing their findings and have uploaded it to the arXiv preprint server and onto Oxford’s Monthly Notices of the Royal Academic Astronomical Society. Source: https://phys.org/news/2019-07-runaway-stars-believed-survivors-thermonuclear.html…
Binary stars with unexplainable dimming pattern
A team of researchers from the U.S., Denmark and the U.K., working with a group at NASA’s Ames Research Center, has found a binary star system that dims unpredictably. They have written a paper describing their findings and have posted it on the arXiv preprint server and also on Oxford’s Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society. Source: https://phys.org/news/2019-07-binary-stars-unexplainable-dimming-pattern.html…