Just 11 months before his death in 2001, famous author Douglas Adams answered questions from Slashdot readers. And Slashdot reader Informativity still remembers how Adams (also a Doctor Who script editor) had included a supercomputer named Deep Thought in his first book which spent 7.5 million years to determine that the answer to the Ultimate Question of Life, the Universe, and…
Tag: universe
JADES will go deeper than the Hubble Deep Fields
Astronomers announced this month that a new deep-field survey called JADES will be carried out with the James Webb Space Telescope, Hubble’s much-anticipated successor. The Webb is due to launch later this year. Source: https://earthsky.org/space/jades-deep-field-surveys-epoch-of-1st-galaxies…
Mira’s last journey: Exploring the dark universe
A team of physicists and computer scientists from the U.S. Department of Energy’s (DOE) Argonne National Laboratory performed one of the five largest cosmological simulations ever. Data from the simulation will inform sky maps to aid leading large-scale cosmological experiments. Source: https://phys.org/news/2021-01-mira-journey-exploring-dark-universe.html…
Extreme black holes have hair that can be combed
Black holes are considered amongst the most mysterious objects in the universe. Part of their intrigue arises from the fact that they are actually among the simplest solutions to Einstein’s field equations of general relativity. In fact, black holes can be fully characterized by only three physical quantities: their mass, spin and charge. Since they have no additional “hairy” attributes to…
Mysterious ‘kick’ just after the Big Bang may have created dark matter
A mysterious “kick” in the early universe may have produced more matter than antimatter. And that imbalance may have also led to the creation of dark matter, researchers now say. Source: https://www.livescience.com/dark-matter-birth-explained.html
‘Babylon 5’ Actress Mira Furlan Dies At 65
Slashdot reader The Grim Reefer shares a report from the BBC: Babylon 5 and Lost actress Mira Furlan has died at the age of 65, her family and management have confirmed. Furlan played Minbari Ambassador Delenn in the 1990s sci-fi TV drama, Babylon 5, and Danielle Rousseau in the noughties mystery drama, Lost. Her family told the BBC the Croatian actress…
What do redshifts tell astronomers?
A redshift reveals how an object is moving in space and enables astronomers to discover otherwise-invisible planets and the movements of galaxies, and to uncover the beginnings of our universe. Source: https://earthsky.org/astronomy-essentials/what-is-a-redshift…
Why Do We Assume Extraterrestrials Might Want To Visit Us?
Avi Loeb, former chair of the astronomy department at Harvard University and who chairs the Board on Physics and Astronomy of the National Academies, writing at Scientific American: It is presumptuous to assume that we are worthy of special attention from advanced species in the Milky Way. We may be a phenomenon as uninteresting to them as ants are to us;…
Neutrons’ ‘evil twins’ may be crushing stars into black holes
The universe may be filled with “mirror” particles — and these otherwise-undetectable particles could be shrinking the densest stars in the universe, turning them into black holes. Source: https://www.livescience.com/neutron-evil-twins.html
Twisted light from the beginning of time could reveal brand-new physics
A new study on the rotation of the universe’s first light could suggest physicists need new rule-breaking subatomic particles Source: https://www.livescience.com/big-bang-light-twisted-new-physics.html