Sunday, August 31, 2008

Monster Galaxy

The active galaxy NGC 1275 is also a well-known radio source (Perseus A) and a strong emitter of X-rays due to the presence of a black hole in the center of the galaxy. The behemoth also lies at the center of the cluster of galaxies known as the Perseus Cluster. By combining multi-wavelength images into a single composite, the dynamics of the galaxy are more easily visible. Detail and structure from x-ray, optical and radio wavelengths combine for an aesthetically pleasing, but nonetheless violent depiction of events going on at the heart of the galaxy.

Chandra data from the Advanced CCD Imaging Spectrometer (ACIS) covers X-ray energies from 0.3-7keV. Hubble data from the Advanced Camera for Surveys covers optical wavelengths in the red, green and blue. Radio data from NRAO's Very Large Array at 328 MHz was also used. In the composite image, the X-ray data contribute to the soft violet shells around the outside of the center. The pinkish lobes toward the center of the galaxy are from radio frequencies.

The radio emission, tracing jets from the black hole, fills the X-ray cavities. Dust lanes, star-forming regions, hydrogen filaments, foreground stars, and background galaxies are contributions from the Hubble optical data.


Constellation Perseus. Also Known As NGC 1275. Distance Estimate About 250 million light years. Scale Image is 3.87 arcmin across. Category Groups & Clusters of Galaxies. Coordinates (J2000) RA 03h 19m 47.60s Dec +41° 30' 37.00


Sunday, August 17, 2008

Faster than Light

Traveling Faster Than the Speed of Light

The method is based on the Alcubierre drive, which proposes expanding the fabric of space behind a ship and shrinking space-time in front of the ship. The ship would not actually move, rather the ship would sit in a bubble between the expanding and shrinking space-time dimensions

Two Baylor University scientists have come up with a new method to cause a spaceship to effectively travel faster than the speed of light, without breaking the laws of physics.

Dr. Gerald Cleaver, associate professor of physics at Baylor theorizes that by manipulating the extra spatial dimensions of string theory around a spaceship with an extremely large amount of energy, it would create a "bubble" that could cause the ship to travel faster than the speed of light.

To create this bubble, the Baylor physicists believe manipulating the 10th spatial dimension would alter the dark energy in three large spatial dimensions: height, width and length.


"Think of it like a surfer riding a wave," said Cleaver, who co-authored the paper with Obousy about the new method. "The ship would be pushed by the spatial bubble and the bubble would be traveling faster than the speed of light."



String theory suggests the universe is made up of multiple dimensions. Height, width and length are three dimensions, and time is the fourth dimension. String theorists use to believe that there were a total of 10 dimensions, with six other dimensions that we can not yet identify because of their incredibly small size.


It is by changing the size of this 10th spatial dimension that Baylor researchers believe could alter the strength of the dark energy in such a manner to propel a ship faster than the speed of light.



Sunday, August 10, 2008

Bridge of Sighs

Photo credit: Neorelix

...supposedly the sound of despair as students traipse out of exams and over this bridge.

The Bridge of Sighs was supposedly Queen Victoria's favourite place in the city - but only because she hadn't been to the Live and Let Live (which btw is having a 5 yr anniversary do this Saturday) or The Free Press obviously.

Inspired by the 231 years-older one in Venice (Really??) it's found between 3rd and New Courts of St John's College (1511). Wacky students occasionally suspend cars beneath it...

Wednesday, August 06, 2008

Order from Chaos

As you can see I've been trying to restore some order in the Universe.

Building a wall around the villa, and in the process getting a bit of a tan between dips in the pool. The villa by the way is in the plot behind the wall (unseen to the right). I'm standing outside the wall on the drive onto the main road.


Tuesday, August 05, 2008

And here is the pool

Sunday, August 03, 2008

Nearby Galaxy Metropolis








Friday, August 01, 2008

A Stellar Jewel Box

Open Cluster NGC 290: A Stellar Jewel Box - Click to Enlarge
Credit: ESA & NASA; Acknowledgement: E. Olszewski (U. Arizona)

Jewels don't shine this bright -- only stars do. Like gems in a jewel box, though, the stars of open cluster NGC 290 glitter in a beautiful display of brightness and colour.

The photogenic cluster, pictured above, was captured recently by the orbiting Hubble Space Telescope. Open clusters of stars are younger, contain few stars, and contain a much higher fraction of blue stars than do globular clusters of stars.

NGC 290 lies about 200,000 light-years distant in a neighboring galaxy called the Small Cloud of Magellan (SMC). The open cluster contains hundreds of stars and spans about 65 light years across. NGC 290 and other open clusters are good laboratories for studying how stars of different masses evolve, since all the open cluster's stars were born at about the same time.