Nearly 12.5 million light-years away, in the dwarf galaxy NGC 4449, stellar fireworks on display have been captured by the Hubble Space Telescope.
NGC 4449 belongs to a group of galaxies in the constellation Canes Venatici, 'the Hunting Dogs'. Astronomers think that NGC 4449's episode of star formation has been influenced by interactions with several of its neighbours. It is likely that the current widespread starburst was triggered by interaction or merger with a smaller companion.
The NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope's Advanced Camera for Surveys observed NGC 4449 in the visible (blue and green), infrared, and hydrogen-alpha regions of the spectrum.
Hundreds of thousands of vibrant blue and red stars are visible in this new image. Hot bluish white clusters of massive stars are scattered throughout the galaxy, interspersed with numerous dustier reddish regions where star formation is taking place. Massive, dark clouds of gas and dust are silhouetted against starlight.
Science & Technology
The tomb of China's first emperor, guarded for more than 2000 years by 8000 terracotta warriors and horses, has yielded another archaeological secret.
Archaeologists have confirmed that a 30m-high building is buried in the vast mausoleum of Emperor Qinshihuang near the former capital, Xian.
Archaeologists have confirmed that a 30m-high building is buried in the vast mausoleum of Emperor Qinshihuang near the former capital, Xian.
Researchers at the University of Pennsylvania have shed new light on how the brain and eye team up to spot an object in motion and follow it, a classic question of human motor control. The study shows that two distinctly different ways of seeing motion are used - one to catch up to a moving object with our eyes, a second to lock on and examine it.
"Without the ability to lock our eyes onto a moving target, something called smooth pursuit, athletes cannot 'keep their eye on the ball,' and a person walking down the street cannot examine the facial expression or identity of a passerby," said Jeremy Wilmer, postdoctoral fellow in the Department of Psychology in Penn's School of Arts and Sciences and lead author of the study.
Researchers found that volunteers showed a range of capabilities when it came to sensing and following motion, and the careful measurement of such differences produced novel insights into the workings of the smooth pursuit system.
"Without the ability to lock our eyes onto a moving target, something called smooth pursuit, athletes cannot 'keep their eye on the ball,' and a person walking down the street cannot examine the facial expression or identity of a passerby," said Jeremy Wilmer, postdoctoral fellow in the Department of Psychology in Penn's School of Arts and Sciences and lead author of the study.
Researchers found that volunteers showed a range of capabilities when it came to sensing and following motion, and the careful measurement of such differences produced novel insights into the workings of the smooth pursuit system.
Hackers hit the heart of the Internet yesterday when they launched an attack on three of the 13 root servers that are responsible for directing all web traffic. The computers were disabled for 12 hours before resuming routine operations.
The hackers hit the UltraDNS company, which directs traffic to websites containing the .info and.org suffixes. The attacks went unnoticed for several hours because legitimate traffic remained unaffected.
The hackers hit the UltraDNS company, which directs traffic to websites containing the .info and.org suffixes. The attacks went unnoticed for several hours because legitimate traffic remained unaffected.
Sûnnet Beskerming researchers observed an interesting deviation in global network trafficover the last 24 hours, particularly for South American, Asian, and Australian networks. Normally, global Internet traffic (as observed by the Internet Traffic Report) oscillates around nine per cent packet loss, with global response times of 138 ms, and the internally derived traffic index at around 79.
Sustained over the last 24 hours, the traffic index has dipped almost five per cent, packet loss has climbed to 11 per cent, and the global response time to almost 150 ms.
Normal spikes and dips as observed on the Internet Traffic Report show up as no more than three- or four-hour blocks of odd results before settling back into normalcy. This latest spike and dip has been sustained for at least 18 hours, with a rapid ramp up in the six hours prior to the peaks (and lows) being reached.
Sustained over the last 24 hours, the traffic index has dipped almost five per cent, packet loss has climbed to 11 per cent, and the global response time to almost 150 ms.
Normal spikes and dips as observed on the Internet Traffic Report show up as no more than three- or four-hour blocks of odd results before settling back into normalcy. This latest spike and dip has been sustained for at least 18 hours, with a rapid ramp up in the six hours prior to the peaks (and lows) being reached.
This weekend's full moon hangs lower in the sky than any other full moon of 2007, according to NASA, and it's a good time to be fooled.
When low on the horizon, the Moon can appear to be larger than when it's higher in the sky. It's all an illusion, scientists say, and it does not involve any enlarging effects of the atmosphere. Rather, it's all in your mind.
Here's how it works:
Our brains think things on the horizon are farther away than stuff overhead, because we're used to seeing overhead clouds that are close compared to those on the horizon. In the mind's eye, the sky is a flattened dome.
With this dome as a reference, we expect something on the horizon (such as the moon) to be farther, and because it is actually no farther than when overhead, our brains goof and imagine that it is larger.
Skeptical? You can test this from home.
When low on the horizon, the Moon can appear to be larger than when it's higher in the sky. It's all an illusion, scientists say, and it does not involve any enlarging effects of the atmosphere. Rather, it's all in your mind.
Here's how it works:
Our brains think things on the horizon are farther away than stuff overhead, because we're used to seeing overhead clouds that are close compared to those on the horizon. In the mind's eye, the sky is a flattened dome.
With this dome as a reference, we expect something on the horizon (such as the moon) to be farther, and because it is actually no farther than when overhead, our brains goof and imagine that it is larger.
Skeptical? You can test this from home.
Evolutionary Psychology and Neuroscience disciplines are set merge into a unified field known as Evolutionary Cognitive Neuroscience or ECN. ECN may produce novel integrated micro, macro models of brain-behavior relationships based on the principles of general Evolution, Evolutionary Psychology and the findings of Neuroscience. Applications may range from predictive human behavior models to neuroweaponry.
Comment: Evolutionary psychology to quote a professor I know, is "neither evolutionary or psychology." It's more like trying to come up with scientific explanations for maintaining the status quo of the selfish elites in power. A big field being pushed in some universities is neuroeconomics, a subset of this ECN business. What is known is often so puzzling that to aggressively pursue this means PTB are really desperate to maintain every shred of control possible. The people who make it big tend to be those that run studies and write theories explaining the behavior of machines, how to be better machines, and why it is beneficial. As if that is all we can aspire to. They forget that if selfishness reaches a particular threshold in a given population, is not evolutionarily stable. There are myriad of things already on the market that alters the function of the brain behavior but I guess that just isn't enough. We must all be psychopaths or completely programmed sheep down to how fast we should think about the things they want us to think.
Mysterious fleeting changes in the appearance of parts of the Moon have been reported by many observers watching with both the naked eye and through telescopes.
Often these consist of a brightening of a small patch of the Moon's surface. Astronauts on Apollo 11 reported an apparent brightening of part of the Aristarchus crater while in orbit around the Moon, for example (see the transcript towards the end of this PDF paper).
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Often these consist of a brightening of a small patch of the Moon's surface. Astronauts on Apollo 11 reported an apparent brightening of part of the Aristarchus crater while in orbit around the Moon, for example (see the transcript towards the end of this PDF paper).
Imagine the shock of growing up in a loving family with people you call "Mum" and "Dad" and then, suddenly, learning that you are actually adopted!
This same sense of shock came as scientists announced that the Sun, the Moon, our planet and its siblings, were not born into the familiar band of stars known as the Milky Way galaxy, but we actually belong to a strange formation with the unfamiliar name of the Sagittarius Dwarf galaxy!
This same sense of shock came as scientists announced that the Sun, the Moon, our planet and its siblings, were not born into the familiar band of stars known as the Milky Way galaxy, but we actually belong to a strange formation with the unfamiliar name of the Sagittarius Dwarf galaxy!
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ViewZone asked me to write a story about the Mayan Calendar. There is a common belief that the calendar holds a prophecy that the end of the world will happen in 2012. At the time, I knew very little about the whole topic and when I began doing the research. I like to think I had an open mind. My investigation began with mainstream archaeology and the expert interpretations of the calendar. But it soon took a turn that made my hair literally stand on end. I am now convinced that these prophecies are true.
To understand what is likely to happen to Earth and it's people, you will need to remain calm and try to follow the facts. It's not as simple as some people describe. It requires an understanding of some fairly complicated scientific realities, but I think I can explain them in a way that you will easily understand.
Comment: This all sounds pretty dramatic, however SOTT experts have run several computer simulations and it seems that, because of the vast distances and sizes, the likelihood of "crossing" the galactic plane having any significant meaning is remote. It could be said that we are already there and will be there for some time.
In fact, the coming Winter Solstice of 2007 looks to be far more interesting since Jupiter and the Sun will be almost conjunct on that day.
Comment: New methodology? Unusually powerful attacks? No problem, if you have unlimited resources (of a secret intelligence service) at your disposal
;-)
Attack of the Bots - The New Internet Mafia, Latest Threat to the 'Net