Sunday 13 July 2014

X-rays shine light on atoms at work in a chemical reaction

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Not your standard protein. orinoco14, CC BY-NC For more than 100 years, scientists have “peered” at atoms in a crystal by analysing the way they scatter X-rays. This process, known as crystallography, reveals the chemical structure of compounds in the crystal and has applications so wide-ranging– from drugs to new materials – that it has become central to how science is done. But almost all of these advances have depended on revealing the chemical structure of unchanging compounds. However, if Makoto Fujita at the University of Tokyo and his colleagues are proved correct, this may all change. For they have developed a method to capture “images” as chemical reactions happen. The difference is in someways as big as that when cameras went from capturing still images to shooting film. Dark magic At this very moment, there are billions of chemical reactions taking place in your body. And yet each of these chemical reaction is special, because for it to occur two or more molecules have come in close contact under the right conditions. These “right conditions” are mostly dependent on the energy available in the system. Without enough energy, the necessary movement of electrons will not occur and the reaction will fail. In nature,

The post X-rays shine light on atoms at work in a chemical reaction has been published on Technology Org.

 
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Edmond Halley's 355th Birthday 2 Poster

Here's a great poster featuring a beautiful image from deep space


tagged with: astronomy, stars, planets

Release Geography: UK

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VIDEO: 'Major step' in Alzheimer's detection

Science Focus

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British scientists say they have made a major step forward in developing a blood test to predict the onset of Alzheimer's disease. 
#science 
 » see original post http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-28205680#sa-ns_mchannel=rss&ns_source=PublicRSS20-sa
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Getting ever closer to full operation

Science Focus

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Getting ever closer to full operation
...and so the speculation starts on what answers it might provide...
#science

 » see original post https://plus.google.com/116000959328274308893/posts/bj17W7SBPKy
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Planetary Nebula NGC 2818 from Hubble

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Zazzle Space Gifts for young and old

Ring Nebula (M57) Wall Graphics

Here's a great wall decal featuring a beautiful image from deep space


tagged with: le0055, nasa, etoiles, les etoiles, astronomy, science, scientific, outer space, deep space, sky, gift, gifts, present, presents, nebula, nebulae, planetary, hubble, hst, hubble telescope, ring, m57, hubble space telescope, black, blue, yellow, gold, golden, orange, eye, beautiful, pretty, celestial

"The NASA Hubble Space Telescope has captured the sharpest view yet of the most famous of all planetary nebulae: the Ring Nebula (M57). In this October 1998 image, the telescope has looked down a barrel of gas cast off by a dying star thousands of years ago. This photo reveals elongated dark clumps of material embedded in the gas at the edge of the nebula; the dying central star floating in a blue haze of hot gas. The nebula is about a light-year in diameter and is located some 2,000 light-years from Earth in the direction of the constellation Lyra."

(qtd. from Hubblesite.org NewsCenter release STScI-1999-01)

Credit: The Hubble Heritage Team (AURA/STScI/NASA)

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War and Peace Nebula Cover For The iPad Mini

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tagged with: cosmological, space, nebulae, ngc 6357, stars, outer space, hubble, telescope, deep space, war and peace nebula

A stunning Hubble telescope image of the nebula NGC 6357, the so-called War and Peace Nebula - so called because the scientists of the Midcourse Space Experiment claimed the western side looks like a dove, and the eastern side like a skull, in infrared photographs. The lovely blue star visible near the bottom is Pismis 24-1, the "core" of NGC 6357.

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Cats Eye Nebula iPad Mini Cases

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tagged with: cosmological, cosmos, nebulae, cats eye, cats eye nebula, hubble, space, telescope, stars, stellar

This is the Cat's Eye Planetary Nebula, one of the first such nebulae discovered, as well as one of the most complex. Image taken by the Hubble Space Telescope.

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Chemists let fluorescent sugar sensors ‘calculate’

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In a chemistry lab at the Friedrich Schiller University Jena (Germany): Prof. Dr. Alexander Schiller works at a rectangular plastic board with 384 small wells. The chemist carefully pipets some drops of sugar solution into a row of the tiny reaction vessels. As soon as the fluid has mixed with the contents of the vessels, fluorescence starts in some of the wells. What the Junior Professor for Photonic Materials does here – with his own hands – could also be called in a very simplified way, the ‘sweetest computer in the world’. The reason: the sugar molecules Schiller uses are part of a chemical sequence for information processing. The chemist of Jena University and his two postgraduate students, Martin Elstner and Jörg Axthelm recently described in the new edition of the science journal ‘Angewandte Chemie International Edition’ how they developed a molecular computer on the basis of sugar (DOI: 10.1002/anie.201403769). “The binary logic which makes a conventional computer chip work is based on simple yes/no-decisions,” Professor Schiller explains. “There is either electricity flowing between both poles of an electric conductor or there isn’t.” These potential differences are being coded as “0″ and “1″ and can be linked via logic gates

The post Chemists let fluorescent sugar sensors ‘calculate’ has been published on Technology Org.

 
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Sombrero Galaxy - M104 - poster/print

Here's a great poster featuring a beautiful image from deep space


tagged with: sombrero, galaxy, space, astronomy, hubble, telescope, sombrero galaxy, hubble space telescope, skies, nasa, horseshoes3

This floating ring is the size of a galaxy. In fact, it is part of the photogenic Sombrero Galaxy, one of the largest galaxies in the nearby Virgo Cluster of Galaxies. The dark band of dust that obscures the mid-section of the Sombrero Galaxy in optical light actually glows brightly in infrared light. The above image shows the infrared glow, recently recorded by the orbiting Spitzer Space Telescope, superposed in false-color on an existing image taken by NASA's Hubble Space Telescope in optical light. The Sombrero Galaxy, also known as M104, spans about 50,000 light years across and lies 28 million light years away. M104 can be seen with a small telescope in the direction of the constellation Virgo. This image is in the public domain

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Crab Pulsar Time Lapse - Neutron Star Stickers

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Galaxies, Stars and Nebulae series

Multiple observations made over several months with NASA's Chandra X-ray Observatory and the Hubble Space Telescope captured the spectacle of matter and antimatter propelled to near the speed of light by the Crab pulsar, a rapidly rotating neutron star the size of Manhattan.

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Image code: crbplsr

Image credit: NASA's Chandra X-ray Observatory and the Hubble Space Telescope

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Celestron 21024 FirstScope Telescope for Under $50

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Star Cluster NGC 346 Wall Graphic

Here's a great wall decal featuring a beautiful image from deep space


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"This image of star cluster NGC 346 and its surrounding star-formation region was taken in July 2004 with the Advanced Camera for Surveys aboard NASA's Hubble Space Telescope. Located 210,000 light-years away in the Small Magellanic Cloud (SMC), a satellite galaxy of our Milky Way, the cluster is one of the most dynamic and intricately detailed star-forming regions in space. A dramatic structure of arched, ragged filaments with a distinct ridge encircles the cluster."

(qtd. from Hubblesite.org NewsCenter release STScI-2005-35)

Credit: NASA, ESA, and The Hubble Heritage Team (STScI/AURA)

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Close-up of the Tarantula Nebula iPad Air Cases

Here's a great iPad case from Zazzle featuring a Hubble-related design. Maybe you'd like to see your name on it? Click to personalize and see what it's like!


tagged with: space, galaxy, science, astronomy, universe, geek, hubble, galaxies, nebula, stars

Hubble took this stunning close-up shot of part of the Tarantula Nebula. This star-forming region of ionised hydrogen gas is in the Large Magellanic Cloud, a small galaxy which neighbours the Milky Way. It is home to many extreme conditions including supernova remnants and the heaviest star ever found. The Tarantula Nebula is the most luminous nebula of its type in the local Universe. Image Credit: NASA/ESA

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