Friday 17 October 2014

Charge transport jamming in solar cells

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Conventional silicon solar cells could have an inexpensive competitor in the near future. Researchers from the Max Planck

The post Charge transport jamming in solar cells has been published on Technology Org.

 
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Hubble Space Poster

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


tagged with: hubble, nasa, space, astronomy, exploration, universe, nebula, telescope

Add mattes and frame this poster to suit your decor. Makes a fantastic gift. The images shown below were created by the Office of Public Outreach at the Space Telescope Science Institute (STScI). The Institute has been contracted by NASA to create products and services that return the scientific discoveries of the Hubble Space Telescope to the American public.

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Hubble Finds Extremely Distant Galaxy through Cosmic Magnifying Glass



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Peering through a giant cosmic magnifying glass, NASA's Hubble Space Telescope has spotted one of the farthest, faintest, and smallest galaxies ever seen. The diminutive object is estimated to be more than 13 billion light-years away. This new detection is considered one of the most reliable distance measurements of a galaxy that existed in the early universe, said the Hubble researchers. Hubble detected the galaxy due to the lensing power of the mammoth galaxy cluster Abell 2744, nicknamed Pandora's Cluster. The cluster is so massive that its powerful gravity bends the light from galaxies far behind it, making the background objects appear larger and brighter in a phenomenon called gravitational lensing.




via HubbleSite NewsCenter -- Latest News Releases

http://hubblesite.org/newscenter/archive/releases/2014/39/

Herschel's Comet

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A month before retiring in 2013, Herschel took a look at Comet Siding Spring. The comet is now heading for a close encounter with Mars on Sunday

via ESA Space Science

http://sci.esa.int/herschel/54802-herschel-view-of-comet-siding-spring/

This is your brain on dogs

Science Focus

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Many dog owners feel like their pets are like their children — and your brain seems to think so, too. In a new study published in the journal PLOS ONE, researchers at Massachusetts General Hospital investigated differences in brain activity when women volunteers viewed pictures of their dogs, their children, and unfamiliar dogs and children. What they found suggests that the bond between human and pup tugs at some of the same heartstrings — or rather, brainstrings — as the bond between mother and child.

The MGH team analyzed functional MRI data for 14 women, each with at least...

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 » see original post http://theweek.com/article/index/269386/this-is-your-brain-on-dogs
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VIDEO: Up close with Curiosity Mars rover

Science Focus

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BBC Click gets rare access to the twin of Nasa's Curiosity Mars rover which is helping scientists solve problems on the Red Planet. 
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 » see original post http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-29522596#sa-ns_mchannel=rss&ns_source=PublicRSS20-sa
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How an island full of landmines led to a thriving penguin population

Science Focus

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For several hundred years, human activity on the Falkland Islands — roughly 300 miles off the Argentine coast — threatened its penguins' survival. But that trend started to reverse in 1982, when Argentina and Britain began duking it out for control of the Falklands. Turns out, a war, a few landmines, and some unstable diplomatic relations might have been just enough to get the penguins back on track.

The Falkland Islands are small. Collectively, the 200-plus islands that make up the Falklands are only about as big as Connecticut. But through the years, they've managed to inspire...

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 » see original post http://theweek.com/article/index/268988/how-an-island-full-of-landmines-led-to-a-thriving-penguin-population
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Name, Carina Nebula in Argo Navis deep space image Wrapping Paper

Get your out-of-this-world gift wrap here! Perfect for Christmas gifts for anyone who is fascinated by what the universe holds in store for us!


tagged with: carina nebula, argos navis constellation, carina the keel, star formation, gas clouds, galaxy stars, ngc 3372, hrbstslr carnebngcttst, astronomy pictures, outer space

Galaxies, Stars and Nebulae series Hubble's view of the Carina Nebula shows star birth in a new level of detail. The fantasy-like landscape of the nebula is sculpted by the action of outflowing winds and scorching ultraviolet radiation from the monster stars that inhabit this inferno. In the process, these stars are shredding the surrounding material that is the last vestige of the giant cloud from which the stars were born. The immense nebula is an estimated 7,500 light-years away in the southern constellation Carina the Keel (of the old southern constellation Argo Navis, the ship of Jason and the Argonauts, from Greek mythology).
The original image is a mosaic of the Carina Nebula assembled from 48 frames taken with Hubble Space Telescope's Advanced Camera for Surveys. The Hubble images were taken in the light of ionized hydrogen. Colour information was added with data taken at the Cerro Tololo Inter-American Observatory in Chile. Red corresponds to sulfur, green to hydrogen, and blue to oxygen emission.

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image code: carnebngcttst

Image credit: Hubble Space Telescope; colour data from the Cerro Tololo Inter-American Observatory, Chile

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Red Supergiant Star V838 Monocerotis Star Stickers

Here's a great sheet of stickers featuring a beautiful image from deep space


tagged with: amazing astronomy images, hubble images, monocerotis, supermassive red giant, stars, interstellar dust, swirling dust clouds, monoceros constellation, red supergiant star, fun stickons

Galaxies, Stars and Nebulae series A gorgeous astronomy picture featuring a distant star, named V838 Monocerotis, in the direction of the constellation of Monoceros on the outer edge of our Milky Way. The image shows the swirls of dust spiralling across trillions of miles of interstellar space, lit mainly from within by a pulse of light from the red supergiant, two years into its journey.

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image code: monocerotis

Image credit: NASA, the Hubble Heritage Team (AURA/STScI) and ESA

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A newborn supernova every night

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Thanks to a $9 million grant from the National Science Foundation and matching funds from the Zwicky Transient Facility (ZTF) collaboration, a new camera is being built at Caltech's Palomar Observatory that will be able to survey the entire Northern Hemisphere sky in a single night, searching for supernovas, black holes, near-Earth asteroids, and other objects. The digital camera will be mounted on the Samuel Oschin Telescope, a wide-field Schmidt telescope that began its first all-sky survey in 1949. That survey, done on glass plates, took nearly a decade to complete.



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Messier 6 and Comet Siding Spring

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This looks like a near miss but the greenish coma and tail of Comet Siding Spring (C/2013 A1) are really 2,000 light-years or so away from the stars of open cluster Messier 6. They do appear close together though, along the same line-of-sight in this gorgeous October 9th skyscape toward the constellation Scorpius. Still, on Sunday, October 19th this comet really will be involved in a near miss, passing within only 139,500 kilometers of planet Mars. That's about 10 times closer than any known comet flyby of planet Earth, and nearly one third the Earth-Moon distance. While an impact with the nucleus is not a threat the comet's dust, moving with a speed of about 56 kilometers per second relative to the Red Planet, and outskirts of its gaseous coma could interact with the thin Martian atmosphere. Of course, the comet's close encounter will be followed intently by spacecraft in Martian orbit and rovers on the surface.

Zazzle Space Gifts for young and old

Nebulosity 360 Wall Art Wall Sticker

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


tagged with: nebula, space, astronomy, galaxy, cosmos

Make your room a space mans room

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Hubble iPad case

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: hubble

Hubble

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Collider exhibition embarks on an international tour

Fast, cheap nanomanufacturing

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Luis Fernando Velásquez-García’s group at MIT’s Microsystems Technology Laboratories (MTL) develops dense arrays of microscopic cones that harness

The post Fast, cheap nanomanufacturing has been published on Technology Org.

 
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Vintage Astronomy Star Chart ~ Sagittarius Poster

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


tagged with: astrology, zodiac, constellations, decor, fine art, art, universe, old, world, star maps, signs, space, map, maps, world maps, vintage maps, antique map, antique maps, ancient, ancient maps, history, ancient history, artwork, vintage artwork, vintage art, unique, unusual, neat, cool, room decor, wall decor, den decor, framed prints, framed posters, framed art, canvas, the vintage vamp, thevintagevamp

A wonderful antique star chart depicting the constellation of Sagittarius (the Archer) was represented as a Centaur, half man, half horse, ready to fire his/its bow and arrow at the heart of Scorpius, the Scorpion. Also shown is the much smaller constellation of Corona Australis (the Southern Crown) is quite distinctive to the eye though its stars are fainter than those in neighboring Sagittarius. It is quite ancient having be recognized by Ptolemy, and one legend has it that it represents the coronet worn by Sagittarius. This wonderful old constellation chart would be perfect for your home wall decor. Add a frame and it would make the perfect retro decoration in your bar, cafe, restaurant, home theater, office or kitchen. Framed canvas prints also make an exceptional gift for any occasion or holiday.

At The Vintage Vamp we obtain high quality images of vintage artwork. Then we use state of the art technology and editing to bring back to life the most compelling images from the past. Unlike a lot of reproductions sold on the Internet, ours have been refurbished to bring out the original colors and fix as many imperfections as possible. We use only PNG format and the largest PPI (pixels per inch) possible, which is the very best for printing. This assures that your image will print with the highest quality possible, no matter what size you choose. Credit: Library of Congress & Wikipedia




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Carina Nebula - Breathtaking Universe Star Sticker

Here's a great sheet of stickers featuring a beautiful image from deep space


tagged with: star clusters, galaxies, starfields, constellation puppis, the stern, star nurseries, nebulae, space exploration, universe photographs, hrbstslr stlrnrsry, european southern observatory, eso, vista

Galaxies, Stars and Nebulae series A gorgeous set of oval stickers showing the area surrounding the stellar cluster NGC 2467, located in the southern constellation of Puppis ("The Stern"). With an age of a few million years at most, it is a very active stellar nursery, where new stars are born continuously from large clouds of dust and gas.

The image, looking like a colourful cosmic ghost or a gigantic celestial Mandrill, contains the open clusters Haffner 18 (centre) and Haffner 19 (middle right: it is located inside the smaller pink region - the lower eye of the Mandrill), as well as vast areas of ionised gas.

The bright star at the centre of the largest pink region on the bottom of the image is HD 64315, a massive young star that is helping shaping the structure of the whole nebular region.

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ESO/J. Emerson/VISTA www.eso.org
Reproduced under the Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported license.

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Name, Swan Nebula, Intriguing Space Pictures Gift Wrap Paper

Get your out-of-this-world gift wrap here! Perfect for Christmas gifts for anyone who is fascinated by what the universe holds in store for us!


tagged with: midswneb, swan nebula, m17, hydrogen gas clouds, star forming activity, newly born stars, outer space, star galaxies, deep space astronomy, pictures of space, young hot stars

Galaxies, Stars and Nebulae series Amazingly this could almost be some underwater scene with strange creatures swimming in the aquamarine waters. It's actually the centre of the Swan Nebula, or M17, a hotbed of newly born stars wrapped in colourful blankets of glowing gas and cradled in an enormous cold, dark hydrogen cloud. This stunning picture was taken by the newly installed Advanced Camera for Surveys (ACS) aboard the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope.
The region of the nebula shown in this picture is about 3500 times wider than our Solar System. The area also represents about 60 percent of the total view captured by ACS. The nebula resides 5500 light-years away in the constellation Sagittarius. Like its famous cousin in Orion, the Swan Nebula is illuminated by ultraviolet radiation from young, massive stars - each about six times hotter and 30 times more massive than our Sun.

The powerful radiation from these stars evaporates and erodes the dense cloud of cold gas within which the stars formed. The blistered walls of the hollow cloud shine primarily in the blue, green, and red light emitted by excited atoms of hydrogen, nitrogen, oxygen, and sulphur. Particularly striking is the rose-like feature, seen to the right of centre, which glows in the red light emitted by hydrogen and sulphur.
As the infant stars evaporate the surrounding cloud, they expose dense pockets of gas that may contain developing stars. Because these dense pockets are more resistant to the withering radiation than the surrounding cloud, they appear as sculptures in the walls of the cloud or as isolated islands in a sea of glowing gas. One isolated pocket is seen at the centre of the brightest region of the nebula and is about 10 times larger than our Solar System.

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Image credit: NASA, the ACS Science Team

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NASA spacecraft provides new information about sun's atmosphere

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NASA's Interface Region Imaging Spectrograph (IRIS) has provided scientists with five new findings into how the sun's atmosphere, or corona, is heated far hotter than its surface, what causes the sun's constant outflow of particles called the solar wind, and what mechanisms accelerate particles that power solar flares.

via Science Daily

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Cosmic jets of young stars formed by magnetic fields

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Astrophysical jets are counted among our universe's most spectacular phenomena: From the centers of black holes, quasars, or protostars, these rays of matter sometimes protrude several light years into space. Now, for the first time ever, an international team of researchers has successfully tested a new model that explains how magnetic fields form these emissions in young stars.

via Science Daily

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Wobbling of a Saturn moon hints at what lies beneath

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Using instruments aboard the Cassini spacecraft to measure the wobbles of Mimas, the closest of Saturn's regular moons, an astronomer has inferred that this small moon's icy surface cloaks either a rugby ball-shaped rocky core or a sloshing sub-surface ocean.

via Science Daily

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Hubble finds extremely distant galaxy through cosmic magnifying glass

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Using the Hubble Space Telescope and the lensing power of giant galaxy cluster Abell 2744, astronomers may have made the most reliable distance measurement yet of an object that existed in the very early universe. The galaxy, estimated to be over 13 billion light-years away, is one of the farthest, faintest, and smallest galaxies ever seen.

via Science Daily

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Inexplicable signal from unseen universe provides tantalizing clue about one of astronomy's greatest secrets - dark matter

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The first potential indication of direct detection of Dark Matter – something that has been a mystery in physics for over 30 years -- has been attained. Astronomers found what appears to be a signature of 'axions', predicted 'Dark Matter' particle candidates.

via Science Daily

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Making measurements when a comet passes close to Mars

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On Sunday 19 October at 20:29 CET a comet will pass close to the planet Mars. At the same time the Swedish instrument ASPERA-3 is on board the European satellite Mars Express orbiting Mars and ready to make measurements.

via Science Daily

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Technical feasibility of proposed Mars One mission assessed

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In 2012, the "Mars One" project, led by a Dutch nonprofit, announced plans to establish the first human colony on the Red Planet by 2025. The mission would initially send four astronauts on a one-way trip to Mars, where they would spend the rest of their lives building the first permanent human settlement. It's a bold vision -- particularly since Mars One claims that the entire mission can be built upon technologies that already exist.

via Science Daily

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Witch Head Nebula deep space astronomy image Room Decal

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


tagged with: star galaxies, outer space picture, deep space astronomy, wtchneb, witch head nebula, screaming witch, cursing witch, nasa space photograph, faces in space, witches curse

Galaxies, Stars and Nebulae series A witch appears to be screaming out into space in this image from NASA's Wide-Field Infrared Survey Explorer, or WISE. The infrared portrait shows the Witch Head nebula, named after its resemblance to the profile of a wicked witch. Astronomers say the billowy clouds of the nebula, where baby stars are brewing, are being lit up by massive stars. Dust in the cloud is being hit with starlight, causing it to glow with infrared light, which was picked up by WISE's detectors.
The Witch Head nebula is estimated to be hundreds of light-years away in the Orion constellation, just off the famous hunter's knee.
WISE was recently "awakened" to hunt for asteroids in a program called NEOWISE. The reactivation came after the spacecraft was put into hibernation in 2011, when it completed two full scans of the sky, as planned.
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Image credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech

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V838 Monocerotis Hubble Space Telescope iPad Mini Cover

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: v838, monocerotis, hubble, astronomy, space, hubble space telescope, nasa, light echo

In January 2002, a dull star in an obscure constellation suddenly became 600,000 times more luminous than our Sun, temporarily making it the brightest star in our Milky Way galaxy. The mysterious star, called V838 Monocerotis, has long since faded back to obscurity. But observations by NASA's Hubble Space Telescope of a phenomenon called a "light echo" around the star have uncovered remarkable new features. These details promise to provide astronomers with a CAT-scan-like probe of the three-dimensional structure of shells of dust surrounding an aging star. Sign up to Mr. Rebates for FREE and save 12% on any zazzle order in addition to a $5.00 sign up bonus All Rights Reserved; without: prejudice, recourse or notice (U.C.C. 1-308) http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:V838_Mon_HST.jpg v838 monocerotis hubble astronomy space "hubble space telescope" nasa "light echo"

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