Evolution of a bimetallic nanocatalyst

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Atomic-scale snapshots of a bimetallic nanoparticle catalyst in action have provided insights that could help improve the industrial process by which fuels and chemicals are synthesized from natural gas, coal or plant biomass.

via Science Daily

Method of synthesizing new type of nickel-carbon heterofullerenes

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Scientists have come up with a method of synthesizing a new type of nickel-carbon compound. Heterofullerenes are hollow molecules with a nearly-spherical shape, which, unlike the typical fullerenes, contain atoms of elements other than carbon. Such compounds were synthesized quite a while ago, in 1991, but till now no heterofullerenes containing nickel, or any other transition metal, have been obtained.

via Science Daily

Some insights into the weirdness of time

Science Focus

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Some insights into the weirdness of time
To anyone with more than a passing interest, something no-one seems to address is the fluid-flow nature of everything - you know, non-linear stuff, aka what is described by Chaos Theory.

You can bet your bottom dollar that the expansion of the universe isn't uniform, it'll follow non-linear fluid dynamics.

To help, picture the billowing smoke clouds above a just-erupting volcano - as the cloud expands some race out into half-spheres and then are overtaken or swallowed up by others billowing faster.

That same sort of thing has to, just has to be happening to the expansion of the universe!

Of course, in the surface-of-a-balloon picture that's often used to help us picture how everything's moving away from everything else,  it's not see easy to visualise some parts of the surface expanding more rapidly than others while overall still remaining a sphere.

Even so, it must be happening.

So where does that leave our observations that there must be dark energy causing the accelerated expansion of the universe?

Well, in that billowing cloud image in your mind, even after the eruption has stopped and the overall cloud expansion is slowing, there will still be, through momentum, some areas still doing the billowing thing.

With my own limited understanding of these things, I'm quite happy that what I hear about dark energy somehow equates to momentum in my analogy, and it could be that we're in one of the billowing bits, while overall the universe expansion is slowing.

I'd be interested to hear what those in the know think :)

I'll just finish by stressing, everything is fluid flow - nowhere is it absent, it's always there hiding in some form or other. Even in the digits of Pi and e.

  #science  

 » see original post https://plus.google.com/116000959328274308893/posts/TACJAX81rNP
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Trace of another world found on Moon

Science Focus

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Researchers find evidence of the world that crashed into Earth billions of years ago to form the Moon. 
#science 
 » see original post http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-27688511#sa-ns_mchannel=rss&ns_source=PublicRSS20-sa
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Monogram, Star Cluster Pismis 24, core of NGC 6357 Round Stickers

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Monogram, Star Cluster Pismis 24, core of NGC 6357 Round Stickers

tagged with: stars, galaxies, astronomy, peel off, envelope sealers, star cluster, pismis 24, sculpting ultaviolet ionisation, super massive stars, sclustpsms, nebula ngc 6357

Galaxies, Stars and Nebulae series The star cluster Pismis 24 lies in the core of the large emission nebula NGC 6357 that extends one degree on the sky in the direction of the Scorpius constellation. Part of the nebula is ionised by the youngest (bluest) heavy stars in Pismis 24. The intense ultraviolet radiation from the blazing stars heats the gas surrounding the cluster and creates a bubble in NGC 6357. The presence of these surrounding gas clouds makes probing into the region even harder. One of the top candidates for the title of "Milky Way stellar heavyweight champion" was, until now, Pismis 24-1, a bright young star that lies in the core of the small open star cluster Pismis 24 (the bright stars in the Hubble image) about 8,000 light-years away from Earth. Pismis 24-1 was thought to have an incredibly large mass of 200 to 300 solar masses. New NASA/ESA Hubble measurements of the star, have, however, resolved Pismis 24-1 into two separate stars, and, in doing so, have "halved" its mass to around 100 solar masses.

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Image credit: NASA/ESA Hubble

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M16 and the Eagle Nebula

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A star cluster around 2 million years young, M16 is surrounded by natal clouds of dust and glowing gas also known as The Eagle Nebula. This beautifully detailed image of the region includes cosmic sculptures made famous in Hubble Space Telescope close-ups of the starforming complex. Described as elephant trunks or Pillars of Creation, dense, dusty columns rising near the center are light-years in length but are gravitationally contracting to form stars. Energetic radiation from the cluster stars erodes material near the tips, eventually exposing the embedded new stars. Extending from the left edge of the frame is another dusty starforming column known as the Fairy of Eagle Nebula. M16 and the Eagle Nebula lie about 7,000 light-years away, an easy target for binoculars or small telescopes in a nebula rich part of the sky toward the split constellation Serpens Cauda (the tail of the snake).

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Hubble Deep Field Image at Full Resolution Cover For iPad

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Eye - Stellar Nursery R136 on nebula background Square Sticker

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Eye - Stellar Nursery R136 on nebula background Square Sticker

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Galaxies, Stars and Nebulae series On a background of the Pelican and North American nebulae, an eye made from hundreds of brilliant blue stars wreathed by warm, glowing clouds appear in this the most detailed view of the largest stellar nursery in our local galactic neighborhood. The massive, young stellar grouping, called R136, is only a few million years old and resides in the 30 Doradus (or Tarantula) Nebula, a turbulent star-birth region in the Large Magellanic Cloud (LMC), a satellite galaxy of our Milky Way.
There is no known star-forming region in our galaxy as large or as prolific as 30 Doradus. Many of the diamond-like icy blue stars are among the most massive stars known. Several of them are over 100 times more massive than our Sun. These hefty stars are destined to pop off, like a string of firecrackers, as supernovas in a few million years. The image, taken in ultraviolet, visible, and red light by Hubble's Wide Field Camera 3, spans about 100 light-years.
The movement of the LMC around the Milky Way may have triggered the massive cluster's formation in several ways. The gravitational tug of the Milky Way and the companion Small Magellanic Cloud may have compressed gas in the LMC. Also, the pressure resulting from the LMC plowing through the Milky Way's halo may have compressed gas in the satellite. The cluster is a rare, nearby example of the many super star clusters that formed in the distant, early universe, when star birth and galaxy interactions were more frequent.
The LMC is located 170,000 light-years away and is a member of the Local Group of Galaxies, which also includes the Milky Way. The Hubble observations were taken Oct. 20-27, 2009. The blue color is light from the hottest, most massive stars; the green from the glow of oxygen; and the red from fluorescing hydrogen.

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image credit: Hubble's Wide Field Camera 3

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Hubble eXtreme Deep Field (XDF) Cases For iPad

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