Science Photo of the Week

neilep · « **Reply #680 on:** 14/12/2019 18:42:12 »

Quote from: Bill S on 14/12/2019 18:32:30

https://www.simplemost.com/woman-finds-lavender-like-spiny-flower-mantis-bug/

Pseudocreobotra wahlbergii.

EXCELLENT !!! incidentally...I saw Mark Wahlberg in Harrods the other day. Had a little chat ! If I'd *known then what I know now I would have quizzed him about Flower Mantis joyness !!

*should this be 'Knew' ?

Bill S · « **Reply #681 on:** 14/12/2019 19:33:08 »

I don’t know if Mark has any link to the name; but Aphonopelma johnnycashi was certainly named for Johnny Cash. Creepy, ain’t it?

neilep · « **Reply #682 on:** 18/12/2019 17:11:50 »

A Hotspot Map of Neutron Star J0030's Surface
Image Credit: NASA, NICER, GSFC's CI Lab

What do neutron stars look like? Previously these city-sized stars were too small and too far away to resolve. Recently, however, the first maps of the locations and sizes of hotspots on a neutron star's surface have been made by carefully modeling how the rapid spin makes the star's X-ray brightness rise and fall. Based on a leading model, an illustrative map of pulsar J0030+0451's hotspots is pictured, with the rest of the star's surface filled in with a false patchy blue. J0030 spins once every 0.0049 seconds and is located about 1000 light years away. The map was computed from data taken by NASA's Neutron star Interior Composition ExploreR (NICER) X-ray telescope attached to the International Space Station. The computed locations of these hotspots is surprising and not well understood. Because the gravitational lensing effect of neutron stars is so strong, J0300 displays more than half of its surface toward the Earth. Studying the appearance of pulsars like J0030 allows accurate estimates of the neutron star's mass, radius, and the internal physics that keeps the star from imploding into a black hole.

CREDIT https://apod.nasa.gov/apod/astropix.html

Border · « **Reply #683 on:** 22/02/2020 14:45:45 »

It's very funny information.

instagyu · « **Reply #684 on:** 09/03/2020 17:52:16 »

i love those!

neilep · « **Reply #685 on:** 28/07/2020 16:04:40 »

DELIGHTFUL GLOW ON A SUMMERS EVE
Photographer: Alessia Scarso (alessiascarso@gmail.com)
Summary Authors: Alessia Scarso (alessiascarso@gmail.com); Jim Foster (james.l.foster@nasa.gov)
Sometimes called lightning bugs or glow worms but more often referred to as fireflies, they’re appearance is a sure sign that summer is at hand. Emerging during twilight, they use intermittent bioluminescence to attract mates and perhaps to also lure prey. Shown here in Monteleone d'Orvieto, Umbria, Italy, with a backdrop of the Milky Way, these little packets of light will soon disappear, though their offspring will be back in time for next summer. Photo taken on June 13, 2020.

CREDIT https://epod.usra.edu/

Anad Rutner · « **Reply #686 on:** 02/08/2020 19:33:48 »

Four 70'-tall trees were felled near this duplex in November of 2019. They all fell to the East. The low temp was 54º. The temperature of the ice on the roof was -2ºF. The opposite side of the roof had no ice. I know EXACTLY why! Do you?

yovav · « **Reply #687 on:** 25/08/2020 06:00:18 »

New light on solid state

NakedTruth · « **Reply #688 on:** 10/11/2020 20:03:19 »

Omg these photos are crazy and spooky! I learned a lot new things here, thanks for that.

haijawae2 · « **Reply #689 on:** 01/03/2021 09:42:29 »

A very good and creative step towards flying on the sky and moon...Scientists have successfully drilled through an Antarctic ice sheet to extract the longest ice core ever recovered.....NACA done a job very well....

Just thinking · « **Reply #690 on:** 15/07/2021 18:52:42 »

I still have one that is of the ground.

DSCN2920 (2).JPG (1657.2 kB . 4145x3239 - viewed 7126 times)

emelymorris · « **Reply #691 on:** 30/07/2021 13:30:34 »

Scientists have found evidence parts of Venus's surface move around like pieces of continent on Earth.

And while this activity is probably not driven by plate tectonics, as on Earth, it could be a "cousin" of that process.

The findings fit an emerging picture of a planet very much alive, in contrast to the traditional view of Venus.

Europe is launching a spacecraft, EnVision, to radar-map and gather spectroscopic measurements of the planet's surface and atmosphere.

And Nasa is sending two craft, Veritas and DaVinci+, to Venus, towards the end of this decade.

"We've identified a previously unrecognised pattern of tectonic deformation on Venus, one that is driven by interior motion just like on Earth," said lead author Paul Byrne, associate professor of planetary science at North Carolina State University.

"Although different from the tectonics we currently see on Earth, it is still evidence of interior motion being expressed at the planet's surface."

Nasa announces two missions to Venus
Europe will join the space party at Planet Venus
Hopes rise of new mission to Venus
Dr Byrne, Dr Richard Ghail, from Royal Holloway, University of London, Prof Sean Solomon, from Columbia University, in New York, and colleagues detected signs blocks of rocky crust in Venus's lowlands region had rotated and moved laterally relative to one another.

They compare the apparently relatively recent activity to the way fragments of pack ice jostle around in the sea in Earth's polar regions.

The blocks - 100-1,000km (620 miles) long - also resemble the Earth's crust in:

China's Tarim and Sichuan basins
Australia's Amadeus basin
the Bohemian massif underlying much of the Czech Republic
Richard Ghail, principal investigator on the European Space Agency's EnVision mission, told BBC News: "This research shows that we have a lot to learn from Venus and that there is a much wider spectrum of surface mobility than just plate tectonics."

The researchers used data gathered by Nasa's Magellan spacecraft, launched in 1989 and active until 1994, to map the surface structures, which they have named "campi", from the Latin for "field", "campus".

Traditionally, Venus's lithosphere - its rocky outer layer - was thought to be in one continuous piece, in contrast to the Earth's, which is broken up into a mosaic of mobile tectonic plates.

The Moon, Mars and Mercury are also thought to have static lithospheres.

But the findings, published in the journal PNAS, suggest Venus's lithosphere actually has some degree of mobility - though nowhere near as much as Earth's.

The results of computer models show molten rock - magma - roiling beneath the crust could produce the strain, fracturing and distortion seen in Magellan images of the surface.

So Venus's tectonic activity might resemble that on early Earth, during the Archean Eon, between four billion and 2.5 billion years ago, when the heat flow within the planet was higher and the lithosphere thinner.