A newly detected dust ring, just outside the orbit of Saturn could help astronomers have come up with a new strategy to shortlist star systems that might contain planets. Astronomers from the European Space Agency believe that this dusty ring is being maintained and replenished through collisions of objects in the solar system, like comets and asteroids. These distant dust clouds should be detectible, as well as swaths cleared out by planets.
New Evidence Supports Formation Theory for Rapidly Spinning Pulsars
Combining images taken by the Hubble Space Telescope, as well as data from radio observatories, astronomers from the European Space Agency have new understanding of a very unusual star system – a fast spinning pulsar and a giant red star. Although 90 of these “millisecond” pulsars have been discovered by astronomers, they haven’t figured out what gets them spinning so quickly. Perhaps through absorbing matter from another star, the pulsar is spun up by the transfer of energy that occurs when material is consumed.
ESO Releases New Images of Saturn and Io
The European Southern Observatory released stunning new images of the planet Saturn and Jupiter’s moon Io on Friday – the sharpest ever taken by a ground observatory. The photographs were taken using the ESO’s Very Large Telescope (VLT) at the Paranal Observatory in Chile, which rivals the Hubble Space Telescope in image clarity. This is an almost perfect view of Saturn, taken when the planet’s rings were tilted towards the Earth.
New Image of the Horsehead Nebula
A new, high-resolution image has been taken of one of the most famous astronomical objects in the night sky ? the Horsehead Nebula, which is located in the constellation of Orion. This beautiful photograph is a composite image made from three separate images taken in February 2000 by the 8.2 metre VLT KUEYEN telescope on Paranal in Chile.
Climatology
- Albedo Effect
- Beaufort Scale
- Causes of Ozone Depletion
- The Coldest Place on Earth
- Cumulonimbus Clouds
- Earth’s Temperature
- Enhanced Greenhouse Effect
- How Does Fog Form?
- Last Day of Summer
- The Northern Lights
- Precession of the Equinoxes
- Summer Solstice
- What are Clouds Made of?
- What is a Warm Front?
- What is an Aurora?
- What is the Hottest Place on Earth?
- What is the Most Remote Place on Earth?
- What is Tornado Alley?
- What Causes Wind?
- Where are Tornadoes Likely to Occur?
- Where do Hurricanes Occur?
- Why are there Seasons?
- Why Does it Rain?