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Archive for the ‘cosmology’ category: Page 113

Sep 12, 2023

The universe caught suppressing cosmic structure growth

Posted by in categories: cosmology, physics

As the universe evolves, scientists expect large cosmic structures to grow at a certain rate: dense regions such as galaxy clusters would grow denser, while the void of space would grow emptier.

But University of Michigan researchers have discovered that the rate at which these grow is slower than predicted by Einstein’s Theory of General Relativity.

They also showed that as dark energy accelerates the ’s global expansion, the suppression of the cosmic structure growth that the researchers see in their data is even more prominent than what the theory predicts. Their results are published in Physical Review Letters.

Sep 12, 2023

The case for a small universe

Posted by in category: cosmology

The universe is big, as Douglas Adams would say.

The most distant light we can see is the (CMB), which has taken more than 13 billion years to reach us. This marks the edge of the , and while you might think that means the is 26 billion light-years across, thanks to it is now closer to 46 billion light-years across. By any measure, this is pretty darn big. But most cosmologists think the universe is much larger than our observable corner of it. That what we can see is a small part of an unimaginably vast, if not infinite creation. However, a new paper published on the arXiv preprint server argues that the observable universe is mostly all there is.

In other words, on a cosmic scale, the universe is quite small.

Sep 11, 2023

Wired To Explore: NASA’s 45-Mile Long “Nervous System” for Roman Space Telescope

Posted by in categories: computing, cosmology, space travel

Roman Space Telescope team is integrating a complex electrical harness, crucial for the spacecraft’s communication and power. After a detailed two-year construction and a preparatory “bakeout” process, assembly into the spacecraft is ongoing, with future installations planned for power components.

NASA’s Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope team has begun integrating and testing the spacecraft’s electrical cabling, or harness, which enables different parts of the observatory to communicate with one another. Additionally, the harness provides power and helps the central computer monitor the observatory’s function via an array of sensors. This brings the mission a step closer to surveying billions of cosmic objects and untangling mysteries like dark energy following its launch by May 2027.

Sep 10, 2023

XRISM satellite launches to study the universe in different colors of X-rays

Posted by in categories: cosmology, satellites

On Sept. 6, a new satellite left Earth; its mission is to tell us about the motions of hot plasma flows in the universe.

Launched from Tanegashima Space Center in Japan, the X-Ray Imaging and Spectroscopy Mission (XRISM) satellite will detect X-ray wavelengths with unprecedented precision to peer into the hearts of galaxy clusters, reveal the workings of and supernovae, as well as to tell us about the elemental makeup of the universe.

XRISM, pronounced “crism,” is a collaborative mission between the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) and NASA, with participation by the European Space Agency.

Sep 9, 2023

Hyades star cluster may contain the closest black holes to Earth

Posted by in category: cosmology

This simulation was then compared with real-time data from the European Space Agency’s Gaia satellite, which has revolutionized our understanding of the positions and velocities of stars in open clusters.

“Our simulations can only simultaneously match the mass and size of the Hyades if some black holes are present at the centre of the cluster today (or until recently),” said Dr. Torniamenti.

The most plausible simulations suggest the presence of two to three black holes currently residing in the Hyades star cluster. At the same time, scenarios in which the black holes were ejected less than 150 million years ago (constituting the last quarter of the cluster’s life) cannot be completely ruled out.

Sep 7, 2023

Hungry black hole regularly eats planet-sized chunks of star

Posted by in category: cosmology

New observations made with the Neil Gehrels Swift Observatory provide a “missing link” in our knowledge of black hole and star interactions.

A Sun-like star in a galaxy near ours is slowly being eaten by a relatively small black hole.

Though it’s small for a black hole, it is extremely active and devours the equivalent mass of three Earths every time the star passes close by, a press statement reveals.

Sep 7, 2023

Bubble of galaxies spanning 1 billion light-years could be a fossil of the Big Bang

Posted by in category: cosmology

The bubble itself is composed of previously identified structures that themselves have been considered some of the universe’s largest arrangements of matter. This includes several superclusters, or groups of galaxy clusters, that each contain 10 clusters and span up to 200 million light-years. At the heart of Ho’oleilana lies the Bootes supercluster and the Bootes void, which is a 330 million-light-year-wide space of nothingness.

Related: Galaxy shapes can help identify wrinkles in space caused by the Big Bang

“We were not looking for it. It is so huge that it spills to the edges of the sector of the sky that we were analyzing,” Brent Tully, study leader and an astronomer at the University of Hawaii, said in a statement. “As an enhancement in the density of galaxies, it is a much stronger feature than expected. The very large diameter of one billion light years is beyond theoretical expectations.”

Sep 7, 2023

“Reality” is constructed by your brain. Here’s what that means, and why it matters

Posted by in categories: computing, cosmology, neuroscience, space travel

Year 2020 The ecology of the human brain is so complex that it even seems like it’s own not only story within itself but also could be like a self perpetuating universe of all sorts. Even neurons resemble the universe. What I believe is that the human brain is actually like an infinite spaceship that has infinite potential not only as a computational source but as sentience that is actual sentient in itself not just a story but kinda the god in the machine like a black box of limitless potential not only a computer but much more possibly a universe that guides us and shapes us. Even when we see the ecology of the mind we see so many stories and realities able to create its own multiverse… More.


What the science of visual illusions can teach us about our polarized world.

Sep 6, 2023

Searching for dark matter with the world’s most sensitive radio

Posted by in categories: cosmology, particle physics

Since the 1960s there has been plenty of evidence to support the existence of dark matter through astrophysical and cosmological observations, and at this point we’re very confident that it exists. The question remains, though: what is dark matter actually made of?

Throughout the decades there have been many candidates for , such as weakly interacting (WIMPs), neutrinos, and primordial black holes. Candidates like WIMPs were originally theorized because they have properties that address issues in other parts of physics. Another candidate that could answer some thorny physics questions is called the .

Axions were originally theorized as a solution to a question known as the Strong CP Problem, but physicists also realized that axions could be produced in a way that would satisfy requirements for them to be dark matter. These are the particles that the DMRadio experiments search for.

Sep 6, 2023

Using an atomic clock to help find evidence of dark matter

Posted by in categories: cosmology, particle physics

A combined team of physicists from the University of Sussex and the National Physical Laboratory, both in the U.K., has been designing experiments to identify ultra-light dark matter particles. In their paper published in the open-access New Journal of Physics, the group describes how they are attempting to use the high precision of atomic clocks to detect ultra-light dark matter particle “kicks” that would lead to time variations and, in so doing, would show evidence of dark matter.

Currently, dark matter is not something that has been shown to exist—instead it is more of a placeholder that has been created to explain observations of deviations from the Standard Model of physics—like certain gravitational effects on galaxies. Since its development as a theory back in the early 1930s, physicists around the world have been developing theories and experiments to prove that it exists.

Sadly, despite a lot of time and effort, no such proof has been found. In this new effort, the team in the U.K. is working on a novel way to add credence to dark matter theories—using atomic clocks to detect ultra-light dark matter particles.