Today’s stories include ALMA Observatory recovering from a devastating cyberattack to Antimatter particles could cross the galaxy without being destroyed to JWST breaks Hubble’s all-time distance record, and much more.
Why scientists can’t give up the hunt for alien life–There will always be “wolf-criers” whose claims wither under scrutiny. But aliens are certainly out there, if science dares to find them, reports Big Think. “The scientific case remains extremely compelling for suspecting that life, and possibly even intelligent life, is out there somewhere. Here’s why we must keep looking.”
“Hell Planet” – How This Super-Earth Got So Scorchingly Hot, reports SciTechDaily. “55 Cnc e (nicknamed “Janssen”), orbits its star so closely that a year lasts just 18 hours, its surface is a giant lava ocean, and its interior may be chock-full of diamond.”
China Maps Out Plans to Put Astronauts on the Moon and on Mars–Chinese officials at a desert rocket base described plans for their new space station and for reusable rockets, as well as travel beyond near-Earth orbit, reports the New York Times.
Spamming Us from Space: SETI, Flying Saucers and the Galactic Internet, reports Aero.com–” How quaint to believe alien tech—or aliens themselves—would even be physical in their nature at all. Or, indeed, that they would be remotely comprehensible.”
She Turns Fluids Into ‘Black Holes’ and ‘Inflating Universes’, reports Thomas Lewton for Quanta. By using fluids to model inaccessible realms of the cosmos, Silke Weinfurtner is “looking for a deeper truth beyond one system.” But what can such experiments teach us?
It’s real! JWST breaks Hubble’s all-time distance record!–Leaving Hubble in the dust, JWST has officially seen a galaxy from just 320 million years after the Big Bang: at just 2.3% its current age, reports Big Think. “Although Hubble showed us the far reaches of the deep Universe as never before, it was fundamentally limited and couldn’t see beyond 400 million years after the Big Bang. JWST was designed, in part, to surpass those limits, but in order to know which objects are truly the earliest, most distant ones, long observations with spectra were required.”
ALMA still recovering from devastating cyberattack, reports Physics Today. “More than a month after a ransomware cyberattack on its computer systems, the Atacama Large Millimeter/Submillimeter Array (ALMA) in Chile remains offline. The unprecedented disruption is hindering the research projects of astronomers around the world and is costing the observatory about a quarter of a million dollars a day.”
NASA’s Artemis I Mission Successfully Returns from the Moon–After a 26-day journey that took it to lunar orbit and back, the uncrewed Orion spacecraft splashed down in the Pacific Ocean on Sunday afternoon, paving the way for future astronaut voyages to Earth’s satellite, reports Nadia Drake for Scientific American. “Artemis is paving the way to live and work in deep space, in a hostile environment—to invent, to create and ultimately to go on with humans to Mars,” NASA Administrator Bill Nelson told reporters nearly two weeks before the splashdown.
Mysteriously bright flash is a black hole jet pointing straight toward Earth, astronomers say–The observations could illuminate how supermassive black holes feed and grow, reports MIT.
How Star Collisions Forge the Universe’s Heaviest Elements–Scientists have new evidence about how cosmic cataclysms forge gold, platinum and other heavy members of the periodic table, reports Sanjana Curtis for Scientific American.
Astronomers Grapple with JWST’s Discovery of Early Galaxies–Researchers are convinced the James Webb Space Telescope has glimpsed an unexpected population of galaxies in the early universe. Now they’re trying to decide what this means for our understanding of the cosmos, reports Jonathan O’Callaghan for Scientific American.
Antimatter particles could cross the galaxy without being destroyed--Experiments at CERN’s particle collider suggest that antihelium particles created by dark matter in distant space could make it to Earth, reports New Scientist.
NASA may unlock future James Webb Space Telescope data, reports Meghan Bartels for Space.com. “It’s a hot competition to snag time using the observatory, and the winners are rewarded with both the observations and a one-year head start on analyzing them under the current system. But NASA is considering changing that policy and opening fresh data from the $10 billion observatory to the world at large, and scientists are divided.”
Antimatter particles could cross the galaxy without being destroyed--Experiments at CERN’s particle collider suggest that antihelium particles created by dark matter in distant space could make it to Earth, reports New Scientist.
Why Some Scientists Choose China’s Space Station for Research--A project led by researchers from a Swiss university highlights China’s ambition to make the Tiangong outpost broadly available for science, reports Kenneth Chang for the New York Times.
There is no “breakthrough”: NIF fusion power still consumes 150 times more energy than it creates--If you gave me $400 and I gave you $2.50, would you consider yourself wealthier? That’s a financial analogy for the supposed fusion power “breakthrough,” reports Tom Hartsfield for Big Think.
The ten top weird science stories –Science delivered a lot in 2022, including wry smiles, chuckles and disbelief, reports Cosmos.
Curated by The Daily Galaxy Editorial Staff
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