Call it the big bang for bug-sized robots.
Cornell researchers combined soft microactuators with high-energy-density chemical fuel to create an insect-scale quadrupedal robot that is powered by combustion and can outrace, outlift, outflex and outleap its electric-driven competitors.
Imagine trying to tune a radio to a single station but instead encountering static noise and interfering signals from your own equipment. That is the challenge facing research teams searching for evidence of extremely rare events that could help understand the origin and nature of matter in the universe. It turns out that when you are trying to tune into some of the universe’s weakest signals, it helps to make your instruments very quiet.
Around the world, more than a dozen teams are listening for the pops and electronic sizzle that might mean they have finally tuned into the right channel. These scientists and engineers have gone to extraordinary lengths to shield their experiments from false signals created by cosmic radiation. Most such experiments are found in very inaccessible places—such as a mile underground in a nickel mine in Sudbury, Ontario, Canada, or in an abandoned gold mine in Lead, South Dakota—to shield them from naturally radioactive elements on Earth. However, one such source of fake signals comes from natural radioactivity in the very electronics that are designed to record potential signals.
In this episode, we explore how a triple-lens supernova observed by the James Webb Space Telescope could help solve the mystery of the Hubble tension, which is the discrepancy between different measurements of the expansion rate of the Universe. We also learn about the details of the supernova and the galaxy cluster that caused the gravitational lensing effect, and how JWST and other telescopes can use this supernova to test various cosmological models and parameters.
Paper Link:
https://arxiv.org/abs/2309.
Chapters:
00:00 Introduction.
01:10 How JWST Discovered a Rare and Triple-Lens Supernova.
04:13 How H0pe Can Measure the Expansion Rate in a New Way.
09:00 How hOpe can test various cosmological models.
11:26 Outro.
12:24 Enjoy.
Best Telescopes for beginners:
Celestron 70mm Travel Scope.
https://amzn.to/3jBi3yY
Celestron 114LCM Computerized Newtonian Telescope.
https://amzn.to/3VzNUgU
Celestron – StarSense Explorer LT 80AZ
The measurement of the mysterious form of matter around these quasar galaxies could have profound implications for our understanding of how the cosmos has evolved.
Astronomers say they have spotted evidence of stars fuelled by the annihilation of dark matter particles. If true, it could solve the cosmic mystery of how supermassive black holes appeared so early.
Black holes are regions in space characterized by extremely strong gravity, which prevents all matter and electromagnetic waves from escaping it. These fascinating cosmic bodies have been the focus of countless research studies, yet their intricate physical nuances are yet to be fully uncovered.
Researchers at University of California–Santa Barbara, University of Warsaw and University of Cambridge recently carried out a theoretical study focusing on a class of black holes known as extremal Kerr black holes, which are uncharged stationary black holes with a coinciding inner and outer horizon. Their paper, published in Physical Review Letters, shows that these black holes’ unique characteristics could make them ideal “amplifiers” of new, unknown physics.
“This research has its origin in a previous project started during my visit to UC Santa Barbara,” Maciej Kolanowski, one of the researchers who carried out the study, told Phys.org. “I started discussing very cold (so called, extremal) black holes with Gary Horowitz (UCSB) and Jorge Santos (at Cambridge). Soon we realized that in fact, generic extremal black holes look very different than it was previously believed.”
Knowing black holes’ speed after being kicked by gravitational waves can reveal how much energy converging black holes can release.
Astronomers say they have spotted evidence of stars fuelled by the annihilation of dark matter particles. If true, it could solve the cosmic mystery of how supermassive black holes appeared so early.
With future observations and as more time passes — both from new data and from data that’s still being analyzed and prepared by this collaboration — we may obtain the most precise and accurate measurement for the expansion rate of the Universe using the cosmic distance ladder method of all-time.
This triply-imaged supernova was not named “Supernova H0pe” in vain, as it really does give us hope that the answer to today’s greatest cosmic puzzle may indeed be written on the face of the Universe. With JWST going strong, we may have already found the galaxy cluster, and the gravitationally lensed system, that will resolve what’s been puzzling astronomers for the entirety of the 21st century.
Astronomers have, for the first time, detected radio waves from a Type Ia supernova, uncovering new clues about white dwarf.
A white dwarf star is the remnant of star that has exhausted its nuclear fuel, but it lacks the mass to become a neutron star. A typical white dwarf is only slightly bigger than Earth, yet it is 200,000 times as dense.
