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Category: space – Page 30

First carbon-enhanced metal-poor stars discovered in Milky Way’s companion

Using the Baryons Oscillation Spectroscopic Survey (BOSS) spectrograph, astronomers have discovered five new carbon-enhanced metal-poor stars in the Large Magellanic Cloud (LMC). This is the first time such stars have been identified in this galaxy. The discovery was reported in a paper published January 15 on the arXiv pre-print server.

Metal-poor stars are rare objects, as only a few thousand stars with iron abundances [Fe/H] below-2.0 have been discovered to date. Expanding the still-short list of metal-poor stars is of high importance for astronomers, as such objects have the potential to improve our knowledge of the chemical evolution of the universe.

Observations show that a significant fraction of these stars exhibit a large overabundance of carbon; therefore, they are known as carbon-enhanced metal-poor (CEMP) stars.

Helical liquid crystals can flip light’s chirality under ultralow electric fields

The direction in which the electromagnetic field of circularly polarized light rotates can be easily reversed by applying a voltage, RIKEN researchers have demonstrated. This could enable a new generation of optical devices based on circularly polarized light. The work is published in two papers in the journal Advanced Materials.

Polarized sunglasses produce light that is polarized along a single direction. But some special devices can generate light with a polarization that rotates as the light propagates. Such circularly polarized light is useful for many applications, including spectroscopy, satellite communications, stereoscopy and microscopy.

For some applications, it would be useful to switch between clockwise and anticlockwise circularly polarized light. However, this handedness is locked into the molecular structure. Known as the material’s chirality, it is used to produce the circularly polarized light. And reversing that requires a lot of energy.

Astronomers Discover Strange “Inside-Out” Planetary System That Defies Cosmic Rules

A newly studied planetary system appears to break the expected order of worlds, revealing an unusual arrangement that current theories struggle to explain. “Many Vile Earthlings Munch Jam Sandwiches Under Newspapers” and “My Very Educated Mother Just Served Us Nachos” may sound like nonsense, but

US firm flies hypersonic system that captures images through plasma layer

Varda Space Industries has launched its sixth reentry capsule aboard SpaceX’s Transporter-16 mission.

The capsule launched aboard a Falcon 9 rocket from Vandenberg Space Force Base, California, at 4:02 am PT (11:02 am UTC). It carried a US government-funded hypersonic technology experiment within its interior.

The payload was designed to test a hypersonic navigation system capable of accurately identifying spacecraft position, even when communications are blocked by intense plasma sheaths during hypersonic flight.

Cosmic collision of galaxies mapped by Maunakea telescope

An astronomer at the University of Hawaiʻi at Hilo is using data from the Canada–France–Hawaiʻi Telescope (CFHT) on Maunakea to help reconstruct a slow-motion cosmic collision, one that has been unfolding for hundreds of millions of years. A new study from principal investigator R. Pierre Martin, a professor of astronomy at UH Hilo, and international researchers such as Ph.D. student Camille Poitras and colleagues at Université Laval in Québec, Canada, simulates the past, present, and future of two spiral galaxies, NGC 2207 and IC 2163.

Artemis II live updates: Crew enters high Earth orbit, NASA says they are in ‘great spirits’

Artemis II will make history, taking astronauts around the moon for the first time in more than 50 years. The four-person crew will launch from NASA’s Kennedy Space Center on Merritt Island, Florida, for a 10-day journey.

The trip will pave the way for future Artemis missions intended to eventually see astronauts set foot on the moon, and the building of a permanent lunar base.

Read more here about what you need to know regarding the Artemis II mission, including how long it will take, who the astronauts are and how to watch.

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