Archive by date | July 2010

Carbon ‘buckyballs’ found in space for the first time

Carbon 'buckyballs'  found in space for the first time

Astronomers have serendipitously found soccer-ball shaped carbon molecules in the nebula around a distant, white-dwarf star. The molecules are the largest ones ever found in space, and are part of a third type of carbon–the other two being graphite and diamond.

Strange star tossed out of galaxy

Strange star tossed out of galaxy

Posted on behalf of Adam Mann The black hole at the center of our Milky Way galaxy likes to play peculiar games. Almost 100 million years ago, it flung a unique star away from the galactic center at nearly two million miles per hour, according to paper published online on 20 July in Astrophysical Journal Letters. The star, named HE 0437-5439, stands out of the crowd; it contains nine times the mass of our sun, is currently 200,000 light-years from the galactic core (five times the average star’s distance), and is one of only 16 stars classified as a hypervelocity  … Read more

Cuts to South African research

Posted on behalf of Linda Nordling Two prominent South African research agencies are facing budget cuts over the next three years, the country’s science minister said on 20 July – while the country’s electric car project is also facing uncertainty. In a written answer to parliament (doc), Naledi Pandor confirmed that the Council for Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR) and the National Science Foundation (NRF) will have their budgets trimmed by ZAR187 million (US$24.8m, £16.4m) over three years.  Read more

Moss releases its spores as ‘mushroom clouds’

A type of moss called ‘Sphagnum’ has a peculiar way of launching its spores so that they rise high enough in the air to be dispersed by winds. As the spores are released from the moss’ capsules—only about a centimetre above the ground—they form tiny mushroom clouds, helping them rise at least 10 cm up in the air, a study in Science finds (doi: 10.1126/science.1190179).  Read more

UK science minister quizzed: round two

The UK’s House of Commons science and technology committee had its first public outing post-election today, with a chance for new members to quiz the country’s science minister, David Willetts. Adrian Smith, in charge of science and research at the government’s department for Business, Innovation, and Skills (BIS), also fielded some queries.

Satellites measure the world’s trees

Satellites measure the world’s trees

Posted on behalf of Adam Mann Researchers have mapped a new dimension of the world’s forests: their height. The map, described in a paper in press at Geophysical Research Letters, will help estimate the total biomass in the Earth’s forests, an important component of understanding the global carbon cycle. Over the course of 7 years, Michael Lefsky of Colorado State University used three NASA satellites – ICESat, Terra, and Aqua – to create a one of a kind map of the planet. He employed a technique called LIDAR, which estimates tree height by observing how much longer it takes a  … Read more