Lifeboat Foundation

Astronomers have used NASA’s Chandra X-ray Observatory to record material blasting away from the site of an exploded star at speeds faster than 20 million miles per hour. This is about 25,000 times faster than the speed of sound on Earth.

Kepler’s supernova remnant is the debris from a detonated star that is located about 20,000 light years away from Earth in our Milky Way galaxy. In 1604 early astronomers, including Johannes Kepler who became the object’s namesake, saw the supernova explosion that destroyed the star.

Continue reading “Kepler’s supernova remnant: Debris from stellar explosion not slowed after 400 years” »

Circa 2012

Back in 1871, James Clerk Maxwell predicted that light exerts a force on any surface it hits. This radiation pressure was experimentally discovered some 30 years later and has since emerged as a hugely important force that is now exploited in systems such as solar sails and laser cooling.

Today, John Zhang and buddies at the University of Southampton in the UK go one better. These guys predict that a far more powerful optical force can exist between a metal or dielectric plate and a metamaterial, a substance with optical properties that have been engineered to control light in specific ways.

Continue reading “Metamaterials Generate Gecko-Like Adhesive Force” »

Circa 2016

A super-hard metal has been made in the laboratory by melting together titanium and gold.

The alloy is the hardest known metallic substance compatible with living tissues, say US physicists.

Continue reading “Scientists create new super-hard metal” »

Circa 2016

By using heat and temperature to modify the orientation of atoms, scientists have created a spongy, ultrastrong material that is lighter than a zip-close bag.

Technology that can convert salty seawater or brackish water into safe, clean drinking water has the potential to transform millions of lives across the globe, which is why so many scientists are busy working on projects to do just that.

Now, a new innovation developed by scientists in Australia could be the most promising one yet, with researchers using metal-organic framework compounds (or MOFs) together with sunlight to purify water in just half an hour, using a process that’s more efficient than existing techniques.

It’s cheap, it’s stable, it’s reusable, and it produces water that meets the World Health Organisation (WHO) standards for desalination. Around 139.5 litres (nearly 37 gallons) of clean water can be produced per day from a kilogram (2.2 pounds) of MOF material, based on early testing.

Hubble Finds That Betelgeuse’s Mysterious Dimming Is Due to a Traumatic Outburst

Observations by NASA ’s Hubble Space Telescope are showing that the unexpected dimming of the supergiant star Betelgeuse was most likely caused by an immense amount of hot material ejected into space, forming a dust cloud that blocked starlight coming from Betelgeuse’s surface.

Hubble researchers suggest that the dust cloud formed when superhot plasma unleashed from an upwelling of a large convection cell on the star’s surface passed through the hot atmosphere to the colder outer layers, where it cooled and formed dust grains. The resulting dust cloud blocked light from about a quarter of the star’s surface, beginning in late 2019. By April 2020, the star returned to normal brightness.

Novel two-dimensional materials are currently a hot research topic around the world. Of special interest are van der Waals heterostructures, which are made up of individual layers of different materials held together by van der Waals forces. The interactions between the different layers can give the resulting material entirely new properties.

Double layer unlocks crucial properties

There are already van der Waals heterostructures that absorb up to 100 percent of light. Single-layers of molybdenum disulfide offer absorption capacities in this range. When light is absorbed, an electron vacates its original position in the valence band, leaving behind a positively charged hole. The electron moves to a higher energy level, known as the conduction band, where it can move freely.

MEDAN, Indonesia — Indonesia’s rumbling Mount Sinabung erupted Monday, sending a column of volcanic materials as high as 16,400 feet into the sky and depositing ash on villages.

It is the second eruption since Saturday after the volcano sat dormant for more than a year.

Falling grit and ash accumulated up to 2 inches in already abandoned villages on the volcano’s slopes, said Armen Putra, an official at the Sinabung monitoring post on Sumatra Island.

Imagine plugging in to your brick house.

Red bricks—some of the world’s cheapest and most familiar building materials—can be converted into energy storage units that can be charged to hold electricity, like a battery, according to new research from Washington University in St. Louis.

Continue reading “Storing energy in red bricks” »