A new multimillion-rand telescope in the Karoo will offer astronomers an unprecedented view of the stars. The MeerLICHT instrument in Sutherland will be specifically linked to the MeerKAT radio telescope array near Carnarvon in the Northern Cape. Unlike its bigger brother SALT (Southern African Large Telescope), the MeerLICHT is meant …
AN ARRESTING array of photographs released by the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) on November 2 provides amazing insights into the wonders of the cosmos. Captured through the Hubble Space Telescope, the images - of events thousands of years old but reaching the Hubble only this April - are …
A team of astronomers at the Cerro Tololo Inter-American Observatory in Chile have sighted the most dis- tant supernova. The redshift (a measure of how fast the object is moving away from us) of the type In supernova is 0.478, which translated into its distance from us, is about 6 …
SCIENCE fiction teleserials like Star Trek may not be gifts of over-stretched imagination, after all. Two independent sightings of a planet around a sun-like star dispel the notion that our solar system is unique. This has freshly fuelled inquiries into the possibility of extraterrestrial life-forms. The star, 51 -Pegasus, is …
THE sun and the moon came together yet again on October 24, 1995, after I long years, in a dazzling display of cele tial reunion. Earthlings watched - awestruck and spellbound. But which the sociocultural significance of th event was well marked, scientists kel their fingers crossed over any new …
COSMOLOGY is somewhat of an oddball among the physical sciences. Experimental facts about the origin and the ultimate fate of the universe are usually scarce, making cosmology a concoction of theory, some facts and much speculation. However, the scenario has undergone a change in the recent past because of the …
QUASARS are among the most intriguing objects in the sky. Discovered in the early 1960s, these quasi-stellar bodies, as they were termed then, are the most luminous objects in the universe which appear like stars optically, but are at distances similar to the most distant galaxies. At these distances, they …
Analysis of about 90 quasars in the ongoing quasar survey at the 500 cm telescope at Mount Palomar, California, has shed some interesting light on the ages of quasars (see accompanying story). From the redshift data, it seems that most of the quasars formed and faded away in a short …
ASTROPHYSICIST Subramanyam Chandrasekhar, 83, died of a heart attack on August 21 in Chicago. Humiliated and laughed at when he presented his theory on dying stars for the first time at the Royai Astronomical Society, London, in 1935, recognition for hisepochal contribution came in the form of a Nobel Prize …
BLACK holes provide an excellent laboratory to test the theories of astrophysics and gravity. There is, however, one small hitch: it is not possible to "see" a black hole because its high gravity doesn't let light produced inside it to come out. A group of researchers has now come closest …
THE Solar System is usually thought of as the Sun and the 9 planets (with their moons) revolving around it. In this picture, the outer limit of the Solar System is obviously the orbit of the farthest planet Pluto at about 40 astronomical units (I AU is the distance from …
ONE of the most specialised and tedious jobs of an astronomer is classifying galaxies after examining them through a telescope. Now, computers are going to help the scientists in this task, which is important because specifying the type of galaxy gives vital clues about its origin and evolution (Science, Vol …
THE WORK done by a team of about 100 astronomers may provide us with the first hints of the answer to a long-standing query - what powers the starlike celestial objects called quasars? (Science, Vol 267, No 5205). Quasars appear like stars from the earth, but are as far off …
PLANETS in our solar system share a mysterious mathematical relationship. If you take the sequence 0, 3, 6, 12, add 4 to each number and divide by 10, you arrive at a ratio repeated in other systems -- the distances of particular planets from the Sun: distance of Earth from …
THE universe is bloated almost beyond measure but about 90 per cent of its bulk is invisible. Intrigued cosmologists have postulated several theories about the missing folds of mass, but so far not one has as much as poked its nose out. Now, scientists at the Los Alamos National Laboratory …
THE universe was born in 4004 BC -- so proclaimed the 18th century English Bishop James Ussher. But that was theology. The following century saw scientists "trespassing" into divine territory and challenging Biblical truths, notably the universe's birthday. The debate spilled over into this century. Only, now theologians don't figure …
AS scientists unravel more data on the crash of the comet Shoemaker-Levy 9 with Jupiter, consensus among experts on the basic aspects of the impact seems to be fast disappearing. New evidence suggests that the size of the cometary fragments, for instance, might have been much smaller than believed. Most …
WHEN was the last time you read a popular science book which made you laugh? Or which didn't treat you like a cretin and didn't make absurd, pseudo-scientific statements regarding mysterious connections between modern science and dancing masters of various kinds? Universe Down to Earth is just such a book, …
The age of the universe is an enigma that only becomes more puzzling with time. If the Big Bang theory, the raison d'etre of the universe, is to be believed, then it should be 15-20 billion years old. But 2 recent measurements, one by the earth-bound Kitt Peak telescope at …
Do you get crabby when the moon waxes? Don't be surprised: scientists at the Goa-based National Institute of Oceanography (NIO) have discovered that even crabs begin to behave differently under the influence of the moon (Indian Journal of Marine Sciences, Vol 23, No 3). During the new and full moon …
Visible celestial bodies account only for about 10 per cent of the total mass of the universe. Astronomers scouring the heavens for the remaining invisible "dark matter" may have now spotted some of it in the form of a halo in a faraway spiral galaxy (Science, Vol 265, No 5175). …
