NASA Orion Heat Shield glows red as Spacecraft re-enters Earth Atmosphere

Entry interface confirmed. The Orion spacecraft is falling back into the atmosphere over the Pacific Ocean at an altitude of 400,000 feet.

Credit: NASA

Iceland raises its volcano aviation warning alert to RED

Iceland's authorities have raised the aviation warning code for a region close to the subglacial Bardarbunga volcano after a small fissure eruption in the area.

No volcanic ash has been detected, however, and the Civil Protection Department said all Icelandic airports remained open.

The country's meteorological agency said scientists were monitoring the eruption in the Holuhraun lava field, about three miles north of the Dyngjujoekull glacier.

"Visual observation confirms it is calm, but continuous," the weather agency said on its website.

This morning's eruption at about 0600 BST followed a smaller one in the same site on Friday that also prompted authorities to briefly raise the aviation warning code to restrict flights in the area.

Thousands of small earthquakes have rocked the region in recent days, leading to concerns that the main volcano may erupt.

The red warning code, the highest in the country's alert system - meant that no flights are allowed in an airspace area of about 40 square nautical miles north of the fissure eruption area, up to 6,000 feet (1.1 miles) from the ground.

Aviation officials said the restrictions do not affect commercial flights, which fly much higher than that.

Authorities said lava fountains of about 165ft (50m) high erupted from the fissure, estimated to be almost a mile long.

The fissure eruption appeared about 28 miles from the main Bardarbunga volcano, which lies under the vast Vatnajokull glacier that dominates the eastern corner of Iceland.

Though remote and sparsely populated, the area is popular with hikers in the summer. Officials earlier evacuated all tourists in the region after intense seismic activity there.

Although today's fissure eruption was more powerful than the one on Friday, experts say the situation is contained and is unlikely to result in the same level of aviation chaos as 2010.

NASA Hubble: Bright Red Outburst of Light

Hubble space telescope images show an expanding burst of light from a red supergiant star. 

(Image: NASA/ESA)

A University of Alberta professor has revealed the workings of a celestial event involving binary stars that results in an explosion so powerful it ranks close to supernovae in luminosity.

Astrophysicists have long debated about what happens when binary stars, two stars that orbit one another, come together in a common envelope.

When this dramatic cannibalizing event ends there are two possible outcomes; the two stars merge into a single star or an initial binary transforms into an exotic short-period one.

The event is believed to take anywhere from a dozen days to a few hundred years to complete. Either length is considered to be extremely fast in terms of celestial events.

More than a half of all stars in the universe are binary stars. Up until now, researchers had no idea what a common envelope event would look like.

U of A theoretical astrophysicist Natalia Ivanova analyzed the physics of what happens in the outer layers of a common envelope.

She found that hot and ionized material in the common envelope cools and expands and then releases energy in the form of a bright red outburst of light.

Ivanova linked these theoretically anticipated common envelope outbursts with recently discovered luminous red novae, mysterious transients that are brighter than novae and just a bit less luminous than supernovae.

Her research provided both a way to identify common envelope events and explained the luminosity generated during the common envelope event.

New Island Born in Red Sea: NASA (PHOTOS)

The yet-to-be-named island has formed in the Zubair archipelago, a collection of small islands off the west coast of Yemen, and lies between Haycock Island and Rugged Island, according to NASA.

The new island was first revealed in a photograph by NASA's Earth Observatory's satellite on Dec. 23, in which white ash plume was seen rising from the sea, indicating an eruption. 

The undersea eruption occurred in a region which is part of the Red Sea Rift, which is "where the African and Arabian tectonic plates pull apart and new ocean crust regularly forms", according to scientists.

In early January, a new satellite image revealed that the submarine eruption had risen completely above the water surface and a fragment of land surrounding the eruption was spotted, indicating the formation of a new island.

According to scientists, the landmass has now grown to about 530 by 710 meters (1,700 by 2,300 feet) in size.

"In contrast to the fragmented rock that forms when lava interacts directly with water, lava that solidifies on land is tough, so this new island is likely to stick around," the scientists added.

New satellite images, taken on Jan. 15, indicated the eruptions had stopped and the island had already formed, as a part of the Zubair archipelago, which is about 60 kilometers (40 miles) from the coast of Yemen.

The photographs released by NASA, which are reproduced below, show the formation of the new island:

The Zubair archipelago consisting of Haycock Island and Rugged Island in the Red Sea, off the west coast of Yemen, as seen on Oct. 24, 2007. Image courtesy EO-1/NASA

A volcanic eruption is see in the Red Sea in this satellite image taken on Dec. 23, 2011. Image courtesy EO-1/NASA

The satellite image, acquired Jan. 7, 2012, suggests that the eruption had risen completely above water and a land surrounding the vent had grown. Image courtesy EO-1/NASA

The new island formed on the Red Sea is seen in the image taken on Jan. 15, 2012. Image courtesy EO-1/NASA

Einstein Ring Hubble Image: Cosmic Horseshoe seems to surround Red galaxy

A fortuitous alignment of celestial mechanics has given the Hubble Space Telescope an amazing view of some distant galaxies.

Here, one interesting red galaxy is encircled by a hazy blue horseshoe shape and contains about 10 times the mass of our Milky Way galaxy.

It's actually the blue horsehoe shape that has astronomers talking about this photo.

The horseshoe is actually a distant galaxy that has been magnified and warped into a nearly complete ring by the strong gravitational pull of the massive red galaxy in the foreground.

To see such a so-called Einstein Ring required the fortunate alignment of the foreground and background galaxies, making this object’s nickname "the Cosmic Horseshoe" particularly apt, NASA says.

NASA MODIS Image: New Island forming in Red Sea

An eruption occurred in the Red Sea in December 2011. According to news reports, fishermen witnessed lava fountains reaching up to 30 meters (90 feet) tall on December 19.


The Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) on NASA’s Terra and Aqua satellites observed plumes on December 20 and December 22.

Meanwhile, the Ozone Monitoring Instrument (OMI) on NASA’s Aura satellite detected elevated levels of sulphur dioxide, further indicating an eruption.

The activity in the Red Sea included more than an eruption. By December 23, 2011, what looked like a new island appeared in the region.

The Advanced Land Imager (ALI) on NASA’s Earth Observing-1 (EO-1) satellite captured these high-resolution, natural-color images on December 23, 2011 (top), and October 24, 2007 (bottom).

The image from December 2011 shows an apparent island where there had previously been an unbroken water surface.

A thick plume rises from the island, dark near the bottom and light near the top, perhaps a mixture of volcanic ash and water vapor.

The volcanic activity occurred along the Zubair Group, a collection of small islands off the west coast of Yemen.

Running in a roughly northwest-southeast line, the islands poke above the sea surface, rising from a shield volcano. This region is part of the Red Sea Rift where the African and Arabian tectonic plates pull apart and new ocean crust regularly forms.

1. References

2. Bauwens, J. (2011, December 22). Eruption in the Zubair Archipelago, in the southern Red Sea. Accessed December 27, 2011.
3. Gass, I.G., Mallick, D.I.J., Cox, K.G. (1973). Volcanic islands of the Red Sea. Journal of the Geological Society, 129(3), 275–309.
4. Global Volcanism Program. (2011, December 20). Weekly volcanic report, 14 December–20 December 2011. Smithsonian Institution. Accessed December 27, 2011.
5. Global Volcanism Program. Zubair Group. Smithsonian Institution. Accessed December 27, 2011.
6. Klemetti, E. (2011, December 19). Potential eruption off the coast of Yemen. Eruptions. Accessed December 27, 2011.
7. U.S. Geological Survey, National Park Service. (1999, January 14). Divergent plate boundaries. Accessed December 27, 2011.
8. Volcano Discovery. (2011, December 21). Volcanic eruption in the Red Sea (Yemen) reported. Accessed December 27, 2011.

NASA Earth Observatory image created by Jesse Allen, using EO-1 ALI data provided courtesy of the NASA EO-1 team. Caption by Michon Scott.

White blood cell chasing a bacteria

New Type of Ultra-Red Galaxy Discovered

This artist's conception portrays several extremely red galaxies that lie almost 13 billion light-years from Earth. 

Discovered using the Spitzer Space Telescope, these galaxies appear to be physically associated and may be interacting. 

One galaxy shows signs of an active galactic nucleus, shown here as twin jets streaming out from a central black hole. Credit: David A. Aguilar (CfA)

In the distant reaches of the universe, almost 13 billion light-years from Earth, a strange species of galaxy lay hidden. Cloaked in dust and dimmed by the intervening distance, even the Hubble Space Telescope couldn't spy it.

It took the revealing power of NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope to uncover not one, but four remarkably red galaxies. And while astronomers can describe the members of this new "species," they can't explain what makes them so ruddy.

"We've had to go to extremes to get the models to match our observations," said Jiasheng Huang of the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics (CfA).

Spitzer succeeded where Hubble failed because Spitzer is sensitive to infrared light - light so red that it lies beyond the visible part of the spectrum. The newfound galaxies are more than 60 times brighter in the infrared than they are at the reddest colors Hubble can detect.

Galaxies can be very red for several reasons. They might be very dusty. They might contain many old, red stars. Or they might be very distant, in which case the expansion of the universe stretches their light to longer wavelengths and hence redder colors (a process known as redshifting). All three reasons seem to apply to the newfound galaxies.

All four galaxies are grouped near each other and appear to be physically associated, rather than being a chance line-up. Due to their great distance, we see them as they were only a billion years after the Big Bang - an era when the first galaxies formed.

"Hubble has shown us some of the first protogalaxies that formed, but nothing that looks like this. In a sense, these galaxies might be a 'missing link' in galactic evolution" said co-author Giovanni Fazio of the CfA.

Next, researchers hope to measure an accurate redshift for the galaxies, which will require more powerful instruments like the Large Millimeter Telescope or Atacama Large Millimeter Array. They also plan to search for more examples of this new "species" of extremely red galaxies.

"There's evidence for others in other regions of the sky. We'll analyze more Spitzer and Hubble observations to track them down," said Fazio.

Astrobiologists Discover Sweet Spots For Formation of Complex Organic Molecules

Scientists within the New York Center for Astrobiology at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute have compiled years of research to help locate areas in outer space that have extreme potential for complex organic molecule formation.

The scientists searched for methanol, a key ingredient in the synthesis of organic molecules that could lead to life.

Their results have implications for determining the origins of molecules that spark life in the cosmos.

The findings will be published in the Nov. 20 edition of The Astrophysical Journal in a paper titled "Observational constraints on methanol production in interstellar and preplanetary ices."

The work is collaboration between researchers at Rensselaer, NASA Ames Research Center, the SETI Institute, and Ohio State University.

"Methanol formation is the major chemical pathway to complex organic molecules in interstellar space," said the lead researcher of the study and director of the NASA-funded center, Douglas Whittet of Rensselaer.

If scientists can identify regions where conditions are right for rich methanol production, they will be better able to understand where and how the complex organic molecules needed to create life are formed.

In other words, follow the methanol and you may be able to follow the chemistry that leads to life.

Using powerful telescopes on Earth, scientists have observed large concentrations of simple molecules such as carbon monoxide in the clouds that give birth to new stars.

To make more complex organic molecules, hydrogen needs to enter the chemical process. The best way for this chemistry to occur is on the surfaces of tiny dust grains in space, according to Whittet.

In the right conditions, carbon monoxide on the surface of interstellar dust can react at low temperatures with hydrogen to create methanol (CH3OH).

Methanol then serves as an important steppingstone to formation of the much more complex organic molecules that are required to create life.

Scientists have known that methanol is out there, but to date there has been limited detail on where it is most readily produced.

What Whittet and his collaborators have discovered is that methanol is most abundant around a very small number of newly formed stars. Not all young stars reach such potential for organic chemistry.

In fact, the range in methanol concentration varies from negligible amounts in some regions of the interstellar medium to approximately 30 percent of the ices around a handful of newly formed stars.

They also discovered methanol for the first time in low concentrations (1 to 2 percent) in the cold clouds that will eventually give birth to new stars.

The scientists conclude in the paper that there is a "sweet spot" in the physical conditions surrounding some stars that accounts for the large discrepancy in methanol formation in the galaxy.

The complexity of the chemistry depends on how fast certain molecules reach the dust grains surrounding new stars, according to Whittet.

The rate of molecule accumulation on the particles can result in an organic boom or a literal dead end.

Resveratrol: The Chemical in Red wine that improves your heart's health

It may soon be possible to receive the heart protecting abilities of red wine without having to drink a glass every day.

This is thanks to the synthesis of chemicals derived from resveratrol, the molecule believed to give wine its protective powers. The chemicals have the potential to fight many diseases, including cancer.

Plants make a huge variety of chemicals, called polyphenols, from resveratrol to protect themselves against invaders, particularly fungi but they only make tiny amounts of each chemical, making it extremely difficult for scientists to isolate and utilise them. 

The unstable nature of resveratrol has also hindered attempts at building new compounds from the chemical itself.

Scott Snyder at Columbia University in New York and his team have found a way around this: building polyphenols from compounds that resemble, but are subtly different to, resveratrol.

These differences make the process much easier. Using these alternative starting materials, they have made dozens of natural polyphenols, including vaticanol C, which is known to kill cancer cells (Nature, DOI: 10.1038/nature10197).

"It's like a recipe book for the whole resveratrol family," says Snyder. "We've opened up a whole casket of nature's goodies."

Red Sand Storm Blacks out Sydney Australia

Above - the smiling gates of Luna Park

Below - Sydney Opera House almost disappears into the red dust cloud. A disaster for locals but a photographer's dream come true!

The Red Dust Storm as seen by passengers on aircraft approaching Sydney!