Earth-sized planet found orbiting nearest star

European astronomers on Wednesday reported they had detected a planet with about the mass of Earth which orbits the closest star to the Sun.

The observation breaks new ground in the hunt for exoplanets — worlds that exist in other solar systems — although the planet itself is not “another Earth” as it is located in a scorchingly hot zone.

The planet swings close to the star Alpha Centauri B, one of a triple star system that is 4.3 light years away, which in cosmic terms is just next door to us.

The find was made thanks to a telltale wobble in the star’s motion, tugged by the gravitational pull of the passing planet.

The signal is “tiny but real,” said Xavier Dumusque of the Geneva Observatory in Switzerland. “It’s an extraordinary discovery and it has pushed our technique to the limit.”

The transiting planet makes the star move back and forth, in relation to Earth, by less than two kilometres (one mile) per hour, about the speed of a baby crawling.

The minute motion was detected using an instrument called HARPS, for high-precision spectrograph, installed on the European Southern Observatory (ESO) at La Silla, in the depths of the Atacama desert in Chile.

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http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2012/10/17/earth-sized-planet-found-orbiting-nearest-star/

Venus to Appear in Once-In-A-Lifetime Event

On 5 and 6 June this year, millions of people around the world will be able to see Venus pass across the face of the Sun in what will be a once-in-a-lifetime experience.

It will take Venus about six hours to complete its transit, appearing as a small black dot on the Sun's surface, in an event that will not happen again until 2117.

In this month's Physics World, Jay M Pasachoff, an astronomer at Williams College, Massachusetts, explores the science behind Venus's transit and gives an account of its fascinating history.

Transits of Venus occur only on the very rare occasions when Venus and Earth are in a line with the Sun. At other times Venus passes below or above the Sun because the two orbits are at a slight angle to each other. Transits occur in pairs separated by eight years, with the gap between pairs of transits alternating between 105.5 and 121.5 years -- the last transit was in 2004.

Building on the original theories of Nicolaus Copernicus from 1543, scientists were able to predict and record the transits of both Mercury and Venus in the centuries that followed.

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http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2012/05/120501085556.htm

What We Learned From The Accelerated Aging of Astronauts

Did you know that astronauts undergo vastly accelerate aging during space flights?  According to a recent review in the journal Clinical Interventions in Aging: 

“The loss of the functional capacity of the cardiovascular system with space flight is over ten times faster than the course of aging on Earth.”

It has been postulated that magnesium (Mg) deficiency may be the major contributing factor underlying these observed pathological changes. Indeed, the review pointed out that “With space flight there are significant reductions of serum Mg (P<0.0001) that have been shown in large studies of astronauts and cosmonauts.”  

Due to the fact that magnesium is an antioxidant and calcium blocker, and is also required for ATP production within the mitochondria of the heart muscle cells, it is likely that a correction of Mg deficiency would be an effective strategy to reduce space flight-associated cardiovascular decline and accelerated aging.

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http://www.greenmedinfo.com/blog/what-we-learned-accelerated-aging-astronauts?utm_source=www.GreenMedInfo.com&utm_campaign=8aabd20cbc-Greenmedinfo&utm_medium=email

NASA Finds Sea Ice Driving Arctic Air Pollutants

Drastic reductions in Arctic sea ice in the last decade may be intensifying the chemical release of bromine into the atmosphere, resulting in ground-level ozone depletion and the deposit of toxic mercury in the Arctic, according to a new NASA-led study.

The connection between changes in the Arctic Ocean's ice cover and bromine chemical processes is determined by the interaction between the salt in sea ice, frigid temperatures and sunlight. When these mix, the salty ice releases bromine into the air and starts a cascade of chemical reactions called a "bromine explosion."

These reactions rapidly create more molecules of bromine monoxide in the atmosphere. Bromine then reacts with a gaseous form of mercury, turning it into a pollutant that falls to Earth's surface.

Read More:

http://www.spacedaily.com/reports/NASA_Finds_Sea_Ice_Driving_Arctic_Air_Pollutants_999.html

NASA study solves case of Earth's 'missing energy'

Two years ago, scientists at the National Center for Atmospheric Research in Boulder, Colo., released a study claiming that inconsistencies between satellite observations of Earth’s heat and measurements of ocean heating amounted to evidence of “missing energy” in the planet’s system.

Where was it going? Or, they wondered, was something wrong with the way researchers tracked energy as it was absorbed from the sun and emitted back into space?

An international team of atmospheric scientists and oceanographers, led by Norman Loeb of NASA’s Langley Research Center in Hampton, Va., and including Graeme Stephens of NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif., set out to investigate the mystery.

They used 10 years of data — spanning 2001 to 2010 — from NASA Langley’s orbiting Clouds and the Earth’s Radiant Energy System Experiment (CERES) instruments to measure changes in the net radiation balance at the top of Earth’s atmosphere. The CERES data were then combined with estimates of the heat content of Earth’s ocean from three independent ocean-sensor sources.

Their analysis, summarized in a NASA-led study published Jan. 22 in the journal Nature Geosciences, found that the satellite and ocean measurements are, in fact, in broad agreement once observational uncertainties are factored in.

Read More:

http://www.physorg.com/news/2012-01-nasa-case-earth-energy.html

Space Daily - First ever direct measurement of the Earth's rotation

by Staff Writers, Space Daily
Munich, Germany (SPX) Dec 28, 2011

http://www.spacedaily.com/reports/First_ever_direct_measurement_of_the_Earths_rotation_999.html

The Earth wobbles. Like a spinning top touched in mid-spin, its rotational axis fluctuates in relation to space. This is partly caused by gravitation from the sun and the moon. At the same time, the Earth's rotational axis constantly changes relative to the Earth's surface. On the one hand, this is caused by variation in atmospheric pressure, ocean loading and wind.

These elements combine in an effect known as the Chandler wobble to create polar motion. Named after the scientist who discovered it, this phenomenon has a period of around 435 days. On the other hand, an event known as the "annual wobble" causes the rotational axis to move over a period of a year.

This is due to the Earth's elliptical orbit around the sun. These two effects cause the Earth's axis to migrate irregularly along a circular path with a radius of up to six meters.

Capturing these movements is crucial to create a reliable coordinate system that can feed navigation systems or project trajectory paths in space travel.

"Locating a point to the exact centimeter for global positioning is an extremely dynamic process - after all, at our latitude, we are moving at around 350 meters to the east per second," explains Prof. Karl Ulrich Schreiber who directed the project in TUM's Research Section Satellite Geodesy.

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NASA - Climate Change May Modify Half Earth's Plants

Published on Friday, December 16, 2011 by Cosmos Magazine

http://www.cosmosmagazine.com/news/5097/climate-change-may-bring-big-ecosystem-changes

PASADENA - By 2100, global climate change will modify plant communities covering almost half of Earth's land surface.

Climate change will also drive the conversion of nearly 40% of land-based ecosystems from one major ecological community type - such as forest, grassland or tundra - toward another, according to a new NASA and university computer modelling study.

"For more than 25 years, scientists have warned of the dangers of human-induced climate change," said Jon Bergengren, a scientist who led the study while a postdoctoral scholar at the California Institute of Technology in the U.S..

"Our study introduces a new view of climate change, exploring the ecological implications of a few degrees of global warming. While warnings of melting glaciers, rising sea levels and other environmental changes are illustrative and important, ultimately, it's the ecological consequences that matter most."

Climate change causes relocations

Researchers from NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) and the California Institute of Technology investigated how Earth's plant life is likely to react over the next three centuries as Earth's climate changes in response to rising levels of human-produced greenhouse gases. Study results are published in the current issue of the journal Climatic Change.

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Michael Collins - Oops! We're Doomed

http://www.opednews.com/articles/Oops-We-re-Doomed-by-Michael-Collins-111215-68.html

December 15, 2011 By Michael Collins We don't have a substantial cushion between today's climate and dangerous warming. James E. Hanson The head of NASA's Goddard Institute for Space Studies, James E. Hansen, announced the results of break through global warming research last week. The earth's temperature is rising at a much quicker pace than previously anticipated according to research by the nation's preeminent climate scientist. We have little time to reverse the trend. (Image) An example of the dangerous pace of change is emerging on Russia's Eastern Siberian Arctic Shelf. Long-frozen permafrost is beginning to melt due to global warming. This threat was identified years ago due to the potential for highly toxic releases of heat-trapping methane gas.  Recent changes are both a surprise and a cause for alarm. There is more methane gas released from the Russian cauldron "than the CH4 emissions estimate for the entire world ocean." Methane is a "far more potent GHG [greenhouse gas] than CO2" with a greater potential to cause "abrupt climate change." At the same time, researchers at the Institute for Atmospheric and Climate Science in Zurich developed a more efficient analysis of contributors to global warming. They found man-made causes can now be linked with at least 75% of global warming. Hansen's warning is brought to life by the methane gas event starting in the Arctic. We are in the danger zone. By the time we know it's too late, it won't matter. Without prompt, concerted action through readily available technologies and programs, we face increasing calamities through midcentury. After that, the displacement, destruction, and death assume unthinkable proportions. As these evidence-based warnings were issued, the military effort to seize effective control of oil and natural gas regions of the Middle East and Central Asia continued unabated. Ironically, as our rulers engage in endless military conflicts to secure access to oil, they are delivering a weapon of mass destruction, an oil-based economy that will create massive disasters and dislocations that plunge the world into chaos.

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World Net Daily - $2 trillion sunstorm coming, NASA warns - Recovery time period estimated at 10 years

World Net Daily: December 04, 2011

http://www.wnd.com/index.php?fa=PAGE.view&pageId=373629

Editor's Note: The following report is excerpted fromJoseph Farah's G2 Bulletin,the premium online newsletter published by the founder of WND.

WASHINGTON – The U.S. is becoming increasingly aware and concerned about the possibility within a few years of an electromagnetic pulse attack from an enemy's high-altitude nuclear explosion. The impact would include the loss of critical U.S. electrical infrastructure that could send the nation back into an 18th century agrarian economy, according to a report fromJoseph Farah's G2 Bulletin.

But experts have warned that such an attack could produce conditions more difficult than the 18th century due to the considerable increase in population and the total reliance by society on electricity and technology for life-sustaining factors, such as food production and delivery. Also hit would be transportation, medical and emergency services, telecommunications, and the economic and financial system.

Republican presidential candidate and former Speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives Newt Gingrich, in a nationally televised presidential debate, recently declared that the potential for an EMP attack is perhaps the most serious national security threat facing the United States today.

However, there is another threat looming that is not only possible but actually forecast, and it could fryelectronicsand knock out the transformers in the national electric grid system.

It is an expected solar storm – or what's called a solar maximum – that the U.S. National Aeronautics and Space Administration and the National Academy of Sciences have confirmed to G2Bulletin could occur sometime between 2012 and 2014.

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Karl Grossman - "Don't Do Disney..." NASA Readies Nuclear Launch

Published on Wednesday, November 9, 2011 by CommonDreams.org

http://www.commondreams.org/view/2011/11/09

by Karl Grossman

NASA intends in coming weeks to launch a rover to be deployed on Mars fueled with 10.6 pounds of plutonium. Opponents of the launch in Florida, concerned about an accident releasing deadly plutonium, such as the explosion of the rocket that’s to loft the rover, have created a Facebook page warning people not to visit Disney theme parks in Orlando during the November 25-to-December 15 launch window. “Don’t Do Disney brought to you by NASA,” the Facebook page is titled.  Other actions are planned.

Indeed, NASA’s Final Environmental Impact Statement for the Mars Science Laboratory Mission says a launch accident discharging plutonium has a 1-in-420 chance of happening and could “release material into the regional area defined…to be within…62 miles of the launch pad,” That’s an area including Orlando.

The EIS says “overall” on the mission, the likelihood of plutonium being released is just 1-in-220. This could affect a major portion of Earth in an accident which vaporizes and disperses plutonium from the rover, called Curiosity, as the Atlas 5 rocket carrying it up gains altitude.

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