July 2008 – astroengine.com

Channel 4 Report About LHC Safety (ft. Walter Wagner!)

The LHC is set to go online in around two months time and the scientific world waits in anticipation for the first results. However, there are a few who are more concerned than excited for the LHC experiments. On Tuesday night, I was kindly asked to join the LHC debate with the prominent LHC critic, Walter Wagner on Captain Jack’s show Paranormal Radio. To be honest, I really enjoyed the open platform provided for me to ask Walter some questions about his forthcoming lawsuit against the US partners funding CERN. Mr Wagner is far from being a fantasist or “crank” (as I’ve seen unkindly written in some of the media), but his views are more in the realms of speculation, rather than being based on the actual physics predicted to come out of the LHC.

Today, science reporter David Fuller with the UK news channel ITN contacted me to say that he had covered Walter’s story in a news item for Channel 4. He put together a very balanced report that should allay any fears that micro black holes or strangelets could be produced by this awesome experiment in the search for the Higgs boson…
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LHC Detector ATLAS Captures High Energy Atmospheric Particles

Reconstruction of a muon passing through ATLAS (CERN/LHC)

Hold on! ATLAS has already started detecting particles? Yes, indeed it has. Particle collisions don’t only happen inside particle accelerators such as the Large Hadron Collider (LHC); they happen all the time in the Earth’s atmosphere. High energy protons (or larger ions) generated by the Sun or other cosmic phenomenon (such as a supernova) bathe local space, passing through matter and colliding with atoms and molecules. Should a natural collision event occur in our atmosphere, billions of particles cascade from the point of collision, creating an “air shower.” Muons are one product of this air shower (in fact, the only natural muon production processes known are cosmic ray collisions) and some have been captured, making a fast-dash across the sensors in the recently completed A Toroidal LHC ApparatuS (ATLAS for short) detector at the LHC. It’s unexpected observations like these that really excite me, especially when we are a (possible) few weeks away from the first injection of particles into the LHC…
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Carnival of Space Week 65 – 21st Century Waves

Another week and the space bloggers have been busy! For the 65th instalment of the great Carnival of Space, Dr. Bruce Cordell is our host over at the superb blog 21st Century Waves. Once again, there’s a cosmically rich mix of stellar goodness on show. From Astroengine.com, I submitted the popular “New Exotic Particle May Explain Milky Way Gamma-Ray Phenomenon.”

So get to 21st Century Waves to read the full spectrum of CoS #65…

International Space Station Solar Transit

The International Space Station Transits the Sun (© Martin Wagner)

Sometimes the NASA Astronomy Picture of the Day (APOD) is just too hard to pass up. Yesterday’s APOD features our sunspot-less Sun with a strange shape in the lower left-hand side of the image. On closer inspection suddenly it becomes clear as to what we are looking at. It’s the International Space Station transiting the solar disk. Stunning…
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Gravitational Wave Theory Takes Another Kick in the Teeth

Northern leg of the LIGO facility on the Hanford Reservation (LIGO)

Six years and nearly 400 million dollars later, the Laser Interferometer Gravitational-Wave Observatory (LIGO) still hasn’t turned up the evidence for gravitational waves. Gravitational waves are predicted by fundamental Einstein general relativity theories, but we haven’t been able to detect them. Is it because the first generation laser interferometers are not sensitive enough? Is it because LIGO needs more time to see through the cosmic noise to root out the gravitational wave signature? This is a deeply worrying non-development for physicists as a null result means that something isn’t quite right. We are certain (in theory) that these waves should be rippling through space-time (after all, massive objects are colliding and exploding all the time throughout the Universe), but if we can’t detect the things in our own cosmic back yard, something must be awry. In a recent publication, LIGO scientists have discussed the lack of evidence for gravitational waves, but remain upbeat that they can still be found…
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Tonight: Walter Wagner Discusses His LHC Lawsuit (a.k.a. “The Doomsday Suit”) on Paranormal Radio – I Will Join the Debate!

I’ve been captivated by the commotion caused by this summer’s “switch on” of the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) at CERN near Geneva, Switzerland. Much of the last few month have been focused around a lawsuit that Walter Wagner filed in Honolulu, Hawaii four months ago.

Tonight, Walter Wagner will be talking live with Captain Jack on Paranormal Radio (WPRT Radio) to discuss his concerns for the particle accelerator. Kudos to Wagner for appearing live to defend his views on the subject. In an added twist, I’ve been invited to join in with the debate. The live show begins at 9pm Eastern Time (Wagner will be on the show starting at 10pm EST), airing over Seattle and Chicago (I think!) and transmitted over the internet.
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Breaking News: The Sun is Still Doing Nothing (Much)

The disk of the Sun as viewed by the Solar and Heliospheric Observatory (SOHO/MDI)

As you can see, the Sun is keeping quiet, devoid of sunspots. As the world awaits an increase in solar activity to celebrate the onset of a new solar cycle, our closest star keeps a blank face and keeps us guessing. This most recent image was taken today by the Solar and Heliospheric Observatory (SOHO) Michelson Doppler Imager (MDI) instrument. MDI measures plasma velocity and magnetic field strength at the top of the convection zone, so it is an invaluable sunspot detector. Sunspots are a good indicator about how active the Sun is, as when the magnetic field becomes stressed and twisted, it is forced from the convection zone, through the photosphere, chromosphere and high into the corona. These protrusions then fill with plasma and glow as coronal loops. The more magnetic activity there is, more sunspots appear. But, it would seem, the Sun remains magnetically inactive seven months since the beginning of Solar Cycle 24…
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Virgin Galactic’s WhiteKnightTwo Sees First Light

Branson and Rutan inspace Eve at the Mojave Air and Space Port (Virgin Galactic) — Branson and Rutan inspect Eve at the Mojave Air and Space Port (Virgin Galactic)

The new addition to the Virgin Galactic family has been rolled out during an early morning ceremony in the middle of the Californian Mojave Desert. Sir Richard Branson and Burt Rutan proudly showed off “Eve,” the first of two WhiteKnightTwo mother ships that will fly up to four times a day. This is a big moment for Branson and Rutan as it brings their dreams of space tourism to a new reality…
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IBEX, The Energetic Neutral Atom Hunter

The termination shock, the point at which the interstellar medium interacts with the heliosphere (NASA)

The Interstellar Boundary Explorer (IBEX) is set for launch in October and it will carry out some pretty cool science when in space. Orbiting Earth 200,000 miles away, IBEX will be on the lookout for tiny, but significant particles originating from the edge of our solar system. Why? It turns out these neutral atoms will provide information on the location and characteristics of the point at which the Solar System’s edge mixes with the tenuous gas between the stars. So how are they generated? How do we know they originate from the termination shock?
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Rolling Rock or Walking Martian?

The Mars "walker" taking a stroll across the Red Planet's surface (AboveTopSecret.com) — The Mars walker taking a stroll across the Red Planets surface (AboveTopSecret.com)

So the new X-Files movie has been released (awesome), there’s been a surge in alien stories (on YouTube, the most reputable scientific resource), NASA astronauts are citing that UFOs are actually extraterrestrials visiting Earth (of course), and now we have beings with big heads having a stroll on the Martian surface. It must be the season for it…
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