Physics – Page 13 – astroengine.com

Saturn’s Hexagonal North Pole: What is Causing It?

Infrared observations of the north pole of Saturn as taken by the Cassini mission in 2007 and 2008 (NASA)

The mystery of Saturn’s hexagonal shape embedded in its violent north polar cyclone just became more intriguing.

NASA’s Cassini probe has been orbiting the ringed gas giant for four years and has just returned some of the most detailed images of the planet’s stormy atmosphere to date. The south pole has been mapped and the north polar region has been imaged in near-infrared wavelengths. The north pole is currently facing away from the Sun, so by observing the atmosphere in these wavelengths, Cassini scientists can see Saturn’s cloud formations silhouette against the background glow of the gas giant’s internal heat. This provides the perfect opportunity to see the hexagon in unprecedented detail.

So what is generating this mysterious six-sided shape?
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No Naked Singularity After Black Hole Collision

Black holes cannot be naked... the event horizon will always be there to cover them up...

You can manipulate a black hole as much as you like but you’ll never get rid of its event horizon, a new study suggests. This may sound a little odd, the event horizon is what makes the black hole, well… black. However, in the centre of a black hole, hidden deep inside the event horizon, is a singularity. A singularity is a mathematical consequence, it is also a point in space where the laws of physics do not apply. Mathematics also predicts that singularities can exist without an associated event horizon, but this means that we’d be able to physically see a black hole’s singularity. This theoretical entity is known as a “naked singularity” and physicists are at a loss to explain what one would look like.

Like any good physics experiment, an international team from the US, Germany, Portugal and Mexico have decided to simulate the most extreme situation possible in the aim of stripping a pair of black holes of their event horizons. They did this by constructing an energetic collision between two black holes travelling close to the speed of light, crashing head-on. Here’s what they discovered…
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Particle Zoo: The Higgs Boson For Sale

Collect them all! The Standard Model of plushie particles (© Particle Zoo & Julie Peasley)

Astroengine exclusive interview with Particle Zoo founder, Julie Peasley

The hunt for the Higgs particle may have come to grinding halt until 2009, but that doesn’t mean you can’t discover the elusive particle for yourself. In fact, it’s not just the Higgs boson that awaits discovery in the zoo of Standard Model particles. And what a zoo it is! We have protons, neutrons, the quarks that make up said hadrons; plus all the force carriers, neutrinos, photons, electrons and anti-particles. There is a delicious and varied array of subatomic particles out there, but they are too small for us to see. Wouldn’t it be interesting to know what these quanta actually look like?

It seems that Particle Zookeeper Julie Peasley has an intimate connection with the tiny “beings” that make up all known matter in the Universe. She has single-handedly set up her own business putting faces to the complex particles, giving us a unique view into the quantum world we would otherwise forget in the soup of theoretical physics equations. The Particle Zoo is a Los Angeles company, where Julie brings particles to life in her “sweatshop of one,” sewing beautifully-made plushie toys of all the Standard Model particles so we can collect them all…
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LHC “Doomsday Lawsuit” Scrapped by Sensible Hawaiian Judge

The Large Hadron Collider is now officially safe in the eyes of the law (and no, that's not because it broke down). Credit: CERN — The Large Hadron Collider is now officially safe in the eyes of the law (*and no, that's not because it broke down*). Credit: CERN

Oh no! It’s all over. The US Large Hadron Collider lawsuit filed by Walter Wagner and Luis Sancho has failed. On Friday, Hawaiian Federal Judge Helen Gillmor officially declared that the American judicial system has no jurisdiction over the largest experiment ever devised by mankind. Although Wagner and Sancho were suing the US partners in CERN, it would seem this convoluted and inaccurate attempt at proving the LHC will destroy the Earth was a bridge too far for the Honolulu court to entertain.

This decision ends the seven month battle for Wagner, following quickly behind Otto Rossler’s eleventh-hour failed attempt at the European Court of Human Rights last month to convince lawmakers that the LHC was going to turn the Earth into a dot.

So in the eyes of the law (and every other sane person on the planet), the LHC is safe and the claims about the production of micro-black holes, strangelets, monopoles, bosenovas etc. etc. are totally unfounded.

But hold on, why do I feel a little sad about all this…?
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Enigmatic Magnetar Blasts to Life Inside Our Galaxy

An artist impression of one of the most intensely magnetic phenomena in our known Universe, the magnetar (ESO/L. Calcada)

It was identified as a gamma-ray burst, resulting from a massive explosion in a distant, young galaxy. Then astronomers realised that this flaring object was much closer to home, in fact it was a gamma-ray source within the Milky Way. Astronomers detected 40 visible-light flashes, only for the source to vanish as quickly as it mysteriously appeared. So what generated this huge firework display for astronomers to originally mistaken it for a gamma-ray burst?

It seems we have an answer, and it has surprised many.

One of the rarest objects ever observed may have sprung to life in our galaxy after a long period of calm. This object is a young neutron star with a magnetic field a billion billion times stronger than the Earth’s, otherwise known as a magnetar…
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Using Cassini to Test Radioactive Decay Rate Variation

Artist impression of Cassini orbiting Saturn (NASA)

In a previous Astroengine article, I explored the possibility that the variation in radioactive decay rates may be synchronised with Earth’s orbital variations in distance from the Sun. Naturally, this would be a huge discovery, possibly questioning the fundamental law that nuclear decay rates are constant, no matter where the material is in the Universe. One of the conclusions in the original decay rate research suggested that we should attach a sample of a radioisotope onto an interplanetary mission far beyond the orbit of Earth. By doing this, the relationship between decay rates and distance from the Sun should become obvious, and terrestrial decay rate variations can be tested.

But wait a minute, let’s have a think about this. Haven’t we already sent radioactive material on board interplanetary missions? What about all that plutonium we use to power interplanetary probes like Voyager, Pioneer, Galileo or Cassini? Plutonium is pretty radioactive… isn’t it?
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Cycle 24 Sunspot Observed… At Last!

Thar she blows! Solar Cycle 24 sunspots make their first appearence since January (SOHO MDI image showing Cycle 24 polarity) — *Thar she blows!* Solar Cycle 24 sunspots make their first appearence since January (SOHO MDI image showing Cycle 24 polarity)

This day has been a long time coming. Ever since the beginning of Solar Cycle 24 back on January 4th 2008, solar physicists have been eagerly awaiting the fireworks to begin… alas, the Sun decided to take a break and stay blank for nine months, keeping any Cycle 24 sunspot activity hidden. That’s not to say there have been no sunspots. Due to a strange quirk in solar activity, the previous cycle took some time to wind down and continued to send groups of spots to the surface, occasionally unleashing some surprise flares and coronal mass ejections (CMEs).

However, it has now been confirmed that the sunspot group seen today by the Solar and Heliospheric Observatory (SOHO) and international amateur astronomers do in fact belong to Cycle 24.

Phew, I was beginning to feel a little chilly…
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Flyby Anomalies Solved?

When the Galileo probe used the Earth for a gravitational slingshot, an anomaly in its velocity was observed (NASA)

This is a captivating mystery. In 1990 and 1992 when the Jupiter probe Galileo used the Earth for gravitational assists (or “slingshots”), ground-based observers noticed a small (unexpected) boost in velocity as the spacecraft approached Earth. A boost in a few millimetres per second had also been observed in the slingshot of NASA’s NEAR probe two years previously. The same was seen in the flybys of Cassini (in 1999), MESSENGER and Rosetta (in 2005). Many explanations have been put forward – including my favourite that it could be dark matter in Earth orbit kicking our robotic explorers around – but flyby anomalies may have a more mundane explanation.

In keeping with Occam’s Razor (i.e. the simplest explanation is usually the right one), a short paper has been published suggesting that flyby anomalies can be accounted for by using conventional physics…
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“Apologies for calling it the Hay-dron Collider the other night, pure ignorance.”

Did he REALLY just say that? Brian Cox's expression says it all... (still from the BBC's Newsnight program) — Did he REALLY just say that? Brian Cox's expression says it all… (still from the BBC's Newsnight program)

It’s days like this that I worry for the future of science in the UK…

Sure, Sir David King is the former Chief Scientific Advisor for the UK government, but the opinions he voiced on last week’s BBC Newsnight airing caught my breath. If his short-sighted and ill informed ideas are indicative of the UK government’s science funding strategy, I’d suggest all UK-funded particle physicists pack up and move to Europe or the US.

In the aftermath of the LHC grand event on Wednesday, outspoken Newsnight host Jeremy Paxman was joined by King and the ever impressive Professor Brian Cox. The topic focused on how the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) will benefit mankind. As the media had been buzzing about the event for weeks, it was great to see a leading news opinion program set aside six minutes for a particle physics debate.

And what a debate it was! Let’s put it this way, Brian Cox got pretty irritated by King’s point that “brilliant people” should be attracted into other challenges to mankind, rather than focusing their attention on “navel searching” projects like the LHC. Brian’s response was awesome…
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Greek Hackers Invade LHC… Nothing Much Happens

LHC computing is some of the most advanced in the world... but it can still be hacked... (CERN) — The LHC computers are some of the most advanced in the world... but they can still be hacked... (CERN)

As the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) circulated its first beam of particles last Wednesday, there was an electronic battle being waged inside the computer systems of the Compact Muon Solenoid Experiment (CMS), one of the four LHC detectors. The detector’s monitoring systems (CMSMON) were compromised and Greek hackers were able to upload half a dozen files during September 9th and 10th forcing CMS software engineers to scour all the systems for any more hidden files as the historic LHC “switch on” happened around them. The detector’s website displayed the Greek Security Team‘s (GST) replacement, mocking the poor security of the international particle accelerator facility, CERN.

This chain of events will of course raise a few eyebrows as to how this could possibly have happened at the multi-billion pound experiment (after all, CERN was the birthplace of the World Wide Web back in 1991), but the LHC is a huge target for hackers, if there’s a flaw, someone will eventually exploit it. CERN officials have pointed out that the security breach did not affect any experiment-critical systems, but there was bound to be some worried faces at CMS last week…
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