Cosmic Rays News

August 25, 2016

Surprising Blazar Connection Discovered

Fifth Force of Nature? Clarifying Dark Matter

Rare Glimpse of Supercharged Radiation Belt

Quantum Theory, Einstein and Plasma Physics

Latest Headlines

updated 10:40pm EDT

The Comet That Disappeared: What Happened to Ison?

Aug. 19, 2016 — Comet ISON, a bright ball of frozen matter from the earliest days of the universe, was inbound from the Oort Cloud at the edge of the solar system and expected to pierce the ... read more

NASA's Fermi Mission Expands Its Search for Dark Matter

Aug. 12, 2016 — Dark matter, the mysterious stuff that makes up most of the material universe, continues to vex scientists, but three creative studies using NASA's Fermi Gamma-ray Space Telescope have helped whittle ... read more

'GPS in Space': Bringing Autonomous Interplanetary Travel Closer to Reality

Aug. 4, 2016 — An accurate method for spacecraft navigation takes a leap forward today as new research reveals that a spacecraft's position in space in the direction of a particular pulsar can be calculated ... read more

Physicist Trio Amplifies Research on Mysterious Forms of Matter

Aug. 2, 2016 — All material things appear to be made of elementary particles that are held together by fundamental forces. But what are their exact properties? Questions with cosmic ... read more

Chorus of Black Holes Radiates X-Rays

July 28, 2016 — The NuSTAR mission is identifying which black holes erupt with the highest-energy X-rays, report scientists. The results will ultimately help astronomers understand how the ... read more

Apollo Astronauts Experiencing Higher Rates of Cardiovascular-Related Deaths

July 28, 2016 — Members of the successful Apollo space program are experiencing higher rates of cardiovascular problems that are thought to be caused by their ... read more

White Dwarf Lashes Red Dwarf With Mystery Ray

July 27, 2016 — Astronomers have discovered a new type of exotic binary star: in the system AR Scorpii a rapidly spinning white dwarf star is powering electrons up to almost the speed of ... read more

A Famous Supermassive Black Hole 'Spied On' With the Gran Telescopio CANARIAS

July 26, 2016 — Novel observations by an international group of researchers with the CanariCam instrument on the Gran Telescopio CANARIAS ... read more

World's Most Sensitive Dark Matter Detector Completes Search

July 21, 2016 — The Large Underground Xenon (LUX) dark matter experiment, which operates beneath a mile of rock at the Sanford Underground Research Facility in the Black Hills of South ... read more

Ancient Supernovae Buffeted Earth's Biology With Radiation Dose, Researcher Says

July 11, 2016 — Ancient supernovae likely exposed biology on our planet to a long-lasting gust of cosmic radiation, which also affected the atmosphere, new research ... read more

Jupiter's Great Red Spot Is So Loud It Heats Up The Planet

Supermassive Blackhole Detector Ready for Business

Scientists Find Invisible Space Shield Protecting Earth

NASA's Atmosphere-Monitoring Satellite Will Measure CO2

Beating Heart of the Crab Nebula

July 7, 2016 — Peering deep into the core of the Crab Nebula, this close-up image reveals the beating heart of one of the most historic and intensively studied remnants of a supernova, an exploding ... read more

Astronomers Find Evidence for ‘direct Collapse’ Black Hole

July 7, 2016 — Astronomers have discovered evidence for an unusual kind of black hole born extremely early in the universe. They showed that a recently discovered unusual source of intense radiation is likely ... read more

Making Astrophysical Simulations More Accurate

July 5, 2016 — New research may result in better simulations of large astrophysical events such as supernova explosions. This work also raises hopes of finding out more about how atomic nuclei behave in neutron ... read more

NASA’s Juno and JEDI: Ready to Unlock Mysteries of Jupiter

July 1, 2016 — The JEDI is one of several instruments aboard NASA's Juno spacecraft -- set to enter Jupiter orbit on July 4 -- that will help scientists answer fundamental questions about the solar ... read more

Space Team Discovers Universe Is Self-Cleaning

June 29, 2016 — Astronomers have released a catalog of the hidden universe, which reveals the unseen sources of energy found over the last 12 billion years of cosmic ... read more

Opal Discovered in Antarctic Meteorite

June 27, 2016 — Planetary scientists have discovered pieces of opal in a meteorite found in Antarctica, a result that demonstrates that meteorites delivered water ice to asteroids early in the history of the solar ... read more

The Universe: Learning About the Future from the Distant Past

June 22, 2016 — Our universe came to life nearly 14 billion years ago in the Big Bang -- a tremendously energetic fireball from which the cosmos has been expanding ever since. Today, space is filled with hundreds of ... read more

X-Ray Echoes of a Shredded Star Provide Close-Up of 'Killer' Black Hole

June 22, 2016 — Billions of years ago in the heart of a distant galaxy, a monster black hole shredded a passing star and emitted X-rays. Now astronomers are using X-ray echoes to study a newly awakened black hole ... read more

Astronomers Find the First 'Wind Nebula' Around a Magnetar

June 21, 2016 — Astronomers have discovered a vast cloud of high-energy particles called a wind nebula around a rare ultra-magnetic neutron star, or magnetar, for the first time. The find offers a unique window into ... read more

'Space Tsunami' Causes the Third Van Allen Belt

June 20, 2016 — Earth's magnetosphere, the region of space dominated by Earth's magnetic field, protects our planet from the harsh battering of the solar wind. Like a protective shield, the magnetosphere ... read more

NASA's Juno Spacecraft to Risk Jupiter's Fireworks for Science

June 17, 2016 — On July 4, NASA will fly a solar-powered spacecraft the size of a basketball court within 2,900 miles (4,667 kilometers) of the cloud tops of our solar system's largest planet. During the ... read more

Most Distant Oxygen Ever Observed

June 16, 2016 — A team of astronomers has used the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA) to detect glowing oxygen in a distant galaxy seen just 700 million years after the Big Bang. This is the most ... read more

Life's Origins May Result from Low-Energy Electron Reactions in Space

June 14, 2016 — New findings from a systematic study demonstrate that early building blocks of life may be produced when low-energy (< 20 eV) electrons interact with cosmic (interstellar, planetary, and cometary) ... read more

The Universe Is Expanding Even Faster Than Expected

June 2, 2016 — Hubble Space Telescope astronomers have discovered that the universe is expanding 5-9% percent faster than expected. They made the discovery by refining the universe's current expansion rate to ... read more

At the Cradle of Oxygen: Brand-New Detector to Reveal the Interiors of Stars

June 2, 2016 — The most intense source of gamma radiation constructed to date will soon become operational at the ELI Nuclear Physics research facility. It will be possible to study reactions that reveal the ... read more

Elliptical Galaxies Not Formed by Merging

June 1, 2016 — Using an "intuitive" approach, a new study confirms a recent hypothesis on the formation of galaxies, according to which the larger elliptical galaxies formed in very ancient times through ... read more

Scientist Suggests Possible Link Between Primordial Black Holes and Dark Matter

May 24, 2016 — An intriguing alternative view is that dark matter is made of black holes formed during the first second of our universe's existence, known as primordial black holes. A scientist suggests that ... read more

Astrophysicists Detect Most Luminous Diffuse Gamma-Ray Emission from Arp 220

May 24, 2016 — Astronomers have detected for the first time the most luminous gamma-ray emission from the merging galaxy Arp 220 -- the nearest ultraluminous infrared galaxy to Earth reveals the hidden extreme ... read more

Astronomers Confirm Faintest Early-Universe Galaxy Ever Seen

May 23, 2016 — Scientists have detected and confirmed the faintest early-universe galaxy ever, using the W. M. Keck Observatory on the summit on Mauna Kea in Hawaii. The team detected the galaxy as it was 13 ... read more

NASA’s Van Allen Probes Reveal Long-Term Behavior of Earth’s Ring Current

May 19, 2016 — New findings have revealed that the ring current -- an electrical current carried by energetic ions that encircles our planet -- behaves in a much different way than previously ... read more

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