Closest Supernova in 25 Years Is a 'Cosmic Classic,' Astronomers Say

The arrow marks PTF 11kly in images taken on the Palomar 48-inch telescope over the nights of, from left to right, Aug. 22, 23 and 24.  The supernova wasn't there Aug. 22, was discovered Aug. 23, and brightened considerably by Aug. 24.
CREDIT: Peter Nugent and the Palomar Transient Factory

Astronomers have spotted the closest supernova in a generation — and in a week or so, stargazers with a good pair of binoculars might be able to see it, too.

The supernova, or exploded star, flared up Tuesday night (Aug. 23) in the Pinwheel Galaxy, just 21 million light-years from Earth. It's the closest star explosion of its type observed since 1986, and astronomers around the world are already scrambling to train their instruments on it.

"The best time to see this exploding star will be just after evening twilight in the Northern Hemisphere in a week or so," Sullivan said. "You’ll need dark skies and a good pair of binoculars, although a small telescope would be even better."

http://www.space.com/12745-closest-supernova-discovered-star-explosion.html

 

 

A Dinasour Era Mammal, the Jurassic Mother of us All?

A tiny, shrew-like creature of the dinosaur era might have been, in a sense, the mother of us all.

Named the "Jurassic mother from China" (Juramaia sinensis), the newfound fossil species is the earliest known ancestor of placental mammals—animals, such as humans, that give birth to relatively mature, live young—according to a new study.

The 160-million-year-old specimen pushes back fossil evidence for the evolutionary split between the placental and marsupial lineages by 35 million years. Although it's unclear if the creature is a direct ancestor of modern placentals, it's "either a great grand-aunt or a great grandmother," the study authors say.

Article here.

A planet made of Diamond found

This illustration shows the alien planet PSR J1719-1438, where ultra-high pressures caused carbon to crystallize in the remnant of a dead star, forming the extrasolar world. The resulting planet is made of diamond and orbits a dense pulsing star with a radius smaller than that of our sun.
CREDIT: Swinburne Astronomy Productions

A newly discovered alien planet that formed from a dead star is a real diamond in the rough.

The super-high pressure of the planet, which orbits a rapidly pulsing neutron star, has likely caused the carbon within it to crystallize into an actual diamond, a new study suggests.

The composition of the planet, which is about five times the size of Earth, is not its only outstanding feature.

Link to story:

http://www.space.com/12731-diamond-alien-planet-discovered-neutron-star.html

America's intolerence towards gays.

I tend to follow American politics closely, its a nation which affects us all because of the policies they make, especially when it comes to its powerful financial system.

What has worried me and most of the rest of the 1st world is America's religiosity gaining in power in the American political world. The republican party has been taken over by the right wing evangelical Christian movement and the repurcussions are vast considering for example the vast majority of Republicans deny global warming which will have great consequences for the US cleaning up its act; considering the amount of polution coming from our friends in America.

Today I'd like to point you to a recent article on CNN regarding advice on how to anwer your children when they ask about same sex couples. Its a thoughtful and insightful article that is attempting to help parents deal with something many Americans are uncomfortable dealing with.

What is always so fascinating to me is not the articles themselves, but the comments below; considering CNN is well known to be a liberal leaning website, it attracts a large number of conservatives who love to make their voices heard on social issues like gay marriage, abortion, welfare for the poor, global warming, etc..

Here's a sample of the comments on this article:

"Amistavia, I believe they have proven scientifically that fecal matter in a man's urethra is very unhealthy to say the least. In addition science has proven that a placenta cannot reside in a rectum. GOD's design and plan works best! Stick with it! Teach your kids the truth! GOD BLESS AMERICA - from an African American man who loves the LORD! HE has done so much for me. Love, grace and mercy are mine everyday. Thank you LORD Jesus!"

"Homophobes are disgusting and revolting. Just the mere thought of them carrying that much bigotry makes me wanna puke. It's completely unnatural and perverted for them to obsess on sexual acts all the time. I will teach my kids to scorn them for their mental illness and I will never accept them as normal. And they will burn in hell forever too."

"Teabagger? That's funny that you talk for gays while you use that term. Typical ignorant liberal! Of course it's ok for 2 men or 2 women, or a man and a dog, a woman and a horse, 2 horses, 2 women 2 sheep and an ox, 2 men and 2 goats......... "

"What has always been known as a sin and a psychological disorder is now being portrayed as normal. If it were so normal this amount of confusion would not exist from the media to the government to the Church. We were all born with a sinful nature. We have a choice whether we will live in sin or repent and turn from it. Those who promote sin as normal will be held accountable because it causes others to stumble. As a nation we continue to ignore and disobey GOD as if there are no consequences. Remember you always have a choice to do what is right and what is wrong. YOU HAVE A CHOICE!
Father forgive us as a nation in the name of Jesus, LORD, King and Savior. Amen"

http://us.cnn.com/2011/LIVING/08/23/kids.explain.samesex.parents/index.html?hpt=hp_c2&is_LR=1

A Christian serial killer in heaven. Justice?

A serial killer raped a Jewish girl, he killed her and later was caught for his horrific crime.

A jury condemned the horrible man for his crimes to death, 10 years later after all his appeals were exhausted he was put to death by lethal injection. In those 10 years, he found god, he spent those remaining years as a born again Christian who repented all of his sins and promised his love to Jesus his savior.

When he was finally put to death, he appeared at the gates to heaven, after entering he asked Jesus "I would like to speak to the girl who'm I murdered, I need to tell her just how sorry I am for my evil deed." Jesus replied, sorry but she's in hell, you cannot speak to her.

Come to God as a Child? (video)

Girl spanked to death in the name of god

Through these Godless Eyes (video)

Major breakthrough in Cancer research

The last few days have been very exciting in the biomedical research world, I’ll start by talking of the big one announced today which could have massive implications for cancer treatment and possibly finally a way to cure cancer.

“In what is being hailed as a potential cancer breakthrough, three men suffering late-stage leukemia have been cured using their own, genetically reprogrammed immune systems.

The technique transforms blood-borne T-cells into “serial killers” that hunt down and obliterate cancer cells, leaving healthy tissue unharmed, according to a pair of studies published simultaneously in two prominent journals.”

The big benefit of this treatment if successful is that you will teach the body to defend itself from cancer, if the cancer would return the t-cells would simply do their thing again and aggressively wipe it out as has been seen in these very early 3 patient trials.

It's way too early to be too excited, but what great hope this methodology has for us in the future. We can use our own body's defenses with a little help from science too reprogram them to be even better at their jobs. With the story yesterday about a new drug that could potentially kill most viruses, including the common cold; we are truly looking at a very exciting era of medical breakthroughs up ahead, and maybe much sooner than we could have dreamt was possible.

 

Time for Iceland to stop whaling?

 *a fin whale

With Pierce Brosnan's recent public condemnation of Iceland's whaling and the push to get the Obama administration to impose sanctions on Iceland (unlikely to happen;) I've had yet again to consider again why we even bother with whaling here in Iceland.

Lets try to break this issue down to a matter of cost/benefit for Iceland, and try to avoid the inevitable nationalistic anger about anyone telling us what to do with our resources. Hvalur, a single company is responsible for our whaling industry; while hunting endangered fin whales and the slightly more abundant minke whales. Icelander's do not include whale meat as a significant part of their diet, its a unique item that most of us will eat (its delicious) and yet we can certainly live without it.

This rather small industry on a nationwide scale is certainly very profitable for Hvalur, but what does this represent as matter of harm done to the image of Iceland globally, not just in business that we may lose or never get because of the passionate force behind those against whaling. What does this do to our tourism, how many people per year more would visit Iceland if not for this policy of whaling, and so forth.

The unknown costs to Iceland financially is very hard to quantify, yet we know there is a cost and I think too often those supporting whaling in Iceland do so more because they do not like outsiders telling us what to do and of course the fact that often people do not have their facts straight on how much we do actually hunt. 

As usual, I'm only giving you my perspective as a relative newcomer to my homeland. Do I have my facts wrong, am I missing something important as to why we should continue whaling and defying international agreements. I'd love to hear from anyone who has contrary ideas or can help me understand why we continue whaling, the only possible logical explanation I've heard is a dubious report suggesting we have to hunt whales to protect our fish stocks.

For selfish sake, lets end with a great little video on Blue Whales with everyone's favorite naturalist, Richard Attenborough.