Science News

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[size=6][b]Asteroid could collide with Earth in 2032, say Ukrainian astronomers[/b][/size]

Astronomers say the 1,345-foot (410m) rock could pass by or hit the Earth on 26 August 2032.

The asteroid was discovered moving through the Camelopardalis – or Giraffe - constellation by scientists at the Crimean Astrophysical Observatory in southern Ukraine last week.

“I was watching the Giraffe constellation, monitoring it as part of our comet search programme,” [url="http://rt.com/news/dangerous-asteroid-collide-earth-313/"]astronomer Gennady Borisov said[/url].

“The first observations show that it moves quickly and is relatively close.”

Astronomers in Italy, Spain, the UK and Russia have now confirmed the presence of the rock, and it has been added to the Minor Planet Center’s list of potentially hazardous asteroids.

If it hit the Earth, the asteroid would create an explosion equivalent to 2,500 megatons of TNT, or 50 times greater than the most powerful nuclear bomb ever used.
However, in reality the threat is minor, with astronomers putting the chance of direct impact at one in 63,000 - the likelihood being that its orbit will miss our planet by some 1.7 million kilometres.
But this did not stop Russian Deputy Prime Minister Dmitry Rogozin announcing that the asteroid would pose a “great challenge for our national space industry” on Twitter

Mr Rogozin has previously pushed for the development of anti-asteroid defence systems, [url="http://telegraph.co.uk/news/1402382/Asteroid-on-collision-path.html"]like former MP Lembit Opik in the UK.[/url]
Nasa played down the possibility of impact, with Don Yeoman, manager of the administration’s Near-Earth Object Profram Office, saying: "The current probability of no impact in 2032 [is] about 99.998 per cent.
"This is a relatively new discovery. With more observations, I fully expect we will be able to significantly reduce, or rule out entirely, any impact probability for the foreseeable future."

[size=6][b]Sleep allows brain to wash out junk[/b][/size]

Sleep hoses garbage out of the brain, a study of mice finds.
The trash, including pieces of proteins that cause Alzheimer’s disease, piles up while the rodents are awake. Sleep opens spigots that bathe the brain in fluids and wash away the potentially toxic buildup, [url="http://dx.doi.org/10.1126/science.1241224"]researchers report[/url] in the Oct. 18 [i]Science[/i].
The discovery may finally reveal why sleep seems mandatory for every animal. It may also shed new light on the causes of neurodegenerative disorders such as Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s diseases.
“It’s really an eye-opening and intriguing finding,” says Chiara Cirelli, a sleep researcher at the University of Wisconsin–Madison. The results have already led her and other sleep scientists to rethink some of their own findings.
Although sleep requirements vary from individual to individual and across species, a complete lack of it is deadly. But no one knows why. (read on sciencenews.org)

[b] Most distant galaxy lens discovered[/b]




Astronomers have discovered a galaxy about 9.4 billion light-years from Earth that is magnifying the light of an even more distant galaxy. It’s the most distant gravitational lens found to date.
A gravitational lens is made from a pair of objects in which the light from the distant one interacts with the gravity of the closer one. If the objects are perfectly aligned an observer on Earth sees the photons from the distant object as a [url="http://hubblesite.org/hubble_discoveries/science_year_in_review/pdf/2006/einstein_rings_natures_gravitational_lenses.pdf"]ring[/url].
[url="http://eprintweb.org/S/article/astro-ph/1309.2826"]Describing the discovery[/url] October 16 in [i]Astrophysical Journal Letters,[/i] the team of astronomers led by Arjen van der Wel of the Max Planck Institute for Astronomy in Heidelberg, Germany report that the lensing galaxy is relatively light, young and bursting with new stars.
These characteristics are a bit peculiar and could mean that this type of starburst galaxy is more abundant in the young universe than previously thought. If so, then astronomers could have to re-think how galaxies evolved.
[img]https://www.sciencenews.org/sites/default/files/main/blogposts/distantlensedgalaxy_free.jpg[/img]

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[b] Kepler finds first known tilted solar system[/b]


Observations show two planets circling star at a 45-degree angle.
[img]http://www.nature.com/polopoly_fs/7.13199.1382028699!/image/web-NASA.615222main_ArtistConcept_full.jpg_gen/derivatives/landscape_630/web-NASA.615222main_ArtistConcept_full.jpg[/img]
Observations from NASA's Kepler spacecraft have uncovered a 'tilted' solar system, a finding that gives clues as to how some planets come to orbit their stars on paths that are misaligned with the stars' equators, astronomers report today in [i]Science[/i][sup][url="http://www.nature.com/news/kepler-finds-first-known-tilted-solar-system-1.13976#b1"]1[/url][/sup].

The planets of Earth's Solar System formed from a flat disc of gas and dust revolving around the Sun's equator, so they all started out in nearly the same plane. Earth’s orbit makes an angle of just 7.2 degrees with the plane of the Sun’s equator.
Five years ago, however, astronomers were shocked to find planets orbiting at steep angles to their stars’ equators[sup][url="http://www.nature.com/news/kepler-finds-first-known-tilted-solar-system-1.13976#b2"]2[/url][/sup]. Some planets even went around their suns backwards — they orbit in the opposite direction to the star’s rotation[sup][url="http://www.nature.com/news/kepler-finds-first-known-tilted-solar-system-1.13976#b3"]3[/url][/sup]. But no one had seen a misaligned multiplanetary solar system until now.

Kepler-56 is a giant star that's four times larger than the Sun and emits nine times more light. To determine the star’s orientation, researchers used Kepler to study variations in its brightness, which arise from the star's vibrations and look different depending on whether the star is viewed equator-on, pole-on or somewhere in between.

The observations revealed that the plane of the star's equator tilts 45 degrees to the planets’ orbits. “It was a big surprise,” Huber says.(read @ nature news)

[b] HIV vaccine raised infection risk[/b]

[img]http://www.nature.com/polopoly_fs/7.13183.1382025322!/image/web-SPL-M0500418-HIV_viruses_red_-SPL.jpg_gen/derivatives/landscape_630/web-SPL-M0500418-HIV_viruses_red_-SPL.jpg[/img]

Evidence is mounting that an experimental vaccine to protect people against HIV increases the risk of infection, according to results presented on 10 October at the AIDS Vaccine 2013 conference in Barcelona, Spain. (Read @ nature news )

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