Physics and Astronomy

An international team of astronomers is announcing today that they have identified the probable surviving companion star to a titanic supernova explosion witnessed in the year 1572 by the great Danish astronomer Tycho Brahe and other astronomers of that era.

A new discovery provides the first direct evidence supporting the long-held belief that Type Ia supernovae originate in binary star systems that contain a normal star and a burned-out white dwarf star. The normal star spills m

Cornell University researchers have demonstrated for the first time a device that allows one low-powered beam of light to switch another on and off on silicon, a key component for future “photonic” microchips in which light replaces electrons.

Photonics on silicon has been suggested since the 1970s, and previous light-beam switching devices on silicon have been demonstrated, but they were excessively large (by microchip standards) or have required that the beam of light that doe

Ming Zhang’s cosmic radiation research takes first step in missions to Mars, moon base

As American space exploration fulfills promises for a new era of long-term moon colonization and a mission to Mars, the research of Florida Institute of Technology space physicist Ming Zhang will become more important to the lives of each and every astronaut. While his research on cosmic radiation has its roots in pure science, the practical applications of what he has learned about space weath

Cassini-Huygens, the joint NASA/ESA/ASI space mission has successfully made a close encounter with Saturn’s moon, Titan. This was confirmed in the early hours of this morning as the first information and pictures were beamed back via NASA’s Deep Space Network tracking station in Madrid, Spain. As anticipated, the spacecraft came within 1,200 kilometres (750 miles) of Titan’s surface.

At the time, Cassini was about 1.3 billion kilometres (826 million miles) from Earth. Numerous ima

Today the NASA/ESA/ASI Cassini-Huygens spacecraft makes a fly-by of Saturn’s largest moon Titan – the closest ever performed.

At the time of the closest approach, which is scheduled for 18:44 CEST, the spacecraft will be travelling only 1200 kilometres above the surface of the moon, almost grazing the outer atmosphere, at a speed of six kilometres per second (21 800 kilometres per hour)!

Confirmation that the fly-by was successful and that all the data were receive

Researchers at The University of Manchester and Chernogolovka, Russia have discovered the world’s first single-atom-thick fabric, which reveals the existence of a new class of materials and may lead to computers made from a single molecule. The research is to be published in Science on 22 October.

The team led by Professor Andre Geim at The University of Manchester has succeeded in extracting individual planes of carbon atoms from graphite crystals, which has resulted in the prod