Physics and Astronomy
This area deals with the fundamental laws and building blocks of nature and how they interact, the properties and the behavior of matter, and research into space and time and their structures.
innovations-report provides in-depth reports and articles on subjects such as astrophysics, laser technologies, nuclear, quantum, particle and solid-state physics, nanotechnologies, planetary research and findings (Mars, Venus) and developments related to the Hubble Telescope.
Aurora participants approve preparatory phase for European Space Exploration Programme
At the last meeting of the Aurora Board of Participants, held at ESA’s Paris headquarters on Thursday 8 July, the participating states approved the Preparatory Phase of the European Space Exploration Programme (ESEP).
Revising the original Declaration, the European countries already participating, plus Canada, unanimously agreed to remodel Aurora into a broader preparatory ESEP. This is with a view to possibly increasing their subscriptions and welcoming further participants, including
Production Of High-Fidelity Entangled Photons Exceeds 1 Million Per Second
Like virtuosos tuning their violins, researchers at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign have tuned their instruments and harmonized the production of entangled photons, pushing rates to more than 1 million pairs per second.
The brighter and purer entangled states could assist researchers in applications involving quantum information processing – such as quantum computation, teleportation and cryptography – and help scientists better understand the mysterious transition from quan
Fire on the "Vomit Comet"
Tiny pellets of fuel may be safer for hazardous places on earth and burn more efficiently in weightless space and low-gravity environments
Researchers from the USC Viterbi School of Engineering say solid fuel particles may be safer for hazardous environments on earth and burn more efficiently in the microgravity of space than gaseous fuels, which are more combustible and difficult to transport.
In the Spring 2004 issue of NASA Space Research, Fokion Egolfopoulos and Charles
Using Carbon Nanotubes For Quantum Computing
The computing community for many years has longed to be able to to carry out high speed calculations using a genuine Quantum Computer because it would facilitate the practical factorisation of very large numbers and the searching of unordered lists and databases. The rapid breaking of secure codes based on prime numbers would have a lot of practical applications particularly in the banking and military field and would necessitate the development of new cryptographic and security methods to protect va
ESA Considers The Next Step In Assessing The Risk Fom Near-Earth Objects
On 9 July 2004, the Near-Earth Object Mission Advisory Panel recommended that ESA place a high priority on developing a mission to actually move an asteroid. The conclusion was based on the panel’s consideration of six near-Earth object mission studies submitted to the Agency in February 2003.
Of the six studies, three were space-based observatories for detecting NEOs and three were rendezvous missions. All addressed the growing realisation of the threat posed by Near-Earth Objects (NEOs) a
Computers probe how giant planets formed
Nearly five billion years ago, the giant gaseous planets Jupiter and Saturn formed, apparently in radically different ways.So says a scientist at the Laboratory who created exhaustive computer models based on experiments in which the element hydrogen was shocked to pressures nearly as great as those found inside the two planets.
Working with a French colleague, Didier Saumon of Material Science (X-7) created models establishing that heavy elements are concentrated in Saturn’s massive c