Astronomers using NASA’s Spitzer Space Telescope have unexpectedly discovered an exotic form of carbon (Buckminsterfullerene, or C60) while looking at data collected from a planetary nebula (The beautiful shell of ejected gas from a dying star, named for the way some examples resemble planets through small telescopes).  Carbon comes in many forms of which the three most well known are diamond, graphite and amorphous carbon (what we find in coal and soot). The molecules of buckminsterfullerene are composed of 60 … Continue reading →

Gamma Ray Bursts (GRB’s) are both the most powerful explosions in the universe and the most mysterious.  About once a day, a burst of high energy radiation (including X-Ray to gamma ray wavelengths) reaches us from one of these distant explosions and nobody knows what causes them.  NASA’s Swift satellite, launched in 2004, is an orbital observatory designed specifically to detect GRB’s and report them to ground-based observatories around the world.  Because GRB’s arrive from unpredictable directions and are extremely … Continue reading →

The European Space Agency’s (ESA) Rosetta mission is only three days away from a close fly-by of the asteroid Lutetia.  At more than 100km across, the oddly shaped body is something of a mystery to astronomers as they have not been able to determine its composition and structure.  At about 15h45 UT this Saturday (Universal Time used to be called Greenwich Mean Time, back when children respected their elders, a loaf of bread cost 5 cents and the world was … Continue reading →