Posts in the “science” category

Cool facts about neutron stars

These are some cool stats about neutron stars from this space.com article:

  • Neutron stars are city-size stellar objects with a mass about 1.4 times that of the sun.
  • They pack their mass inside a 12.4 mile diameter.
  • They are so dense that a single teaspoon would weigh a billion tons — assuming you somehow managed to snag a sample without being captured by the body’s strong gravitational pull.
  • On average, gravity on a neutron star is 2 billion times stronger than gravity on Earth.

Global warming in the news in 1912

Back in 1912, a little newspaper article warned people about global warming. Per Snopes, the original story was written a year before this one.

Hubble telescope uncovers black hole that shouldn’t exist

From NASA.gov: As if black holes weren't mysterious enough, astronomers using NASA's Hubble Space Telescope have found an unexpected thin disk of material furiously whirling around a supermassive black hole at the heart of the magnificent spiral galaxy NGC 3147, located 130 million light-years away.

The conundrum is that the disk shouldn't be there, based on current astronomical theories. However, the unexpected presence of a disk so close to a black hole offers a unique opportunity to test Albert Einstein's theories of relativity.

Can snakes see?

I’ve seen five rattlesnakes since I moved to Colorado, four dead and one that was quite upset with me. As I was walking yesterday I wondered, can snakes see? Here’s an answer from animals.howstuffworks.com.

LiveScience.com adds this information: “With the exception of a few species that have adapted to daytime hunting, most snakes do not see well. Generally they can see shapes but not details. Snakes called pit vipers can see well at night by an amazing trick. Their pits (one on each side of the head) sense heat (infrared light) like night vision goggles. These pits, not eyes, actually are thought to render images of prey in the snakes’ brains.”

The U.S. wind turbine database

I remember when the only wind turbines I had ever seen were the ones off of I-65 in Indiana, part of an experiment at Purdue. Now there are over 59,000 of them. I’m not sure why the southeast isn’t participating, but this U.S. wind turbine database is cool.