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05/23/2007

Caltech and Berkeley Astronomers Identify a New Class of Cosmic Explosions

Robert Tindol

Astronomers are announcing today the discovery of a new class of stellar explosions. The finding is based on observations of a flash seen in the Virgo cluster in a galaxy known as Messier 85.

04/12/2007

Astronomers Obtain Highly Detailed Image of the "Red Square" By Using Adaptive Optics of Palomar and Keck Telescopes

Astronomers today announced the arrival of a new member in the pantheon of exotically beautiful celestial objects. Christened the "Red Square" by Peter Tuthill, leader of the team, the image was compiled with data from the 200-inch Hale Telescope at Palomar Observatory, owned and operated by the California Institute of Technology, and the Keck-2 Telescope atop Mauna Kea, Hawaii.

04/06/2007

Segment of Quantum Repeater Demonstrated; May Lead to Long-Distance Quantum Communications

Physicists at the California Institute of Technology have succeeded for the first time in the distribution of "entanglement" in a way that could lead to long-distance quantum communications, scalable quantum networks, and even a quantum internet.

04/05/2007

Caltech Observatory Receives Science Education Award

Jill Perry

The Laser Interferometer Gravitational-Wave Observatory in Hanford, Washington, which was created by the California Institute of Technology and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, and funded by the National Science Foundation, has received a science education award.

04/04/2007

Astrophysicists Using Space Observatories Catch Magnetar in Gigantic Stellar Belch

Robert Tindol

When it comes to eerie astrophysical effects, the neutron stars commonly known as magnetars are hard to beat. The massive remnants of exploded stars, magnetars are the size of mountains but weigh as much as the sun, and have magnetic fields hundreds of trillions of times more powerful than the earthly field that turns our compass needles north.

04/03/2007

Twisted Flux Tubes Expel "Wrong-Way" Ions

John Avery

Physicists seeking to tame plasma have figured out yet another of its wily ways. Knowing how plasma escapes the grip of magnetic fields may help researchers design better magnetic bottles to contain it. Magnetic confinement could be a crucial technology for electric power plants that harness nuclear fusion, the powerful process fueling the sun.

03/22/2007

Negative Refraction of Visible Light Demonstrated; Could Lead to Cloaking Devices

Robert Tindol

For the first time, physicists have devised a way to make visible light travel in the opposite direction that it normally bends when passing from one material to another, like from air through water or glass. The phenomenon is known as negative refraction and could in principle be used to construct optical microscopes for imaging things as small as molecules, and even to create cloaking devices for rendering objects invisible.

03/14/2007

Kuiper-belt Object Was Broken up by Massive Impact 4.5 Billion Years Ago, Study Shows

Robert Tindol

In the outer reaches of the solar system, there is an object known as 2003 EL61 that looks like and spins like a football being drop-kicked over the proverbial goalpost of life.

02/21/2007

Astronomers Puzzled by Spectra of Transiting Planet Orbiting Nearby Star

Robert Tindol

A team of astronomers led by Carl Grillmair of the California Institute of Technology has discovered some puzzling things about a Jupiter-sized planet that passes in front of a nearby star in the constellation Vulpecula.

02/13/2007

LIGO and Virgo Join Forces In Search for Gravitational Waves

Robert Tindol

The Laser Interferometer Gravitational-Wave Observatory (LIGO) and the Virgo interferometric gravitational-wave detector of the European Gravitational Observatory (EGO) near Pisa, Italy, have agreed to join in a collaborative search for gravitational waves from sources in and far beyond our galaxy. The collaboration will link the three LIGO detectors, which are in the United States, and LIGO's partner, GEO600 in Germany, with the Virgo detector to increase the likelihood of detecting the elusive phenomenon first predicted over 90 years ago by Albert Einstein in his general theory of relativity, and pinpointing the source of the signals.

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