Tuesday 18 November 2014

What can we learn from measuring the temperature of space?

Maynooth University

On a clear night, when we gaze at the skies we can look back in time.



With an optical telescope, or sometimes even with just the naked eye, we see the pinpoints of light that we call stars.



What is actually meeting our eyes is energy in the visible wavelength that has travelled across space (and time) from that star or planet to us. 
But what about the wavelengths that we can’t see? That ‘invisible’ energy can also tell us much about the universe and its history, if we know how to look at it. Scientists at Maynooth University ’s Department of Experimental Physics know how to look at it, and their research is helping to cast the universe in a new light.

Thursday 13 November 2014

Rosetta’s Philae probe lands on comet

Touchdown! Rosetta’s Philae probe lands on comet



ESA’s Rosetta mission has soft-landed its Philae probe on a comet, the first time in history that such an extraordinary feat has been achieved.

After a tense wait during the seven-hour descent to the surface of Comet 67P/Churyumov–Gerasimenko, the signal confirming the successful touchdown arrived on Earth at 16:03 GMT (17:03 CET).

The confirmation was relayed via the Rosetta orbiter to Earth and picked up simultaneously by ESA’s ground station in Malargüe, Argentina and NASA’s station in Madrid, Spain. The signal was immediately confirmed at ESA’s Space Operations Centre, ESOC, in Darmstadt, and DLR’s Lander Control Centre in Cologne, both in Germany.

Tuesday 11 November 2014

Birth of planet captured by Chilean telescope

Birth of planet captured by Chilean telescope

 Some of the most detailed images ever taken of new planets being born around a star have been published, which astronomers said could transform theories about planet formation.

High in the Chilean desert, the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillmeter Array, or Alma, observed the planet-forming disc around the young HL Tauri star, producing the sharpest pictures ever made at submillimeter wavelengths. The pictures show clear concentric rings in the dust left over from the formation of the star, the gaps indicating that planets are already forming, sweeping a path through the material.

Thursday 6 November 2014

Science Week Events 2014 Maynooth University from Monday the 10th Nov

Science Week



 There are a number of excellent events during the week including on  Thursday 13th November JH2 7.00 - 8.00  Prof. John Sweeney, Maynooth University discusses:


CLIMATE CHANGE AND IRELAND: BRIDGING THE GAP FROM SCIENCE TO POLICY

Professor John Sweeney, Emeritus Professor at Maynooth University, will discuss the role of greenhouse gas emissions in shaping present and future global climate. He will look at the impact that climate change is likely to have on a mid latitude country such as Ireland, considering various sectors such as water, biodiversity, agriculture and construction. He will examine how adaptation to the inevitable can best be achieved, and how mitigation of the worst excesses of future scenarios should be tackled.

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