Nov 2, 2015 A star with a spot out of proportion to its size. According to a recent publication, “starspots” are seen on the surface of XX Trianguli, otherwise known as HD 12545. The puzzling aspect is that there is only one spot visible and it covers almost one-third…
Oct 30, 2015 Galaxies are threaded through with filaments. The Herschel Space Observatory was launched with the largest spaceborne mirror ever constructed: 3.5 meters in diameter. Herschel was set to orbit around LaGrange point L2 in July 2009, to protect its liquid helium-cooled infrared detectors. However, Herschel’s helium coolant…
Oct 29, 2015 Rhea bears examination in light of electrical theories. Rhea is one of Saturn’s medium-sized moons, second only in size to Titan, with a mean diameter of 1528 kilometers. The entire visible surface of Rhea is covered in craters, making it a candidate for the most heavily cratered…
Oct 23, 2015 Flying through a vapor plume from an ice moon. The Cassini spacecraft is preparing to fly by Saturn’s moon Enceladus on October 28, 2015 when it will pass though the mysterious plume of gas and water vapor erupting from the moon’s south polar region. At that…
Oct 21, 2015 Ionized particles from the Sun constitute the solar wind. In an electric Universe, plasma discharges are a better model for solar activity than the consensus community likes to accept. Experiments using a positively charged sphere show that a plasma torus forms above the sphere’s circumference. Charged…
Oct 19, 2015 Pluto’s potato-shaped moon. The New Horizons space probe flew by the dwarf planet Pluto on July 14, 2015. Its images of Pluto and Charon, along with infrared and spectral analyses, will provide planetary scientists with enough data to keep them occupied for years to come. More…
Oct 16, 2015 A new scientific analysis ignores electrical activity. NASA officials recently announced that there is water on Mars. Again. The news builds upon ideas that are embedded in the foundation of Martian exploration, the search for life on other planets. As most theories state, for life to…
Oct 13, 2015 Hot gas or streams of charged particles? Complex rings, knots, and twisted streamers are often ejected from stars (and other celestial objects). The overall shape of so-called “planetary nebulae” sometimes reveal gigantic, bifurcated jets emerging from their central stars, indicating the beginnings of helical shapes. According to…
Oct 12, 2015 Stars are not constant. Attempts to locate planetary bodies in orbit around distant stars suffer from the “glare problem”: starlight tends to obscure direct observation of dim companions. A little over 18 years ago, astronomer Geoff Marcy and his team, using the 120-inch telescope at the…
Oct 9, 2015 Electric stars in an electric Universe. The Nebular Hypothesis is considered the sine qua non of consensus star-forming theory. When a star condenses out of primordial material, it is thought that the remaining clumps of dust and gas that are not absorbed swirl around, attracting more…
