Universe on EARTH Magazine

Exploding source of lithium

Mon, 01 Jun 2015 09:49:59 -0400

Artist's rendering of a nova explosion in a binary star system. Credit: National Astronomical Observatory of Japan.

Trace amounts of lithium are found in all living organisms, and the soft metal is widely used in cellphones and batteries, and as a mood-stabilizing medication. But the galactic source of the element has been unclear.

Geomedia: Books: To Tiktaalik and beyond

Fri, 30 Jan 2015 13:08:18 -0500

"The Universe Within: The Deep History of the Human Body," by Neil Shubin, Vintage, 2013, 978-0307473271.

In 2008, Neil Shubin penned the terrific, “Your Inner Fish: A Journey into the 3.5-Billion-Year History of the Human Body,” in which he explored the stories of deep time as they are written in the details of our bodily architecture. As both a professor of anatomy and the paleontologist who discovered Tiktaalik, a transitional fossil between fish and amphibians, Shubin was ideally positioned to tell this tale.

The Big Turn-On

Thu, 05 Jan 2012 06:41:58 -0500

The underground tunnel of the Large Hadron Collider accelerator ring, where the proton beams are steered in a circle by magnets. CERN

Tuesday, Sept. 9, 11:30 a.m. EDT — Fourteen years in the making, the $8 billion Large Hadron Collider comes online Wednesday at last (although, when you think about it, that's not really that long to wait for a machine that may reveal some of the mysteries of the universe).

TV: Discovery Channel grows more curious

Thu, 05 Jan 2012 06:41:58 -0500

Stephen Hawking illustrates the principles of gravity in 'Curiosity.' Discovery Channel

Hawking sitting in the dining hall at the University of Cambridge. Discovery Channel

Milky Way galaxy. Discovery Channel

At first, it is difficult to distinguish the Discovery Channel’s new show “Curiosity” — in which celebrity-scientists and science-oriented celebrities each host an episode purportedly answering a big question — from the many other similar shows on television, especially on Discovery itself. The premiere episode, which aired in August and was hosted by Stephen Hawking, appears to be a rehash of that old chestnut of science television, the question of how the universe began. The first clue that you are perhaps about to see something different is the disclaimer: “This program examines the creation of the universe through the commentary and opinions of Professor Stephen Hawking.” Then the question: “Did God Create the Universe?”