Mysterious New Object Discovered in Space

space.com ^ | 04/19/10 | Charles Q. Choi

[KevinDavis]

A strange and mysterious new object in space may the brightest and long-lasting "micro-quasar" seen thus far, a miniature version of the brightest objects in the universe.

The object suddenly began pumping out radio waves last year in the relatively nearby galaxy M82, some 10 million light-years away. Its discovery was announced Tuesday.

"The new object, which appeared in May 2009, has left us scratching our heads — we've never seen anything quite like this before," said researcher Tom Muxlow, a radio astronomer at the University of Manchester's Jodrell Bank Observatory in England.

[SunkenCiv]

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[SunkenCiv]

Thanks KevinDavis, a three-list ping.

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[MHGinTN]

IIRC, a light year —as a distance measure— is how far light will travel in a year, in space. If you take light speed in a vacuum in miles per second(~186,000 miles per second), and multiply 186,000 miles by the number of seconds in a typical year (365 x 24 x 60 x 60 x 186,000) you get a number of miles light travels through space in one typical earth year.

[SuperLuminal]

"I feel the exact same way. I just don't 'get' astronomical measurements. "

I'm all right with the astronomical measurements...It's the astrological measurements used by obamao to compute the tax cuts that we should be thankful for that have me confused...

[LiberConservative]

"Since the object is 10 million light years away, doesn’t that mean it really started producing the light 10 million years ago, and we are just now seeing it?"

Yes. Wrap your head around that. That is what is SO FRACKIN' COOL about astronomy. :)

[KoRn]

"Yes. Wrap your head around that."

Yeah, I try. It makes my head hurt, because my feeble mind can't handle/comprehend such information. I've found myself increasingly interested in Astronomy during the past few months. It could be when what's going on down here sucks so bad, you find yourself looking away from the planet for relief. lol I recently purchased a good set of binoculars to look at the night sky, and I've been blow away by it. I think I'm going to invest in a nice telescope as soon as I get bored with the binoculars. I've found, there's so much more to it than just looking around.

[ForGod'sSake]

Nothing to see here. It's only algore making the rounds...

[saundby]

I’ve had a long interest in astronomy, myself. It started out as an interest in the sort of “wonders of science” thing we all get into when we’re kids, but I’ve stuck with it, in part, because it’s a great way to relax, get away from the problems on this world, and keep my sense of perspective on things.

On rainy days (like today) I make telescopes.

You might want to check out my astro-blogs. Not a lot there, but one is on picking a decent telescope, based on questions I get asked frequently and what I tell people when I run star parties.

http://buytelescope.blogspot.com/
http://astrobasics.blogspot.com/

One thing that comes up frequently at public star parties is questions about global warming. I mention that Mars and Neptune are warming, too, (those being the planets I’ve seen some data on) and wonder aloud whether that is man-made... ;)

[theDentist]

I've had a thought: Obama has no initiative, no imagination. Let's show him up:

Let's fold Space/Time according to directions for a Japanese Origami... Charging Elephant design!! 8-D

[TigersEye]

I like that. ;-)