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Black holes are famous for their muscle: an intense gravitational pull known to gobble up entire stars and launch streams of matter into space at almost the speed of light. It turns out the reality may not live up to the hype. In a paper published today in the journal Science, University of Florida scientists have discovered these tears in the fabric of the universe have significantly weaker magnetic fields than previously thought. A 40-mile-wide black hole 8,000 light years from Earth named V404 Cygni yielded the first precise measurements of the magnetic field that surrounds the deepest wells of...

At first blush, Frank Klein is another distinguished veteran in a military town full of them. But the 96-year-old retired U.S. Air Force colonel can also lay claim to a special footnote in history. In addition to being a decorated officer and skilled navigator, he’s the man who helped redefine where north was. The Wauwatosa, Wisconsin, native’s journey to his footnote was a circuitous one. Following high school, he had a mind to go into acting and actually moved to New York City. For a year he had a role on a weekly CBS radio program, where he would rub...

Why should be we worried about a polarity flip? The magnetic field protects us from harmful solar radiations and cosmic rays. If these start fading away, it may affect every living creature on Earth. An increase in radiation exposure may not only lead to serious health outcomes, but also some genetic disorders could occur. Some biologists even fear that direct exposure to harmful solar radiations may result in mass extinctions. Not only could some severe health consequence fallow the weakening of magnetic field. In a less concerning outcome, but still very worrisome it could lead to a severe disturbance in...

There have been many estimates for when the earth's inner core was formed, but scientists from the University of Liverpool have used new data which indicates that the Earth's inner core was formed 1 -- 1.5 billion years ago as it "froze" from the surrounding molten iron outer core. . . . . In a new study published in Nature, researchers from the University's School of Environmental Sciences analysed magnetic records from ancient igneous rocks and found that there was a sharp increase in the strength of the Earth's magnetic field between 1 and 1.5 billion years ago. This increased...

A new class of magnets that expand their volume when placed in a magnetic field and generate negligible amounts of wasteful heat during energy harvesting, has been discovered by researchers at Temple University and the University of Maryland. The researchers, Harsh Deep Chopra, professor and chair of mechanical engineering at Temple, and Manfred Wuttig, professor of materials science and engineering at Maryland, published their findings, "Non-Joulian Magnetostriction," in the May 21st issue of the journal, Nature. This transformative breakthrough has the potential to not only displace existing technologies but create altogether new applications due to the unusual combination of magnetic...

A new class of magnets discovered that swell in volume and generate little heat when placed in a magnetic field could be used to harvest or convert energy efficiently. Applications range from sensors and actuators for automobiles to biomedical devices, besides defence applications. Discovered by scientists at the University of Maryland (UMD) and Temple University, the new magnets made from abundant metal alloys could replace the expensive, rare-earth magnets which exhibit poor mechanical properties. Maryland professor of materials science and engineering Manfred Wuttig, and Harsh Deep Chopra, professor and chair of mechanical engineering at Temple heated certain iron-based alloys (iron-gallium,...

New understanding of electromagnetism could enable 'antennas on a chip' Apr 08, 2015 Enlarge Anechoic chamber. Credit: University of Cambridge A team of researchers from the University of Cambridge have unravelled one of the mysteries of electromagnetism, which could enable the design of antennas small enough to be integrated into an electronic chip. These ultra-small antennas - the so-called 'last frontier' of semiconductor design - would be a massive leap forward for wireless communications. In new results published in the journal Physical Review Letters, the researchers have proposed that electromagnetic waves are generated not only from the acceleration of electrons,...

Ice Age Magnetic Reversal Was Global Event And Linked With Super Volcano Eruption And Rapid Climate Variability, Says New Research October 17, 2012 in Geology & Climate During the last ice age, around 41,000 years ago, there was a very rapid and complete reversal of the Earth’s geomagnetic field, according to new research. There was already localized evidence of polarity reversals during this time, but with the new research, the theory that it was a global event is now strongly supported. And very interestingly, it is one that nearly coincided with the very fast, short-term climate variability of the last...

An experiment conducted has revealed an unlikely behavior in a class of materials called frustrated magnets, addressing a long-debated question about the nature of these discontented quantum materials. The researchers tested the frustrated magnets -- so-named because they should be magnetic at low temperatures but aren't -- to see if they exhibit a behavior called the Hall Effect. When a magnetic field is applied to an electric current flowing in a conductor such as a copper ribbon, the current deflects to one side of the ribbon. This deflection, first observed in 1879 by E.H. Hall, is used today in sensors...

“Magnetic reconnection is one of the most important drivers of space weather events,” said Jeff Newmark, interim director of the Heliophysics Division at NASA Headquarters in Washington. “Eruptive solar flares, coronal mass ejections, and geomagnetic storms all involve the release, through reconnection, of energy stored in magnetic fields. Space weather events can affect modern technological systems such as communications networks, GPS navigation, and electrical power grids.” The four MMS have been stacked on top of one another like pancakes, encapsulated in the payload fairing, transported to the launch pad, hoisted and mated to the top of the 195-foot-tall rocket.

The aurora is more than just a breathtaking display of light. It may also hold the secret of a magnetic phenomenon related to the nuclear fusion powering the sun. This secret could even help create nuclear fusion in the lab, says a team of researchers. Nuclear fusion is a reaction that combines the nuclei of two atoms into one. The process powers stars, but getting a self-sustained fusion reaction going on Earth is very difficult, and has so far eluded scientists. For example, in February, researchers at the Lawrence Livermore Laboratory in California made headlines when they managed to spur...

Our North loses the Pole After centuries in Canada, the roaming magnetic North Pole has crossed into international waters, en route to Siberia CanWest News Service Thursday, June 09, 2005 YELLOWKNIFE, N.W.T. - Sometime in the last year, a longtime friend turned its back on Canada and was last spotted heading for Siberia.For centuries, the magnetic North Pole was ours, a constant companion that wandered the rolling tundra and frozen seas of our Arctic.But no more.A Canadian scientist who recently returned from a trip to measure the Pole's current location says it has now left Canadian territory and crossed into...

Searching for a pot of gold? Try the center of the Earth. More than 99 percent of Earth's gold is missing—it all sank to the center of the planet billions of years ago. In fact, says geologist Bernard Wood of Macquarie University in Australia, there's enough gold in Earth's core to coat its surface in 1.5 feet of the stuff. How did it get there? Earth formed from a series of smaller planetesimals that crashed together over the course of 30 million to 40 million years. Wood deduced how much gold ought to be present in Earth's crust by comparing...

NASA has been warning about it…scientific papers have been written about it…geologists have seen its traces in rock strata and ice core samples... Now "it" is here: an unstoppable magnetic pole shift that has sped up and is causing life-threatening havoc with the world's weather. Forget about global warming—man-made or natural—what drives planetary weather patterns is the climate and what drives the climate is the sun's magnetosphere and its electromagnetic interaction with a planet's own magnetic field. When the field shifts, when it fluctuates, when it goes into flux and begins to become unstable anything can happen. And what normally...

Source:   University Of Missouri-Rolla (http://www.umr.edu) Date:   Posted 7/17/2002 The Sun: A Great Ball Of Iron? For years, scientists have assumed that the sun is an enormous mass of hydrogen. But in a paper presented before the American Astronomical Society, Dr. Oliver Manuel, a professor of nuclear chemistry at UMR, says iron, not hydrogen, is the sun's most abundant element. Manuel claims that hydrogen fusion creates some of the sun's heat, as hydrogen -- the lightest of all elements -- moves to the sun's surface. But most of the heat comes from the core of an exploded supernova...

Primordial NukesThe 2-billion-year-old tale of Earth's natural nuclear reactors Peter Weiss For more than a decade, Alexander P. Meshik has kept close tabs on a fleck of black rock no larger than an infant's fingernail. It's so unassuming that most people would sweep it into a dustpan without a second thought. Yet to Meshik, a nuclear physicist originally from Russia, this little scrap of mineral is a scientific gem. E. Roell The fleck, with its clues to believe-it-or-not geophysical events, emerged from the bowels of Earth decades ago. It was unearthed in the early 1970s at the Oklo uranium mine...

What may be a new outermost layer of the Earth's core has been found, geoscientists have revealed. This discovery could help solve mysteries of the planet's magnetic field, researchers say. The Earth's core is composed mainly of iron, divided into a solid inner center roughly 1,500 miles (2,440 kilometers) wide covered by a liquid outer layer about 1,400 miles (2,250 km) thick. Even though the bulk of the core is iron, researchers also knew it contained a small amount of lighter elements such as oxygen and sulfur. As the inner core crystallized over time, scientists think this process forced out...

A new method of capturing detailed, three-dimensional images of minute samples of material under extreme pressures is shedding light on the evolution of the Earth's interior. Early results suggest that the early Earth did not have to be entirely molten to separate into the rocky crust and iron-rich core it has today. Researchers at Stanford University and SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory are leading the group pioneering the technique, which could lead to a wide range of new experiments.To answer the big questions, it often helps to look at the smallest details. That is the approach Stanford mineral physicist Wendy Mao...

The collapse of the Earth's magnetic field, which both guards the planet and guides many of its creatures, appears to have started in earnest about 150 years ago. The field's strength has waned 10 to 15 percent, and the deterioration has accelerated of late, increasing debate over whether it portends a reversal of the lines of magnetic force that normally envelop the Earth. During a reversal, the main field weakens, almost vanishes, then reappears with opposite polarity. Afterward, compass needles that normally point north would point south, and during the thousands of years of transition, much in the heavens and...

Earthquakes and Tsunamis are triggered by Star-quakes – the invisible interconnection between different parts of the Universe The position of SGR1806-20 in a radio image of the sky - 50,000 light-years away Staff Reporter Mar. 7, 2005 Computer models are showing an interesting relationship between star-quakes and earthquakes. Supernova, star-quakes and similar burst of energy in the Universe triggers earthquakes and tsunamis. According to researchers, most of the large earthquakes and Tsunamis happened when there was a burst of energy somewhere in the cosmos. According to BBC, Astronomers say they have been stunned by the amount of energy released in...