Lifeboat Foundation

Until now, it was thought they came from massive star collapses.

Astrophysicists around the world may be shocked to learn that long gamma-ray bursts (GRBs) do not solely come from the collapse of massive stars. A new study by astrophysicists at Northwestern University upends the long-standing belief, uncovering new evidence that at least some long GRBs can result from neutron star mergers, which were previously believed to produce only short GRBs, the university’s publication reported.

It all began in December 2021 when the team detected a 50-second-long GRB (any GRB longer than 2 seconds is considered ‘long’).

Continue reading “New information about long gamma-rays shatters astrophysicists’ theory” »

The first-of-its-kind experiment proved that gamma ray-catalyzed reactions can produce amino acids, which contributed to the origin of life on Earth.

How life arose on Earth remains one of science’s most complex mysteries. One of the many myths and hypotheses is the possibility of meteorites delivering amino acids, known as life’s building blocks, to our planet.

In a first-of-its-kind experiment, researchers have shown that amino acids might have formed in early meteorites from reactions driven by gamma rays produced inside space rocks due to the decay of radioactive elements.

Continue reading “Gamma-ray and meteorites helped life form in outer space, a study suggests” »

In this video, we’ll talk about how future humans can survive the end of the universe. We’ll cover obstacles they must survive before facing the Death of the Universe.

Read more about Strange Physics: The Universe Isn’t Expanding the Way We Thought.

Photons come in every wavelength you can imagine. But one particular quantum transition makes light at precisely 21 cm, and it’s magical.

Covering interstellar distances in a human lifetime is far from easy. Going at 1 percent of the speed of light, it would take over 400 years to reach the closest star, and we have not been able to propel any spacecraft even close to that speed. But a new method aims to get to those speeds and maybe more – and it takes inspiration from the mighty albatross.

Chemical propulsion can be very useful in achieving high speeds pretty quickly, but there’s the drawback in that you need to carry the fuel with you, which means you need to be able to generate more thrust to shift the extra fuel and so on. It’s a huge issue when it comes to rocket science. A realistic alternative is ion propulsion, used to slowly and successfully maneuver the Dawn spacecraft, but it would take an equally long time to reach enough speed with such a steady but small acceleration.

Solar sails hold a more intriguing possible approach. Proposals such as the Breakthrough Starshot see lasers used to massively accelerate a spacecraft the size of a credit card to one-fifth the speed of light. But, you need to build a very powerful laser. A similar method using sunlight might also work, although not up to such a high speed.

Amino acids have been found in meteorites, and now an experiment shows how they might have been created by chemical reactions in these space rocks.

Artemis I will be the first in a series of increasingly complex missions to build a sustained human presence at the Moon for decades to come.

The asteroid strike simulation website lets users customize material, size, and speed then witness the destruction, in the name of science.