89 results found.
... Science Frontiers ONLINE No. 93: May-Jun 1994 Issue Contents Other pages Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues This Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects From Dust Unto Dust This Biblical assertion may be right on the mark, but in a sense that is slightly different from what is usually meant. The "first" dust may not have been terrestrial dust but interplanetary dust. Let us commence with long-winged U2s cruising at 20 kilometers altitude or more. Collectors coated with silicone oil are deployed. To them stick tiny bits of interplanetary and interstellar debris that have been caught by earth's gravity and are slowly drifting downward in the atmospshere. Some of these micron-sized particles come from asteroid collisions; others from the disintegration of comets. This rain of cosmic matter is not negligible; the earth harvests about 40,000 tons annually from the fertile fields of outer space. "Fertile?" Yes, outer space is a vast biochemical retort. D. Brownlee, R. Walker, and others: ". .. suggest that interplanetary dust has probably carried organic matter to Earth since the early aeons of the solar system. The complexity of the organic molecules found on these particles has fueled the imaginations of many who ponder the role extraterrestrial matter may have played in the prebiological evolution of organic material on the primordial Earth." Beyond these conjectures, several other things about interplanetary dust particles bother scientists: "' What is surprising,' Walker notes, 'and still not understood, is the fact that the organic molecules we see in the dust particles are ...
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... Science Frontiers ONLINE No. 44: Mar-Apr 1986 Issue Contents Other pages Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues This Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects Of Dust Clouds And Ice Ages Ice cores from the polar ice at Camp Century, in Greenland, have been analyzed for the presence of cosmic dust. "It is concluded that on five occasions during the interval 20,000-14,000 years BP, cosmic dust mass concentrations in the solar system rose by one and two orders of magnitude above present day levels. Moreover if the particles found in these ice core samples are indicative of the particle size distribution which prevailed in the interplanetary medium at that time, then it may be concluded that the space number density of submicron sized particles must have uncreased by a factor of 105 or more. During these times the light transmission properties of the solar system would have been significantly altered resulting in major adverse effects to the earth's climate. Thus it is quite possible that these dust congestion episodes were responsible for the abrupt climatic variations which occurred toward the end of the last Ice Age." Whence these interplanetary dust clouds? The author of this article ruled out terrestrial volcanism (an insufficient source of iridium) and encounters with asteroids and cometary tails (too infrequent to account for the long periods of high dust levels). Rather, the dust source may have been the same event that created the recently discovered dust ring between Mars and Jupiter, which is believed to be only a few tens of thousands of years old. The nature of the "event" is not ...
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... Science Frontiers ONLINE No. 96: Nov-Dec 1994 Issue Contents Other pages Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues This Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects The 536 ad dust-veil event Circa 536 AD, our planet suffered a great geophysical calamity, as proved in tree-ring measurements and human records of the period. Until astronomical catastrophism became more fashionable in recent years, the so-called "dust-veil" event of 536 AD was blamed on a huge volcanic eruption. Work by M.G .L . Baillie now casts doubt upon interpretation. "Now tree-ring data, published by Professor Mike Baillie of Queens University of Belfast, has brought catastrophes almost into modern times. The tree rings show that in the mid 530s -- just about the time civilisation on Earth suffered a sharp setback -- there was a sudden decline in the rate of tree growth which lasted about 15 years. Clearly, something dramatic had happened. "There are two possibilities: a huge volcanic eruption or a collision between the Earth and a solid object: an asteroid or comet. Ice-cores drilled from Greenland show no evidence of large-scale volcanic activity at that time, so Professor Baillie and others now believe a cosmic impact is more likely. The result would have been to throw up a huge veil of dust and debris, cooling the Earth and producing widespread crop failures." (Anonymous; "Raining Death and Dark Ages," London Times, July 27, 1994. Cr. A. Rothovius) In the scientific literature, Baillie has elaborated ...
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... Science Frontiers ONLINE No. 38: Mar-Apr 1985 Issue Contents Other pages Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues This Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects Young Interplanetary Dust Here follows an abstract of an article that appeared in Science: "Nuclear tracks have been identified in interplanetary dust particles (IDP's ) collected from the stratosphere. The presence of tracks unambiguously confirms the extraterrestrial nature of IDP's , and the high track densities (1010 to 1011 per square centimeter) suggest an exposure age of approximately 104 years within the inner solar system." (Bradley, J.P ., et al; "Discovery of Nuclear Tracks in Interplanetary Dust," Science, 226:1432, 1984.) Comment. Where does this young dust come from? The Poynting-Robertson drag is supposed to sweep the inner solar system clear of dust fairly quickly. If comets supply a steady stream of dust, the particles should display a wide range of exposure ages. Apparent path of star SAO 186001 behind Neptune. The star's light was reduced at the black circle. From Science Frontiers #38, MAR-APR 1985 . 1985-2000 William R. Corliss ...
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... Science Frontiers ONLINE No. 39: May-Jun 1985 Issue Contents Other pages Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues This Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects Recipe For Dust Devils R.H . Swinn, formerly Chief Instructor for the Egyptian Gliding School, has had much practical experience with those fascinating little (sometimes not so little) swirls of hot air called "dust devils." Under the broiling Egyptian sun, dust devils launched themselves naturally every few minutes from a tented camp near the airfield where Swinn taught. Curiously, the devils often were born in pairs; a big one followed by a modest little chap following behind by 100-150 yards. The devils ranged from just a foot or so in diameter to 500 yards and more. The giants were majestic masses of swirling sand that moved along at leisurely paces. These appeared harmless enough, but stepping through the outer wall into the vortex sucked the air out of the lungs. "Outside our hangar there is a large stretch of wind-sheltered concrete which becomes intensely hot. In this area, close to the foot of the hangar, one can start up one's own little devils on occasions by a quick sweep of a signalling bat (which is shaped like a large ping-pong bat) from shoulder level in circular and downwards direction to a point almost touching the ground; one must step rapidly back or the vortex that is set up is spoilt. Such a miniature thermal starts about a foot in diameter and quickly assumes a conical shape about two feet high, moving along the ground at a ...
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... Science Frontiers ONLINE No. 86: Mar-Apr 1993 Issue Contents Other pages Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues This Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects Meteoric "dust bunnies"All around the world, watching through the long nights, is a band of dedicated meteor observers -- mainly amateur astroomers. Collectively, they record many meteor showers and fireballs; all quite respectable astronomical objects. But sometimes fuzzy, rapidly moving luminosities appear, as in the following paragraph written by J.S . Gallagher: "Diffuse luminous objects moving at angular velocities similar to those of meteors were observed during over 200 hours of meteor watching in 1991. They fell in three broad categories: arcs, patches, and 'meteors' similar in appearance to comet comas. Though I at first dismissed the possibility of their being related to meteors, I reconsidered this relation after eliminating other possible causes such as reflections from aircraft lights and tricks of vision. Their meteor-like behavior suggested that perhaps these events might be caused by clouds of exceedingly small meteoroids, visible only because of their numbers and compact grouping. Because such a formation would be unlikely to be maintained long in space, it appeared necessary that the particles involved must have maintained some weak physical contact until just prior to becoming visible. Perhaps some type of 'cosmic dust bunny,' disrupted by air resistance, might be the cause of these events." These moving patches of light also resemble the "auroral meteors" cataloged under GLA3 in Lightning, Auroras, Nocturnal Lights. Physically, they might be related to the small, icy ...
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... Science Frontiers ONLINE No. 102: Nov-Dec 1995 Issue Contents Other pages Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues This Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects From dust unto abyssal mud We know the Creator made at least one species from dust, but ocean-floor mud has turned out to have more biodiversity. Twenty years ago, biologists put the number of species at about 1 million. Then, they started shaking and gassing rain-forest canopies. The rain of new insect species that fell to the ground made them revise the estimate to 30 million. The latest, long-unappreciated reservoir of undescribed species is mud -- oceanic mud. In particular, we know that the mud in the Rockall Trench off the western coast of Scotland teems with untold species of diminutive nematodes. Of course, nematodes are not as pretty as birds and fish, but they are nevertheless bona fide species of life. Examination of the Rockall mud and that from other seabed sites has convinced the nematode counters that there may be as many as 100 million nematode species on our planet. When other classes of life are added, the figure rises to at least 130 million. (Pearce, Fred; "Rockall Mud Richer than Rainforest," New Scientist, p. 8, September 16, 1995.) Comments. Lifeless molecules can apparently unite to form an almost infinite array of life forms! The next reservoir of unexplored biodiversity may be the crevicular realm -- all those fluid-filled crevices and channels that extend miles down into the earth's crust. They are full of bacteria ...
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... Science Frontiers ONLINE No. 27: May-Jun 1983 Issue Contents Other pages Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues This Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects The solar-system dust bin For hundreds of thousands of years, miscellaneous rocky debris swirling around the sun has been falling upon the icy wastes of Antarctica. The motion of Antarctica's ice sheet carries these meteorites conveyor-belt fashion out towards the encircling seas. But where Antarctic mountains get in the way, the rocky cargo tends to get concentrated. Several thousand meteorites have already been picked up at these favored spots. In just a few brief summers of searching, these massive finds have posed unexpected questions. Here is a sampling. The terrestrial ages (times since arrival on earth) measure between 1,000 and 700,000 years, implying that the Antarctic ice sheet may be at least 700,000 years old. This is unfortunate for several proposed scenarios of recent catastrophism, which envision an iceless Antarctica. At least 20 amino acids appear in the more than 40 carbonaceous chondrites picked up with sterile equipment. These meteorites are dated as 4.5 billion years old, or 1 billion years older than the earliest terrestrial life found in the rocks. These finds highlight the old question: Did meteorites seed life on earth? The much-publicized "lunar" meteorite, supposedly blasted out of the moon's crust by asteroid impact, thence falling to earth, shows little evidence of mechanical shock. If this meteorite, with a composition so similar to the Apollo samples is not from the moon, where ...
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... Science Frontiers ONLINE No. 107: Sep-Oct 1996 Issue Contents Other pages Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues This Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects "NOT WITH A BANG BUT A WHIMPER"Poet T.S . Eliot speculated that life on earth might not after all be terminated catastrophically, as in the impact of a large asteroid (today's popular doomsday machine). Rather, we might depart slowly, quietly, and mournfully. Of course, Eliot was not thinking of asteroids -- no one foresaw impact havoc in his day. But, his use of the word "whimper" can be attached to another, much slower astronomical agent of planetary death: cosmic dust and gas. Here's the current situation: "For the most part of the past five million years, the Solar System has been moving through a rather empty region of interstellar space between the spiral arms of the Milky Way. But a few thousand years ago, it entered a diffuse shell of material expanding outward from an active star-forming region called the Scorpius-Centaurus Association. Such 'super-bubble' shells of gas and dust result from the formation of massive stars, or the explosion of those stars as they become supernovas, and contain gas and dust clouds of varying densities." The density of matter in this solarsystem-engulfing shell could well shroud our planetary system with dust and gas a million times more dense than that we now encounter. If this happens, the sun's rays would slowly dim and life forms dependent on photosynthesis would expire. ...
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... Science Frontiers ONLINE No. 71: Sep-Oct 1990 Issue Contents Other pages Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues This Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects Another Anomaly Bites The Dust Some mysterious cultural practice of ancient people all over the world resulted in curious grooves on tooth surfaces. The grooves occur near the cementoenamel junction, mostly on molars and premolars, and usually on males. The diameter of the channel between adjacent teeth varies from 1-4 millimeters. (See SF#61 for an earlier item on the subject.) Proposed solutions to this riddle range from bacterial attack, to gritty saliva propelled through the teeth, to the overenthusiastic use of bone toothpicks. But Australian aborigines have provided a more convincing explanation. When the aborigines want, thin, strong cords for fashioning spears and spearthrowers, they take a pliable, thinned, kangaroo sinew, pull it down between their molars like dental floss and begin "stripping" it, by pulling it back and forth. They get their thin cords this way but also grooved teeth. (Eckhardt, Robert B.; 'The Solution for Teething Problems," Nature, 345: 578, 1990.) Comment. Unless someone comes up with a fatal objection to this theory, we must de-anomalize the grooved-teeth phenomenon. From Science Frontiers #71, SEP-OCT 1990 . 1990-2000 William R. Corliss ...
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... Science Frontiers ONLINE No. 9: Winter 1979 Issue Contents Other pages Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues This Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects A Chilly Martian Night Viking Lander 2 photographed frost on Mars in September 1977 during the Martian winter. A planet-wide dust storm had just subsided, and the theory evolved that both water and carbon-dioxide ice had frozen on dust particles in the atmosphere. Such particles were heavy enough to fall and give the scene around Viking a snow-like coating. However, frost was again photographed in 1979 (one Martian winter later) without the benefit of a dust storm. So, Mars theorists are in a quandary -- no dust, then no frost theory is reasonable. (Anonymous; "Viking, Three Years Later," Eos, 60:635, 1979.) Comment. Evidently, frost cannot form directly on the Martian surface as it does on earth due to the very low vapor pressure of water on the planet. From Science Frontiers #9 , Winter 1979 . 1979-2000 William R. Corliss ...
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... Science Frontiers ONLINE No. 93: May-Jun 1994 Issue Contents Other pages Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues This Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects Marine Snow The marine analog of the high-altitude U2 used to collect interplanetary dust is the scuba diver armed with small jars and syringes. In these, marine biologists, such as A. Alldredge, collect the tiny bits of debris drifting downwards from the ocean's upper layers. This is the "marine snow." Its constituents are mainly: ". .. the tiny leftovers of animals, plants, and non-living matter in the ocean's sun-suffused upper zones. Among these particles are chains of single-celled plants called diatoms, shreds of zooplankters' mucous food traps, soot, fecal pellets, dust motes, radioactive fallout, sand grains, pollen, and pollutants. Microorganisms also live inside and on top of these odd-shaped flakes." Marine snow is everywhere in the ocean. Sometimes, it reaches blizzard proportions, and divers cannot see beyond a few feet. Measured in millimeters, the marine snowflakes are much larger than the average interplanetary dust particles (but of course interplanetary dust itself is also a constituent of marine snow). The bigger marine snowflakes -- over 0.5 mm -- are a major food source for deep-sea denizens waiting below for this manna from the watery heaven. The reason for mentioning marine snow in Science Frontiers is that biologists like Alldredge are really pio-neering new territory, where new anomalies must surely dwell. "' ...
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... Science Frontiers ONLINE No. 106: Jul-Aug 1996 Issue Contents Other pages Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues This Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects A SAGA OF SOOT: PART I The tale began on March 27, when Comet Hyakutake passed within 15 million kilometers of earth. At this point in its trajectory, it came into the field of view of the X-ray astronomy satellite ROSAT. ROSAT was designed to look at stars whose extremely high temperatures can generate X-rays. It seemed ridiculous to point ROSAT's instruments at a comet composed mainly of ice and dust. How could a comet emit X-rays? When a German-American team of scientists proposed taking a peek at Hyakutake with ROSAT, scientific eyebrowns were raised. What a waste of observing time! At the most, the team thought they might pick up a smudge of weak X-rays where dust grains flying off Hyakutake collided with dust grains normally present in interplanetary space. The team did get ROSAT to take a look, and what the satellite saw ignited a controversy. Some 50,000 kilometers in front of the comet was a bright crescent of X-rays, 100 times brighter than the brightest "smudge" the team of scientists had hoped for. This was completely unexpected. All astronomers could do was come up with three rather unconvincing theories: (1 ) Solar X-rays were absorbed and reemited by the comet (Xray fluorescence); (2 ) Cometary material emitted X-rays when bathed in the solar wind; and (3 ) Charged particles were ...
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... Science Frontiers ONLINE No. 93: May-Jun 1994 Issue Contents Other pages Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues This Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects Anomalous Horizon Glows Seen On The Moon The spacecraft Clementine , now engaged in surveying the moon from orbit, has apparently recorded once again a perplexing sky glow that precedes lunar sunrises and follows lunar sunsets. An astronaut standing on the moon watching the spot where the sun is about to rise would see first of all two well-recognized phenomena: the solar corona (even though the solar disc is still well below the horizon) and the zodiacal light (sunlight reflected from interplanetary dust). In addition, the astronaut would detect a glow along the horizon itself, as in the illustration. Since the moon is virtually airless, there should be none of those gas molecules and suspended dust particles that cause the sunsets and sunrises that we admire so much here on earth. Still, there must be something suspended above the moon's surface to scatter light from the sun still located just below the horizon. The best guess is that lunar dust particles are ionized by solar radiation and are repelled upwards from the surface and hang there suspended by electrostatic forces. But no one really knows for certain the cause of the glow. (Cowen, R.; "On the Horizon: Clementine Probes Moon Glow," Science News, 145:197, 1994.) Reference. Anomalous lunar horizon glows are cataloged in ALO11 in our catalog: The Moon and the Planets. For details, visit here . From Science Frontiers #93 ...
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... -Eclipse Brightening of Io AJX7 Discrepancies in Predictions of of Eclipses and Transits AJX JUPITER'S MAGNETIC FIELD AJX1 Offset Magnetic Field AL THE MOON ALB THE MOON'S ORBITAL ANOMALIES ALB1 Earth-Moon Instability ALB2 Discrepancies in the Moon's Ephemeris ALB3 Nongravitational Forces and Earth-Moon Acceleration Discrepancies ALB4 Earth-Moon Acceleration Incompatible with Moon's Origin in Earth Orbit ALE LUNAR GEOLOGY PROBLEMS ALE1 Asymmetrical Distribution of Maria and Large Basins ALE2 Sinuous Rilles and Formations Resembling Terrestrial Water-Formed Features ALE3 The Lunar Rays ALE4 Lunar Features Seemingly Shaped by Ice ALE5 Swirl Markings ALE6 Anomalous Red Formations ALE7 Layered Structures ALE8 Lunar Glasses ALE9 Nonrandom Distribution of Lunar Craters ALE10 Unexplained Minor Surface Features ALE11 Large-Scale Asymmetries in in Composition ALE12 Dark-Haloed Lunar Craters ALE13 Local Concentrations of Radioactivity ALE14 Scarcity of Dust and Meteoric Material ALE15 Young Lunar-Surface Ages ALE16 Local Concentration of Volatiles ALE17 Lunar Soils Older Than Associated Rocks ALE18 Problems in Dating Lunar Rocks and Soils ALE19 Compositional Differences between Earth and Moon ALE20 Apparently Anomalous Long Term Persistence of Craters ALE21 Alignment of Mascons and Lunar Moments of Inertia ALE22 Geological Changes within Historical Times ALF LUNAR LUMINOUS PHENOMENA ALF1 Infrared Anomalies ALF2 Lunar Catastrophism within Historical Times ALF3 Transient Points of Light ALF4 Localized Color Phenomena ALF5 Transient, Large-Area Luminescence ALF6 Lightning-Like Phenomena on the Moon ALL THE MOTION OF LUNAR SATELLITES ALL1 Perturbation of Artificial Lunar Satellites ALO ANOMALOUS TELESCOPIC AND VISUAL OBSERVATIONS ALO1 Doubling of Lunar Detail ALO2 Variable Spots, Streaks, and Other (Apparently) Optical Phenomena ALO3 Banded Craters ALO4 Lunar "Canals" and Lineaments ALO5 The Lunar Zodiacal Light ALO6 Distortions ...
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... Science Frontiers ONLINE No. 6: February 1979 Issue Contents Other pages Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues This Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects Strange high-level haze in the arctic Every March and April, the supposedly pristine air of Alaska is defiled by a peculiar haze concentrated at about 10,000 feet. The sky has a whitish, diffuse look; from an airplane the horizon seems to disappear entirely. Is the haze due to pollutants in this remote region? Recent studies indicate two components in the haze: (1 ) Dust, and (2 ) Sulfuric acid droplets. Both of these must be imported because there are no sources of such materials in the arctic. Violent wind storms in the Gobi Desert may carry some dust into the arctic. Strong winds might also transport sulphuric acid from Japanese industries to Alaska. These are speculations, though, and no one is sure where this haze comes from or how far it extends beyond Alaska into the stable, stagnant air over the Arctic Ocean. (Anonymous; "Alaska's Imported Haze," Mozaic, 9:41, September/October 1978.) From Science Frontiers #6 , February 1979 . 1979-2000 William R. Corliss ...
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... term now in vogue. And, believe it or not, the rains of tektites discussed below may have been the forerunners of climatic catastrophes similar to the postulated nuclear winters. We shall call them "meteor-impact winters. First, a tad of background: Great meteor impacts and tektite events seem to have occurred nearly simultaneously with deep-cutting biological extinctions and reversals of the earth's magnetic field. Ever since this apparent synchrony was recognized a few decades ago, theorists have been vying in generating scientific scenarios, especially some mechanism that would reverse the earth's magnetic field. New entrants in the lists are R. Muller and D. Morris, two Berkeley physicists. Here is how they see it: "A sufficiently large asteroid or cometary nucleus hitting the Earth lofts enough dust to set off something like a 'nuclear winter.' The cold persists long after the dust settles because of the increased reflectivity of the snow-covered continents. In the course of a few centuries, enough equatorial ocean water is transported to the polar ice caps to drop the sea level about 10 meters and thus reduce the moment of inertia of the solid outer reaches of the Earth (crust and mantle) by a part in a million. 'That doesn't sound like much, Morris told us. 'But when we realized that this translates into a full radian of slippage between mantle and core in just 500 years, we began to look seriously at the consequences.' With the moment of inertia of the crust and mantle 'suddenly' decreased, the argument goes ...
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... Science Frontiers ONLINE No. 93: May-Jun 1994 Other pages Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues Last Issue Next Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects Contents Archaeology The spirit pond inscription stone Molecular clock places humans in new world 22,000-29,000 bp Astronomy Anomalous horizon glows seen on the moon From dust unto dust Biology Marine snow A REALLY ERRANT PIGEON A REALLY ERRANT SEAL Cold-blooded birds? Why snakes have forked tongues Lactating male bats Geology The nebraska sand hills: wind or water deposits? The giant crystal at the heart of the earth Geophysics Strange explosions at sasovo, in russia Just plane weird Psychology The healing of rents in the natural order Mathematics Btt and surreality ...
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... Science Frontiers ONLINE No. 38: Mar-Apr 1985 Issue Contents Other pages Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues This Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects Two Snowflake Anomalies Rarely is there anything in the scientific literature suggesting that anything about snowflakes could possibly be mysterious. Surprisingly, two articles on snowflake anomalies have appeared recently. To form at all above -40 F, snowflakes supposedly require a solid seed or nucleus around which ice can crystallize -- or so scientists have assumed for many years. It was long believed that airborne dust, perhaps augmented by extraterrestrial micrometeoroids, served as the necessary nuclei. But cloud studies prove that there are about a thousand times more ice crystals than dust nuclei. Now, some are convinced that bacteria blown off plants and flung into the air by ocean waves are the true nuclei of atmospheric ice crystals. Remember this the next time you tast a handful of snow! (Carey, John; "Crystallizing the Truth," National Wildlife, 23:43, December/ January 1985.) Comment. The possibility that the fall of snow and all other forms of precipitation is largely dependent upon bacter-ia brings to mind the Gaia Hypothesis; that is, all life forms work in unison to further the goals of life. The second item is from Nature and is naturally more technical. After reviewing the great difficulties scientists are having in mathematically describing the growth of even the simplest crystal, the author homes in on one of the fascinating puzzles of snowflake growth: "The aggregation of particles into a growing surface will be determined exclusively by local ...
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... past Mercury in 1974, its camera eye reinforced the baked-cinder model. To everyone's surprise, recent radar images obtained with powerful earth-based antennas, revealed a highly reflective patch at Mercury's north pole. Could it be ice, for ice reflects radar waves well? Quite possibly, for when Mercury's polar temperatures are calculated, away from the sun's direct glare, they plunge to -235 F. This means that some of the water vapor in the planet's thin atmosphere might freeze out in the poles, creating ice or frost caps. Wouldn't Mariner 10 have seen such a remarkable deposit? Not necessarily, for the spacecraft viewed only half the planet and, if the 640 x 300-kilometer ice patch were covered with dust, it could have been invisible to the camera. But it would still be a bright patch on terrestrial radar scopes, because radars see through thin dust layers. So, polar ice is not physically impossible on Mercury, although it is defi nitely surprising so close to the sun. All that is needed is a little water in the planet's atmosphere. Mainstream thinking is that "passing comets and asteroids" might bequeath Mercury some of their H2O cargos. (Cowen, R.; "Icy Clues from Mercury's Other Half," Science News, 140:295, 1991.) Also: Wilford, John Noble; "Photographs by Radar Hint of Ice on Poles of Mercury," New York Times, p. A14, November 7, 1991. Cr ...
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... books to support my research, for no government offices or private foundations seem at all interested in supporting this new discipline of "anomalistics"; Goal #3 has been more altruistic: the anticipation that there may be something scientifically useful in all this. But, even if there is not, the quest has been fulfilling in itself. Some mainstream scientists may recoil at the thought of 40,000 anomalies and curiosities. Surely nature cannot be that enigmatic and cryptic! Actually, I must stress that my search is stil far from complete. Anomalies -- those observations that do not yield to mainstream explanations -- are ubiquitous and proliferate. I have trawled through only a small fraction of the English-language scientific journals; thousands of volumes of specialized, less-known, publications gather dust untouched. Among them are unexamined books, monographs, informal papers, and popular publications. Foreign-language sources have only been sampled, and I can attest that the fishing there is good, too. And in today's electronic milieu, anomalies travel from computer screen to computer screen, by E-mail, and by fax. What an immense untapped resource! Yes, I am certain that nature is even more anomalous than the following pages intimate. I admit freely that this book and the Catalog of Anomalies harbor a scattering of fraudulent and questionable data. I try to weed these out; but no data base can be completely clean. On the other hand, I do not apologize for retaining phenomena upon which mainstream science has "closed the book." Didn' ...
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... Science Frontiers ONLINE No. 113: Sep-Oct 1997 Issue Contents Other pages Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues This Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects A VANISHED PLANET?Almost every week, it seems, a new Texas-sized object is discovered in the outer solar system. In the inner solar system, however, some astronomers are finding "holes" where planets seem to have been ejected by unknown forces. D. Christodoulou, Louisiana State University, found one such "hole" serendipitously. He was studying how the sun and the planets might have condensed from the (hypothesized) cloud of primordial gas and dust. Factoring in gravity, rotation, and magnetic fields, he found the cloud condensing in concentric rings at just the right locations for protoMercury, proto-Venus, and proto-earth. The fourth ring, however, did not correspond to any existing planet, and the position of proto-Mars was off the mark. But the asteroids and outer planets fell rather neatly into place. The implication of these calculations is that some turmoil in the early inner solar system cast out one planet and dislocated Mars. (Hecht, Jeff; "Did Extra Planet Vanish into Outer Space?" New Scientist, p. 18, June 14, 1997.) Comment. These are sour notes in the "music of the spheres," but don't be overly concerned; these are just calculations based upon many assumptions. Calculated positions of rings of condensed dust and gas compared to actual planet locations. From Science Frontiers #113, SEP-OCT ...
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... Science Frontiers ONLINE No. 60: Nov-Dec 1988 Issue Contents Other pages Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues This Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects Asteroids That Turn Into Comets Even though Chiron is large (about 200 kilometers in diameter) and a bit dark for a rocky asteroid, astronomers have been quite comfortable with calling it an asteroid. True, its orbit between Saturn and Uranus is unusual, but what else could it be but an asteroid? A comet, that's what! Recently, the brightness of Chiron has doubled, suggesting that it has expelled considerable gas and dust -- a characteristic of comets, according to mainstream thinking. Another peculiar aspect of the phenomenon is that Chiron is now located 12 A.U . from the sun (12 earth orbits out). Conventional wisdom has it that solar heating is too weak at that distance to vaporize cometary ices. However, other comets, such as Schwassmann-Wachmann 1, have displayed comas even farther away from the sun. Thus, we have two possible anomalies here: (1 ) The existence of a huge cometlike asteoid in a peculiar orbit (2 ) A mechanism that expels gas and dust from comets at great distances from the sun. The blurring of the distinctions between asteroids and comets is aggravated by the recognition that some other asteroids produce streams of particles that create meteor showers; that is, some asteroids are not merely associated with meteor streams, they actually create them, just as comets expel ice and rocky debris. Some bold astronomers now ask whether asteroids are all burntout comets. ...
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... defect'!" (Ref. 1) Searching for explanations, J. Gallagher has discovered that many of the prominent canals drawn by Lowell, Schiaparelli, et al, actually closely follow contour lines drawn on USGS maps of Mars from Viking data. It is quite possible, then, that the "canals" are really only elevational differences in Martian topography. (Ref. 2) Global Cooling. The Hubble Space Telescope recently photographed Mars when the planet was nearly totally shrouded by high cirrus clouds. Mars is now cloudier than it has been for years. The reason for this is that the planet's average temperature has fallen by almost 20 C. What little water vapor exists in the atmosphere freezes out into cirrus clouds. Why has Mars cooled so drastically? Because the huge dust storms of the Viking years have mysteriously abated. Now, we have to explain why dust storms no longer envelope the planet! (Ref. 3) References Ref. 1. Louderback, Daniel; Letter, Strolling Astronomer , 37:131, 1994. Ref. 2. Gordon, Rodger; Letter, Strolling Astronomer , 37:89, 1993. Ref. 3. Kerr, Richard A.; "Hubble Glimpses a Hazy Day on Mars," Science, 267:1912, 1995. Cross references. Modern sightings of canal-like lines on Mars can be found in The Moon and the Planets. Details here . From Science Frontiers #100, JUL-AUG 1995 . 1995-2000 William R. Corliss ...
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... Sky Phenomenon GWC2 Cloud Arches GWC3 Polar Bands GWC4 Miniature Thunderclouds GWC5 Noisy Clouds GWC6 Noctilucent Clouds GWC7 Ring Clouds GWC8 Thunderclouds Affecting the Ionosphere GWC9 Circular Holes in Cloud Decks GWC10 Anomalous Cloud Lines GWC11 Dispersal of Clouds by the Moon GWC12 The Morning Glory Phenomenon and Other Roll Clouds GWC13 Long, Hollow, Cylindrical Clouds GWC14 Cloud Spokes Radiating from Thunderclouds GWC15 Excess of Ice Crystals in Cumulus Clouds GWC16 Cloud Brightness Changes GWC17 Anomalous High-Altitude Haze Green Clouds [GWH] Bright-Night Phenomenon High-Altitude Layers of Material Natural Sodium Clouds Bromine Pulses Arctic Plumes Stratospheric Water Flow and Reservoirs Miscellaneous Unexplained Clouds Holes in the Ionosphere (Icy Comets) Ozone Holes Ozone Clouds GWD DARK DAYS, FOGS, AND OTHER OBSCURATIONS GWD1 Dark Days GWD2 Pogonips and Other Ice Fogs GWD3 Mists and Epidemics GWD4 Dry Fogs and Dust Fogs GWF FALLS GWF1 Ice Falls or Hydrometeors GWF2 Stone Falls GWF3 Sulphur/Pollen Falls GWF4 Falls of Miscellaneous Inorganic Substances GWF5 The Fall of Manna GWF6 Unusual Falls of Hay and Leaves GWF7 Gelatinous Meteors or Pwdre Ser GWF8 Prodigious Falls of Web-Like Material (Angel Hair) GWF9 Falls of Miscellaneous Organic Substances GWF10 Fish Falls GWF11 Falls of Frogs and Toads GWF12 Insect Falls GWF13 Bird Falls GWF14 Falls of Miscellaneous Living Animals Sewage Falls Falls of Liquids and Goo GWH LARGE STORM SYSTEMS GWH1 Ozone in Hurricanes GWH2 Hurricane Geographical Anomalies GWH3 Thunderstorm Systems Hypercanes Unusually Intense Storms Large-Scale Oscillations of the Atmosphere Wind Storms in the Upper Atmosphere Green Thunderstorms [GWC] Hurricane Fine Structure GWP ANOMALOUS PRECIPITATION GWP1 Precipitation from a Clear Sky GWP2 Giant Snowflakes GWP3 Conical Snowflakes GWP4 Hailstones with Anomalous Shapes GWP5 Giant Hailstones ...
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... Science Frontiers ONLINE No. 76: Jul-Aug 1991 Issue Contents Other pages Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues This Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects Subterranean "circles"As if we didn't have enough problems with crop circles on the earth's surface, it now seems that whatever agency (or "entity") that is responsible for them also plies its craft underground! "Sets of concentric rings, similar to those found last summer in British wheat fields, have been discovered in a Japanese subway tunnel. .. .. . "Many sets of concentric rings were found drawn in dust that accumulated on the ground and walls inside the tube. The metro versions of the mystery circles are much smaller -- up to 8 centimeters in diameter -- than the British ones, the largest of which measures scores of meters." Y. Otsuki, a professor of physics at Waseda University, discovered the rings and believes that plasma generated in the air creates them. Subway tunnels, he says, create conditions similar to those in the plasma generators he uses in his fireball research. A photo of the rings accompanying the article shows six neatly-formed, concentric rings around a central crude circle. (Anonymous; "' Mystery Circle' Found in Tunnel," Asahi Evening News (Tokyo), April 5, 1991. Cr. Y. Matsumura via L. Farish) Speculations. Apparently, plasmoids can be of any size: crop circles may be 100 feet in diameter of just a foot or two, and now we may have centimeter ...
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... Online All Issues This Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects Mercury: the impossible planet Mercury, largely hidden in the sun's glare, also conceals beneath its baked, cratered surface: (1 ) far more iron than solar-system theory allows; and (perhaps) (2 ) a dynamo that should not exist. Let us take the excess-iron problem first. Mercury's density is 5.44 (compared to earth's 5.52), so that it very likely contains much iron. Our moon, which resembles Mercury in size and external appearance, only has a density of 3.34, implying an altogether different origin. In the currently accepted theory of solar-system formation, all of the planets and their satellites condensed from a primordial disk of dust sur rounding the just-formed sun. The planets closer to the solar inferno lost more of their easily vaporized constituents due to the sun's heat. The cooler, outer planets were able to retain large amounts of ices. In this scenario, we would expect Mercury to be rich in iron and rocks. This seems to be the case, but it has too iron to fit the theory. Astronomers have tried to save the theory by supposing that a large asteroid sideswiped Mercury tearing off part of its outer layer of lighter rocks, leaving the heavier iron core untouched. The theory doesn't say what happened to the debris from this colossal collision. As for Mercury's magnetic field, it is small, only 1% that of the earth. But where does ...
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... Science Frontiers ONLINE No. 86: Mar-Apr 1993 Other pages Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues Last Issue Next Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects Contents Archaeology The acoustics of rock art Where did agriculture really begin? Astronomy Meteoric "dust bunnies" Cosmic snowballs and magnetic asteroids Biology Must we die? the medfly's answer How a fly hears what a cricket hears Once more science fiction predicts the future! Rethinking aids Geology Geysers as detectors of distant earthquakes Precariously balanced rocks as earthquake detectors Geophysics An electrical virtuoso The milky sea a.k .a . "white water" A CURIOUS SIGHTING Cloud plumes natural but still a bit anomalous Logic and Mathematics Math's mystery All roads lead to 123 Psychology Hypnosis and skin temperature Hypnosis and basketball Physics Solar radiation and mental illness ...
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... Science Frontiers ONLINE No. 96: Nov-Dec 1994 Other pages Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues Last Issue Next Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects Contents Archaeology That little "roman" head from precolumbian mexico The "kites" or "keyhole" structures of the middle east Astronomy On the sun, south is almost everywhere The moon: still partly molten? Lunar crater chains Biology Too identical! Why do flying fish have such colorful wings? "ADAPTIVE" MUTATION Electric snakes Geology Satellite spies strange stripes Two really deep oceans Geophysics The 536 ad dust-veil event Underwater thumps Remarkable straw fall Unusual lunar halo Psychology Psi phenomena and geomagnetism Physics Cold fission? Mathematics Lazzarini eats humble pi (posthumously) Unclassified A CURIOUS STRING OF COINCIDENCES Close encounters with unknown missiles ...
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... Science Frontiers ONLINE No. 4: July 1978 Issue Contents Other pages Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues This Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects Meteoric night-glow During some intense meteor showers, such as the Leonids in 1866 and the Bielids in 1872, observers noted a faint diffuse glow of the night sky in the direction of the meteor shower radiant. The glows were aurora-like but no sunspot or magnetic activity was noted. A New Zealand scientist, W.J . Baggaley, has suggested that these strange glows were caused by sunlight scattered from huge clouds of fine meteoric dust accompanying the meteor swarms. (Anonymous; "Meteoric Night-Glow," Sky and Telescope, 35:485, 1978.) Comment. This item is closely related to the many observations of luminous skies and, in particular, the vivid sky glows following the Tunguska Event of 1908. There may also be a connection with the highly variable behavior of the not-sowell-understood zodiacal light. From Science Frontiers #4 , July 1978 . 1978-2000 William R. Corliss ...
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... Science Frontiers ONLINE No. 8: Fall 1979 Issue Contents Other pages Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues This Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects An oasis on mars -- no palm trees but...Most of the data returned from the Viking Landers and Orbiters confirm a highly desiccated surface for Mars. Life-as-we-know-it would seem to be impossible in such an ultra-dry environment. The Solis Lacus region is an exception. On occasion, Orbiter photos of this region have revealed heavy frosts and fogs. Further, the clouds here have more moisture in them than elsewhere on Mars. Conclusion: Considerably more water exists near the surface of the Solis Lacus region than elsewhere. Since this area was the source of the great 1971 Martian dust storm, one wonders whether the unusual concentration of water has been revealed only because winds have stripped off the normally dry surface layer. (Huguenin, R.L ., et al; "Mars: An Oasis in Solis Lacus," Eos, 60:306, 1979.) Comment. Close-up photos of Mars show many signs of fluid erosion. Abundant water may still remain well below the planet's surface. Reference. Probable wet areas on Mars are cataloged at AME16 in The Moon and the Planets. Ordering information for this book is located here . From Science Frontiers #8 , Fall 1979 . 1979-2000 William R. Corliss ...
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... Science Frontiers ONLINE No. 106: Jul-Aug 1996 Issue Contents Other pages Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues This Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects A SAGA OF SOOT: PART III "For the first time, researchers have found complex organic molecules on the Earth that came from outside the Solar System. American scientists say tiny sooty grains extracted from meteorites contain polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs) from interstellar dust clouds." This article continues with an acknowledgement that F. Hoyle did predict way back in the 1950s that some of earth's organic matter came from outer space. And that he was roundly scoffed at. Next, more evidence is presented suggesting that the universe is full of the basic ingredients of life: Recently, the spectrum of the amino acid glycine was detected near the center of our galaxy. (Hecht, Jeff; "Stardust Brought Down to Earth," New Scientist, p. 17, March 23, 1996) Cross reference. IN SF#101, we related how PAHs were found in meteorite ALH84001, which was picked up in the Antarctic, and which is believed to have originated on Mars. From Science Frontiers #106, JUL-AUG 1996 . 1996-2000 William R. Corliss ...
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... Science Frontiers ONLINE No. 128: MAR-APR 2000 Issue Contents Other pages Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues This Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects Burps of Death Not only did the poor dinosaurs have to contend with an asteroid impact and a lurch of the poles, but also with the possible ignition of voluminous methane burps. 65-million years ago. This was the time of the well-publicized, but still hypothetical, asteroid impact. It is said to have wreaked havoc on our wounded planet and, especially, the dinosaurs. Volcanos spewed out vast lava fields and filled the air with greenhouse gases and dust. It was a bad time for many life forms. Actually, It may have been far worse than generally advertised. In addition to the volcanic activity and climate change, the shock of the asteroid impact could have been sufficient to destabilize the immense amounts of methane hydrate that have long been locked up, frozen and dormant, in oceanic sediments all over the world. According to this scenario, once the shock of the asteroid impact released the methane from its icy prison, it rose to the surface of the oceans in a world-wide burp. Methane, unfortunately for the dinosaurs and many other life forms, is highly flammable. Lightning could have ignited it almost immediately if it was concentrated enough. A colossal firestorm might have then enveloped the entire planet. The whole atmosphere could have been afire. This, according to B. Hurdle and colleagues at the Naval Research Laboratory, who speculate that the dinosaur hegemony may ended suddenly in flames rather than ...
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... Science Frontiers ONLINE No. 133: JAN-FEB 2001 Issue Contents Other pages Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues This Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects Invisible Suns And Maybe See-through Planets, Too Astronomers have been baffled lately by the discovery of planets wandering aimlessly through outer space apparently without the guidance of a central sun. (Ref. 1) Planets, you see, are supposed to have been formed in the discs of dense dust orbiting newly created stars. They have no business wandering through the void unattended. No problem, says R. Frost of the University of Melbourne, "They could be in orbit around Invisible Stars! (Ref. 2) If we can have Missing Matter, we suppose that Invisible Stars are not as ridiculous as they sound. It is postulated that Invisible Stars are composed of Mirror Matter, a new construct of astronomers who are desperately trying to explain their burgeoning files of celestial anomalies. Mirror Matter is strange "stuff." It interacts with Ordinary Matter only through gravity, it doesn't emit light. It is palpable but invisible. (This sounds weird, but no weirder than quantum mechanics!) Foot also pointed out that stars composed of Ordinary Matter may be orbited by Mirror-Matter planets. Expanding along these lines, whole star systems could be 100% Mirror Matter, and we'd never see them at all. How about Mirror-Matter asteroids and meteors zipping around our solar system -- invisible but palpable and threatening? As a matter of fact, it has been speculated that the still- ...
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... Science Frontiers ONLINE No. 18: Nov-Dec 1981 Issue Contents Other pages Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues This Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects The Long Arms Of Venus And Jupiter Many times in the two or three "scientific" centuries now behind us, investigators have discovered, almost against their wills, that the moon and planets affect the earth. The moon's influence is understandable, but the planets are too far away for their gravitational fields to influence one terrestrial dust mote. Well, here is one more study showing that the planets (Venus and Jupiter, in this case) do affect the peak electron density in the earth's ionosphere. The effect is most noticeable when these planets are close to earth and dwindles as they swing around to the other side of the sun. The authors are at a loss to explain this effect in terms of gravitation, suggesting that perhaps Venus or Jupiter may instead affect solar activity, which in turn modifies the terrestrial ionosphere. (Harnischmacher, E., and Rawer, K.; "Lunar and Planetary Influences upon the Peak Electron Density of the Ionosphere," Journal of Atmospheric and Terrestrial Electricity, 43:643, 1981.) Comment. Actually, no one has shown how the planets can possibly influence the sun with known action-at-a -distance forces. Electrical forces are taboo. There are no other "recognized" forces. From Science Frontiers #18, NOV-DEC 1981 . 1981-2000 William R. Corliss ...
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... Science Frontiers ONLINE No. 24: Nov-Dec 1982 Issue Contents Other pages Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues This Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects Islands Of Hope For Life Eternal Frautschi examines expanding "causal" regions in the universe, where entropy (disorder) does not increase as fast as the maximum predicted by Thermodynamics. The conclusion of this highly theoretical paper is that, even in these "islands of hope," life and the order it requires cannot survive indefinitely if it is restricted to solid substances. But, ". .. it stands as a challenge for the future to find dematerialized modes of organization (based on dust clouds or an e- e+ plasma?) capable of self-replication. If radiant energy production continues without limit, there remains hope that life capable of using it forever can be created." (Frautschi, Steven; "Entropy in an Expanding Universe," Science, 217:593, 1982.) Comment. Who said Science was a conservative journal? This smacks of scifi tales of electrolife and Hoyle's Black Cloud. From Science Frontiers #24, NOV-DEC 1982 . 1982-2000 William R. Corliss ...
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... Science Frontiers ONLINE No. 27: May-Jun 1983 Other pages Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues Last Issue Next Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects Contents Archaeology Ogham Inscriptions in West Virginia? An Earthen Stonehenge Astronomy Anomalous Redshifts (Again) Biology A Compass in Our Sinuses? How Trees Talk to One Another Does Ri = Mermaid? Great Balls of Snakes Geology The Solar-system Dust Bin Hushing Up the Guadeloupe Skeleton Geophysics Electromagnetic Noise Prior to Earthquakes The Current Anomalous El Nino ...
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... Science Frontiers ONLINE No. 31: Jan-Feb 1984 Issue Contents Other pages Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues This Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects There are cold anomalies "out there"As data from the IRAS (Infrared Astronomy Satellite) pile up (at 700 million bits per day), astronomers are seeing a new universe -- one consisting of cold gas, dust, and debris that emit little or no visible light. Here are just four of the new enigmas revealed: (1 ) Infrared "cirrus clouds." A network of faint wisps of cold matter that cover the whole sky. (2 ) Galactic matter of an unknown nature. This material has been observed only on one of the 100-micrometer IRAS scans. (3 ) A ring of solid particles around the star Vega. (4 ) "Blank fields." IRAS scans have found infrared sources where no visible object exist. (Waldrop, M. Mitchell, and Kerr, Richard A.; "IRAS Science Briefing," Science, 222:916, 1983.) From Science Frontiers #31, JAN-FEB 1984 . 1984-2000 William R. Corliss ...
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... Science Frontiers ONLINE No. 38: Mar-Apr 1985 Other pages Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues Last Issue Next Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects Contents Archaeology Who Built the East Bay Walls? Ancient Engineering Feat Antarctica Revisited, Hapgood Acknowledged Astronomy Quasar, Quasar, Burning Bright; What Shifts Your Spectral Light? Unidentified Object Young Interplanetary Dust Neptune's Incomplete Ring Biology Whales and Dolphins Trapped Magnetically Listening with the Feet Life in the Dark Bad Year for Water Monsters Geology Galloping Glaciers Geophysics: The Sick Man of Science Geophysics Ball Lightning and Blue Flashes Green Cloud with Light Rays Still Another Mystery Cloud The Sounds That Shouldn't Have Been Expanding Phosphorescent Rings Two Snowflake Anomalies Psychology Hypnosis and Memory The Subtle Placebo ...
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... Science Frontiers ONLINE No. 39: May-Jun 1985 Other pages Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues Last Issue Next Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects Contents Archaeology East Bay Wall Photographs The Hambleton Hill Neolithic Fortress Astronomy Mysterious Spate of Sky Flashes Exorcising the Hidden Mass Hold Everything: it May Be A Nonproblem The Message of Aluminum-26 Saturn's Rings May Be Young Biology Upside-down Animals How Animals Might Get Inverted Shrimp Trains Are A'coming Geology Status of Archaeopteryx Up in the Air! The Coming Revolution in Planetology Deeper Mysteries Bone Bed Discovered in Florida Geophysics Recipe for Dust Devils The Tsunami Tune Lde Problem Still Unsolved Falls of All Sorts of Things Psychology Pk parties: real or surreal? It's Easier to Hypnotize Right-handers Chemistry & Physics Anomalous Anomalons Forbidden Matter ...
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... Science Frontiers ONLINE No. 39: May-Jun 1985 Issue Contents Other pages Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues This Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects Saturn's rings may be young When the Voyager spacecraft swept past Saturn, they radioed back photos of a complex, very dynamic system of rings -- thousands of rings. Studies of these rings have led some astronomers to wonder if they are really as old as Saturn itself. Two lines of thinking suggest a recent origin: (1 ) The rings are composed of both light material (very likely water ice) and dark material (probably rocks and dust). The rocky fragments, according to the prevailing nebular theory, should have condensed early in solar-system history, and then been swept gravitationally into the planet as they were slowed by friction with the uncondensed nebular material. Yet, dark material is still in the rings. (2 ) The incessant bombardment of the rings by meteorites should have pulverized the rings, sending fragments and vaporized material in all directions. In just 10 million years the rings should have been largely erased. They are still there. (Cuzzi, Jeffrey N.; "Ringed Planets: Still Mysterious -- II," Sky and Telescope, 69:19, 1985.) Comment. Assuming the rings are young, where did they come from? What happened to Saturn in "recent" times? Reference. Several lines of evidence point to the youth of Saturn's rings. See: ARL16 in our catalog The Moon and the Planets. Ordering information here . From ...
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... Science Frontiers ONLINE No. 44: Mar-Apr 1986 Other pages Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues Last Issue Next Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects Contents Archaeology How the Incas Worked Stone Checking Out Those Australian Pyramids Astronomy Neptune's Partial Rings Space Spume Star Sludge Tunnelling Towards Life in Outer Space Biology Evolving on Half A Wing (And A Prayer?) Signals in the Night The Moon, the Stars, and Human Behavior Geology Squirrels As Measures of Geological Time Northwest Indian Tradition of A Large-scale Sea Inundation Of Dust Clouds and Ice Ages Geophysics Atmospheric Footprints of Icy Meteors Unusual Double Sun Unclassified Unidentified Flashing Object ...
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... Science Frontiers ONLINE No. 44: Mar-Apr 1986 Issue Contents Other pages Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues This Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects Star Sludge All of a sudden it seem that astronomers are finding dark -- even "charcoal-black" -- materials in unlikely places in the solar system. Three "sludgy" sites have been high-lighted in the recent literature. (1 ) Comets. "Black" comets certainly defy our expectations. Are all those pictures of white, flaming apparitions wrong? Not really. The comets approaching the sun are made visible by sunlight reflected from the gases and dust in the coma and tail, plus some direct emission. However, the heart of the comet, its nucleus, has long been considered a "dirty snowball"; that is, a mixture of dirt and ices. Now it appears that comets are more like "icy dirtballs"! And some of that dirt is pitch black. New measurments of the bare nuclei of comets, using a visual-infrared technique, find that the nuclei reflect as little as 2% of the incident sunlight. They are indeed charcoal black. Comet nuclei, according to W. Hartmann and his colleagues, are colored by a brownishblack primordial organic sludge, and have the appearance of "a very dark Hershey bar." The use of the adjective "organic" may be premature, but in light of the next item, maybe not. (2 ) Carbonaceous chondrites . This well-known class of meteorites sometimes appears tarry and is characterized by carbon contents ...
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... Science Frontiers ONLINE No. 44: Mar-Apr 1986 Issue Contents Other pages Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues This Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects Tunnelling Towards Life In Outer Space Most books on biology begin the history of life in those apochryphal warm ponds of primordial soup. Leave comfortable earth for a moment and consider the immense, cold clouds of gas and dust swirling between the stars and galaxies. At near-absolute-zero, sunless and waterless, these clouds hardly seem the womb of life. Yet, there may be found the atoms necessary to life -- H, C, O, N, etc -- and in profusion. Collisions of cosmic rays can promote the synthesis of fairly large molecules. We have already detected molecules as complex as formaldehyde in the interstellar medium. But surely the immensely more complicated molecules of biology cannot be synthesized near absolute zero. This may not be true either because at extremely low temperatures the quantum mechanical phenomenon of "tunnelling" becomes important. To achieve molecular synthesis, repulsive barriers must be overcome. The warm temperatures in that terrestrial pond can provide the extra kinetic energy to climb over these barriers. In cold molecular clouds we must look elsewhere. The laws of quantum mechanics state that there is always a very low probability that atoms and molecules can tunnel through repulsive barriers -- no need to climb over them via thermal effects. "Specifically, entire atoms can tunnel through barriers represented by the repulsive forces of other atoms and form complex molecules even though the atoms do not have the energy required by classical chemistry to overcome ...
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... Science Frontiers ONLINE No. 56: Mar-Apr 1988 Issue Contents Other pages Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues This Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects Celestial mirages?Those mysterious giant blue arcs mentioned above have at least two explanations. The less-favored states that the arcs are formed when a spherical light pulse from a briefly flaring quasar encounters a plane of gas and dust. This matter scatters the light, making it visible to us as a huge arc. The preferred model employs gravitational lensing. Here, the arcs are simply distorted images -- mirages, if you want -- of distant galaxies. (Two of the many reports on this subject are: Waldrop, M. Mitchell; "The Giant Arcs Are Gravitational Mirages," Science, 238:1351, 1987; and Anonymous; "Giant Arcs: Light Echoes or Lensed Galaxies?" Sky and Telescope, 75:7 , 1988.) Comment. A bit of background: according to Einstein, the presence of matter can bend light rays, just as our atmosphere does when mirages are created by refraction. Gravitational mirages of celestial objects are thus predicted by Relativity. From Science Frontiers #56, MAR-APR 1988 . 1988-2000 William R. Corliss ...
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... Science Frontiers ONLINE No. 64: Jul-Aug 1989 Issue Contents Other pages Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues This Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects Halley: a young, combusting, alien interloper Can this be the comet Halley of the textbooks? Comets are supposed to be as old as the solar system itself (4 .6 billion years), born of solar-system stuff when a gaseous cloud condensed. Above all, comets do not "burn" or combust! The vision of a "burning" comet was advanced by recent observations that the velocity and temperature of the gases escaping from Halley are higher than one would expect from the sublimation of ices under solar radiation. Also, the concentration of expelled material in large, hypersonic jets carrying large quantities of fine dust further undermine the sublimation model. E.M . Drobyshevski has concluded "The new observations, together with some earlier data still poorly understood (e .g ., the appearance in the coma of large amounts of C3 ) can be accounted for by assuming the cometary ices to contain, apart from the hydrocarbons, nitrogen-containing compounds, etc., also of free oxygen (about 15 wt. %) . Under these conditions, burning should occur in the products of sublimation under deficiency of oxidizer accompanied by the production of 'soot,' 'smoke,' etc. The burning should propagate under the surface crust and localize at a few sites. "The presence of oxygen in cometary ices follows from a new eruption theory assuming the minor bodies of the Solar System to have formed ...
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... Science Frontiers ONLINE No. 71: Sep-Oct 1990 Other pages Home Page Science Frontiers Online All Issues Last Issue Next Issue Sourcebook Project Sourcebook Subjects Contents Archaeology Florida's circular canals GREAT ANCIENT CIVILIZATIONS IN AMAZONIA? RIDICULOUS! The sweet track Another anomaly bites the dust Astronomy Modern technology gets Two hot spots on mercury Astronomers cope with both Biology NATURE COMMUNICATES IN MYSTERIOUS WAYS Those amazing insects The bombardier beetle pulse-jet Duesberg revisited Geology Pennsylvanian time-scale problems OF TIME AND THE CORAL - AND OTHER THINGS, TOO Paleomagnetic pitfalls What's another dipole or two? Wyoming: a periodic spring WYOMING: IS OLD FAITHFUL A STRANGE ATTRACTOR? Geophysics Ball lightning studies LUNAR ECLIPSES AND RADIO PROPAGATION General Novel forms of matter ...
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... Down; • Extinct Species; • Skipping; • Graveyards; • Degeneration; • Fossil Men. Price was a creationist, but his book is devoid of theology. The Aerial World View Cart Buy online via PayPal with MC/Visa/Amex G. Hartwig 1886, 560 pp., $26.95p Iven though this title is over a century old, it is still a pleasure to read. Its 37 chapters touch on just about every facet of weather and geophysics known: • The echo; • Waterspouts; • The Rainbow; • The thunderstorm; • St. Elmo's fire; and even flying machines, such as they were in 1886! There are hundreds of anecdotes and descriptions of curious phenomena, such as: • Remarkable echoes in Siberia; • Luminous dust; • Elf Candles; • The 1838 Spout of Calcutta, and • Moon blindness. It is a classic collection of geophysical anomalies and curiosities. ...
Terms matched: 1 - Score: 14 - 10 Oct 2021 - URL: /books.htm
... and Lignifications ESC8 Geological Effects of Natural Combustion ESC9 Rocks and Sediments of Controverted Origins ESC10 Unusual Growth Structures ESC11 Possible Extraterrestrial Origin of Ocean Water ESC12 Chemical Anomalies of Lakes and Ground Water ESC13 Petroleum Anomalies ESC14 Coal Anomalies ESC15 Outgassing of Radon-222 ESC16 Methane Anomalies ESD DEPOSITS OF REMARKABLE SIZE ESD1 Bone Caves, Bone Caches,... ESD2 Bone Beds, Fish Beds,... ESD3 Sedimentary Deposits of Exceptional Volume ESD4 Historical Evidence for Large Scale Flooding ESD5 Recent Large Reductions of Polar Ice Cover ESD6 Giant Basalt Flows and Traps ESD7 Giant Accumulations of Oil ESD8 Giant Erratics and Megabreccias ESD9 Deposits of Great Areal Extent ESI INCLUSIONS ESI1 Inclusions in Crystals ESI2 Microdebris ESI3 Erratic Boulders, Stones, and Mineral Patches ESI4 Anomalous Amber Inclusions ESI5 Microfossil-Like Inclusions ESI6 Oil in Fossil Cavities ESI7 Carbon Dust on Fossil Plants ESI8 Great Rarity of Fossil Meteorites and Tektites ESI9 Stretched Pebbles ESM ANOMALOUS SUPERFICIAL GEOLOGICAL MATERIALS ESM1 Unusual Superficial Aggregations of Rocks ESM2 Strewn Fields of Natural Glasses ESM3 Tektite and Microtektite Paradoxes and Anomalies ESM4 Boulder Trains and Belts ESM5 Rock Glaciers, Block Fields,... ESM6 Elevated Erratics... ESM7 Anomalous Glacial Drift ESM8 Fluidized Debris Slides ESM9 Surging Glaciers ESM10 Driftless Enclaves within Glaciated Regions ESM11 Anomalous Rock Motion ESM12 Superficial Rocky Debris of Doubtful Provenance ESP ANOMALOUS PHYSICAL PHENOMENA IN GEOLOGY ESP1 Anomalous Radiohalos ESP2 Flexible Rocks ESP3 Unusually Colored Rocks ESP4 Noncrushing of Fossils in Sediment Compaction ESP5 Remarkable Polished Rocks ESP6 Ringing Rocks ESP7 Small-Scale Magnetic Anomalies ESP8 Frazil Ice, Anchor Ice,... ESP9 Long-Range Fine Structure In Strata ESP10 Jointing, Cleat, Crack Patterns ESP11 ...
Terms matched: 1 - Score: 14 - 15 May 2017 - URL: /cat-geol.htm
... March 1, 1931], apparently written by a Catholic missionary 'Father Fidello, of Aviano', and it is to this that we now turn. Apparently, there were three bolides or fireballs seen. Father Fidello wrote: "They landed in the centre of the forest with a triple shock similar to the rumble of thunder and the splash of lightning. There were three distinct explosions, each stronger than the other, causing earth tremors like those of an earthquake. A very light rain of ash continued to fall for a few hours and the sun remained veiled till midday. The explosions of the bodies were heard hundreds of kilometres away." (Ref.1 ) M.E . Bailey singles out two puzzling features of the Brazilian event: (1 ) the fall of dust before the fireballs were observed; and (2 ) the lack of any mention of a blast wave. Further, the L'Osservatore Romano account does not say anything about extensive forest fires. (Ref. 1; see Ref. 2 for a synopsis.) Circa December 11, 1935. British Guiana (now Guyana). Only five years after the Brazilian event, a large bolide apparently smashed into the jungle of Guyana. Buried in the library stacks, we found a mostly forgotten trio of reports on the 1935 event in a 1939 issue of The Sky, predecessor of Sky & Telescope. The articles suggest that the devastated area "may equal or exceed that of the great Siberian meteor of 1908." The bolide and apparent impact area were observed by a gold prospector ...
Terms matched: 1 - Score: 14 - 15 May 2017 - URL: /sf103/sf103g08.htm
