Sky & Telescope's News Bulletin - Dec 12

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* * * SKY & TELESCOPE's WEEKLY NEWS BULLETIN - December 12, 2003 * * *

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Welcome to S&T's Weekly News Bulletin. Images, the full text of stories
abridged here, and other enhancements are available on our Web site,
SkyandTelescope.com, at the URLs provided below. (If the links don't work, just
manually type the URLs into your Web browser.) Clear skies!

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NEW BINARY NEUTRON STAR WILL TEST EINSTEIN

An international team of astronomers has discovered the sixth known binary
consisting of two neutron stars -- collapsed stellar cores that cram about 1.4
solar masses into spheres about the size of a city. The two stars of the newly
discovered binary orbit each other more closely than the previously known
systems, so they provide astronomers with a golden opportunity to test
Einstein's general theory of relativity to high levels of precision....

Astronomers and physicists are licking their chops at the prospect of studying
this system. Neutron stars have large masses but small sizes, so they provide
very clean testbeds for studying key predictions of general relativity,
Einstein's theory that equates gravity with the curvature of space-time....

http://SkyandTelescope.com/news/article_1124_1.asp

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A CAULDRON OF STARBIRTH

Like a billowing firestorm, the giant nebula NGC 604 in our neighboring galaxy
M33 burns with the young energy of massive star formation. A swarm of immense
blue-white stars with up to 120 solar masses, and surface temperatures up to
40,000 degrees Kelvin, emit copious ultraviolet radiation that stimulates the
surrounding gas to fluoresce. Meanwhile, radiation pressure and stellar winds
from the stars are sculpting the gas and blowing a large central cavity....

http://SkyandTelescope.com/news/article_1123_1.asp

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OH, THE PLACES YOU'LL GO!

The Cassini spacecraft is currently speeding toward Saturn with a scheduled
arrival date of July 1, 2004. And like any traveler set to complete a long
journey, the spacecraft is looking ahead to its goal....

http://SkyandTelescope.com/news/article_1119_1.asp

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ASTRO NEWS BRIEF

Hope Lost for Nozomi

The name of Japan's interplanetary spacecraft Nozomi means "hope," but flight
controllers have given up their hope of using it to explore Mars. Despite
valiant efforts to keep the mission on track after malfunctions and damage from
solar storms (see the January 2004 issue of SKY & TELESCOPE, page 48),
engineers at the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) were unable to
regain contact with the Nozomi yesterday. They have therefore called off their
attempts to place the troubled spacecraft into orbit around the red planet. The
probe will instead slip past Mars on December 13th.

http://SkyandTelescope.com/news/article_1121_1.asp

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HIGHLIGHTS OF THIS WEEK'S SKY

* The Geminid meteor shower peaks on night of December 13th.
* Last-quarter Moon on December 16th.
* Saturn rises during late twilight. An hour or two later it's well up in the
east, between Orion to its right and Castor and Pollux closer to its left or
lower left.

For details, see This Week's Sky at a Glance and Planet Roundup:

http://SkyandTelescope.com/observing/ataglance/

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subscription to SKY & TELESCOPE. Send the stars, planets, and galaxies to your
friends and relatives for only $42.95 per subscription.

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*-----------------------------------------------------*
| Stuart Goldman |
* Associate Editor *
| Sky & Telescope |
* 49 Bay State Rd. Sky & Telescope: The Essential *
| Cambridge, MA 02138 Magazine of Astronomy |
*-----------------------------------------------------*

On Sat, 13 Dec 2003 07:57:08 +0000 (UTC), "Michael McNeil"
wrote:

"Stuart Goldman" wrote in message

...The two stars of the newly
discovered binary orbit each other more closely than the previously known
systems, so they provide astronomers with a golden opportunity to test
Einstein's general theory of relativity to high levels of precision....
How inaccurate or suspect is relativity at present?

All theories are tested and retested, and new postulations are tested
to see if you can make predictions from them, and see if new
postulations better explain observed data. If something comes along
to explain effects explained by realtivity more accurately, then it
will be accommodated, however, just as Newtonian Mechanics works quite
well in everyday life, and you don't need to use General relativity
when a car crashes into a light pole, both Newtonian Mechanics and
Relativity apply.

As I explained to you in sci.geo.earhtquakes, that's SCIENCE.

Want to talk about Doppler shifts and Cepheid Variables?

--

Find out about Australia's most dangerous Doomsday Cult:
http://users.bigpond.net.au/wanglese/pebble.htm

"You can't fool me, it's turtles all the way down."

"Michael McNeil" wrote in message
news:3f43faf630d8d30052ceee5c7136f6de.45219@mygate .mailgate.org...
"Stuart Goldman" wrote in message

...The two stars of the newly
discovered binary orbit each other more closely than the previously
known
systems, so they provide astronomers with a golden opportunity to test
Einstein's general theory of relativity to high levels of precision....
How inaccurate or suspect is relativity at present?



As far as I am aware, the General Theory has passed all tests so far, and
agrees with experiment to within experimental error. The current precision
level for experiments is somewhere around 10^-3 ot 10^-5, depending on what
is being tested. There is a proposed spacecraft experiment, STEP "Satellite
Test of the Equivalence Principle" being planned for a few years hence.

--
Mike Dworetsky

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