Monday, October 09, 2006

Cosmic Radiation


Cosmic radiation
entering Earth's atmosphere.

An essential role for remote stars in everyday weather on Earth has been revealed by the Danish National Space Center in Copenhagen.

A team at the Danish National Space Center has discovered how cosmic rays from exploding stars can help to make clouds in the atmosphere. The results support the theory that cosmic rays influence Earth's climate.

It is already well-established that when cosmic rays, which are high-speed atomic particles originating in exploded stars far away in the Milky Way, penetrate Earth's atmosphere they produce substantial amounts of ions and release free electrons.
Now, results from the Danish experiment show that the released electrons significantly promote the formation of building blocks for cloud condensation nuclei on which water vapour condenses to make clouds.
Hence, a causal mechanism by which cosmic rays can facilitate the production of clouds in Earth's atmosphere has been experimentally identified for the first time.

The Danish team officially announced their discovery, published by the Royal Society, the British national academy of science.

Read more on the SKY experiment
neutrinos & cosmic particles by Plato
neutrinos for beginners by Sabine Hossenfelder
Explaining Cosmic Rays by Clifford @ Asymptotia
more on Climate Sciences by Stoat @ Scienceblogs
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Saturn's Clouds in Silhouette
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False colour image
made with data from

Cassini's visual & infrared
mapping spectrometer,
which can image the planet
at 352 different wavelengths
Image credit: NASA/JPL/SSI
Cassini February, 2006
.
Click to enlarge

False-colour mosaic of Saturn
The strange red colour is the glow of thermal radiation from inside Saturn’s warm interior, which is visible on the night-side of the planet.

The northern hemisphere is brighter because the atmosphere is relatively clear - this reveals the turbulent lower clouds. Cassini took this image when it was 1 million miles from Saturn.

Read the full story @ universetoday
more on Saturn's Rings by Louise Riofrio
mission to Saturn Cassini Huygens NASA
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Famous Quotes
Never give in and never give up.
Hubert H. Humphrey
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