Let’s face it – it’s been a pretty rough year for the solar system. But it has been a great year for scientists studying the far reaches of the universe. Here are some top stories of physics in 2020.
10. Boom!
The most powerful known explosion in the universe was discovered in 2016 – but it actually happened 390 million years ago. While the first four-legged critics were on the ground, a jet was launched through a supermassive black hole in the Ophecus cluster that blew sharp cavities of surrounding gas. In 2020, astronomers revisited old data and Realized how powerful that explosion was: Five times 10 ^ 54 ou rja jul. In perspective, the galaxy has enough energy to literally tear apart all 300 billion stars and hundreds of galaxies.
9. I can see my solar system from here
If you want to navigate between the stars, you will need a map. And it is That’s exactly what the European Space Agency’s Gaia Space Observatory is all about Created using data on over 1.8 billion cosmic onbjets. These distances include near and far stars, asteroids, comets and more. 0.5 of our galaxy. Want to know the status, momentum, spectrum and more for 0.5% of the population? You are in luck. More than 1,600 papers have been published with Gaia data, and astronomers will be sure to mine the database for years to come. And here’s the best part: There’s more data to come.
8. Losing a legend
In 2020, the world Lost one of its leading and celebrated supermarkets, Freeman Dyson. An unbound imaginative man, Dyson is best known in popular science circles for his vision of the field. (He didn’t name it after that; it came later.) The Dyson Sphere is a fictional megastructure that completely shuts down a star for 100% of its solar energy crop – exactly the hyper-advanced culture that may need to be hyper-advanced. Things. So far, astronomers have not been able to find any other Dyson spheres in our galaxy, but Freeman’s dream is alive.
7. We found life on Venus, and then we didn’t find it
That was pretty good to be true: the solid evidence claims for life in Venus’s cloud tops, it’s the world’s otherwise narcissistic. The logic was based on a strange (and foul-smelling) chemical phosphine emitted to Earth by anaerobic bacteria. To get as much phosphine as was obtained in the atmosphere, scientists proposed, Venus would need a large population of airborne microorganisms. Hey Further analysis reduced the amount of observation of odorous material (Up to the levels considered rarely significant, leave a mark for life), and in some analyzes, it was completely removed just like any other noisy signal. Don’t worry, alien life: if you’re out there, we’ll keep watching.
6. The newest toy of 2020: FRB
Everyone loves a good fast radio burst (FRB), right? The source of these mysterious, energetic signs has been an annoying puzzle for astronomers for over a decade. FRBs are fast, high-powered, frequency-hopping radio signals from all over the world, making it difficult to direct their origins. But in the end, in 2020, Astronomers became lucky: They found an FRB source in our own cosmic backyard. Follow-up observations revealed the culprit: a strange star known as a magnet (the core of a super magnetized dead star). Apparently, magnetars often strip away large amounts of paint-up energy, which Earthbound observers see as a rapid explosion of radio emissions.
5. Wet Mars after all
There is liquid water on Mars. No, it’s bone-dry. No, wait; It sometimes contains water. No, no, never mind. This important question of whether the Red Planet has been home to any liquid water has been bothering astronomers for decades. Astronomers care because, where there is water, there is a potential home for life. Earlier this year, astronomers claimed that there was not just one, but Four lakes of liquid water on Mars. The catch? They are surprisingly salted – like bright mud rather than something more boring – and are buried under a mile of frozen carbon dioxide on the South Polar Cape. Not everyone is convinced, however, yet pack your Martian swimsuit.
4. Take him home
2020 was definitely the year of the solar system. Three independent spacecraft have successfully acquired samples and were returning to Earth. NASA introduced it OSIRIS-REx The mission of the asteroid Bennu, which collected so much material that its sample container leaked. Japanese Hibusa 2 pushed on the mission Asteroid Rayugu And landed the material safely on Earth. And the Chinese Chang 5 Lender went on a mission The moonManage to launch the sample back to Earth before the lander breaks.
3. It’s a big black hole!
Astronomers have used gravitational waves (ripples in space-time fabric) to observe many black hole collisions that have so far been rare newspapers. But in 2020, astronomers Announced the discovery of the biggest collision yet: Titanic Merger of 85-Solar-Mass Black Hole and 66-Solar-Mass Black Hole. After the merger, the resulting black hole commented on 142 times the mass of the Sun. (The mass of about nine suns was converted into mass pure energy rays.) In other black hole news, the final Pandora of the universe was the subject of BX. This year’s Nobel Prize in Physics.
2. Is it getting hot in this superconductor?
The superconductor is super neat. Due to the peculiarities of quantum mechanics, in very special situations, a pair can travel together without losing electrification, becoming an electron mate. That means a game-changing technology where electricity flows forever without resistance. Unfortunately, in order for superconductors to work, physicists had to cool everything down. But in 2020, Researchers have announced the discovery of a superconductor at room temperature, Only 59 degrees Fahrenheit (15 degrees Celsius). The catch? You need to recreate the pressure at the center of the earth.
1. Take it, COVID-19
The novel coronavirus SARS-CO-2 has devastated humanity, reaching an epidemic in just a few months and washing away the entire world. But we are fighting together with one of our most powerful weapons: vaccines. Current vaccines target a very specific part of the virus, the “spike” protein that it uses to invade our cells. One of the first steps in the war against covid was to identify and map the proteins that the researchers Earlier this year, accomplished using a physics-based technique called cryogenic electron microscopy. With the help of this map, drug manufacturers can mimic the virus for a vaccine aimed at this feature, which gives our immune system a chance to fight back.
