Latest Galactic cosmic ray Stories

In a paper to be published in the April 10, 2011, issue of The Astrophysical Journal, scientists on NASA's Interstellar Boundary Explorer (IBEX) mission, including lead author Nathan Schwadron and others from the University of New Hampshire, isolate and resolve the mysterious "ribbon" of energy and particles the spacecraft discovered in the heliosphere "“ the huge bubble that surrounds our solar system and protects us from galactic cosmic rays.The finding, which overturns 40 years...

In the paper the authors from the Key Laboratory of Particle Astrophysics, Institute of High Energy Physics, Chinese Academy of Sciences in Beijing proposed a new model trying to explain the knee at cosmic ray spectra. The knee kept as a puzzle in cosmic ray physics for nearly half a century. The work was inspired by the recent observation of anomalous excess of electrons and positrons in cosmic rays. The work tries to explain the knee and the electron/positron excess in a single model.The...

NASA's current mission in orbit around the moon, the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter, or LRO, has been providing crucial insights about our nearest celestial neighbor since its launch in June. At a scientific meeting on Dec. 15, researchers unveiled the latest findings from three instruments of the powerful suite of seven aboard the satellite. LRO is expected to return more data about the moon than all previous orbital missions combined.At the American Geophysical Union meeting in San Francisco,...

GREENBELT, Md., Dec. 15 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- NASA's current mission in orbit around the moon, the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter, or LRO, has been providing crucial insights about our nearest celestial neighbor since its launch in June. At a scientific meeting today, researchers unveiled the latest findings from three instruments of the powerful suite of seven aboard the satellite. LRO is expected to return more data about the moon than all previous orbital missions combined. (Logo:...

Planning a trip to Mars? Take plenty of shielding. According to sensors on NASA's ACE (Advanced Composition Explorer) spacecraft, galactic cosmic rays have just hit a Space Age high."In 2009, cosmic ray intensities have increased 19% beyond anything we've seen in the past 50 years," says Richard Mewaldt of Caltech. "The increase is significant, and it could mean we need to re-think how much radiation shielding astronauts take with them on deep-space missions."The cause of...

Thanks to a unique "ballistic study" that combines data from ESO's Very Large Telescope and NASA's Chandra X-ray Observatory, astronomers have now solved a long-standing mystery of the Milky Way's particle accelerators. They show in a paper published today on Science Express that cosmic rays from our galaxy are very efficiently accelerated in the remnants of exploded stars.During the Apollo flights astronauts reported seeing odd flashes of light, visible even with their eyes closed. We have...

An international team of researchers has discovered a puzzling surplus of high-energy electrons bombarding Earth from space. The source of these cosmic rays is unknown, but it must be close to the solar system and it could be made of dark matter. Their results are being reported in the Nov. 20th issue of the journal Nature."This is a big discovery," says co-author John Wefel of Louisiana State University. "It's the first time we've seen a discrete source of accelerated cosmic...

Mechanism explains how the most energetic form of light can be produced in areas dominated by bright, young stars In 2002, when astronomers first detected cosmic gamma rays -- the most energetic form of light known -- coming from the constellation Cygnus they were surprised and perplexed. The region lacked the extreme electromagnetic fields that they thought were required to produce such energetic rays. But now a team of theoretical physicists propose a mechanism that can explain this mystery...

New clues about the origins of cosmic rays, mysterious high-energy particles that bombard the Earth, have been revealed using NASA's Chandra X-ray Observatory. An extraordinarily detailed image of the remains of an exploded star provides crucial insight into the generation of cosmic rays.For the first time, astronomers have mapped the rate of acceleration of cosmic ray electrons in a supernova remnant. The new map shows that the electrons are being accelerated at close to the theoretically...

Solar activity can be surprisingly good for astronauts.NASA -- Last month, the sun went haywire. Almost every day for two weeks in early September, solar flares issued from a giant sunspot named "active region 798/808." X-rays ionized Earth's upper atmosphere. Solar protons peppered the Moon. It was not a good time to be in space.Or was it?During the storms, something strange happened onboard the International Space Station (ISS): radiation levels dropped. "The crew of the ISS...