Astrophysicist John Dubinski has been running simulations on his supercomputer of galaxies forming, colliding into each other, and otherwise moving around as they are wont to do. Last year he compiled nine animations onto a DVD, wrapped them up with "the soundworlds of renaissance and baroque counterpoint, free improvisation, Middle-Eastern music, minimalism, techno and electronica to create a musical feast that crosses time and dimension," and sold Gravitas.
As of this week, he's begun giving the DVD away for free via torrent, but he's posted the series of animations on YouTube, making my day far, far happier than otherwise possible.
As a galaxy, it can get difficult out there in the black. Just cold chillin' on your own gets, well, cold. Elliptical galaxy NGC 1132 (pictured) survives by 1) being huge and 2) containing enormous amounts of dark matter comparable to what you might find in entire groups of galaxies.
This new Hubble image captures the scale of the ginormous galaxy, which either formed as a solo "lone-wolf" amidst tons of galaxy clusters or perhaps merged with other galaxies in recent history. The amount of dark matter classifies the galaxy as a "fossil-group" system, a rare galaxy that formed when growth of moderate-sized galaxies got suppressed, leaving only one massive galaxy to form.
The elliptical NGC 1132 emanates tons of yellow light — which pours out from the aging stars within. Since it's 318 million light-years away in the constellation Eridanus, it's not like we'll have any contact. But hey, 1132 — if you get too lonely, don't be afraid to text us or something.
Scientific American editor George Musser explains dark matter using nothing but stuff lying around his office and his rapier-sharp wit. It's like Macgyver, if Macgyver had to explain abstruse subjects instead of, you know, escaping.
Woohoo! After more blood sweat and tears than the monkeys who turn out this site would care to recount, we're finally ready to start posting the fruits of our ongoing project, a new video podcast that includes a segment we call Instant Egghead.
Our first installment: Scientific American editor George Musser explains Dark Matter in about a minute, using nothing but stuff he has lying around his office -- not a trivial feat!
