Word: solarized
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: during 1960-1969
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
...look as stable as anything in the universe. But the view may be a cosmic illusion. Astrophysicists Fred Hoyle and William A. Fowler, from Caltech. told the American Physical Society that galaxies often explode with improbable energy. Even the Milky Way Galaxy, of which the earth and the entire solar system are only a tiny part, may have blown up many times already-and could pop off again...
...solar system lies in the dense disk of the Milky Way Galaxy and at the safe distance of 30,000 light-years from the center. If a giant star were even now exploding at the galactic center, the earth and its inhabitants would have a good chance to survive the effects of the blast, which they would not know about for at least 30,000 years...
Most scientists believe that the solar system-sun, planets and all-condensed out of a vast nebula of gas and dust. Graduate Student Craig M. Merrihue of the University of California at Berkeley is even convinced that some of the first objects that condensed are still around and can be identified. They are "chondrules"-round, pea-sized or even smaller globules of stony material. When they happened to be embedded in meteorites, the tiny pebbles were preserved by the cold and vacuum of interplanetary space and lasted for billions of years...
Xenon 129 is a rare xenon isotope that is the descendant of iodine 129, a radioactive form of iodine that was created with the rest of the elements that formed the solar nebula and became extinct not many million years later. Since chondrules contain xenon 129, Merrihue argues that they must have acquired it from the decay of iodine 129. This means that they condensed as droplets during the infancy of the solar system, when everything else in the nebula was dust or gas-and they must be older than the earth...
Diagnosis. Telstar, which had no spare transponder, was in much more serious trouble. But its case was not hopeless. Its radio beacon was transmitting normally; so were the host of instruments that report by telemetry on its internal condition. They showed that Telstar's solar cells were generating plenty of electricity. Its temperature was normal, and no intruder, such as a meteorite, had damaged its delicate nervous system. Apparently the only trouble was in the command decoders. Telstar was ablebodied, but without working decoders it could not hear and obey commands...