http://newscenter.berkeley.edu News from the University of California, Berkeley Mon, 20 May 2013 23:39:36 +0000 en-US hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.5.1 http://newscenter.berkeley.edu/2013/02/08/intelligent-civilizations-rarer-than-one-in-a-million/ http://newscenter.berkeley.edu/2013/02/08/intelligent-civilizations-rarer-than-one-in-a-million/#comments Fri, 08 Feb 2013 09:29:32 +0000 Robert Sanders http://newscenter.berkeley.edu/?p=33991 After looking for intelligent radio signals from 86 stars with known planets, UC Berkeley scientists have, for the first time, calculated the odds of finding intelligent civilizations in the Milky Way Galaxy. Fewer than one in a million stars probably are advanced enough for us to detect, though that means there are still potentially millions of such civilizations in the galaxy.]]> http://newscenter.berkeley.edu/2013/02/08/intelligent-civilizations-rarer-than-one-in-a-million/feed/ 0 http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/hubble/science/rogue-fomalhaut.html http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/hubble/science/rogue-fomalhaut.html#comments Sat, 12 Jan 2013 16:03:16 +0000 Robert Sanders http://newscenter.berkeley.edu/?p=33796 UC Berkeley astronomer Paul Kalas has studied the star Fomalhaut for years because of its resemblance to our own solar system 4 billion years ago. New observations using the Hubble Space Telescope reveal that an already-known planet circling Fomalhaut has a highly eccentric orbit that suggests the presence of other planets.]]> http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/hubble/science/rogue-fomalhaut.html/feed/ 0 http://newscenter.lbl.gov/news-releases/2013/01/09/scp0401-farthest-yet/ http://newscenter.lbl.gov/news-releases/2013/01/09/scp0401-farthest-yet/#comments Wed, 09 Jan 2013 19:27:31 +0000 Robert Sanders http://newscenter.berkeley.edu/?p=33801 The Supernova Cosmology Project, based at Berkeley Lab and headed by UC Berkeley physicist and Nobel Laureate Saul Perlmutter, has discovered the most distant supernova yet that can be used in cosmological studies. Announced at the American Astronomical Society meeting, it will help answer questions about dark energy and the fate of the universe.]]> http://newscenter.lbl.gov/news-releases/2013/01/09/scp0401-farthest-yet/feed/ 0 http://newscenter.berkeley.edu/2013/01/08/earth-size-planets-common-in-galaxy/ http://newscenter.berkeley.edu/2013/01/08/earth-size-planets-common-in-galaxy/#comments Tue, 08 Jan 2013 18:00:46 +0000 Robert Sanders http://newscenter.berkeley.edu/?p=33696 Last year, astronomers were excited to discover that the number of exoplanets increases toward smaller sizes, suggesting that there are many Earth-size planets in the galaxy. A new analysis of three years of Kepler data shows that this increase plateaus around twice Earth size. Nevertheless, Earth-like planets occur around at least 17 percent of sun-like stars.]]> http://newscenter.berkeley.edu/2013/01/08/earth-size-planets-common-in-galaxy/feed/ 0 http://newscenter.berkeley.edu/2013/01/07/exocomets-may-be-as-common-as-exoplanets/ http://newscenter.berkeley.edu/2013/01/07/exocomets-may-be-as-common-as-exoplanets/#comments Mon, 07 Jan 2013 18:00:23 +0000 Robert Sanders http://newscenter.berkeley.edu/?p=33695 Astronomers have found thousands of potential exoplanets and many stars with massive disks of gas and dust that suggest planets are forming, but not much of the stuff intermediate between dust and planets, such as asteroids, planetesimals and comets. UC Berkeley astronomer Barry Welsh has looked closely at a number of stars with dust disks and found evidence that they also have comets.]]> http://newscenter.berkeley.edu/2013/01/07/exocomets-may-be-as-common-as-exoplanets/feed/ 0 http://newscenter.lbl.gov/news-releases/2012/12/04/moore-foundation-bigboss/ http://newscenter.lbl.gov/news-releases/2012/12/04/moore-foundation-bigboss/#comments Wed, 05 Dec 2012 15:50:29 +0000 Robert Sanders http://newscenter.berkeley.edu/?p=33571 A $2.1 million grant from the Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation to the Berkeley Center for Cosmological Physics will fund revolutionary technologies that the proposed BigBOSS project will use to study dark energy with unprecedented precision. BigBOSS, based at Berkeley Lab, will probe the expansion history of the universe, says BCCP director Uros Seljak. professor of physics.]]> http://newscenter.lbl.gov/news-releases/2012/12/04/moore-foundation-bigboss/feed/ 0 http://newscenter.berkeley.edu/2012/11/21/robert-lin-uc-berkeley-pioneer-in-experimental-space-physics-dies-at-70/ http://newscenter.berkeley.edu/2012/11/21/robert-lin-uc-berkeley-pioneer-in-experimental-space-physics-dies-at-70/#comments Wed, 21 Nov 2012 21:25:27 +0000 Robert Sanders http://newscenter.berkeley.edu/?p=33512 Physicist Robert Peichung Lin, a former director of the Space Sciences Laboratory at the University of California, Berkeley, who designed and built dozens of instruments to study solar flares, the magnetic fields on the surface of the moon and Mars and the plasma environment of Earth, died suddenly of a stroke on Saturday, Nov. 17.]]> http://newscenter.berkeley.edu/2012/11/21/robert-lin-uc-berkeley-pioneer-in-experimental-space-physics-dies-at-70/feed/ 0 http://newscenter.berkeley.edu/2012/10/17/keck-observations-reveal-complex-face-of-uranus/ http://newscenter.berkeley.edu/2012/10/17/keck-observations-reveal-complex-face-of-uranus/#comments Wed, 17 Oct 2012 17:10:16 +0000 Robert Sanders http://newscenter.berkeley.edu/?p=33163 Uranus is so far from Earth that telescopes have typically seen little more than a blue-green blur, but new techniques employed with the Keck II telescope in Hawaii are revealing complex surface detail reminiscent of the solar system's other giant planets, including Saturn and Neptune.]]> http://newscenter.berkeley.edu/2012/10/17/keck-observations-reveal-complex-face-of-uranus/feed/ 0 http://newscenter.berkeley.edu/2012/10/05/grants-help-scientists-explore-border-between-science-science-fiction/ http://newscenter.berkeley.edu/2012/10/05/grants-help-scientists-explore-border-between-science-science-fiction/#comments Mon, 01 Oct 2012 17:54:57 +0000 Robert Sanders http://newscenter.berkeley.edu/?p=33047 Astronomer Geoff Marcy and cosmologist and string theorist Raphael Bousso are among 20 scientists awarded research grants to explore innovative and edgy areas of science. In the case of Marcy and Bousso, these areas are on the border between science and science fiction.]]> http://newscenter.berkeley.edu/2012/10/05/grants-help-scientists-explore-border-between-science-science-fiction/feed/ 0 http://newscenter.berkeley.edu/2012/10/02/nobel-laureate-and-alum-adam-reiss-to-discuss-dark-energy/ http://newscenter.berkeley.edu/2012/10/02/nobel-laureate-and-alum-adam-reiss-to-discuss-dark-energy/#comments Tue, 02 Oct 2012 18:41:03 +0000 Robert Sanders http://newscenter.berkeley.edu/?p=32681 Nobel Laureate and alumnus Adam G. Riess will give a free public talk at UC Berkeley about groundbreaking research on the expansion of the universe and its implications for dark energy. ]]> http://newscenter.berkeley.edu/2012/10/02/nobel-laureate-and-alum-adam-reiss-to-discuss-dark-energy/feed/ 0 http://www.calacademy.org/newsroom/releases/2012/fellows.php http://www.calacademy.org/newsroom/releases/2012/fellows.php#comments Fri, 28 Sep 2012 22:48:45 +0000 Robert Sanders http://newscenter.berkeley.edu/?p=33101 David Wake, amphibian expert and professor emeritus of integrative biology, will receive this year's Fellows' Medal, the highest honor of the California Academy of Sciences. Wildlife ecologist Justin Brashares, associate professor of ESPM, and astronomer Steven Beckwith are among 10 newly elected fellows of the academy. ]]> http://www.calacademy.org/newsroom/releases/2012/fellows.php/feed/ 0 https://news.slac.stanford.edu/features/panofsky-prize-honors-researchers-underground-hunt-dark-matter https://news.slac.stanford.edu/features/panofsky-prize-honors-researchers-underground-hunt-dark-matter#comments Thu, 27 Sep 2012 22:48:11 +0000 Robert Sanders http://newscenter.berkeley.edu/?p=33096 The 2013 Panofsky Prize in Experimental Particle Physics was awarded jointly to UC Berkeley physicist Bernard Sadoulet and Stanford's Blas Cabrera for their development of new techniques for searching for weakly interacting massive particles (WIMPS), the most popular candidate for the unseen dark matter that permeates the universe.]]> https://news.slac.stanford.edu/features/panofsky-prize-honors-researchers-underground-hunt-dark-matter/feed/ 0 http://science.kqed.org/quest/video/black-holes-objects-of-attraction/ http://science.kqed.org/quest/video/black-holes-objects-of-attraction/#comments Wed, 26 Sep 2012 19:10:23 +0000 Robert Sanders http://newscenter.berkeley.edu/?p=33075 UC Berkeley astronomer Alex Filippenko joins William Craig and other NuSTAR satellite scientists tonight on the KQED Quest program "Black Holes: Objects of Attraction," airing locally at 7:30 p.m. Filippenko explains the physics of black holes, while Craig and NuSTAR principal investigator Fiona Harrison of Caltech explain how the x-ray satellite will help solve black hole mysteries.]]> http://science.kqed.org/quest/video/black-holes-objects-of-attraction/feed/ 0 http://newscenter.berkeley.edu/2012/09/04/explosion-of-galaxy-formation-lit-up-early-universe/ http://newscenter.berkeley.edu/2012/09/04/explosion-of-galaxy-formation-lit-up-early-universe/#comments Tue, 04 Sep 2012 18:30:54 +0000 Robert Sanders http://newscenter.berkeley.edu/?p=32782 The universe was dark until the first stars began to form, but the universe really lit up once massive hydrogen clouds began birthing galaxies of stars. A new study by postdocs Oliver Zahn and Christian Reichardt, using data from the South Pole Telescope, finds that this period, called the Epoch of Reionization, was later and more explosive than thought.]]> http://newscenter.berkeley.edu/2012/09/04/explosion-of-galaxy-formation-lit-up-early-universe/feed/ 0 http://newscenter.lbl.gov/news-releases/2012/08/23/supernovae-of-the-same-brightness/ http://newscenter.lbl.gov/news-releases/2012/08/23/supernovae-of-the-same-brightness/#comments Thu, 23 Aug 2012 22:26:17 +0000 Robert Sanders http://newscenter.berkeley.edu/?p=32748 When UC Berkeley astronomers Alex Filippenko and Joshua Bloom heard about a newly exploded star, they swiveled the Keck Telescope into position to take a picture. This data helped Berkeley Lab's Peter Nugent determine that the "progenitor" star had a companion red giant and had undergone more than one previous nova explosion before it went supernova.]]> http://newscenter.lbl.gov/news-releases/2012/08/23/supernovae-of-the-same-brightness/feed/ 0 http://newscenter.berkeley.edu/2012/07/31/cinema-among-tiny-cubesats-to-be-launched-aug-2/ http://newscenter.berkeley.edu/2012/07/31/cinema-among-tiny-cubesats-to-be-launched-aug-2/#comments Tue, 31 Jul 2012 16:53:00 +0000 Robert Sanders http://newscenter.berkeley.edu/?p=32527 CINEMA, a tiny nanosatellite designed and built by students at UC Berkeley, is scheduled for launch on Aug. 2. Once in Earth orbit, it will monitor the movement of charged particles in the atmosphere that can disrupt power grids on the ground.]]> http://newscenter.berkeley.edu/2012/07/31/cinema-among-tiny-cubesats-to-be-launched-aug-2/feed/ 0 http://newscenter.berkeley.edu/2012/07/24/theoretical-astrophysicist-receives-500000-no-strings-attached/ http://newscenter.berkeley.edu/2012/07/24/theoretical-astrophysicist-receives-500000-no-strings-attached/#comments Tue, 24 Jul 2012 16:15:23 +0000 Robert Sanders http://newscenter.berkeley.edu/?p=32403 The Simons Foundation of New York initiated a new program of Simons Investigators this year, awarding 21 mathematicians, theoretical physicists and theoretical computer scientists $100,000 per year for 5-10 years, no strings attached. Theoretical astrophysicist Eliot Quataert was one of them.]]> http://newscenter.berkeley.edu/2012/07/24/theoretical-astrophysicist-receives-500000-no-strings-attached/feed/ 0 http://newscenter.berkeley.edu/2012/06/08/x-ray-telescope-to-focus-on-hottest-regions-of-black-holes-supernovas/ http://newscenter.berkeley.edu/2012/06/08/x-ray-telescope-to-focus-on-hottest-regions-of-black-holes-supernovas/#comments Fri, 08 Jun 2012 17:45:48 +0000 Robert Sanders http://newscenter.berkeley.edu/?p=22514 NASA is scheduled to launch an orbiting X-ray satellite on Wednesday, June 13, that will open a new window on the universe, allowing scientists to probe the roiling edges of black holes, exploding stars and the smallest, most frequent flares on the sun. UC Berkeley scientists and engineers helped build the instruments, will operate the satellite, and will analyze the data from supernova explosions.]]> http://newscenter.berkeley.edu/2012/06/08/x-ray-telescope-to-focus-on-hottest-regions-of-black-holes-supernovas/feed/ 0 http://newscenter.berkeley.edu/2012/06/06/transit-of-venus-a-bright-spot-for-campus-stargazers/ http://newscenter.berkeley.edu/2012/06/06/transit-of-venus-a-bright-spot-for-campus-stargazers/#comments Wed, 06 Jun 2012 21:27:30 +0000 Cathy Cockrell http://newscenter.berkeley.edu/?p=31706 A rare transit of Venus brought campus astronomers, and many others' inner astronomers, out of doors Tuesday. On Sproul Plaza, hundreds lined up, over the course of five hours, for a last-in-a-lifetime chance to glimpse Venus by day; others viewed the planet from as near as Lawrence Hall of Science or as far away as Hawaii.]]> http://newscenter.berkeley.edu/2012/06/06/transit-of-venus-a-bright-spot-for-campus-stargazers/feed/ 0 http://newscenter.berkeley.edu/2012/05/17/uc-berkeley-junior-hot-on-the-trail-of-sutters-mill-meteorites/ http://newscenter.berkeley.edu/2012/05/17/uc-berkeley-junior-hot-on-the-trail-of-sutters-mill-meteorites/#comments Thu, 17 May 2012 19:14:58 +0000 Robert Sanders http://newscenter.berkeley.edu/?p=30334 When a fireball exploded over California's Gold Country on April 22, Cal geology major Jason Utas wrapped up his final exam and headed to Sutter's Mill with a dozen of his friends to look for fragments. Four of them, including Utas, found small pieces of a rare carbonaceous chondrite, a type of meteorite that may have carried the building blocks of life to Earth billions of years ago.]]> http://newscenter.berkeley.edu/2012/05/17/uc-berkeley-junior-hot-on-the-trail-of-sutters-mill-meteorites/feed/ 0