Received
- Details
- Written by Grant Broadcasters
- Category: Received
- Hits: 96
Our view of the universe just expanded, with the first image from NASA's new space telescope brimming with galaxies and offering the deepest ever look at the cosmos.
The first image from the $US10 billion ($A15 billion) James Webb Space Telescope is the furthest humanity has ever seen in time and distance, closer to the dawn of time and the edge of the universe.
The 'deep field' image released at a White House event is filled with lots of stars, with massive galaxies in the foreground and faint and extremely distant galaxies peeking through.
Part of the image is light from not too long after the Big Bang, which was 13.8 billion years ago.
"We're going to give humanity a new view of the cosmos," NASA Administrator Bill Nelson told reporters last month in a briefing.
"And it's a view that we've never seen before."
More images will be released later on Tuesday, including a view of a giant gaseous planet outside our solar system, two images of a nebula where stars are born and die in spectacular beauty and an update of a classic image of five tightly clustered galaxies that dance around each other.
The world's biggest and most powerful space telescope rocketed away last December from French Guiana in South America.
It reached its lookout point 1.6 million km from earth in January.
Then the lengthy process began to align the mirrors, get the infrared detectors cold enough to operate and calibrate the science instruments, all protected by a sunshade the size of a tennis court that keeps the telescope cool.
The plan is to use the telescope to peer back so far that scientists will get a glimpse of the early days of the universe about 13.7 billion years ago and zoom in on closer cosmic objects, even our own solar system, with sharper focus.
Webb is considered the successor to the highly successful, but ageing Hubble Space Telescope.
Hubble has stared as far back as 13.4 billion years. It found the light wave signature of an extremely bright galaxy in 2016.
Astronomers measure how far back they look in light-years with one light-year being 9.3 trillion kilometres.
"Webb can see backwards in time to just after the Big Bang by looking for galaxies that are so far away that the light has taken many billions of years to get from those galaxies to our telescopes," Jonathan Gardner, Webb's deputy project scientist said during the media briefing, said.
How far back did that first image look? Over the next few days, astronomers will do intricate calculations to figure out just how old those galaxies are, project scientist Klaus Pontoppidan said last month.
The deepest view of the cosmos "is not a record that will stand for very long", Pontoppidan said, since scientists are expected to use the telescope to go even deeper.
Thomas Zurbuchen, NASA's science mission chief said when he saw the images he got emotional and so did his colleagues.
"It's really hard to not look at the universe in new light and not just have a moment that is deeply personal," he said.
At 6.4m, Webb's gold-plated, flower-shaped mirror is the biggest and most sensitive ever sent into space.
It is comprised of 18 segments, one of which was smacked by a bigger than anticipated micrometeoroid in May. Four previous micrometeoroid strikes to the mirror were smaller.
Despite the impacts, the telescope has continued to exceed mission requirements, with barely any data loss, according to NASA.
NASA is collaborating on Webb with the European and Canadian space agencies.
"I'm now really excited as this dramatic progress augurs well for reaching the ultimate prize for many astronomers like myself: pinpointing 'Cosmic Dawn' - the moment when the universe was first bathed in starlight," Richard Ellis, professor of astrophysics at University College London, said.
© AP 2022
- Details
- Written by Grant Broadcasters
- Category: Received
- Hits: 90
Police officers are set to talk about training as hearings continue in the inquiry into Queensland Police's response to domestic and family violence.
Judge Deborah Richards is heading the independent commission announced by Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk in response to the Women's Safety and Justice Taskforce recommendations.
Public hearings will be held over five weeks throughout Queensland.
They started in Brisbane on Monday with Assistant Commissioner Brian Codd telling the inquiry a link between stressed and unsatisfied officers and community members who are dissatisfied with police responses to domestic and family violence was likely.
There were various things he thought impacted on attitudes, beliefs and sometimes performance and this included the "sheer demand" of services.
"They (officers) tell me, nearly every time I speak to them, about feeling so fatigued," he said.
A senior constable from Logan - where 25,000 to 30,000 domestic violence cases could be reported a year - told him last week a single shift could involve going to five such incidents.
"At the end of the shift she'll go home at night and cannot sleep for worrying about whether she was able to provide as good a service as she wants to and whether she misses something," Asst Comm Codd said.
Six police officers are expected to take the stand on Tuesday to talk about domestic and family violence training for recruits, first year constables and general duties officers.
This week hearings will examine the capability, capacity and structure of the Queensland Police Service's response to domestic and family violence.
The experiences and observations of regional and Indigenous police officers, legal representatives and community support workers will be the focus later.
Experts on topics related to the policing of domestic and family violence will also be called.
Hearings will be held in Brisbane, Cairns, Townsville and Mount Isa.
The commission, which has a budget of $3.4 million, began work on May 30 and is expected to report by October 4.
It will consider but not investigate or make findings about individual cases because of the focus on systemic issues and the inquiry's limited time frame.
1800 RESPECT (1800 737 732)
Lifeline 13 11 14
© AAP 2022
- Details
- Written by Grant Broadcasters
- Category: Received
- Hits: 95
A tense fifth bull run at Pamplona's San Fermin Festival has left three people gored, including one American, and three others with bruises, the Navarra regional government said.
It was the first run with gorings in the festival so far this year. There are three more daily runs before the festival ends on Thursday.
The regional government said a 25-year-old runner from Sunrise, Florida, was gored in the calf in the bullring on Monday. The other two gored were Spaniards, one in the ring and one on the street. None was in a serious condition.
Earlier festival organisers had said erroneously that the foreigner gored in the ring was Australian.
Three other runners, all Spaniards, were treated for injuries sustained in falls during the run.
Television images showed one bull repeatedly tossing and butting one runner against the wooden barriers on the edge of the ring and then goring another in the back of the leg.
The spectacle lasted just over three minutes as hundreds of runners, mostly men, ran frantically ahead and alongside six fighting bulls as they charged through the cobblestone streets of this northern city. The run finishes at Pamplona's bullring, where later in the day the bulls are killed by professional bullfighters.
Tens of thousands of visitors come to the Pamplona festival, which was featured in Ernest Hemingway's 1926 novel "The Sun Also Rises." The adrenaline rush of the morning bull run is followed by partying throughout the day and night.
Eight people were gored in 2019, the last festival before a two-year hiatus because of the COVID-19 pandemic. Sixteen people have died in Pamplona's bull runs since 1910, with the last death in 2009.
© AP 2022
- Details
- Written by Grant Broadcasters
- Category: Received
- Hits: 89
One person has been gored and several people have had very close shaves in the sixth running of the bulls at Pamplona's San Fermin Festival.
Spanish Red Cross spokesman Jose Aldaba told reporters at the end of Tuesday's run that as well as the goring victim, medics treated four other people for knocks and bruises sustained in falls and pile-ups during the speedy run that lasted just over two minutes.
Aldaba said the person gored suffered an injury to the arm.
One bull charged straight into the back of a young woman, knocking her to the ground before lifting another runner into the air and tossing him, too.
One other runner was dragged along the ground for several metres by a bull whose horn was hooked into the back of his jersey.
In all, four people have been gored in the six runs held so far this year. The other three gorings all occurred on Monday.
In the 8am runs, hundreds of runners, mostly men, dash frantically ahead and alongside six fighting bulls as they charge along an 875-metre route through the cobblestone streets of this northern city. The run finishes at Pamplona's bullring, where later in the day the bulls are killed by professional bullfighters.
Tens of thousands of visitors come to the Pamplona festival, which was featured in Ernest Hemingway's 1926 novel "The Sun Also Rises." The adrenaline rush of the morning bull run is followed by partying throughout the day and night.
Eight people were gored in 2019, the last festival before a two-year hiatus because of the COVID-19 pandemic. Sixteen people have died in Pamplona's bull runs since 1910, with the last death in 2009.
© AP 2022
Page 830 of 1496