NASA and NSF-Funded Research Finds First Potentially Habitable Exoplanet

To astronomers, a "potentially habitable" planet is one that could sustain life, not necessarily one where humans would thrive. Habitability depends on many factors, but having liquid water and an atmosphere are among the most important.

The research, sponsored by NASA and the National Science Foundation, placed the planet in an area where liquid water could exist on the planet's surface. If confirmed, this would be the most Earth-like exoplanet yet discovered and the first strong case for a potentially habitable one. 

The paper reports the discovery of two new planets around Gliese 581. This brings the total number of known planets around this star to six, the most yet discovered in a planetary system outside of our own. Like our solar system, the planets around Gliese 581 have nearly-circular orbits.

The new planet designated Gliese 581g has a mass three to four times that of Earth and orbits its star in just under 37 days. Its mass indicates that it is probably a rocky planet with a definite surface and enough gravity to hold on to an atmosphere.

Gliese 581, located 20 light years away from Earth in the constellation Libra, has two previously detected planets that lie at the edges of the habitable zone, one on the hot side (planet c) and one on the cold side (planet d). While some astronomers still think planet d may be habitable if it has a thick atmosphere with a strong greenhouse effect to warm it up, others are skeptical. The newly-discovered planet g, however, lies right in the middle of the habitable zone.

The planet is tidally locked to the star, meaning that one side is always facing the star and basking in perpetual daylight, while the side facing away from the star is in perpetual darkness. One effect of this is to stabilize the planet's surface climates, according to Vogt. The most habitable zone on the planet's surface would be the line between shadow and light (known as the "terminator").

Meanings.......Which Has Never Been Explained.

Today the day was so fun!! The starting was not that exciting but, I can bet anyone, after my dad came to visit us, life has changed completely, now everyday we have a "Family Session" kind of thing, and we talk about all our fun-memories, and laugh a lot!!
Now I sometimes think, life in here is not that bad. I can still have the smell of my country, the affection of our culture, and the happiness we had back there. But still there are some sort of things, which is missing, my nana-bhai (grandpa), nanu(grandma)!!
Last year, during Ramadan, we had done all our religious rituals together, but this year, I couldn't really realize what was happening, even during The Eid, when I called my nanu, and after talking with her, asked for nana-bhai I couldn't stop my tears when I heard his voice.
There was a time, when I was fasting alone, and my nana-bhai came to see me, and he said "Ushmi! I am feeling really bad, that my grand-daughter is hungry all day....." then I laughed, he started to tell his old-stories which I have heard 100times before, and by the time he fell asleep, but he was still talking with himself, I started crying.

If someone ask me, who is your favorite person in this world? my answer will be, "nana-bhai"
If someone ask me, who is the most interesting person in this world? my answer will be, "nana-bhai"
If someone ask me, who would you like to be in future? my answer will be, "nana-bhai"

sometimes I ask myself, why do I miss my country so much? I think thats because, I have brought everything I need here, but I forgot to bring two thing which I need more than any other thing in this world, my nana bhai and nanu

I miss you guyzzzz, nana-bhai I really miss when you work and I come from your back and scare you!!
I want you two to be with us, LOVE YOU xoxo

Windows XP users can't ride the IE9 train Some estimates are that more than half of Windows users are still with XP

The release of Internet Explorer 9 beta garnered a lot of attention and positive reviews. Cribbing from Chrome's UI and significantly boosting speed over previous iterations of the browser, IE9 looks like a real winner. Too bad Microsoft left Windows XP users — more than half of all Windows users — out in the cold.
In a statement to The Register, Ryan Gavin, senior director of IE business and marketing, said Windows XP users couldn't download IE9. Not now; not ever. Instead, Microsoft plans to "continue to focus on how we do a great job with Windows 7," Gavin said. (Msnbc.com is a joint venture of Microsoft and NBC Universal.)

According to recent stats, Windows XP represents the vast majority of the OS market with more than 53 percent. Windows 7 has only 22 percent.

The roadblock here is that XP doesn't have the capabilities required to support the hardware acceleration and HTML5 features of IE9. The hardware acceleration in IE9, according to The Register, comes courtesy of DirectX 10 — an update to the DirectX program that does not run on Windows XP unless it's been "modified." But quick Web search shows a handful of sites where DirectX 10 can be downloaded onto machines running XP, which leads me to believe that eventually someone will find a way to dump IE9 on XP, whether Microsoft likes it or not.

That Microsoft is keeping IE9 exclusive to those running Vista SP2 or higher seems like a foolish move that is likely to inspire millions to find an alternative browser, such as Firefox or Chrome. This could further damage IE's current supremacy of the browser market. All versions of Internet Explorer combined currently dominate with 60.4 percent of the Web browser market. Firefox has 22.93 percent, and Chrome has 7.52 percent.

Barring XP users also seems like a sneaky ploy to get more people to upgrade to Windows 7. I can't imagine many people would be so discouraged by the news that they cannot download a beta browser that they'd drop hundreds on an OS upgrade.

So while predictions have it that IE9 will crush the browser competition, over half of Windows users won't get a chance to play around with it. Chrome Beta, anyone?

Eyes Are Still Open........: Prime time for moongazers

Eyes Are Still Open........: Prime time for moongazers: "Alan Boyle writes:The moon is getting its figurative 'day in the sun' this weekend during a global celebration of lunar looks, and the gr..."

Prime time for moongazers

The moon is getting its figurative "day in the sun" this weekend during a global celebration of lunar looks, and the great thing is that you don't need to be a hotshot astronomer to join in.

More than 275 events in 40 countries are planned on Saturday during International Observe the Moon Night, with most of those events aimed at casual observers who usually wouldn't give the moon a second look.

Our only natural satellite tends to get noticed only during unusual astronomical events — for example, when it blots out the sun during a solar eclipse (such as the one that occurred July 11), or when Earth's shadow creates a total lunar eclipse (as it will on Dec. 22). In contrast, this Moon Night may seem as if it's occurring when the moon is in a ho-hum phase — not a brilliant full moon, nor a slender, svelte crescent, but a couple of days after its first-quarter phase. Well, it turns out that right now is the best observing opportunity in the moon's 29-day cycle.

Space.com's skywatching columnist, Joe Rao, points out that the full moon is so bright that details on the surface tend to look flat and washed-out. Just after first quarter is a much better time for seeing the moon in post-sunset skies, and for picking out the shadowed mountains and craters in sharp relief. What's more, nearly all of the moon's best features are illuminated.

So what's there to see? The highlights include:

• Copernicus Crater: This prominent crater toward the upper left of the lunar disk spans 60 miles and is a mere 800 million years old. Huge rays of lighter material emanate from the impact site, which is surrounded by the ancient Carpathian Mountains.
• Tycho Crater: 50-mile-wide Tycho is thought to be even younger than Copernicus — perhaps 100 million years old — and is surrounded by a similar burst of rays. The impact that created Tycho caused material to splash up and create a characteristic central peak.
• Seas on the moon: The lunar "maria," or seas, are smooth stretches of the lunar surface filled with volcanic lava from a long-ago phase of lunar geology. The Sea of Tranquility is one of the best-known maria because it was the site of the historic Apollo 11 landing in 1969. Just last year, NASA's Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter sent back pictures showing traces of the landing site.
• The terminator: The line between light and dark is the best place to look for dramatically lit craters and mountain ranges, particularly if you're looking through binoculars or a telescope. Among Saturday night's must-see craters along the terminator are Schiller, Gassendi and Kepler.

All these sights are described on a 10-megabyte moon map available from the Observe the Moon website.

This weekend's event coincide with a milestone for the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter. On Thursday, the $500 million mission officially wrapped up a survey aimed at scouting out landing sites for future probes and turned its full attention to scientific investigation. This all-science phase should last another two to four years, NASA said.

Moon Night has also served as an opportunity to boost a citizen-science project calledMoon Zoo. The moon-cataloging project's organizers asked participants to classify geological features on 20,000 images by Sunday — adding an area twice the size of Chicago to the Moon Zoo database. It turned out that the target was reached a couple of days early. At last check, more than 32,000 images had been classified since Wednesday.

"When we launched this challenge we had no idea how overwhelming and enthusiastic the response would be," the organizers reported on their Moonometer page. Which goes to show that the moon may not be ho-hum after all.

Ten killed as Taliban tries to disrupt Afghan election Hundreds of polling stations stay closed, mainly due to security concerns

KABUL, Afghanistan — A string of attacks hit Afghanistan's parliamentary election Saturday, killing at least 10 people as the Taliban tried to disrupt a poll that is testing the credibility of the government and security forces.

Voters appeared hesitant to go to polling stations after a series of rocket strikes in provincial centers across the country, including one which landed near the U.S. embassy and the headquarters of NATO-led forces in central Kabul about three hours before polls opened at 7 a.m. local time (10:30 p.m. ET).

Officials reported violence across the country. In the worst attack, police said the Taliban killed one Afghan soldier and six pro-government militiamen in a raid on a security outpost next to a polling station in northern Baghlan province.

Significant security failures would be a major setback, with Washington watching closely before U.S. President Barack Obama conducts a war strategy review in December likely to examine the pace and scale of U.S. troop withdrawals.

A poll flawed by violence and fraud would also weigh on Obama when his administration faces mid-term Congressional elections in November amid sagging public support for the war, with violence at its worst levels since the Taliban were ousted in 2001.

Saturday's election followed a similar pattern to last year's flawed 2009, which the Taliban also threatened but failed to disrupt significantly despite scores of attacks.

The Independent Election Commission (IEC) said 8 percent of the 5,816 polling centers had either not opened or not reported in, mainly because of security fears, IEC chairman Fazl Ahmad Manawi told a news conference. It had already decided not to open another 1,019 sites in light of a Taliban vow to disrupt voting.

Election's credibility at risk The attacks, and the number of polling stations that remained closed, raised fears about low voter turnout that could affect the outcome and credibility of the vote. "As in every election, we do hope that there will be a high voter turnout and that nobody will be deterred by security incidents," President Hamid Karzai told reporters after voting at a high school near the presidential palace in Kabul.

The election will "take the country many steps forward to a better future," Karzai said.

Rocket strikes in northern Takhar province and eastern Kunar killed three and wounded nine, officials said.

Two Afghan election observers were wounded by an explosion inside a polling center in eastern Khost province, a Taliban stronghold near the Pakistan border, local police chief Abdul Haqim Eshaqzai said.

Similar attacks on polling stations and government buildings were reported in Badakhshan and Kunduz in the north, Jalalabad in the east and Herat in the west.

"People are in their homes and they want to see the security situation. They will come out later and vote," Mohammad Omar, governor of Kunduz province, told Reuters. Four polling centers were closed after Taliban assaults in Logar, south of Kabul, and many stayed home after the Taliban threatened to cut off the ink-stained fingers of those who voted.

"I don't want to go and vote because of the Taliban's intimidation. I don't want to risk my life, just for a candidate," said a Logar resident named Naveed.

At least 24 people have been killed in election-related violence preceding the vote, including four candidates, according to observers.

In the past two days, Taliban militants abducted 18 election workers from a house in northern Bagdhis province, and a candidate was kidnapped in eastern Laghman province.

দিন-কাল

হুম!! এইটা লেখার আগে আমার মাথায়ে যা ঘুড়ছিলো তা হলো, আজকের সারাটাদিন আসলেই অনেক অদ্ভুত ভাবে কেটে গেলো!! আমি কি সেই একই মানুষ, যে, কিছুদিন আগে বাসার থেকেই বের হতে ভয় পেতো, সেই একই মানুষ যে, আগে সম্পূর্ণভাবে শুধু একজনের উপরই নির্ভর করতো?? সে এখন নিজে নিজে হাঁটতে শিখছে, নিজেকে চিনতে শিখছে, পৃথিবীটাকে বুঝতে শিখছে!!
আচ্ছা এখন আসা যাক, আমার সারাটাদিন কিভাবে গেলো তাতে...আমি ক্লাস থেকে ফিরেই কিছু না করে রেডি হয়ে গেলাম, কারণ জানতাম, আবার কোনো না কোনো কারণে বের হতে হবেই, কারণ শেষ কিছুদিন কোনো না কোনো একটা কাজ আমার বের হয়েই যায়!! বয়স তো আমার তেমন বেশি না, তাও জানি না কোনখান থেকে এতো ঝামেলার মধ্যে আমার পড়তেই হচ্ছে!! যাকে দেখি সেই কোনো সমস্যায়ে পড়লে আমার নাম নিচ্ছে, আগামী বছর এমনেই কলেজ এ উঠছি!! এমনেও পড়ার এতো চাপ যে নিজের জন্যই মাঝে মাঝে সময় পাই না!!
এখন মাঝে মাঝে মনে হয়, পিচ্চি মেয়েটা আর পিচ্চি নেই!! মানুষ ওর উপর অনেক আশা রাখা শুরু করেছে, আর ও সবার আশা অবশ্যই পুরোন করবে, বিশেষ করে ওর আব্বা-আম্মা এবং আল্লাহর!!
যত কষ্টই হোক, এবার আমি হারতে রাজি না!!