May 2014 Archives

To date, only a few candidates for close binary supermassive black holes have been found. All are in active galaxies where th

An artist's conception of a supermassive black hole and accretion disk. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

ey are constantly ripping gas clouds apart, in the prelude to crushing them out of existence. In the process of destruction, the gas is heated so much that it shines at many wavelengths, including X-rays. This gives the galaxy an unusually bright centre, and leads to it being called active.

On 10 June 2010, Dr Fukun Liu from Peking University in China with colleagues spotted a tidal disruption event in the galaxy SDSS J120136.02+300305.5 (J120136 for short). They were scanning the data for such events and scheduled follow-up observations just days later with XMM-Newton and NASA's Swift satellite.

A new plant species with an unusual lifestyle - it eats nickel for a living - has been discovered, according to a recent study.

Scientists from the University of the Philippines, Los Baños have discovered Rinorea niccolifera, a plant species that accumulates up to 18,000 ppm of the metal in its leaves without poisoning itself, according to Edwino Fernando, lead author of the report and professor, said in a statement.

Nickel hyperaccumulation is such a rare phenomenon with only about 0.5 to 1 percent of plant species native to nickel-rich soils having been recorded to exhibit the ability. 

On Friday, the CDC confirmed the first case of the MERS virus in the United States:

MERS-CoV (Photo credit: NIAID)

On May 2, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) reported the first confirmed U.S. case of Middle East Respiratory Syndrome (MERS).  Public health officials are assuring citizens that there is very low risk to the general public.  Still, the Daily Herald reports that CDC officials are contacting individuals that may be at risk and will respond if others are showing symptoms.

On April 24, the patient traveled by plane from Riyadh, Saudi Arabia to Chicago, IL, via London, England.  The patient then took a bus from Chicago to Indiana.  On the April 27, the patient began to experience respiratory symptoms and went to an emergency department in an Indiana hospital the next day and was admitted that same day.