NASA finds distant galaxy shining as bright as 300 trillion suns

Ever tried looking at the sun with your bare eyes? Too bright, right? Now imagine looking at something with the brightness of 300 trillion suns. That’s how intense “the most luminous galaxy found to date” is, so much so that NASA has created a new classification for it and the 19 other similar galaxies it has discovered: extremely luminous infrared galaxies, or ELIRGs. Scientists have recently spotted the ELIRGs in infrared images of the sky taken by the agency’s Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer (WISE) space telescope in 2010. This particular one is located 12.5 billion light years away, which means it started forming soon after the universe was born 13.8 billion years ago. As for why it’s so incredibly brilliant, NASA JPL scientist Chao-Wei Tsai says it “may be from the main growth spurt of the galaxy’s black hole.”

See, some galaxies have supermassive black holes in the center that actively absorb gas, dust and other matter that form a disc around them. These discs radiate a ton of energy and make the black holes look brighter than stars. Some black holes are a lot more ravenous than others, though, attracting more matter than their less voracious counterparts and, as such, are several degrees more luminous and massive. To wit: the bigger the black hole, the larger the disc and the brighter the whole galaxy.

There are several possible reasons why the black hole in this record breaker is so huge. According to the scientists’ paper, it could have just been born big, so it’s only natural for it to consume more food than usual. We might also just be seeing a period in its life — remember, the light WISE spotted was from 12.5 billion light years ago! — when it was bending the limit of black hole feeding. Finally, it might not be spinning as fast as other black holes, which allows it to go on a sustained binge eating, so to speak. One of the paper’s co-authors, Andrew Blain, describes it as “winning a hot-dog-eating contest lasting hundreds of millions of years.” You’d have a tough time eating hot dogs while whirling very, very fast, after all.

[Image credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech]

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Via: NASA (Twitter)

Source: NASA

Human gene sequencing gets an official yardstick

Gene sequencing, once a rare feat, is pretty common these days… but how do you know that your DNA data is up to snuff? As of now, there’s an easy way to find out. The National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) has released reference genetic material that serves as a “measuring stick” for human gene sequencing. Researchers have tested this sample genome so thoroughly that it’ll tell labs whether or not they’re making typical mistakes, and ensure that their results are trustworthy. The hope is that you’ll see bulletproof sequencing devices that take the anxiety out of pinpointing genetic conditions or understanding your ancestry.

[Image credit: Gerald Barber, Virginia Tech University (with permission of the National Science Foundation)]

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Via: EurekAlert

Source: NIST

NASA patched Curiosity rover’s autofocus problem over the air

Pardon me while I say something that might not be entirely popular: Software updates are pretty awesome. Maybe not so much for game consoles, but, I digress because the Curiosity rover recently received a patch that improved the autofocus of its “ChemCam” telescope. Over the air. On Mars. Before the update, scientists at Los Alamos National Laboratory would take nine pictures of a subject (each at a different focus) to get one usable close-up image of any of the Red Planet’s rocks and soils, and send them back home. Same goes for any sample analyses the laser was doing. The problem is that for those analyses to be anywhere remotely useful, the telescope projecting said laser needs to be in focus and the workaround in place wasn’t very efficient.

The solution? Get the rover to keep taking nine images, but for it to self-analyze the photos and choose the one that has the best focus — all with software totaling 40 kilobytes. That’s right: The software used to spot water in Martian soil is lighter than the last Gmail update for your phone. The patch went live this week and Curiosity‘s already back in action.

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Source: NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Los Alamos National Laboratory

NVIDIA Shield Tablet getting Android 5.1 update

As a long holiday weekend got underway in the U.S., NVIDIA took the opportunity to start rolling out Android 5.1 to their NVIDIA Shield Tablet devices. As is typically the case with operating system updates, NVIDIA says this one brings improved performance and responsiveness to the devices. Users will also enjoy improved security and support for Android for Work along with typical Android 5.1 improvements like a better quick-settings menu, better profile management and other items.

As part of the Shield tablet software upgrade 3.0, NVIDIA took the opportunity to make some improvements to display performance. They also provided a firmware update for the Shield controller to improve the pairing experience. The package also includes a variety of unspecified system improvements to items like the camera, audio and the modem.

If you have an NVIDIA Shield tablet, be on the lookout for the notification that an over-the-air update is available.

source: NVIDIA

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