A ballot question to enshrine Nevada's abortion rights in the state constitution has met all of the requirements to appear in front of voters in November, the Nevada Secretary of State's office announced Friday, and Democrats across the nation hope similar measures mobilize...

A court ruling on Friday put an involuntary manslaughter case against Alec Baldwin on track for trial in early July as a judge denied a request to dismiss the case on complaints that key evidence was damaged by the FBI during forensic testing.Judge Mary Marlowe Sommer sided...

Thursday night’s presidential debate has fanned and reignited many longstanding controversies, but one of the more contentious segments that’s being somewhat overlooked concerns the subject of abortion.…

JUMP TO… The Tennessee Star obtained photos of Audrey Hale’s final journal earlier this month, illustrating the Nashville shooter’s enduring struggle with mental illness and, most importantly, the…

Neutron stars are among the densest objects in the Universe, second only to black holes. Like black holes, neutron stars are what remains after a star reaches the end of its life cycle and undergoes gravitational collapse. This produces a massive explosion (a supernova), in which a star sheds its outer layers and leaves behind a super-compressed stellar remnant. In fact, scientists speculate that matter at the center of the star is compressed to the point that even atoms collapse and electrons merge with protons to create neutrons. Traditionally, scientists have relied on the “Equation of State” – a theoretical model that describes the state of matter under a given set of physical conditions – to understand what physical processes can occur inside a neutron star. But when a team led by scientists from the Spanish National Research Council (CSIC) examined three exceptionally young neutron stars, they noticed they were 10-100 times colder than other neutron stars of the same age. For this, the researchers concluded that these three stars are inconsistent with most of the proposed equations of state. The team consisted of astrophysicists from the Institute of Space Sciences (ICE-CSIS) in Barcelona, the Institute d’Estudis Espacials de Catalunya (IEEC), and the Department of Applied Physics at the University of Alacant. Alessio Marino, a postdoctoral fellow in astrophysics at the ICE and IEEC, was the lead author of the team’s paper (“Constraints on the dense matter equation of state from young and cold isolated neutron stars“), which recently appeared in Nature Astronomy. Three “oddball” neutron stars are too young to be so cold. Credit: ESA/ATG While astronomers are still unsure which equation of state models are correct for neutron stars, the laws of physics dictate that all neutron stars must obey the same one. What’s more, the cool nature of neutron stars is a reliable method for determining their age – the older they are, the cooler they get. While they are difficult to study invisible light, their rotating nature and magnetic fields (which funnel energy towards the magnetic poles) produce X-ray pulses that can be observed. After consulting data from the ESA’s XMM-Newton and NASA’s Chandra missions, the team found evidence of three neutron stars. The extreme sensitivity of these telescopes not only allowed the team to detect these neutron stars but also to collect enough light to determine their temperatures and other properties. According to astrophysicist Nanda Rea, whose research group at the ICE-CSIC and the IEEC led the investigation, the results were very surprising: “The young age and the cold surface temperature of these three neutron stars can only be explained by invoking a fast cooling mechanism. Since enhanced cooling can be activated only by certain equations of state, this allows us to exclude a significant portion of the possible models,” “Neutron star research crosses many scientific disciplines, spanning from particle physics to gravitational waves. The success of this work demonstrates how fundamental teamwork is to advancing our understanding of the Universe.” To this end, Rea and her colleagues – Alessio Marino, Clara Dehman, and Konstantinos Kovlakas – benefited from their combined and complementary expertise. Marino, a postdoctoral fellow with the ICE-CSIS and IEEC, led the team’s efforts to deduce the neutron stars’ other physical properties. In addition to determining their temperature from the X-rays emitted, the sizes and speeds of the surrounding supernova remnants gave an accurate indication of their ages. An outbursting, magnetically strong neutron star called a magnetar is seen here in an artist’s illustration. Courtesy: NASA. This was followed by Clara, a Postdoctoral Researcher at the University of Alacant, computing the neutron stars’ “cooling curves” of neutron stars based on a range of masses and magnetic field strengths. This consisted of plotting what each “equation of state” model predicts for how a neutron star’s temperature (as indicated by its brightness) changes over time. Last, Kovlakas, a postdoctoral fellow at the ICE-CSIC and IEEC, led a statistical analysis that used machine learning to match the simulated cooling curves with the properties of the three neutron stars. These simulations revealed that without a fast cooling mechanism, none of the equations of state matched the data. What’s more, the team concluded that the properties of these stars are inconsistent with about 75% of known neutron star models. By narrowing the range of possibilities, astronomers are one step closer to learning which neutron star equation of state governs them all. This could also have important implications for understanding how the fundamental laws of the Universe – General Relativity and Quantum Mechanics – fit together. This makes neutron stars a perfect laboratory for testing the laws of physics since they have densities and gravitational forces far beyond anything that can be recreated on Earth. Much like black holes, these objects are where the laws of physics begin to break down, where the most profound breakthroughs in our understanding of them can often be found! Further Reading: ESA, Nature Astronomy The post These Three Neutron Stars Shouldn't Be So Cold appeared first on Universe Today.

The following article, Biden’s “Unsecured Southern Border” A Domestic Terror Threat, Says U.S. Special Ops Group, was first published on Conservative Firing Line. (Natural News) The Special Operations Association of America (SOAA) has written an open letter expressing deep concern about the “current heightened risk of terrorist attacks against targets inside the United States and both U.S. and allied interests abroad.” In light of the recent rise in illegal crossings and suspected terrorist encounters at the southern border, the SOAA, … Continue reading Biden’s “Unsecured Southern Border” A Domestic Terror Threat, Says U.S. Special Ops Group ...

Selena Gomez appeared on “Jimmy Kimmel Live!” last night—not to chat with Kimmel himself, who was off, but her “Only Murders in the Building” co-star Martin Short filling in as guest host. And the interview was a 13 minute glimpse into quite the endearing cross-generational friendship…complete with an adorable mini makeover. Discussion topics were abound—everything from the “Wizards of Waverly Place” reboot to Molly Shannon farting in Meryl Streep’s face while filming “Only Murders” season four. Yes, really. But one of the many highlights of the segment was when Short reflected on their very first meeting, which happened to be their first day working together. Short recalled being worried that Gomez, with her early fame and millions of followers, might be a “nightmare” on set, but was “already in love” with her from their first hello, and called her “the biggest pro” he had ever worked with. In turn, Gomez shared how nervous she was to be working with “two icons” (Martin Short and Steven Martin, that is), and one day mustered up the courage to ask if she could sit next to them during a break to feel less “lonely.” “Ever since then, my chair has always been in the middle of theirs,” Gomez said.This moment happens around the 2:20 mark. Check it out below. Then Gomez gives Short some contouring with her makeup line, Rare Beauty. Gomez giggling while instructing Short to give a “kissy face” is everything. Honestly the whole thing is just filled with so much mutual adoration, that fans couldn’t help but gush. “This was unbelievably sweet.” “One of the best things about this show is that Selena’s involvement has introduced so many young people to the genius of Steve Martin and Marty Short and given them this huge late-career revival.” “Idk what it is, but this interview was just so…pleasant. Like it was thoroughly enjoyable and it went by so quickly.” “The bond between her and Steve/Martin is real.” “Martin making her laugh constantly makes me happy. Everybody deserves a good laugh .” OMG, this has got to be one of the most heartwarming interactions between host and guest I have ever seen on a talk show. And perhaps this was the best comment of all: “This friendship of theirs is profound and adorable, and proof that it doesn't matter what our differences are, we can all be better to each other, and for each other. Age is just a number, and it shouldn't be a cause for societal separation. People like to call this strange crew weird, and it's great for jokes, but there's nothing weird about mutual admiration, love, and respect. We would all be much better off with more of those things in our lives.”