Gravitational waves are vibrations that occur when highly dense cosmological elements like dwarf stars, neutron stars or black holes come together and collide or merge. The vibrations produced are commonly known as ‘ripples’, for they travel in a manner similar to the ripples formed when a stone is pelted in a pond or lake. The…
Virtual Reality (VR) is a computer technology that creates an imaginary environment or recreates a real one, with which a user can interact. In other words, it is a technology that allows users to experience an environment without actually being present in it. 3D cinema is one of the best examples. The first practical…
Andromeda, the galaxy closest to the Milky Way, is about 2.5 million light years away. To travel in space, we need to achieve the speed of light, which is about 3,00,000 kilometres per second. Even at that great speed, it will take us about 2 million years (not 2.5 million years due to an effect called…
ALMA stands for Atacama Large Millimetre/Submillimetre Array. Operational since 2013, it is the world’s most powerful telescope with 66 high precision antennas and is ten times sharper than Hubble. It is built in the Atacama Desert in Chile at an altitude of 16,500ft with almost no humidity or vegetation to block its view of the…
Uranus, the third largest planet, was discovered on 13 March 1781 by Sir Frederick William Herschel. Herschel also discovered the infrared radiation.
The James Webb Space telescope is a space telescope scheduled to be launched this decade. It has been designed to study the first formed galaxies. It would be able to see objects lying up to 1.5×106 km away from the earth. A sun shield will protect the telescope from the heat of the sun. (It…
