Comments on: A WISE flower blooms in space

By: A Spring Flower at Asymptotia

A Spring Flower at Asymptotia — Fri, 26 Mar 2010 14:53:19 +0000

[...] It is Springtime, and it is not unheard of for me to have pictures of flowers, often from my garden, up on the blog (see here). This time, I have a picture of a flower from a different garden. It is the one you can see by looking up. If you look up with the right equipment, you can even see new growth (just like you can in Springtime gardens). In this case, the equipment is WISE (the spacecraft launched in December, recall) with its ability to survey the sky in the infrared part of the spectrum, and the new growth is a cluster of new stars, called the Berkeley 59 cluster. Looks a bit like a rosebud, doesn’t it? Phil over at Bad Astronomy gives an excellent breakdown of what you’re seeing here. [...]

By: Gary Ansorge

Gary Ansorge — Tue, 23 Mar 2010 20:25:31 +0000

13. Torbjörn Larsson, OM

” I seem to have said it before here. ”

Don’t feel bad. At my age, I should have a cross referencing data base to keep things straight.

What does the OM stand for? I had a girl friend in college who was from Columbia, SA., of Dutch extract. Her name was Rondalda Lucille Haekmiester O.The O was the first letter of her mothers maiden name

Just wondering,,,

GAry 7

By: Torbjörn Larsson, OM

Torbjörn Larsson, OM — Tue, 23 Mar 2010 19:45:18 +0000

The hot thing is that PAHs seems to be preferentially photo-selected, here as well as elsewhere. Organic rings is what we see in amino acids, nucleic acids, the ATP energy molecule of the cell, et cetera. Nice correlation!

[Uups! I seem to have said it before here. Oh, well.]

By: jcm

jcm — Mon, 22 Mar 2010 20:17:01 +0000

So flowery. So rosy! Cool!

By: QuietDesperation

QuietDesperation — Mon, 22 Mar 2010 19:19:58 +0000

QD – the answer is no & somehow I don’t think that is ever terribly likely! LOL

What are you suggesting? Did Sylvia Browne used to be female or something?

By: Lonny Eachus

Lonny Eachus — Mon, 22 Mar 2010 19:11:31 +0000

It actually looks most like a rosebud from a distance. The resemblance gets lost in the big picture.

By: Pi-needles

Pi-needles — Mon, 22 Mar 2010 18:07:46 +0000

@ 1. SLC & 7. QuietDesperation :

SLC – the answer is yes.

QD – the answer is no & somehow I don’t think that is ever terribly likely! LOL

See : http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/badastronomy/2010/03/22/james-randi-comes-out-of-the-closet/ presuming you haven’t already.

PS. @6. Gary Ansorge: THX but actually I’ve known about Gliese 710 for a while now.

By: skylyre

skylyre — Mon, 22 Mar 2010 17:41:58 +0000

Anyone else thinking Super Mario Bros? Fire flower!

By: QuietDesperation

QuietDesperation — Mon, 22 Mar 2010 16:57:14 +0000

It’s an OK nebula, I guess. Color palette could be better although the brushwork is serviceable.

This is far off topic but is Dr. Plait going to comment on the announcement by Mr. Randi?

You mean the one where he announced his engagement to Sylvia Browne?

By: Gary Ansorge

Gary Ansorge — Mon, 22 Mar 2010 16:29:37 +0000

Just a non related post:

This has to do with an orange star:

http://www.technologyreview.com/blog/arxiv/24917/?nlid=2816

It seems in only 1.5 million years, we’re going to meet and greet another star system(ok, it’ll only be an Oort cloud grazer).

Gary 7
PS: Beautiful pic!