Give Me 10 Minutes, I'll Give You 5 facts about Stars

Stars are known to be the dominant feature of the universe and are only filled with mysteries and questions. Here are some of the most amazing mysteries about stars that will blow your mind!

1. The star that's there but shouldn't be there.

The star in question is called "SDSS J102915+172927" and like its name the existence of the Star is more complex than you think. This star has been known to exist for 13 billion years and according to theories it shouldn't even exist as the universe itself is known to be 13.8 billion years old. 13 billion years ago there was just gas and debris in space so its difficult to wrap our head around the existence of a star. Since the star did exist during the time this would also mean that the earliest planets revolved around this very star.  

2. Not all stars are hot

3d representation of a cold star from a planet 

NASA has found 14 stars that have extremely low temperatures. These stars are known as failed stars because well they could not develop after the Big bang. Their low density prevents these stars from fusing atoms within their cores. The heat generated from every star directly depends upon the rate of fusion occurring at its core. Since this doesn't take place on these cold stars, no heat is generated. Finding such a star is extremely rare and can only be seen in spectrums beyond the human eye i.e. Ultraviolet or Infrared. So the next time when somebody says that all stars are hot you can use this to counter their argument.

3. Stars formed from Stars

According to theorists before the big bang there existed a similar universe like ours. This universe had seen its end and had collapsed into one big star. What happened after this led to the big bang. So you could say that the stars we see today are the creation of the stars that were there in another universe before the big bang. 

4. Blackholes form from stars

We know that a collapsed star forms a black hole but what exactly happens. When a star collapses it has basically lost all its energy and it throws its energy into space. Accept sometimes there exists a gravity on this dead star that has the tendency to pull back this energy of the now dead sun. Most of the time this energy wraps around the dead star to form a spiral but if the energy falls back on the neutron star, a black hole is formed. The sun gets destroyed because of its own energy. This is known as the fall back. Its like throwing an object towards the sky on Earth and it comes back down. 

5. Stars in the sky aren't where they are seen

If the star was moving away it would only be visible in
Infrared. Otherwise it is visible in the Ultraviolet spectrum.

Space is expanding faster than the speed of light and it is causing Stars and everything in the universe to move. This means that stars are continuously moving in Space and what stars you see now are just the light that remains of the Star. The star itself has moved ahead. So what you see today might have been the position of the stars a few million years ago. Yes you read it "MILLION"!

Stars are everywhere in the Universe. Humans have only looked at a handful of stars in the universe but the amount of information from these stars has been ground breaking.

Thanks for reading!

What you Don't know about the internet?

The internet being simple is extremely complex and putting out any information on the internet will always remain there. But there are a few things internet experts don't want you to know.

1. Can it be switched off?

The answer is no. At least not on a worldwide scale. The internet does not have one common switch that can be just flipped and the entire world falls off the grid. Each country has many number of ISPs who control internet access for particular areas. The government of a country can shut down the internet in a country but shutting the internet worldwide is impossible. Even if the internet is shut down, internet experts will still be able to find a way to access it through satellites. 

2. Does it affect the environment?

Sending an E-mail from one continent to another doesn't seem like an activity that will affect the environment but it does affect the carbon footprint. An estimate suggests that just the data base of the internet takes 152 billion kilowatt-hours to be powered continuously. Sending any kind of data across the internet is putting load on the system causing it to use more power. With people continuously sharing data across the internet data base, more and more power is being used affecting the environment and causing a huge impact on the environment.

3. Are there multiple internets?

Approximately 40 years ago during the inception of the internet, there were many number of internets and each internet was owned by a service provider. The problem with this model was the lack of connection between each internet. To solve this it was decided that there would be only one internet in the world allowing everybody to remain connected to each other. Today I am writing this article from India and it is being read by someone in the United States. This has been possible only because of one internet that connects all of us.

4. The dark side to the internet.

I myself wasn't very aware that there exists a dark internet known as Deep web or dark web. This section of the world wide web is not indexed by search engines and there is very good reason for this.  The deep web is said to be approximately 400-500 times bigger than the surface web but these figures are a very rough estimation. Websites that aren't indulging in illegal activities come under the Dark Internet category and websites with illegal activities are categorised under Deep Web. The dark internet is known to be growing rapidly. Due to this the dark internet is not quantifiable. 

5. The internet also has black holes.

These black holes in the internet are similar to black holes in Space. If you send an email and it is not received on the other side then you might have run into one of these black holes. Like black holes in space, black holes of the internet eat up information in the form of losing packets of data. These losses can occur due to improper maintenance of cables or problems within the routers. Since the internet has such a large surface area to the point where it covers the entire Earth it is impossible to remove all these black holes. Distances are also a factor for losses of data but that problem has a much less occurrence because of ISPs (Internet Service Providers).

The last two facts mentioned in this blog weren't even known to me. After researching I was able to find these two unknown facts about the internet. These facts must be known to everybody that uses the internet.

Thanks for reading!

What Will Space Be Like In a 100 Years?

Space is ever changing and its fascinating to think about what space would be like a 100 years from today. Here are some facts:

1. The Andromeda galaxy

The Andromeda galaxy will be the biggest change in the skies when viewed from Earth. Currently at 2.5 million light years from the milky way, the Galaxy is known to be moving towards the milky way.  A hundred years from today, the galaxy will be much more prominent in the sky. The collision between the galaxies will occur a few billion years from today and should not affect the position of the Earth allowing human existence to continue. The galaxy is known to be twice the size of the milky way. The image shows you a future representation of what the galaxy might look like from the Earth a hundred years from today. Unfortunately for now the galaxy is only visible as a diffused cloud and we can only see it side making it difficult to spot in the Sky.

2. The Sun

Long term secular change in sunspot number is thought by some scientists to be correlated with long term change in solar irradiance. For example in the 17th century, scientists observed a pause in the solar cycles of the sun and this had a drastic effect on Earth also known as the little Ice age experienced by Europe. It is known that these changes take place every 41,000-100,000 years and are considered to be a valid reason for the Pleistocene Ice age that began 1.8 million years ago and ended 11,700 years ago. apart from this the Sun will act like any other star and expand once the Hydrogen fusion in its core has stopped. According to scientists, the sun has remained stable for 4 billion years and will remain stable for 4 billion more years. So a hundred years from today the sun might not become a monster but it will get hotter as it is getting hotter every second due to the Hydrogen fusion. 

3. Pluto

A hundred years from today Pluto would have reached its furthest point from the sun. Today Pluto is known to have barely started its journey away from the Sun. It takes Pluto 248 years to go around the sun which means after a hundred years it should have reached approximately near the furthest point from the Sun in its orbit. As Pluto moves away from the Sun it will have the tendency to lose its atmosphere due to extremely chilly temperatures. The atmosphere will collapse into the planet. This kind of climate change has never been observed in any other planet of the solar system. Scientists have found out that thanks to the Earth's rotation rate, the speed of the suns rotation is reducing by 0.00003 seconds per year. This is affecting the angular momentum of the Sun causing the Earth to move away from our Star. So its safe to assume that every planet is having the same affect on the Sun. So maybe a hundred years from today the solar system might have 8 visible planets with Pluto flying into interstellar Space.

4. Humans in Space

Humans will be able to get a pretty good experience of Space a hundred years from now. With companies already running contests for people to go to Space, it won't be long before Space travel will be like air travel today. Mars and the moon might act as second colonies in a hundred years allowing people to live on these planets and spend their holidays. It seems unreal but everything that we have today seemed unreal a hundred years back so the possibilities are endless.

5. More Earth like planets

We might possibly look for colonisation of different worlds as Earth doesn't look like its going to stay for a very long time. In a hundred years, we should be able to start the large colonisation movement and send life to other planets increasing the existence of the Human race. Currently NASA uses the International Space Station to conduct experiments for these purposes. The milky way is alone estimated to have over 2 billion Earth like planets. The only problem is the distance which makes it impossible to reach these planets within the human life span. Maybe travelling faster than light might become a possibility a hundred years from now.

These were some facts about Space a hundred years from now. As incredible as it seems most of us won't be there to experience it first hand. Anyway we should feel lucky enough to already know what it would be like a hundred years from today.

Thanks for reading!