Researchers say a quasar nine billion light years from earth could offer an alternative to black hole theory. A quasar is a very bright, compact object whose radiation is believed to be generated by a black hole nibbling at its surrounding matter. But the new theory says black holes do not exist but are really bizarre and compact balls of plasma called magnetospheric eternally collapsing object (MECO).

Rudolph Schild of the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics in Massachusetts and his team observed quasar Q0957+561 during a rare cosmological coincidence that allowed them to probe the structure of the quasar in great detail. Those details suggest the central object is not a black hole at all.

A black hole is an object with such a powerful gravitational field even light is not fast enough to escape it. Anything within the black hole's event horizon (a certain distance from its center) will be trapped. Black holes are also incapable of sustaining a magnetic field of their own. But the team's observations of the quasar indicate its "black hole" does have a magnetic field and they say it could be a MECO, not a black hole.

According to the MECO theory, objects in the universe cannot collapse to form black holes. When an object gets very dense and hot, subatomic particles start popping in and out of existence inside it in huge numbers, producing large amounts of radiation. Outward pressure from this radiation stops the collapse and the object remains a hot ball of plasma rather than forming a black hole.

  

What happens when a galaxy crash into a neighboring intergalactic gas at 372 miles/sec (600km/sec)? Two things: new stars are born and the galaxy itself is ripped apart. This was revealed by images from the Very Large Telescope (VLT) array in Chile.

NGC 1427A (left) a small galaxy with an unusual arrowhead shape lies 60 million light years from Earth in a group of galaxies known as called the Fornax (the Furnace) cluster. As it crashes through intergalactic gas at high speed new new stars are spawned. But in the end the gravitational force of the other galaxies in Fornax cluster is expected to rip NGC 1427A apart.

Meanwhile, galaxy NGC 908 (right) sports a bent left spiral arm that is curved upwards. Also called as a starburst galaxy for its prolific ability to produce new stars, NGC 908's left arm is thought to have been caused by a near collision course with another galaxy a long time ago. This same collision is believed to have given NGC 908 its intense star-forming phase. NGC 908 is 65 million light years from Earth and is 75,000 light years across.

This just goes to show how much we do not know about our universe and how things really behave and move about over the years even with the advancement of the human mind and technology. Prepare for a long read because recently, scientists have been busy debunking and questioning nature's fundamental laws and they have found discreprancies that will show that the value of certain fundamental parameters, such as the speed of light or the invisible glue that holds nuclei together, may have been different in the past. So constants, seems to not be real constants.

The said differences are small, a few ppms, but even the smallest of changes would mean that the laws of physics would have to be revised--if not completely rewritten. Plus aside from the three spatial dimensions that we have grown accustomed to (length, width, and height), it seems that we might need to make room for six more spatial dimensions.

The evidence for varying constants that scientists rely on comes primarily from quasar studies. A quasar is an astronomical source of electromagnetic energy, including light, that dwarfs the energy output of the brightest stars. This one is bright and usually powered by black holes. It may readily release energy in levels equal to the output of hundreds of average galaxies combined.

Astronomer Michael Murphy heads the team that has been studying the spectra of this ancient light to determine if the early universe was different than now. Specifically, they look at absorption lines, which are due to gas clouds between us and the quasars. These lines are like fingerprints and DNA, it reveals what's in the clouds. All seems well until in 1999, the team found out that these fingerprints and DNA change in time.

How? By using the Keck Observatory in Hawaii, they detected a frequency difference between billion-year-old quasar lines and the corresponding lines measured on Earth. Also they  recently performed careful lab experiments to confirm that there is indeed a shift in the quasar spectra, since some of those Earth-bound lines are not well characterized.

So, what does this mean? Because of the difference between quasars of today and those of billion years ago, this was interpreted as indicating that light was faster in the past, or that the electron had a weaker charge. Thus grilling the Fundamental Law of the Speed of Light and that electrons had a weaker charge.

Another finding from the team of Patrick Petitjean in the Astrophysical Institute of Paris revealed that a change in the proton to electron mass ratio from molecular absorption lines in quasar spectra. Which coincides with the observed electrron charge change in the Murphy study.

And talk about rewriting the Laws of Physics. If this is proven to be accurate and true, this would be a deviance in Albert Einstein's Theories-- the Equivalence Theory which basically says that  any experiment testing nuclear or electromagnetic forces should give the same result no matter where or when it is performed; and the Gravitational Theory or general relativity.

A tiny, artificial solar system could prove the existence of hidden spatial dimensions and alternative theories of gravity. There are many theories attempting to unify all the forces of physics into one cohesive model which requires the existence of hidden spatial dimensions. According to some, gravity leaks into extra dimensions diluting its power in a 3D unviverse and causing abberations from the standard law of gravity. While this would be noticeable at very small scales, scientists have not been able to accurately measure the force of gravity between closely spaced objects in the lab .

One way of detecting the presence of the hidden dimensions according to Varun Sahni of the Inter-University Centre for Astronomy and Astrophysics (IUCAA) in India, is to send a "solar system in a can" into space. The artificial system would be kept inside a spacecraft about four times as far away from Earth as the Moon known as the Lagrange point.

At the Lagrange point, the artificial solar system would be set in motion inside the spacecraft. A test sphere smaller than the 8-centimetre-wide tungsten sphere (the "sun") will be launched in an oval-shaped orbit 10 cm away. The mini planet would orbit its tungsten sun 3,000 times per year. If the test sphere's movement, changed slightly differently than expected from standard gravity, it could be an indication that gravity is leaking into extra dimensions.

The artificial solar system could also be used to test an alternative theory of gravity, called Modified Newtonian Dynamics (MOND). Acording MOND, gravity starts diverging from Einstein's theory below a certain acceleration. Sahni's team says by placing one or more planets in orbits larger than the one at 10 cm, the slight extra strength of gravity at those larger orbits should make the planets there move faster than predicted under general relativity if the MOND theory holds.

Executing the mini-solar system test is harder than it looks on paper. Cosmic rays, static electricity from charged particles in space, could alter the course of the tiny "planets". Even the spacecraft's components would exert gravitational forces on the spheres. To minimize the effect of these unwanted forces, spacecraft carrying the mini-solar system should be as symmetrical as possible with its heaviest components placed as far from the artificial star system as possible. Although challenging, the experiment was described as not technologically impossible.

As objects in the universe push and pull against each other, spinning, orbiting, grazing and even (occasionally) colliding, they give off huge gravitational waves. Fred Raab, head of the Laser Interferometer Gravitational-Wave Observatory (LIGO) in southeastern Washington State, plans to observe those waves as they crash against our terrestrial shores.

Raab says that since the invention of the telescope in the early 1600's, we've seen only "a small portion of what exists." He believes that LIGO can show us everything else.

Kip Thorne, a physicist at the California Institute of Technology, adds, "[LIGO] gives us an observational tool to probe the dark, strong-gravity part of the universe, which we've never really done."

Instead of observing light or radio waves or X-Rays directly, LIGO "feels" these things by measuring gravitational waves that ripple like water across a pond. The advantage here is that unlike light waves - which bounce off or can be blocked by solid objects - gravitational waves go through everything.

The ability to observe and measure these gravitational waves could very well change our entire understanding of the universe.

There have been plenty of blog entries here on the subject of "Black Holes. Additionally, they have been the subject of at least one movie, and interactions with black holes are a science-fiction staple. But what exactly are they, really? Are they "wormholes" - passageways to other parts of the universe, or even a parallel universe? Are they monstrosities that devour everything around them?

The answer is really quite simple. Every body in the universe - from dust particles to supergiant stars - have an attraction to every other body, which is called gravity. Generally, the greater the mass, or density of a body, the more powerful its gravity. Therefore, a solid chunk of iron-nickel 10,000 km in diameter will have much more powerful gravitation than a ball of gas of the same size. The only reason Saturn has a more powerful gravitational field than Earth - despite its lack of density - is its sheer size. Saturn's density is less than that of water, yet it's diameter is ten times that of Earth, so it contains greater mass. Were Saturn the same size as Earth, however, it's gravity would be a fraction of ours.

Got that? Excellent...

A planet's gravitational force determines - among other things - its "escape velocity," that is to say, the speed required for a vehicle or other matter to escape into outer space. For Earth, this "escape velocity' is about 7 miles, or 11 kilometers per second.  If Saturn had a surface, this speed would be about 22 miles, or over 35 kilometers per second.

In general, the greater the mass, the higher the speed required to achieve escape velocity.

As most science students know, the speed of light is 186,000 miles, or around 300,000 kilometers per second. What would happen if a body were so dense, its escape velocity exceeded this speed...?

The answer is - a Black Hole. It is nothing more than the burned-out cinder of a star that has collapsed to the size of a small planet, creating a body made of matter so dense, its escape velocity exceeds the speed of light.

Since - theoretically - nothing can travel faster than light, some very odd things begin to happen in the vicinity of these objects, which even scientists do not fully understand. Much of this discussion would (and does) take up volumes, but the people who operate the Hubble Space telescope - source of much of our understanding about black holes - has prepared a way-cool virtual journey to a black hole that's quick, painless, and sure to impress your science teacher. In addition, they will tell you everything you could possibly want to know (and possibly some things you don't!)