Knowledge Update

​Washington, Oct 7 (IANS) Using NASA's Hubble space telescope data, scientists, including one of Indian-origin, have detected superhot blobs of gas, each twice as massive as the planet Mars, being ejected near a dying star.

The plasma balls are zooming so fast through space it would take only 30 minutes for them to travel from Earth to the moon, NASA said in a statement on Thursday.

Astronomers have estimated that this stellar "cannon fire" has continued once every 8.5 years for at least the past 400 years.

"We knew this object had a high-speed outflow from previous data, but this is the first time we are seeing this process in action," said lead author of the study Raghvendra Sahai of NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California.

The fireballs present a puzzle to astronomers, because the ejected material could not have been shot out by the host star, called V Hydrae. 

The star is a bloated red giant, residing 1,200 light years away and which has probably shed at least half of its mass into space during its death throes. 

Red giants are dying stars in the late stages of life that are exhausting their nuclear fuel that makes them shine. They have expanded in size and are shedding their outer layers into space.

The current best explanation suggests the plasma balls were launched by an unseen companion star. 

According to this theory, the companion would have to be in an elliptical orbit that carries it close to the red giant's puffed-up atmosphere every 8.5 years. 

As the companion enters the bloated star's outer atmosphere, it gobbles up material. This material then settles into a disk around the companion, and serves as the launching pad for blobs of plasma, which travel at roughly a half-million miles per hour.

This star system could be the archetype to explain a dazzling variety of glowing shapes uncovered by Hubble that are seen around dying stars, called planetary nebulae, the researchers said. 

A planetary nebula is an expanding shell of glowing gas expelled by a star late in its life.

"We suggest that these gaseous blobs produced during this late phase of a star's life help make the structures seen in planetary nebulae," Sahai noted.

Sahai's team used Hubble's Space Telescope Imaging Spectrograph (STIS) to conduct observations of V Hydrae and its surrounding region over an 11-year period, first from 2002 to 2004, and then from 2011 to 2013. 

The results appeared in The Astrophysical Journal.

​New York, Oct 7 (IANS) Snap Inc -- the parent company of popular photo-sharing messaging service Snapchat -- is considering an initial public offering (IPO) that can value the company at $25 billion or more, media reported on Friday.

New York, Oct 7 (IANS) Snap Inc -- the parent company of popular photo-sharing messaging service Snapchat -- is considering an initial public offering (IPO) that can value the company at $25 billion or more, media reported on Friday.

​Seoul, Oct 7 (IANS) Samsung Electronics saw its operating profit rise in the third quarter despite a global recall of Galaxy Note 7 smartphones, the company said on Friday.

The South Korean tech behemoth posted 7.8 trillion won ($7 billion) in its preliminary figure for operating profit during the July-September period, up 5.55 per cent from the

​London, Oct 7 (IANS) The next time you visit a hospital, do not be surprised if you find robots as your new nursing assistants.

Robots can imitate human motions as well as effectively coordinate their actions with humans even with surgeries, a research has found.

​New York, Oct 8 (IANS) Facebook has introduced a standalone app that allows event seekers to keep up with nearby events and finding things to do with their friends.

Whether you are looking for something to attend this weekend or just wondering what is happening in your area, events app will help get you there, the social media giant said.

​New York, Oct 8 (IANS) Technology giant Google will shut down Panoramio, the location-centric photo sharing service that the company used to augment its Google Maps and Google Earth services, in November, a media report said.

New York, Oct 8 (IANS) A pill that prevents the accumulation of toxic molecules in the brain and can help prevent or delay Alzheimer's, can be the next target in the fight against the neurocognitive disease, according to US scientists.

​New York, Oct 8 (IANS) There is more bad news for Samsung. The company lost some ground following incidents of the Galaxy Note 7 battery exploding, and now a US court has reinstated its decision that Samsung had infringed on Apple's patents and owes the company nearly $120 million.

​London, Oct 6 (IANS) Intake of nitrates, typically found in spinach, can boost sports performance particularly at high altitudes with low oxygen conditions, a study has found.

Nitrate, commonly found in green leafy vegetables like spinach, is important for the functioning of the human body, especially during exercise.

The study showed that nitrate supplementation in conjunction with sprint interval training (SIT) -- short, high intensity exercise -- in low oxygen conditions could enhance sport performance.

For the study, a research team from the University of Leuven in Belgium examined 27 moderately trained participants. They were given nitrate supplements ahead of SIT, which took the form of short but intense cycling sessions three times a week.

Further, to assess differences in performance in different conditions, they included workouts in normal oxygen conditions and in hypoxia conditions, which are low oxygen levels such as those found in high altitudes.

After five weeks, the muscle fibre composition changed with the enhanced nitrate intake when training in low oxygen conditions.

"This is probably the first study to demonstrate that a simple nutritional supplementation strategy, i.e. oral nitrate intake, can impact on training-induced changes in muscle fibre composition," said Peter Hespel, Professor at the University of Leuven.

Athletes participating in sports competitions require energy production in conditions with limited amounts of oxygen.

In these conditions, performing intense workouts requires high input of fast-oxidative muscle fibres to sustain the power.

Enhancing these muscle fibre types through nutritional intake could very well boost the performance, the study said.

"It would now be interesting to investigate whether addition of nitrate-rich vegetables to the normal daily sports diet of athletes could facilitate training-induced muscle fibre type transitions and maybe in the long term also exercise performance," Hespel said.

The observations were published in the journal Frontiers in Physiology.