Huge asteroid flies past Earth

October 15th, 2009 WASHINGTON - A NASA scientist has said that the prophecy by the ancient Mayans that the world might end in the year 2012, is nothing but a hoax, which is only helping the promoters of the conspiracy theory to rake in huge profits. NASA scientist David Morrison's concise summary of the claims and the scientific response to the widespread Internet belief that December 21, 2012, will be doomsday for planet Earth, determines that the whole thing is nothing but a hoax.

October 8th, 2009 WASHINGTON - There is some good news and some bad news for doomsday pundits, in the sense that the chances of asteroid Apophis colliding with Earth in 2036 has been recuded, but a new impact possibility of the same asteroid has come up in the year 2068. University of Hawaii asteroid hunter Dr.

September 18th, 2009 WASHINGTON - In a very rare finding, scientists have discovered an unusual kind of meteorite in the Western Australian desert and have uncovered that it came from the innermost main asteroid belt between Mars and Jupiter. Meteorites are the only surviving physical record of the formation of our Solar System.

August 6th, 2009 WASHINGTON - A new study raises the possibility that flies and other insects that encounter nanomaterial "hot spots," or spills, near manufacturing facilities in the future could pick up and transport nanoparticles on their bodies, transferring the particles to other flies or habitats in the environment. The study, by David Rand and Robert Hurt and colleagues, notes that emergence of a nanotechnology industry is raising concerns about the potential adverse health and environmental effects of nanoparticles.

July 31st, 2009 WASHINGTON - NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory is introducing a new Web site that will provide a centralized resource for information on near-Earth objects - those asteroids and comets that can approach Earth. The "Asteroid Watch" site also contains links for the interested public to sign up for NASA's new asteroid widget and Twitter account.

July 15th, 2009 Space invaders: Asteroid belt has rocks from afarWASHINGTON — A new astronomy theory says the solar system's main asteroid belt is littered with icy invaders from far away. The so-called invaders are asteroids that seem more like primitive frozen comets than the baked rocks that make up the overwhelming majority of asteroids between Mars and Jupiter.

July 14th, 2009 WASHINGTON - In a study on fruit flies, scientists have debunked the belief that fasting extends life spans in various organisms, including humans, when they suffer infection. In their study, researchers at Stanford University School of Medicine wanted to see if reduced caloric intake also helps creatures cope with infection.

June 12th, 2009 WASHINGTON - Japanese scientists have announced that a 1,124-pound (510-kilogram) space probe will "collide" with our home planet in June 2010 to simulate an approaching asteroid. According to a report in National Geographic News, the Hayabusa spacecraft is currently on its way back to Earth after a successful mission that landed on and hopefully collected samples from the asteroid Itokawa.

April 30th, 2009 WASHINGTON - A new research has refuted the hypothesis that 'chevrons', large U- or V-shaped formations found in some of the world's coastal areas, are evidence of megatsunamis caused by asteroids or comets slamming into the ocean. The research was done by University of Washington (UW) geologist and tsunami expert Jody Bourgeois.

April 30th, 2009 SYDNEY - An astronomy student spotted a huge rock orbiting the outer reaches of our solar system, when he was scanning the skies for potentially hazardous asteroids. 'The asteroid image obtained by the Zadko telescope is the same as detecting a grain of sand from 130 km away,' said David Coward, a professor at the University of Western Australia (UWA).

April 29th, 2009 LONDON - Comets could have supplied missing ingredients for the creation of life on earth, according to the latest study. 'When comets slammed into the earth about four billion years ago, they delivered a payload of organic materials that combined with Earth's own large reservoir of organics and led to the emergence of life,' said Bar-Nun, professor of planetary sciences at Tel Aviv University (TAU).

April 17th, 2009 WASHINGTON - David French may be the guy who saves the world from an asteroid when it comes hurtling down from space. French, a doctoral candidate in aerospace engineering at North Carolina State University (NCSU), has thought up a way to divert asteroids and other threatening objects from hitting the earth.

April 17th, 2009 WASHINGTON - A scientist in the US has found an effective way to deflect an Earth-threatening asteroid, by attaching a long tether and ballast to the incoming object. The theory has been put forward by David French, a doctoral candidate in aerospace engineering at North Carolina (NC) State University, US.

April 4th, 2009 WASHINGTON - Planetary scientists are all set to turn "noise" from the data obtained by NASA/ESA LISA satellites' mission into useful information about the mass of near-Earth asteroids. LISA is on a mission to detect gravitational waves - a warping of the space/time continuum that scientists hope to see directly for the first time.

March 27th, 2009 WASHINGTON - Scientists have identified a tiny asteroid before it hit the earth, helping computers pinpoint its origins and predict the arrival of its shattered parts. The four-metre-diameter asteroid, called 2008 TC3, was initially sighted by the automated Catalina Sky Survey telescope at Mount Lemmon, Arizona, on Oct 6 last year.