#gammarays — Public Fediverse posts
Live and recent posts from across the Fediverse tagged #gammarays, aggregated by home.social.
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To Predict Tree Death, Scientists Tapped Gamma Rays To Peer Underground
(Airborne radiation sensors could help forecast and prevent drought-driven tree mortality_
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https://www.science.org/content/article/predict-tree-death-scientists-tapped-gamma-rays-peer-underground <-- shared technical article
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https://doi.org/10.1029/2026GL122182 <-- shared paper
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H/T @hannah Richter
“Over an 18-month period starting in 2023, the dense forests of Western Australia [WA] experienced a record-setting drought. Jarrah trees towering 35 metres high died off in patchy brown splotches, turning 400 square kilometres - 3% of the forest - into brittle, fire-prone stands. The event led researchers to wonder whether there was a better way to predict where such die-offs might occur both there and in other forests, a problem that has long been tricky to solve because important factors such as soil depth are hidden underground…
Now, those same researchers have unveiled a surprising new tool for predicting tree mortality: gamma rays [link above.] Resulting from the natural decay of the potassium-40 isotope from granite-rich bedrock, the radiation acts as a proxy for soil depth, which in turn signals how much water a tree can access during drought. The new method could be applied to other highly weathered soils, which cover one-third of Earth’s ice-free land...”
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"... PLAIN LANGUAGE SUMMARY: During a record-breaking drought and heat event in 2023–2024, forests in southwestern Australia experienced widespread, patchy die-off. While we know that extreme weather triggers these events, it is often a hidden factor, the thickness of soil and the depth to underlying bedrock, that determines which trees live or die. Trees growing in shallow soil over solid rock are highly vulnerable due to limited water storage. Here, [they] show how to map these hidden zones from the air using gamma rays that are naturally emitted by potassium in the ground. Like southwestern Australia, many parts of the world have highly weathered soils where potassium has been washed out of the upper layers of soil. However, [they] showed that higher potassium areas signal that potassium-rich bedrock is closer to the surface and this is sensitive for tens of meters. By comparing gamma ray maps with ground-based geophysical surveys and satellite data, [they] showed that these potassium hotspots accurately predict where forests are most likely to experience die-off during a drought. These types of soils cover about one-third of the Earth's land, so the method provides a powerful new tool for managers to identify and protect vulnerable forests from future, hotter droughts…”
#GIS #spatial #mapping #spatialanalysis #spatiotemporal #Australia #WesternAustralia #WA #forests #vegetation #bush #jarrah #karri #drought #heat #extremedrought #extremeweather #climatechange #water #waterresources #dieoff #soil #weathering #erosion #moisture #nutrients #airborne #gammarays #GRS #granite #gneiss #bedrock #geology #potassium40 #potassium #K #remotesensing #earthobservation #groundwater #interstitial #subsurface #waterstorage #electricalresistivitytomography -
Shaken, Not Stirred: NASA’s StarBurst Aces Extreme Temperature Tests https://www.nasa.gov/general/shaken-not-stirred-nasas-starburst-aces-extreme-temperature-tests/ #NASA #General #Astrophysics #GammaRays #GammaRayBursts
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Shaken, Not Stirred: NASA’s StarBurst Aces Extreme Temperature Tests
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NASA’s Fermi Spots Young Star Cluster Blowing Gamma-Ray Bubbles https://science.nasa.gov/missions/fermi/nasas-fermi-spots-young-star-cluster-blowing-gamma-ray-bubbles/ #NASA #Astrophysics #CosmicRays #FermiGammaRaySpaceTelescope #GalaxiesStarsBlackHolesResearch #GammaRays #GoddardSpaceFlightCenter #ScienceResearch #StarClusters #Stars #TheMilkyWay #TheUniverse
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🎉 A new paper with Einstein@Home gamma-ray pulsar discoveries 🔭
The new publication “Einstein@Home Searches for Gamma-ray Pulsars in the Inner Galaxy” was accepted for publication in The Astrophysical Journal and is posted on the arXiv preprint server today.
📄 https://arxiv.org/abs/2509.21307
The international science team reports the discovery of four previously unknown gamma-ray pulsars towards the direction of the Galactic Center. Most likely the four discoveries are foreground sources from the Galactic disk.
🙏 We thank our volunteers, without the support of whom this research could not have happened.
All of our publications and PhD theses related to the project at https://einsteinathome.org/science/publications.
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Food Irradiation Is Not As Bad As It Sounds https://hackaday.com/2025/08/19/food-irradiation-is-not-as-bad-as-it-sounds/ #HackadayColumns #foodirradiation #electronbeam #gammarays #radiation #radiatoin #gammaray #Science #X-Rays #x-ray #food #who? #fda
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Food Irradiation Is Not As Bad As It Sounds - Radiation is a bad thing that we don’t want to be exposed to, or so the convention... - https://hackaday.com/2025/08/19/food-irradiation-is-not-as-bad-as-it-sounds/ #hackadaycolumns #foodirradiation #electronbeam #gammarays #radiation #radiatoin #gammaray #science #x-rays #x-ray #food #who? #fda
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The “Eye of Sauron” spotted in deep space
👁️ Okay, so the plasma jet in the blazar PKS 1424+240 isn't on a tower in Mordor, and it's not the fire-rimmed eye of a powerful tyrant. But if you don't think of Sauron's eye when you see the image released today, throw the first ring.
📡 Behind this deep image of the jet at unparalleled resolution are 15 years of ultra-precise radio observations with the Very Long Baseline Array (VLBA) and an international research team.
Curious? Please take a look at our latest press release:
👉 https://www.mpifr-bonn.mpg.de/pressreleases/2025/5#blazar #radioastronomy #universe #vlba #gammarays #neutrinos
Credits: Y.Y. Kovalev et al.
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NASA Explores Industry Possibilities to Raise Swift Mission’s Orbit https://www.nasa.gov/missions/swift/nasa-explores-industry-possibilities-to-raise-swift-missions-orbit/ #NASA #NeilGehrelsSwiftObservatory #AstrophysicsDivision #GammaRays #GoddardSpaceFlightCenter
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An interesting proposal to build a Compton telescope using an opaque liquid scintillator that is able to confine photons #gammarays
http://arxiv.org/abs/2502.20916v3 -
Understanding Cosmic Explosions: StarBurst Arrives at NASA for Testing https://www.nasa.gov/image-article/understanding-cosmic-explosions-starburst-arrives-at-nasa-for-testing/ #NASA #GammaRays #MarshallAstrophysics #MarshallScienceResearchProjects #MarshallSpaceFlightCenter #TheUniverse
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On this day seven years ago, an international research team (led by @mpi_grav and @MPIfR_Bonn) published the first millisecond pulsar flashing only in gamma rays.
The discovery was possible thanks to the volunteer distributed computing project @einsteinathome, which the researchers used to find many more gamma-ray pulsars.
Millisecond pulsars are neutron stars – remnants of stellar explosions about 20 km in size with strong magnetic fields – that spin many hundreds of times per second around their axis.
Prior to this discovery, all millisecond pulsars observed in gamma rays also emitted radio waves. The newly discovered “PSR J1744-7619” (rotating 213 times per second) is the first known exception.
https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/sciadv.aao7228 [Open Access]
#Astronomy #Astrophysics #Pulsar #NeutronStar #GammaRays #OTD
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Via NASA Plane, Scientists Find New Gamma-ray Emission in Storm Clouds https://science.nasa.gov/earth/via-nasa-plane-scientists-find-new-gamma-ray-emission-in-storm-clouds/ #NASA #Earth #GammaRays #GoddardSpaceFlightCenter
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NASA’s Mini BurstCube Mission Detects Mega Blast https://science.nasa.gov/burstcube/nasas-mini-burstcube-mission-detects-mega-blast/ #NASA #Astrophysics #BurstCube #CubeSats #GammaRays #GammaRayBursts #GoddardSpaceFlightCenter #ISSResearch #SmallSatelliteMissions #TheUniverse
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NASA’s Mini BurstCube Mission Detects Mega Blast https://science.nasa.gov/burstcube/nasas-mini-burstcube-mission-detects-mega-blast/ #NASA #Astrophysics #BurstCube #CubeSats #GammaRays #GammaRayBursts #GoddardSpaceFlightCenter #SmallSatelliteMissions #TheUniverse
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NASA’s Fermi Finds New Feature in Brightest Gamma-Ray Burst Yet Seen https://science.nasa.gov/science-research/astrophysics/gamma-ray-bursts/nasas-fermi-finds-new-feature-in-brightest-gamma-ray-burst-yet-seen/ #NASA #BlackHoles #FermiGammaRaySpaceTelescope #GalaxiesStarsBlackHoles #GammaRays #GammaRayBursts #GoddardSpaceFlightCenter #MarshallSpaceFlightCenter #StellarMassBlackHoles #TheUniverse
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We may have spotted the first magnetar flare outside our galaxy - Enlarge / M82, the site of what's likely to be a giant flare from a mag... - https://arstechnica.com/?p=2019842 #astrophysics #neutronstar #giantflare #astronomy #gammarays #magnetar #science
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Early-time γ-ray constraints on cosmic-ray acceleration in the
core-collapse SN 2023ixf with the #Fermi Large Area Telescope: https://www.aanda.org/articles/aa/pdf/forth/aa49061-23.pdf -> NASA’s Fermi Mission Sees No #GammaRays from Nearby #Supernova: https://science.nasa.gov/missions/fermi/nasas-fermi-mission-sees-no-gamma-rays-from-nearby-supernova/ -
NASA’s Tiny BurstCube Mission Launches to Study Cosmic Blasts https://science.nasa.gov/burstcube/nasas-tiny-burstcube-mission-launches-to-study-cosmic-blasts/ #NASA #Astrophysics #BurstCube #CubeSats #GammaRays #GammaRayBursts #GoddardSpaceFlightCenter #GravitationalWaves #InternationalSpaceStationISS #NeutronStars #SensingTheUniverseMultimessengerAstronomy
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NASA’s Tiny BurstCube Mission Launches to Study Cosmic Blasts https://science.nasa.gov/burstcube/nasas-tiny-burstcube-mission-launches-to-study-cosmic-blasts/ #NASA #Astrophysics #BurstCube #CubeSats #GammaRays #GammaRayBursts #GravitationalWaves #InternationalSpaceStationISS #NeutronStars #SensingTheUniverseMultimessengerAstronomy #TheUniverse
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Gamma-ray Bursts: Harvesting Knowledge From the Universe’s Most Powerful Explosions https://science.nasa.gov/universe/gamma-ray-bursts-harvesting-knowledge-from-the-universes-most-powerful-explosions/ #NASA #Astronomy #Astrophysics #BlackHoles #ComptonGammaRayObservatoryCGRO #FermiGammaRaySpaceTelescope #GalaxiesStarsBlackHoles #GammaRays #GammaRayBursts #NeutronStars #Stars
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What’s Made in a Thunderstorm and Faster Than Lightning? Gamma Rays! https://science.nasa.gov/universe/whats-made-in-a-thunderstorm-and-faster-than-lightning-gamma-rays/ #NASA #BlackHoles #Earth #ExtremeWeatherEvents #FermiGammaRaySpaceTelescope #GammaRays #GammaRayBursts #NeutronStars #TheUniverse #WeatherAndAtmosphericDynamics
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A standard candle shouldn’t do this 🔽 #gammarays #pulsar #crab #fermi
