First Full-Sky Image From Planck Mission 56
krou writes "Six months of work has produced a remarkable full-sky map from Planck. 'It shows what is visible beyond the Earth to instruments that are sensitive to light at very long wavelengths — much longer than what we can sense with our eyes. Researchers say it is a remarkable dataset that will help them understand better how the Universe came to look the way it does now. ... Of particular note are the huge streamers of cold dust that reach thousands of light-years above and below the galactic plane. "What you see is the structure of our galaxy in gas and dust, which tells us an awful lot about what is going on in the neighborhood of the Sun; and it tells us a lot about the way galaxies form when we compare this to other galaxies," observed Professor Andrew Jaffe, a Planck team member from Imperial College London, UK.' The ESA has more details on their website, with a higher-res JPG available."
Re:Faster than light expansion.... (Score:5, Interesting)
I saw a presentation a few months ago by someone who was involved in this research.
basically, they see fluctuations in this picture, and these fluctuations are in fact quantum fluctuations (or traces of) that have been blown up by the sheer speed of expansion at that particular time. this is one interesting thing they can see.
on the basis of various correlations they can also impose limits on string theories. the various models have some parameters, and these measurements put bounds on those parameters.
any FTL traveling was actually relative motion between pieces that were far away from each other; since quantum fluctuations can be seen, it's obvious something like this happened. You are right in assuming this can't probably be used for tricks.
but, since this research will lead to a better model of the universe, (think of it as the mother of all experiments, because they are actually measuring the big bang), it is more than likely that any possible FTL tricks we'll ever find will be related in some way to these studies.
for anyone spotting mistakes: please feel free to reveal them. I aim to understand, so I need to be told when I'm being an idiot.
Re:At the risk of hurting someone (Score:4, Interesting)
I think most scientists would rather do real science for funding but quickly find out that the funding they obtain that way is greatly limited while the "dance in a bear suit" approach gets you a lot more funding. So they grit their teeth, do the little dance and then get back to real science until their funding runs low again.
Re:Axis units? (Score:1, Interesting)
Look at the bbc article. There is a check box on top of the image that shows where some things you may know are on the maps.
Also : http://www.esa.int/esaSC/SEMF2FRZ5BG_index_1.html