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A Symmetrical Cosmic Red Square

Remember the hexagon surrounding Saturn's north pole? Now for our delectation Ano_Nimass Coward sends us to Space.com for a look at a nebula with near perfect bilateral symmetry surrounding a dying star. The so-called Red Square ranks among the most symmetrical objects ever observed by scientists. "If you fold things across the principle diagonal axis, you get an almost perfect reflection symmetry," said the leader of a study of the object, recently published in Science. A possible explanation for the structure's glow, if not its shape, was advanced in a paper appearing in PNAS, which attributes the glow of a similar object — dubbed, confusingly, the Red Rectangle — to exotic space-hardened organic molecules called Polycyclic Aromatic Hydrocarbons. PAHs are normally unstable but may occur in places like the nebula in question, in nanostructured clusters that are extremely stable and radiation hardened.

9 of 152 comments (clear)

  1. Too obvious... by adrianmonk · · Score: 3, Funny

    In Soviet Russia, the Red Square ejects stars.

    On a more serious note, in present-day Russia, the Red Square really does eject -- and beat and arrest -- stars[1] when they show up to demonstrate against the government. Things are getting kinda shaky over there, it would appear.

    [1] Garry Kasparov, specifically.

  2. Obligatory by Rubinhood · · Score: 5, Funny

    In Soviet Russia, you don't observe Red Square, but Red Square observes you.

  3. dude, it's the borg by circletimessquare · · Score: 4, Funny

    look away, don't send any signals in that direction, or they'll soon follow up, and we'll have to travel back in time to 1980s san francsico to save the whales, or something

    --
    intellectual property law is philosophically incoherent. it is your moral duty to ignore it or sabotage it
  4. God's rendering engine running out of steam by Tablizer · · Score: 5, Funny

    Appearently the universe is expanding faster than God's hardware can handle, and we are seeing rendering polygon effects. Boundary detection problems will appear next.

    1. Re:God's rendering engine running out of steam by SharpFang · · Score: 4, Funny

      Boundary detection problems will appear next.

      Yeah? They've been reported decades ago, and the exploits are out in the wild and in common use (tunnel diode, tunneling microscope and so on).

      Will these pesky scientists be surprised when the next batch of patches comes. :)

      --
      45 5F E1 04 22 CA 29 C4 93 3F 95 05 2B 79 2A B2
  5. Proof of God ... by HW_Hack · · Score: 3, Funny

    Not really - a million monkees blowing up a million stars could achieve the same result

    --
    Its not the years, its the mileage .....
  6. Re:Geometry by theuedimaster · · Score: 3, Funny

    Remember children, every Red Square is a Red Rectangle, but not every Red Rectangle is a Red Square.

  7. Re:Geometry by Stormx2 · · Score: 3, Funny

    See if you'd put that on a wikipedia article, someone would add the {{Original research}} tag, because the link between being a "pedantic, literal-minded little shit" and being a wikipedia fan hasn't been proven, yet. How about {{NPOV}}? But seriously, stop trolling.

    Oh, and in answer to your question, you aren't surprised because you were all too happy to find a coincidental link.

  8. Re:Geometry by Walt+Dismal · · Score: 3, Funny
    Let us put this on a scientific basis. The first step is to create a proper acronym to speed discourse. Henceforth, we shall use "PLLS" instead of the longer "pedantic literal-minded little shit."

    I, of course, am not a PLLS, as I spell and punctuate correctly and wipe myself properly after every bowel movemnet, because Nanny would beat me severely if I didn't...er.. I digress. Where was I? Oh yes, the 32nd poster previous failed to spell 'incunabula' correctly. Oh, and there are 152 toothpicks on the floor.