Most Massive Star discovered..[ 1504 ]

Scientists Discover Most Massive Star

Published July 21, 2010

| Associated Press

AP Photo/European Southern Observatory

Scientists have indentified the star R136a1 -- thought to be the heaviest star ever discovered, hundreds of times more massive than the sun -- Wednesday after working out its weight for the first time. This montage shows a visible-light image of the Tarantula nebula (left) along with a zoomed-in visible-light image from the Very Large Telescope (middle). A new image of the R136 cluster, obtained with the Very Large Telescope is shown in the right-hand panel, with the cluster itself at the lower right.

LONDON -- A huge ball of brightly burning gas drifting through a neighboring galaxy may be the heaviest star ever discovered -- hundreds of times more massive than the sun, scientists said Wednesday after working out its weight for the first time.

Those behind the find say the star, called R136a1, may once have weighed as much as 320 solar masses. Astrophysicist Paul Crowther said the obese star -- twice as heavy as any previously discovered -- has already slimmed down considerably over its lifetime.

In fact, it's burning itself off with such intensity that it shines at nearly 10 million times the luminosity of the sun.
"Unlike humans, these stars are born heavy and lose weight as they age," said Crowther, an astrophysicist at the University of Sheffield in northern England. "R136a1 is already middle-aged and has undergone an intense weight loss program."

Crowther said the giant was identified at the center of a star cluster in the Tarantula Nebula, a sprawling cloud of gas and dust in the Large Magellanic Cloud, a galaxy about 165,000 light-years away from our own Milky Way.

The star was the most massive of several giants identified by Crowther and his team in an article in the Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society.

Astronomers discover enormous star

While other stars can be larger, notably the swollen crimson-colored ones known as red giants, they weigh far less.
Still, the mass of R136a1 and its ilk means they're tens of times bigger than the Earth's sun and they're brighter and hotter, too.

Surface temperatures can surpass 40,000 degrees Celsius (72,000 degrees Fahrenheit), seven times hotter than the sun. They're also several million times brighter, because the greedy giants tear through their energy reserves far faster than their smaller counterparts.

That also means that massive stars live fast and die young, quickly shedding huge amounts of material and burning themselves out in what are thought to be spectacular explosions.

"The biggest live only 3 million years," Crowther said. "In astronomy that's a very short time."

Small lifespans are one of several reasons why these obese stars are so hard to find. Another is that they're extremely rare, forming only in the densest star clusters.

Astronomers also have a limited range in which to look for them. In clusters that are too far away, it isn't always possible to tell if a telescope has picked up on one heavyweight star or two smaller ones in close proximity.

In this case, Crowther's team re-examined previously known stars to see if they could find an accurate measurement of their weight. The team reviewed archival data from the Hubble Space Telescope and gathered new readings from the European Southern Observatory's Very Large Telescope at Paranal in Chile.

Scientists who weren't involved in the find said the results were impressive, although they cautioned it was still possible, although unlikely, that scientists had confused two very close stars for a bigger, single one.

"What they're characterizing as a single massive star could in fact be a binary system too close to be resolved," said Mark Krumholz, an astronomer at the University of California, Santa Cruz.

Both he and Phillip Massey, an astronomer with the Lowell Observatory in Arizona, also cautioned that the star's weight had been inferred using scientific models and that those were subject to change.

But both scientists said the authors had made a strong case, arguing that the solar material being thrown off from feuding stars in a binary system would produce much more powerful X-rays than have been detected.

Crowther acknowledged that R136a1 could have a partner, but he said it was likely to be a much smaller star, meaning that the star's its birth weight was still considerable -- perhaps 300 solar masses instead of 320.

UK.,Families will be £3,000 a year poorer ..[ 1503 ]

Budget will cost familes £3,000 a year

Families will be an average of £3,000 a year poorer under measures introduced by George Osborne in last month’s emergency Budget, a leading economic forecaster has warned.

George Osborne's Treasury forecast said the austerity drive would cost the top 10 per cent of households £1,600 in two years' time

By Philip Aldrick, Economics Editor
Telegrapg co.uk., 11:16PM BST 21 Jul 2010 

Household disposable incomes would fall by one per cent next year, the first decline since 1982, and would not improve until 2012, Capital Economics said.

It would be “the tightest squeeze” on families since the mid-1970s, Vicky Redwood, senior UK economist, said.

By 2015, the £40billion of tax rises and spending cuts unveiled in the Budget would have eroded about 8pc of average household income – or £3,000 out of £36,000, the forecaster said. Next year would be the toughest single stretch as VAT is increased to 20pc, public sector pay is frozen and jobs are cut – leaving households £1,100 worse off.

“Consumers clearly stand to be amongst the biggest losers in the fiscal squeeze,” Miss Redwood said.
The figures paint a much gloomier picture of post-recession Britain than the Budget statistics. The Treasury predicted that the austerity drive would cost the top 10 per cent of households £1,600 in two years’ time, average earners between £300 and £600, and the poorest £180. But Capital Economics, which admits to a more pessimistic outlook than most, believes the tax measures alone next year will cost the average household £550. The figure doubles after the impact of pay freezes and job cuts.

The Office for Budget Responsibility, the Treasury’s public finances watchdog, has warned workers of a real-terms pay cut this year and next as inflation outstrips salary rises.
The bleak forecast came as the Bank of England reported that the economy had “deteriorated a little” in the past month and that the Budget may have harmed short-term growth prospects, despite reducing longer-term risks. For the first time since February, the Bank raised the prospect of restarting its so-called “money printing” programme to stimulate growth.
Economists said the minutes from this month’s rate-setting meeting suggested that interest rates, currently at a record low of 0.5 per cent, would remain lower for longer. James Knightley, of ING Financial Markets, said: “We forecast the first rate hike for 3Q11 [the third quarter of next year]”.

Ms Redwood warned that the outlook for households could be worse than her predictions. “We expect overall real household disposable incomes [after inflation] to rise by 0.5pc or so this year, before falling by 1pc or so in 2011 and flatlining in 2012.

“This would be the tightest squeeze on incomes since the mid-1970s, when real incomes fell by almost 3pc in 1976 and 1977. And if we are right in thinking more fiscal tightening is yet to come, the squeeze could turn out to be worse.”

Families were hit hard in the Budget to pay for a £6billion tax cut to business in an attempt to preserve jobs. Although the Budget con­tain­ed overall tax rises of £8.2billion, households’ taxes rose by nearly £11billion “to help pay for cuts in corporation tax and the rise in the threshold for employers’ national insurance contributions”, she said.

Ms Redwood added: “The fiscal squeeze, combined with continued deleveraging (cutting debt), will condemn consumer spending to a period of extraordinary weakness,” she said.

Russia's strategic partnernships with the world ..[ 1502 ]

Russia rethinking its strategic partnernships with the world

Wednesday, July 21, 2010 11:11 am TWN, 

By Frank Ching 

In a dramatic but little noticed shift, Russian President Dmitry Medvedev has announced that Russia will give top priority to the country's economic modernization and identified the leading members of the European Union and the United States as countries with which Moscow needs to forge “special modernization alliances.”

While China, too, is important, the Russian leader made it clear in his speech that what Russia needs are partnerships with such countries as Germany, France and Italy in Europe and, of course, the United States.
 

Medvedev outlined Moscow's new direction in a speech July 12 to the country's ambassadors and its representatives to international organizations.
Russia's new foreign policy emphasis had been foreshadowed in a confidential report prepared by Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov that was leaked in May and published in the Russian Newsweek.
The Medvedev speech confirms the authenticity of that report, which contained details missing from the president's public remarks.
 

Quite strikingly, Medvedev warned of Iran's nuclear program in words that could have come from the mouth of an American official. “It is essential to abandon simplistic approaches to this issue,” he said. “It is obvious that Iran is getting close to acquiring nuclear capability that can be used, in theory, to create nuclear weapons.”
 

In the past, China had some degree of cover from Russia on issues such as Iran so it was not the only voice opposing harsh sanctions. Thus, in a note to President Medvedev attached to the confidential report, Foreign Minister Lavrov says:
 

“Particular attention should be paid to monitoring the growing role of China in international affairs [and] proceed from the fundamental importance of consolidating China's position on joint action with us — with due regard to the evolving situation — in the G-20, BRIC [Brazil, Russia, India and China] and the Shanghai Cooperation Organization as well as the U.N. Security Council (where our support is often more useful to the Chinese than theirs to us).”
 

Aside from economic modernization, Medvedev said Russia's second biggest challenge was strengthening democratic and civil society institutions in the country.
 

In words that may sound alarming to Chinese officials, the president said, “We must promote the humanization of social systems around the world and especially at home. ... It is in the interests of Russian democracy for as many nations as possible to follow democratic standards in their domestic policy.”

Strike disrupts European travel..[ 1501 ]

France air controllers' strike disrupts European travel

 

Passengers wait at Paris Orly airport, where half of domestic flights were cancelled on Wednesday

BBC., 21 July 2010 Last updated at 10:25 GMT

A strike by air traffic controllers in France is causing serious disruption to domestic and European flights.

In Paris, one in five flights from Charles de Gaulle airport were cancelled on Wednesday, while half of flights from Orly are grounded.

Air France said the flights affected are short and medium haul only. Long haul should take off as normal.

Disruption is expected at most French airports due to the strike, according to the civil aviation authority DGAC.

The action - the third major airport strike in France this year - is scheduled to run until Thursday morning.

Stranded overnight Unions representing air traffic controllers called the strike to protest against plans to merge France's 4,000 controllers and 8,000 other DGAC personnel into a European-wide system.

Budget airline Easyjet has cancelled about a third of its departures from Charles de Gaulle and Orly to destinations across Europe, according to its website.

Queues began forming on Tuesday evening at Orly, where Simone Battaglia, 30, was stranded overnight after his Easyjet flight home to Naples was scrapped.

"The company is just offering us a flight for Milan tomorrow," he told the AFP news agency. "But Milan is hundreds of kilometres from Naples. That means we will have to take the train. It is a waste of time and money."

Ties to yakuza for Osaka sumo tournaments..[ 1500 ]

Stablemaster rents building with ties to yakuza for Osaka sumo tournaments

The building in Osaka that was used by the Matsugane stable, pictured on July 21. (Mainichi)

 

(Mainichi Japan) July 21, 2010

Sumo stablemaster Matsugane has been renting a building connected to a front company for an organized crime group for spring tournaments in Osaka, it was learned on July 21.

Matsugane, 53, rented the building, located within the city of Osaka, from the company president, 61, and has used it for lodging and training purposes.

Registration records show that the building belonged to the company until 2002, and it is now owned by a partner company. Police say the company managed by the president is a front for the Yamaguchi-gumi crime syndicate. 

The company president was arrested in March of 2008 for engaging in negotiations over an eviction from the building despite not having a license to practice law. In January of last year, he was given a two-year prison sentence, suspended for four years, by the Tokyo District Court.

Matsugane, formerly Ozeki Wakashimazu, was born in Tanegashima, Kagoshima Prefecture. He is married to former singer Mizue Takada. Matsugane won two championships during his active sumo days, and was known as the "nankai no kurohyo" (black leopard of the southern seas). He retired from active wrestling in 1987, and after the January sumo tournament in 1990, he left the Futagoyama stable and created his own successful stable. 

He has raised several wrestlers to high "sekitori" ranks. Currently, his wrestler Matsutani is performing well at the "juryo" rank. Matsugane is a referee for the Japan Sumo Association (JSA), and he is judging at the Nagoya tournament.

In 2009, high-ranking members of the Kodokai, a sub-group of the Yamaguchi-gumi crime syndicate, were seen sitting at the Nagoya tournament in front-row seats reserved for big money donors. In response to the scandal, in May of this year, the JSA added an item to its fundamental rules forbidding "deals or providing of benefits with anti-social forces," referring to crime syndicates and those affiliated with them.

Click here for the original Japanese story