It's Raining Stardust (3X Increase From Six Years Ago)

Science News Magazine ^ | 8-23-2003 | Ron Cowen

[blam]

I wonder what effect this is having on our weather and climate, Global Warming?

As a size comparison, a human hair is about 100.0 micrometers in diameter. This dust is 0.6 micrometers in diameter. Minimum features, these days, on a computer chip are about 0.25 - 0.125 micrometers.

[blam]

Ping.

[strela]

What did Bush know and when did he know it?

[Mercat]

Those blankity blank evil Republicans. :-D

[texas booster]

Well, obviously Bush has not done enough to keep the sun's magnetic field from reversing. Just like any bad ole' Republican, the sun flip-flops on the citizens of earth just like a bad campaign promise.

If elected president, or governor of CA, or mayor of Maypearl, my first act will be to pass a bill outlawing the sun to change magnetic orientation, and to create a registry of flip-flops to be used to fine the sun up to $1,000 per day per offence.

That'll shown 'em who is tough on enviromental crime.

And after that I'll file for protected status for magnetic orientation, not that there's anything wrong with that.

[PokeyJoe]

It's a proven fact that cows emit more stardust than exists in the solar system.

[Prof Engineer]

Sky Is Falling ping

[Ahban]

Ping

[kb2614]

This is just another effect of Bush's WAR for OIL.

GLOBAL WARMING!!!! GLOBAL WARMING!!!!!

WE'RE ALL GOING TO DIE AND IT ALL BUSH'S FAULT!!!!!

(chicken little alert is now off)

[Calvin Locke]

...effect this is having on our weather and climate.

Well, assuming an even distribution, most of the stuff that makes it down falls in to the ocean, thereby raising the sea
level faster than the stuff falling on land can build up...

[dark] dust on the poles probably collects more sunlight, thereby melting faster. Of course, the dust in the
atmosphere inhibits the sunlight too, but then again, probably warms the dust in the atmosphere....

I'm wondering if any of those dust particles have something like the Andromeda Strain attached.

[Consort]

I wonder what effect this is having on our weather and climate, Global Warming?

Yes, I thought that the solar system might be passing through a warm spot in the Aether, but it could be the stardust: warm stardust + space friction = global warming.

[Aracelis]

Ping

[Barry Goldwater]

"Sunlight rapidly charges dust attempting to enter the solar system, and, according to conventional theory, the sun's magnetic field then ejects the particles. "

Someone previously said the dust is neutral and therefore unaffected by the sun's magnetic field.


"Not only does dust absorb starlight, reradiating it as heat, "

Could this explain the cosmic microwave background radiation? The starlight is absorbed and reradiated as heat? Seems quite a bit simpler than the current theories cosmologists cling to.

[varon]

I wonder what effect this is having on our weather and climate, Global Warming?

Well, I don't know about the weather or Global Warming but I sure can attest that I have to dust my place more often ;-)

[RichInOC]

"Ziggy played guitar, jamming good with Weird and Gilly and The Spiders From Mars
"He played it left hand
"But made it too far,
"Became the special man, then we were Ziggy's band..."

[RightWhale]

The sun has a magnetic field that reverses polarity frequently. Does the sun have an iron core? If not, how does the sun generate its magnetic field?

Is the earth's magnetic field due to the iron core, and if it is, how can the earth's magnetic field reverse polarity?

It might be noted that celestial objects with more atmosphere seem to have a stronger magnetic field.

[blam]

"It might be noted that celestial objects with more atmosphere seem to have a stronger magnetic field."

Are you hinting at a gravity particle?

[Phsstpok]

This dust is 0.6 micrometers in diameter

Yeah, but I bet ya there's more than a few of them.

There's a great clasic (60s?) Sci Fi novel by Fred Hoyle called the Black Cloud where we are in the path of a large interstellar cloud dense enough to blot out the stars, and of course they figure out finally that it will kill all life on Earth, but that it also must truly be alive itself. Hundreds of Star Trek and similar science fiction ripped this plot off mercilessly. I wonder if we'll find this dust is somehow connected to an intelligent cloud coming our way?

The other novel I think of in the same context, though I can't remember the title to save my life, has the Earth passing out of a region of space that has somehow been dampening the bio-chemical reactions involved in intelligence. Suddenly we're all walking around with IQs of 1,000. Does anyone else feel any smarter today? Dumber?

[Elliott Jackalope]

Just FYI, the newest generation of processors is being fabbed at .09 microns (some at .1), or as it is more commonly referred to, 90 nanometers. That's 90 billionths of a meter.

[ASA Vet]

I'm wondering if any of those dust particles have
something like the Andromeda Strain attached.

Nope, life doesn't exist anywhere except Earth.
And only for 6,000 - 7,000 years on Earth.