Latest news with #Greenstreet
Yahoo
10-07-2025
- Science
- Yahoo
Our solar system has a new mysterious visitor—what is it?
On July 1, scientists operating a planetary defense facility saw something glimmering in the shadow of Jupiter, about 420 million miles from Earth. It certainly wasn't a near-Earth asteroid, nor was it a regular comet. Within a matter of hours, it became clear that this voyager wasn't even from our solar system: Its orbit was too steep, its speed was too great. Astronomers quickly concluded that this was an interstellar object—a sojourner from another star. These entities are, for the moment, vanishingly rare. This interstellar object is just the third ever confirmed. Serendipitously, scientists caught as it was making its way into the solar system, which means they will get to study it for several months and uncover its many secrets. 'Astronomers around the world will be pointing their telescopes, large and small, at this object… providing us with clues about its home planetary system,' says Sarah Greenstreet, an astronomer at the University of Washington. Here's everything we know so far about our solar system's latest interstellar visitor—and how scientists plan on resolving its mysteries in the coming weeks and months. Like asteroids and comets, interstellar objects are thought to be remnants from a time when planets were first forming or the ruins of wrecked worlds and moons. But instead of originating around our sun, they hail from another planetary system entirely. As such, finding them is of paramount importance to astronomers. 'The more we can learn about other planetary systems from these interstellar visitors, the better we can understand how similar or different our own solar system is to the vast number of other planetary systems that stretch across the Milky Way,' says Greenstreet. (Did a 2014 meteor come from interstellar space?) Only two have been discovered so far. The first, 'Oumuamua, was spotted in 2017, and it was considerably strange: a pancake or cigar-shaped object that behaved like a comet but didn't display any clear signs of cometary activity. Because it was detected as it was already leaving the solar system, astronomers didn't get much time to study it. Theories about its origin run the gamut from plausible (a piece of a dead planet or a particularly odd comet) to the considerably less plausible (an alien spaceship). Then in 2019, astronomers spied a second object called 2I/Borisov, which looked and acted a lot more like a comet. Astronomers managed to scope it out as it was making its way into the solar system, and they got to examine it more closely. A sample size of two makes it difficult to know what interstellar objects are like in general. Astronomers hope that number will increase with the new Vera C. Rubin Observatory's comprehensive 10-year survey of the night sky launching later this year. But for now, this third interstellar object is a nice surprise. The new visitor was detected by the Asteroid Terrestrial-impact Last Alert System (ATLAS) facility, a network of four autonomous NASA-funded telescopes designed to spot potentially hazardous near-Earth asteroids. ATLAS's station in Chile spotted the interloper during a routine survey. Initially, 'we did not suspect anything unusual about its orbit,' says Larry Denneau, one of the principal investigators of ATLAS at the University of Hawai'i. But that quickly changed when astronomers at other telescopes glimpsed the object, and scientists plotted out its orbit with more precision. (Asteroids with 'unstable orbits' hide around Venus—do they threaten Earth?) Asteroids and comets can have all sorts of orbits, but they all still circumnavigate the Sun. This object, though, was moving too rapidly and in a very elongated manner, which indicated it 'is not bound to the Sun's gravity and will never pass through our solar system again,' says Greenstreet. With everyone in agreement, the object was confirmed and officially given a name: 3I/ATLAS. So, what's it like? A new paper uploaded to the pre-print server arXiv summarizes what scientists know about the interstellar object so far. It clearly has a coma—a hazy bubble of gas created when ice turns into vapor as it's warmed by sunlight. 'Compared to the first two interstellar objects we've discovered, 3I/ATLAS is cometary like 2I/Borisov,' says Greenstreet, meaning, for now, 'Oumuamua remains the weirdo of the group. There are also hints that the object is somewhat red—a tell-tale sign that it's made of primeval matter that coalesced during the early days of its planetary system. So it's probably an extremely old geologic time capsule. 'At the moment, it's difficult to say how big it is,' says Greenstreet. Based on how much sunlight it's reflecting, it could be anywhere from 6 to 15 miles long. That's far bigger than 'Oumuamua (about one-quarter mile long) and 2I/Borisov (two-thirds of a mile long). But its coma and current distance obscure the true size of its likely smaller solid core. Not too much else is known about 3I/ATLAS just yet, but its trajectory through the solar system works in astronomers' favor. 'It'll be moving inwards for a few more months before it starts heading back out again,' says Aster Taylor, a graduate student of astrophysics at the University of Michigan. 'it's moving fast… [but] we'll have time to observe it.' Observatories all around the world, and even those in space, will spend time tracking it. As it dives toward the sun, 3I/ATLAS will also come within 18 million miles of Mars in early October. Several spacecraft are currently orbiting the Red Planet, and they may be able to use their cameras to study 3I/ATLAS's chemistry and other features as it rushes by. Astronomers expect to see plenty more cometary activity. Comets are often made of various types of ice, including frozen carbon monoxide, carbon dioxide, and water. In the next few weeks, 3I/ATLAS will get close enough to the sun for its water ice to start vaporizing—expanding its coma and lengthening its luminescent tail. 'Be on the lookout for images in the coming months that show off its beautiful cometary features as it makes its relatively short journey through our corner of the galaxy,' says Greenstreet.
The Guardian
20-03-2025
- Business
- The Guardian
Rate of UK shop closures expected to rise after budget tax changes
The UK's high streets are expected to empty out at a faster pace this year as extra costs imposed on businesses by Rachel Reeves are blamed for shops closing and a slowdown in chain store openings. The rate of store closures is forecast to rise again as a result of the chancellor's tax-raising budget last October, after a slowdown to 10 a day last year from 13 a day in 2023, according to research. Overall, the picture for the UK's under-pressure high streets improved slightly in 2024 despite significant numbers of high-profile banks and retail chain stores shutting. Net closures were the second lowest in a decade – beaten only by 2022 when retail destinations bounced back after the coronavirus pandemic lockdowns, according to the research by Greenstreet, for the advisory firm PwC. Just over 12,800 stores closed in 2024 – 1,277 fewer than in 2023 – while 9,002 opened, just over 130 fewer than a year before. The study did not include specific forecasts for the number of openings and closures for 2025 but predicted that costs, including a rise in the minimum wage and extra national insurance contributions from April, would accelerate the rate of closures. Kien Tan, a senior retail adviser at PwC, said: 'Announcements by retail and hospitality operators over the past couple of months suggest that many of them are being more cautious with their opening plans, partly because of higher operating costs following last year's budget, which is why openings are likely to slow in 2025. New sites may be less viable.' There had also been fears about the impact on consumer spending linked to job cuts expected as a result of Reeves's changes. While 2025 got off to a shaky start, consumer confidence stabilised this month after February's record low, according to figures from the British Retail Consortium trade body released on Wednesday. This was coupled with an increase in households' retail spending expectations for the three months ahead. Expectations for DIY and home improvements moved into positive territory but the shift in spending was led by food, where inflation on basics such as dairy has returned. Tan said the pace at which units on high streets, retail parks and in shopping centres had become empty appeared to have stabilised post-pandemic and that it was now matching the rate at which shopping and services were moving online. PwC said that, in the long run, the number of shops and services in retail destinations would continue to shrink by 2% a year as the loss of key services, such as banks and chemists, reduced the reason to head there. In 2024, chemists, pubs, banks and car or motorbike services such as dealerships and MOT centres, accounted for half of all net chain store closures, with the departure of Lloyds pharmacies from high streets and the closures of more than a dozen Wetherspoon's swinging the numbers. Sign up to Business Today Get set for the working day – we'll point you to all the business news and analysis you need every morning after newsletter promotion UK banks have consistently closed branches as many consumers switch to digital banking, causing concern about the impact on local communities. The number of UK bank branches to have shut over the last nine years passed 6,000 earlier this year. On Wednesday, Santander said it would close a further 95 UK branches this year, and reduce services in at least 50 more. Lloyds Banking Group said in January that it was closing a further 136 branches. Convenience store chains expanded the fastest, led by Morrisons and Asda's shift into smaller stores, followed by coffee shops, takeaways and budget retailers. The twice-yearly report using data from Green Street, formerly known as the Local Data Company, tracks more than 200,000 chain outlets in more than 3,500 locations to gain an insight into the changing landscape of high streets, shopping centres and retail parks. The report for PwC does not include independent stores, which are tracked separately.
