Bushels of Buckyballs Found in Space

October 28, 2010

Strong cages of carbon, known as buckyballs, have been found not only in the exploded remains of stars, but also in interstellar space, raising the prospect that they may be the packaging to transport other molecules and atoms through the galaxy.

It was just three months ago that scientists first announced they'd found the 60-packs of carbon molecules, known as buckminsterfullerens, in a planetary nebula, the death shroud of an exploded star.

This week, astronomers report four more sightings of buckyballs in planetary nebula, including one located beyond the Milky Way in the Small Magellanic Cloud, a neighboring galaxy about 210,000 light-years away.

[atsimg]http://files.abovetopsecret.com/images/member/976af8d9da2a.jpg[/atsimg]
The buckyballs were found in a dying star, called a planetary nebula, within the nearby galaxy, the Small Magellanic Cloud.
Star Aging Video

news.discovery.com...

Buckyballs were named after dome-lover Buckminster Fuller, they are the third form of solid carbon after diamonds and graphite.

Apparently finding them in space is that it shows they occur in nature, which makes since to me, what is that saying as above as below or something to that effect, our planet was formed from particles that were captured from outer space in the beginning

Video from the link in my opening post from the Discovery Channel

I'd love to know how scientists can determine molecular structure of "matter" hundreds of lightyears away.

I don't get what is so special about it, please explain?
Of course our planet was made from particles from outer space. Because there is no other place.

Originally posted by frozenspark
I'd love to know how scientists can determine molecular structure of "matter" hundreds of lightyears away.

That is a good question, they theorize and speculate is my guess, no different then the Big Bang "theory", they talk about like it's real and people tend to believe it.

If the Big Bang were true what came before it? Every question has more questions.

Originally posted by frozenspark
I'd love to know how scientists can determine molecular structure of "matter" hundreds of lightyears away.

The Force..... Or copious amounts of Vodka, take your pick.

Its possible they know this because they know what to "scan" for. We have probes in the solar system with detection equipment on board. Bucky Balls if I remember right were theorized, and confirmed to exist fairly recent.

We know that particles give off a resonance / vibration, whatever you want to call it. When we confirmed the existence of Bucky balls, we knew what to look for. Shoot that info to any satellite in our solar system that is equipped with a Spectrometer, and you should be able to gather results.

reply to post by frozenspark


Spectroscopy...

reply to post by frozenspark


To expand a bit on the previous post, from Wikipedia (technically, it's Spectrometry that's used to determine chemical content, but spectrometry is just a particular spectroscopic technique:

Spectrometry is the spectroscopic technique used to assess the concentration or amount of a given chemical (atomic, molecular, or ionic) species. In this case, the instrument that performs such measurements is a spectrometer, spectrophotometer, or spectrograph.

Spectroscopy/spectrometry is often used in physical and analytical chemistry for the identification of substances through the spectrum emitted from or absorbed by them.

Spectroscopy/spectrometry is also heavily used in astronomy and remote sensing. Most large telescopes have spectrometers, which are used either to measure the chemical composition and physical properties of astronomical objects or to measure their velocities from the Doppler shift of their spectral lines.

reply to post by Aquarius1

Originally posted by Aquarius1

Originally posted by frozenspark
I'd love to know how scientists can determine molecular structure of "matter" hundreds of lightyears away.

That is a good question, they theorize and speculate is my guess.

They do it by absorption spectroscopy.

these are carbon atoms in a particular shape.

specto's can tell carbon but will it say what kind?


sorry if i missed that.

absorbtion, never mind!

reply to post by fooks

They can. Different isotopes have different absorption lines.