DarkKnightRadick - Slashdot User

Submission + - Supermassive black hole is thrown out of galaxy (physorg.com)

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DarkKnightRadick

on Tuesday May 11, 2010 @08:22PM

DarkKnightRadick writes: "An undergrad student at the University of Utrecht, Marianne Heida, has found evidence of a super massive black hole being tossed out of it's galaxy. According to the article, the black hole — which has a mass equivalent to 1 billion suns — is possibly the culmination of two galaxies merging (or colliding, depending on how you like to look at it) and their black holes merging, creating one supermassive beast. The black hole was found using the Chandra Source Catalog (from the Chandra X-Ray Observatory). The direction of the expulsion is also possibly indicative of the direction of rotation of the two black holes as they circled each other before merging. The story can also be found here."

Submission + - QUT physicist corrects Oxford English Dictionary ( (physorg.com)

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DarkKnightRadick

on Monday May 10, 2010 @08:19AM

DarkKnightRadick writes: "Dr. Stephen Hughes, a Queensland University of Technology physics lecturer, has discovered an error in the Oxford English Dictionary that has apparently been there since 1911 and has made it's way to every other dictionary in existence. The error, which defines a siphon as working on the principle of atmospheric pressure, was discovered as Dr. Hughes was getting ready to write an article about siphons after viewing the one at Lake Bonney (mis-spelled in the article). Dr. Hughes' article(pdf) — practical example of a siphon at work — is ready for viewing (along with a correct spelling of the Lake's name)."

Submission + - Mayan Plumbing Found in Ancient City (physorg.com)

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DarkKnightRadick

on Tuesday May 04, 2010 @06:10PM

DarkKnightRadick writes: "According to this article on PhysOrg.com, the ancient Mayans had pressurized plumbing as early as sometime between the year 100 (when the city in question was first founded) and 800 (when it was abandoned). While the Egyptians had plumbing way earlier (around 2500BC according to this site), this is the first instance of plumbing in the New World prior to European exploration and conquering."

Submission + - Twitter to Go "Unlimited" (mashable.com)

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DarkKnightRadick

on Thursday April 15, 2010 @08:49AM

DarkKnightRadick writes: "Most of you who use twitter apps know that there is a rate limit to the API so as not to flood the Twitter servers. Well an article just up on Mashable reveals that Twitter is about to do away with rate limits completely:
The new API is focused around pushing out data to desktop applications in real time. There will no longer be rate-limits for data on desktops — tweets, retweets and all other updates will be streamed directly to the desktop.
"

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