Milky Way's Zone of Avoidance to Michio Kaku on UFOs: "The Burden has Shifted"

Weekend Edition

This weekend’s stories include:

The Center of the Milky Way has a 'zone of avoidance' and we don't know why--The stars that orbit close to the Milky Way's supermassive black hole are already tough to explain – but there also seems to be some stars missing, reports New Scientist. " Stars at any given distance from the supermassive black hole at the galactic centre, called Sagittarius A*, should have a random distribution of shapes to their orbits, but one group of stars is mysteriously missing from that distribution."

"The Burden has Shifted" --Physicist Michio Kaku was asked about UFOs. Here’s his response: "Well, first of all, I think that there’s been a game changer. In the old days, the burden of proof was on the true believers to prove that what they saw last night was a flying saucer of some sort. Now the burden of proof has shifted. Now it’s the military, the military has to prove that these aren’t extraterrestrial objects."

Does the Milky Way Harbor Thousands of Stars from Another Galaxy--We know there are stars moving fast enough to escape the Milky Way, so the same is probably true of other galaxies. Now, simulations suggest there could be almost 4000 stars from the Andromeda galaxy in the Milky Way today, reports New Scientist.

Did Massive Black Holes Litter the Early Universe? Calculations by a gravitational wave hunter suggest that the early universe was more developed than what we can observe, reports Isaac Schultz for Gizmodo.

Future of Astronomy from Moon's Far Side--The far side of the Moon offers unique advantages for science. A meeting at the Royal Society in London brought together planetary scientists, astronomers, astrophysicists and other stakeholders to discuss the future of astronomy from the Moon, reports Nature.

A star cluster in the Milky Way appears to be as old as the universe--Measuring ages of ancient clusters like M92 can help resolve a puzzle about cosmic evolution, reports Science News. "Refining the ages of clusters like M92 can help put limits on the age of the universe itself. It can also help solve cosmic conundrums about how the universe evolved."

Boston University: Is the Government Concealing UFO Craft and Dead Extraterrestrials? "The allegation comes not from an outside crank, but a respected former intelligence officer who had occasion to work with the Pentagon’s All-domain Anomaly Resolution Office (AARO), charged with identifying unidentified objects near military assets."

The Dark-Matter Distribution Paradox, reports SciTechDaily --"Astrophysicists found the “clumpiness” of Universe’s dark matter to be 0.76, a figure conflicting with the Cosmic Microwave Background value of 0.83, indicating possible errors or an incomplete cosmological model. The research used the Hyper Suprime-Cam Subaru Strategic Program data and will further investigate this compelling discrepancy."

A long-duration gamma-ray burst from the nucleus of an ancient galaxy, reports Nature. "In this case, it could be a compact object merger. These may form in dense nuclear clusters or originate in a gaseous disc around the supermassive black hole."

Is There Weather on the Moon? SciTechDaily asks NASA. "The Moon does experience what we refer to as space weather. Space weather loosely refers to how changing conditions throughout the solar system, like the varying solar wind, which is composed of charged particles from the Sun, and meteoroid streams, affect planetary surfaces and volatile cycles."

200,000 Lightning Flashes – Tonga’s Hunga Eruption Produced the Most Intense Lightning Ever Recorded, reports SciTechDaily. "The January 15 eruption lasted at least 11 hours, several hours longer than previously known. The plume produced the highest-altitude lightning flashes ever measured, 20 to 30 kilometers (12 to 19 miles) above sea level."

Curated by The Galaxy Report editorial staff.