Tag Archives: ganti

A lot from “almost nothing”

by S. Prasad Ganti “There is plenty of room at the bottom” exclaimed the Nobel Prize winning Physicist Richard Feynman. He was referring to the room in the atoms. The nucleus is very tiny, about ten thousand times smaller than … Continue reading

Posted in March 2025, Sidereal Times | Tagged , , | Leave a comment

History of the Cosmic Web

by S. Prasad Ganti On a recent long flight to India, I saw a documentary titled “How does the Universe work”. I am summarizing the notes I took down from this fascinating piece. How did the universe evolve from such … Continue reading

Posted in January 2025, Sidereal Times | Tagged , | Leave a comment

X-Ray Telescopes

by S. Prasad Ganti All the X-ray telescopes are in space. None on the ground. There are optical, infra-red, radio telescopes on the ground, but not X-rays. For the simple reason that X-rays coming from outer space cannot penetrate the … Continue reading

Posted in December 2024, Sidereal Times | Tagged , | Leave a comment

Hubble Tension

by S. Prasad Ganti Edwin Hubble was the legendary astronomer of the early twentieth century. Credited with the discoveries of the Andromeda galaxy and the expansion of the universe. With these, he brought the concept of galaxies to our lexicon. … Continue reading

Posted in November 2024, Sidereal Times | Tagged , | Leave a comment

Waves in the Cosmic Sea

by S. Prasad Ganti BAO (Baryon Acoustic Oscillation) is a mouthful of an acronym. It interested me because of its relation to our baby Universe. That was a time when our Universe was less than 380,000 years old. With no … Continue reading

Posted in October 2024, Sidereal Times | Tagged , , | Leave a comment

Flavors of Gravitational Waves

by S. Prasad Ganti In 2015, gravity waves were detected by LIGO (Laser Interferometer Gravitational-wave Observatory) from the locations at Louisiana and Washington states. This proved one of the significant predictions of Einstein’s General theory of relativity. Generated by very … Continue reading

Posted in September 2024, Sidereal Times | Tagged , | Leave a comment

Darkness at Noon

by S. Prasad Ganti Millions of people made long journeys across the US to catch a glimpse of the total solar eclipse on April 8th 2024. The totality lasted up to 4 mins. First I will write about the logistics … Continue reading

Posted in May 2024, Sidereal Times | Tagged , , | Leave a comment

Stellar Nurseries

by S. Prasad Ganti Stellar nurseries are places in a galaxy where star formation is taking place. Very much like all living beings, stars are born and die. Huge clouds of gaseous hydrogen, embedded with dust particles,  are the source … Continue reading

Posted in April 2024, Sidereal Times | Tagged , | Leave a comment

Expansion of the Universe

by S. Prasad Ganti A recent article in the journal “Nature” intrigued me. It stated that the accelerated expansion of the Universe, attributed to dark energy currently, could be happening due to merger with other Universes. A very thought provoking … Continue reading

Posted in March 2024, Sidereal Times | Tagged , , | Leave a comment

The Sun God Aditya

by S. Prasad Ganti In Hindu mythology, Aditya is the Sun god, something akin to Ra in Egyptian mythology. Studying the Sun has been occurring for most of human history. In the last few decades done using telescopes – both … Continue reading

Posted in February 2024, Sidereal Times | Tagged , , , | 1 Comment