Won Over

 

“Reaching that honored city, which was protected by the arms of the ten-headed Ravana, roaming about and not finding that highly respected daughter of King Janaka, who was won over by her husband’s divine qualities, that monkey then became highly distressed.” (Valmiki Ramayana, Sundara Kand, 7.16)

tataḥ sa tām kapir abhipatya pūjitām |
caran purīm daśa mukha bāhu pālitām |
adṛśya tām janaka sutām supūjitām |
suduhkhitām pati guṇa vega nirjitām ||

Those intimately associated with the Supreme Personality of Godhead substantiate their exalted position and remain steadfast to their occupational duty of being a lover of God not due to any outside obligation or social convention. The roles of brother, son, wife, father, mother, friend, and so on carry many responsibilities. It is said that “a friend in need is a friend indeed”, which means that a good friend is one who is around to help you through the bad times. Being a friend during times of peace is a lot easier than riding out the struggles with your good buddy who is in major distress. A real friend is always there for you, as they are attracted by your qualities and drawn to your association. With a wife, there is an inherent duty that she be there for the husband to support him. This is especially true when the marriage has been arranged by the parents and the couple married under religious principles. Lest we think that this was the main cause for Sita’s devotion to Rama, in the above referenced verse it is declared that she was drawn to Rama by His nature, won over by His divine qualities, orgunas. In this respect she became even more worthy of honor and worship from Shri Hanuman

 

, the faithful servant who had been tasked with finding her.

Sita’s glories actually know no end. To describe her only as the most beautiful woman in the world would be to shortchange her other qualities, which include kind-heartedness and benevolence. Anyone who is dedicated in thought, word and deed to the Supreme Lord can never be lacking in divine qualities. Scholars not of the bhakti attitude will try to compare Sita to characters from fictional literature and mythological traditions, but the search for anyone even similar to her will be a futile one. Sita is as real as the sun and her glories as everlasting as the infinite nature of time and space. Though she is endowed with every virtuous quality to an immeasurable extent, the devotees still try to describe some of her features and glorify her character, for this brings great joy to the heart. This joy is especially needed during times of distress, when success in a difficult task doesn’t seem certain.

When the couple was acting out their dramatic roles on this earth many thousands of years ago, one of the acts involved a period of separation. Lord Rama

 

 is a non-different form of the original Supreme Lord, who is known as Bhagavan in the Vedic tradition. Bhagavan is the most fortunate individual. In sports and areas of acclaim there is always the search for the greatest of all-time. Based on past performance and the ability to exercise skill, an individual will be labeled as being very great or better than anyone else to have ever done what they do. Lost in this mix, however, is the issue of fortune, or luck. Without good luck, without things going right for you more times than not, there is no question of success. In the grand scheme of things we are quite powerless, as the soul does not create actions nor is it responsible for the results of behavior. These are taken care of by nature, which is governed by the three modes of goodness, passion and ignorance, which operate under the purview of the Supreme Lord.

“Those with the vision of eternity can see that the soul is transcendental, eternal, and beyond the modes of nature. Despite contact with the material body, O Arjuna, the soul neither does anything nor is entangled.” (Lord Krishna, Bhagavad-gita, 13.32)

If we do see someone excel in a particular field, it is to be understood that they are fortunate. Their luck is good because they have been able to perform without impediment, without injury, and without loss of skill. They were also able to defeat their competitors, which means that the laws of nature did not place anyone in their way who could have defeated them. We may think we have control over our own actions, but we certainly can’t manage the behavior of others. Everything is placed into just the right circumstance to have the proper result always manifest.

God is described as Bhagavan because His fortune is higher than anyone else’s . He is the most beautiful, wise, strong, renounced, wealthy and famous. He is the reservoir of all pleasure and good fortune. When He appears on earth for whatever reason, these divine qualities come with Him. Therefore even when playing the role of the prince of the Raghu dynasty, Bhagavan retained His supreme standing.

Just as the original Personality of Godhead can descend to earth and maintain His stature, the Lord’s eternal consort also comes with Him. The distinguishing feature of the eternal consort is that she gives more pleasure to Bhagavan than anyone else. We could search the three worlds and every inch of space and never find anyone who gives more pleasure to Rama than Sita. She played the role perfectly of a devoted wife, married to Rama after a wonderful ceremony held in the kingdom of Videha ruled by King Janaka, Sita’s father.

Since Rama won Sita’s hand in marriage after lifting and breaking a powerful bow coming from Lord Shiva

 

, it would be understandable if Sita’s greatness would be attributed to her dedication to dharma, or virtue. In different fields of endeavor, there are specific guiding principles and recommendations to be followed. These help to maintain the ideal condition. With a marriage, the ideal condition is that the husband and wife live together peacefully and steadily advance in consciousness. Those who think of Bhagavan at the time of death immediately put an end to the cycle of birth and death known as samsara. Transmigration of the soul is a scientific concept that is mistakenly viewed to be a product of faith called reincarnation

 

.

Since the male species dominates the female, the duty applied to the wife is to be subservient to and supportive of her husband. This maintains the harmony within the marriage, as the male ego is very strong. Should the wife become predominant, the male ego gets bruised and problems arise. In reality, in most homes where happily married couples reside, the wife runs the show. It’s just that in good marriages the wife acts in such a way that the husband thinks that he is in charge. When both parties follow their prescribed duties, there is a better chance of advancing in consciousness.

Since Sita and Rama live forever in each other’s company, they don’t require adherence to dharma. In fact, they are the very objects of virtue and piety, as they are regularly remembered by those who follow bhagavata-dharma, or devotional service

 

. A set of guiding principles enables a specific condition to be reached, but since there can be no better condition than having God’s constant company, the set of principles belonging to bhagavata-dharma becomes the most inclusive and worthwhile to follow. Those who regularly chant, “Hare Krishna Hare Krishna, Krishna Krishna, Hare Hare, Hare Rama Hare Rama, Rama Rama, Hare Hare

 

”, can constantly remember Bhagavan and His eternal consort and the love they share for each other.

While on earth, Sita abided by her religious duties perfectly. Rama had a biological mother and two other mothers who were married to His father King Dasharatha. In this sense Sita inherited three mother-in-laws at the time of marriage. Yet she never failed to please any of them, honoring them as she would her own mother on a daily basis. More than anything, she was very chaste and wholly dedicated to Rama. This was done not out of duty necessarily, but more out of love for her husband. Rama’s divine qualities won Sita over, as they had previously done with Lakshmana

 

.

“I am His younger brother, Lakshmana by name. Due to His transcendental qualities, I have taken up service to Him, as He is grateful and very knowledgeable.” (Lakshmana speaking to Hanuman, Valmiki Ramayana

 

, Kishkindha Kand, 4.12)

Shri Lakshmana, Rama’s younger brother, was inseparable from Rama since childhood. Again, a younger brother’s duty as espoused by the Vedas is to worship the older brother and treat him like a father. In this respect Lakshmana was wholly deferent to dharma. But when he met Shri Hanuman, Lakshmana made sure to tell him that he was following Rama through thick and thin because of the Lord’s qualities. Twelve years after his marriage to Sita, Rama was ordered to leave the kingdom and not come back for fourteen years. Sita and Lakshmana insisted on accompanying Him, and while in the forest Sita would be kidnapped by a Rakshasa named Ravana. Rama and Lakshmana met up with Hanuman in Kishkindha after that.

Hanuman was the chief minister of the monkey-king Sugriva, so when he met Rama for the first time, there was also an underlying duty guiding his behavior. Sugriva tasked Hanuman with finding out what Rama and Lakshmana wanted, for their presence as fighters was conspicuous in a forest inhabited by animals and monkeys. Nevertheless, when Hanuman met Rama, he eventually forgot his initial purpose and instead became overwhelmed by the Lord’s brilliant qualities. Right then he decided that Rama was his object of worship and that he would dedicate his life to Him.

Jumping forward to when Hanuman was in Lanka searching for Sita, we see that he became dejected upon not finding her right away. Indeed, Hanuman saw everything there was to see in Lanka. The kingdom was extremely opulent, richer than any city seen today. Even the floors were inlaid with jewels and the buildings made of gold. Who could imagine such opulence? Though he appreciated this beauty, Hanuman was still dejected that he had yet to find Sita, who was the reason for his being in Lanka.

In the above referenced verse from the Ramayana it is said that Hanuman was dejected upon not having met the daughter of King Janaka. Amongst kings in the world at the time Janaka was one of the most respected. Initially well known for his mastery over mystic yoga, Janaka would later find a higher sensation by gaining Shri Rama as a son-in-law. Today Janaka is listed as one of the twelve authorities on devotional service. Therefore his daughter Sita would naturally be very exalted as well. It is also mentioned that Sita was well-worshiped. Though she was being held against her will in Lanka, she was the real precious gem in the city, not like the opulence that served as a façade to mask the dedication to the mode of ignorance of the residents. Despite their wealth, Ravana and the Rakshasas lived lives that were devoid of any meaning. Drinking wine and having illicit sex

 

 can only take you so far. When life is ruled by this behavior, it becomes empty very quickly. The soul is meant to pour out heaps of transcendental love. When there is no outlet for this love, perverse activities are adopted instead, leading to the opposite condition, wherein more misery and less happiness are encountered .

Sita had been conquered by the force of her husband’s qualities. Rama’s kindness, beauty, smiling face, and loving heart had won Sita over for life. In this sense her being drawn to Him represented another wonderful quality. Anyone who can say they have been subjugated by Bhagavan’s qualities can be considered highly fortunate. Many exalted saints and divine figures are also referred to as Bhagavan for this very reason. Rishi Narada knows no other business except glorifying Rama and spreading the nectar of His holy name across the world. Hence he is often referred to as Bhagavan, as is Lord Shiva, who is an expert on devotion to Rama, as he practices it as his primary business in life.

Sita’s wonderful qualities only increased Hanuman’s grief over not having found her. At the same time, the separation made him even more eager to search for her, through thick and thin, through both the good times and the bad. Ravana was very powerful, but he was not able to stop someone as devoted as Hanuman from finding the person who gives Rama more pleasure than anyone else. Just as Sita was won over by Rama’s qualities, Hanuman was eternally attached to Sita because of her level of devotion. In the same manner, the sincere souls hearing the tradition of the Ramayana and following the methods of worship instituted by the Vaishnava acharyas can’t help but be won over in the heart by Hanuman’s wonderful exhibition of devotion and dedication. One of Bhagavan’s many qualities is that He is unbeatable, or unconquerable. When the devoted soul makes their life’s mission the pleasing of Bhagavan, that same invincibility is passed on to them. Therefore Hanuman never had a chance of failing in his mission, and neither does anyone who is fortunate enough to hear about Rama’s most faithful servant on a regular basis.

In Closing:

The beloved daughter of Janaka in Lanka waits,

For her husband to rescue her from her dire straits.

Hanuman, from Kishkindha was sent,

Much time in Ravana’s land he spent.

Looking for Sita, to bring the news to her,

That Rama’s arrival in Lanka soon to occur.

But not finding that woman highly blessed,

Hanuman felt temporarily distressed.

Her qualities are second to none,

At pleasing Rama she is number one.

As wife devotion to husband from her everyone came to expect,

But more taken by Rama’s qualities was she, brilliant in every respect.

City of Lanka having opulence unimaginable,

Protected by arms of Ravana, strength formidable.

Without sight of princess, difficult for monkey to proceed,

But by remembering Sita, indeed would he succeed.

From Snake to Swan

“The tongue is like a snake and the mouth like a snake hole for the person who does not chant the holy names of the Lord. Those who have no love for Shri Rama are understood to be bereft of the creator’s favor, says Tulsi.” (Dohavali, 40) rasanā sam̐āpini badana bila je na japahiṃ harināma | tulasī prema na rāma soṃ tāhi bidhātā bāma || A sincere lover will always think of new ways to properly describe their intense and pure emotions to others. It’s not easy to put what you feel into words, especially if you are presenting your thoughts through poems that can also be sung. Because of the constraints accompanying poetry, the writer must use brevity, which Shakespeare referred to as the soul of wit. In this nice verse from the Dohavali, the poet Tulsidas  very succinctly and emphatically declares his love for Shri Rama, the Supreme Personality of Godhead, and at the same time provides valuable insight into the purpose of human life. Our bodies were crafted through nature’s influence, which works under the direction of the creator. Just as a machine is the result of fine craftsmanship on the part of one or more intelligent human beings, the form adopted by the spirit soul is due solely to the work of a higher power, the creator who is in charge of distributing the results of karma, or fruitive work. When a particular individual has no love for the Supreme Lord, who is a loving God through and through, then the creator obviously has not been favorable to them. In the verse above, Tulsidas first says that anyone who doesn’t chant the names of Hari essentially has a tongue which is like a serpent and a mouth which is like a serpent hole. The comparison is so extreme that it is even a bit humorous, as it conveys the deep love and affection held by the poet not only for the person addressed in harinama-japa, or the silent chanting  of a devotional mantra, but also the recitation process itself. The tongue reveals the thoughts of the mind; through our speech our ideas and feelings are communicated to others. When time is spent chanting the Lord’s holy names, such as those found in the maha-mantra, “Hare Krishna Hare Krishna, Krishna Krishna, Hare Hare, Hare Rama Hare Rama, Rama Rama, Hare Hare ”, the tongue is put to good use. Hari is another word for God that means “one who removes distresses”. The Supreme Lord’s position is not to facilitate desires for personal sense gratification or advancement in some material endeavor. These aspects of life essentially take care of themselves through the workings of nature, which are managed by elevated living entities that are godly but not equal to the Supreme Lord. The distresses that Hari removes relate todevotional service , or bhakti-yoga. In the absence of God consciousness, the living entity, in any form he accepts, takes part in activities driven only by animal instincts. Eat when you are hungry, sleep when you are tired, have sexual relations when you are stimulated, and defend your property from foreign attack. But consciousness is the real gift given to the soul, which is the essence of life. Therefore the true aim in any form of body is to develop this consciousness fully and purify it by connecting it with God. Yoga is meant only for this purpose. The root meaning of yoga is “plus”, or “addition”. The two operands in the equation are the individual spiritual entity and the fountainhead of all things matter and spirit, God. Since the Supreme Lord is superior, if He sees someone steadily determined in yoga, trying very hard to connect with Him, He removes their fears. In this sense the tongue is one of the greatest blessings bestowed upon the living entity. Through the medium of the tongue, one can regularly chant the names of Hari, or harinama, of which there are too many to count. Rama is the favorite name for Tulsidas, as it represents the Supreme Lord’s divine incarnation of Shri Ramachandra  who appeared on earth in the guise of a warrior prince many thousands of years ago. Tulsidas dedicated his whole life to chanting the glories of Rama and persuading others to take to pure bhakti, wherein one’s life and soul would be surrendered to the interests of Hari. Aside from its ability to purify, chanting the names of Hari is a very pleasurable experience, especially for one who is able to steadily develop their God consciousness. In every other endeavor the instigating factor is the desire for happiness or enjoyment. When engagement or dedication in an activity ceases, it is to be understood that the enjoyment has withered away. If we suck the juice out of sugarcane, we really have no use for the plant anymore. Therefore once one activity gets boring, we will jump to another and try to squeeze the sweetness out of it. With bhakti, however, it is seen that the dedication to chanting and devotional service in general only increases with further practice. This property of spiritual science can never be understood by blunt measurements or deductive reasoning. In the spiritual land, one minus one can equal one, as the Supreme Lord is not limited by any rules of a temporary land governed by matter. Just as Hari knows no exhaustion, defeat, fear or loss, the devotees who regularly chant His names grow increasingly attached to bhakti-yoga and the happiness it brings. One who develops a taste for harinamawill naturally compare their new situation to the way they felt before. Since everyone starts off at the same position, as unintelligent human beings needing guidance, even the advanced yogi can remember a time when he wasn’t wholly dedicated to connecting with the divine consciousness. Looking back on his previous life he will think of how uneventful and painful it was. He now loves chanting the names of the Lord so much that he will wonder how any person gifted with a tongue could ever refrain from such an activity. The tongue is a very powerful instrument, as it can not only bring about a purification in consciousness, it can also lead the conditioned soul astray. When the tongue is used to chant the names of Hari and eat the remnants of foodstuff offered to Him [prasadam ], the true benefit of the wonderful tongue included with the human body is realized. In the absence of God consciousness, the tongue talks about all sorts of nonsense, curses others, can’t be controlled in speech, and takes to eating varieties of impure foods. As the aim of human life is to realize God through yoga, any engagement which prohibits this connection can be considered impure and a waste of time. Since eating is a necessity for any life form, it cannot be neglected by the aspiring transcendentalist. Fortunately, every angle is covered by bhakti. For eating, the devotee is advised to eat the remnants of sacrifice, or yajna-shishta. A sacrifice is typically a formal ritual aimed at pleasing the enjoyer of all sacrifice, Yajneshvara, which is another name for Hari. “If one offers Me with love and devotion a leaf, a flower, fruit, or water, I will accept it.” (Lord Krishna, Bhagavad-gita , 9.26) In the Bhagavad-gita, the same Hari, in His original form of Lord Krishna , states that if someone offers Him a flower, a fruit, a leaf or some water with love and devotion, He gladly accepts it. This doesn’t apply just to Krishna the original person, but to His deity  representation as well. God is Absolute, so the sound vibration of His name and the picture depicting His transcendental features are non-different from Him. When food items are sacrificed in this way, Hari accepts them and then returns the remnants to the person doing the offering. By eating prasadam the tongue gets purified and remains immune to the effects of the material world, which act at every moment to attack the vulnerable senses. Impure actions by the tongue indicate that the material forces have a strong influence on the individual. When the tongue eats animal flesh, especially that of a cow  mercilessly killed in a slaughterhouse, the individual’s lack of God consciousness is revealed. All forms of life are Brahman, or pure spirit. Therefore even the animals are in the same boat as the human beings. They may not have the potential for high intelligence and the ability to fully develop consciousness, but this doesn’t mean that we should unnaturally stop their progression through the various forms of body. A small infant is very unintelligent, as are many innocent human beings, but this doesn’t give us license to kill them. When the tongue engages in unauthorized meat eating, the love for the Supreme Lord that naturally exists within the heart is understood to still be in a dormant state. When the tongue talks about Hari, His forms, names and activities, the true benefit of speech is achieved. Accompanying japa is kirtana, which means “to glorify”. Kirtana usually takes the form of songs sung that describe the glories of the Supreme Lord. Japa is usually performed quietly and alone, while kirtana typically involves groups of people. The tongue that regularly takes part in these two activities obviously lives in the mouth of a wise person. Such a tongue belongs to the body of an individual who is very fortunate; to whom the creator was favorable. The opinion that those who don’t chant the names of Hari have tongues like snakes and mouths like serpent holes seems a bit harsh. After all, we may know many people who are kind, pious, sweet and caring but don’t take part in bhakti. Should we consider their tongues to be like snakes? Let’s think of it this way. If we see a student in a classroom who is nice and polite but does not do any of their homework nor pass their exams, will we say that they are a good student? If we work with someone at the office who never tells a lie and never says a mean word but at the same time fails to complete the tasks assigned to them, would we say that they are a valuable asset to the company? As the aim of human life is to become God conscious, for as long as that mission is not furthered, the body parts granted by the creator are not taken full advantage of. When the tongue doesn’t chant the names of Hari and glorify Him through speech and song, it must glorify and praise other living entities and things. Since these objects are not God, the tongue cannot be said to be properly utilized. A snake is a cold-blooded reptile, and a snake hole is not something we prefer to see, as it probably scares us more than anything. If someone speaks regularly about the glories of material life, which is fueled by illicit sex  and unhealthy desires, their influence must be considered poisonous, as it will do nothing to further awareness of life’s real mission. The news media serves as the most notable culprit in this regard. Every day they have another new lead story, which either blasts a person they don’t like or praises someone they view as worthy of adulation and fame at the time. Obviously the attention paid does nothing tangible for anyone, as news from a few days ago is rarely revisited. If you give someone a newspaper that is more than a day old, they will not have any desire to read it. As a newspaper’s worthiness comes from its content, it is to be understood that the stories themselves become worthless after a few days. While it may be harsh to say that the tongue of the materially conscious individual is like a snake, it should be remembered that the snake in this instance can be turned into a swan very quickly. Those who have made the best use of their tongues through chanting the names of Hari can distribute the nectar of the holy names to others, inducing them to take up their constitutional engagement. The soul is meant to serve in a loving mood, so when there is no information about Hari available, the individual will take to serving its own interests or the desires of other materially conscious individuals. Through distribution of the names of God, which is the primary aim of the bona fide spiritual preachers and the Vaishnava poets, thousands of snakelike entities can turn into wonderful swans that always remain amidst the lotus flowers represented by the sweet, transcendental vibrations that glorify the Supreme Lord. “From the highest planet in the material world down to the lowest, all are places of misery wherein repeated birth and death take place. But one who attains to My abode, O son of Kunti, never takes birth again.” (Lord Krishna, Bg. 8.16) Tulsidas states that the creator has been unfavorable to those who don’t have love for Lord Rama . In the absence of bhakti, how can any situation gained in any form of body be considered favorable? As death takes away all accumulated gains, nothing remains for the conditioned soul at the time of quitting their body other than a return ticket to the same cycle of acceptance and rejection, which repeats perpetually until consciousness is purified. Bhakti’s benefits, on the other hand, are always increasing, as is evidenced by the increase in fervor and attachment that results from continuous practice in devotional efforts. The materially conscious individual was not shown favor by the creator, but the spiritually attached liberated soul has the full blessings of the Supreme Lord, who is the creator of even the creator. These benedictions can be received at any time, even if the creator was not originally favorable to us. God’s mercy is open to everyone, just as the sun’s rays hit every corner of the earth. One who knows how to take advantage of the divine mercy will make the most of their human form of life. Even if the creator grants us birth in an aristocratic family, a home full of spiritually conscious individuals, or the most pleasant circumstances, unless and until we tap into the divine consciousness, we cannot validly claim to have been favored by him. But when pure love for Shri Rama, the same God that everyone naturally believes in, is established, every body part and every condition of life becomes favorable, as they only further increase one’s God consciousness. In Closing: Those who attention to chanting Hari’s names do not give, Their tongue like a snake in its hole of the mouth does live. Seems like a harsh comparison for poet to make, But from it great lesson we can take. Tongue indicates what the mind is thinking of, Whether it wants material enjoyment or divine love. Purify eating by using tongue for prasadam tasting, No more on unclean foods senses indulging. Purify speech by talking of God, whose glories are broad, No more wasting time on entities who are flawed. Those without love for Rama by creator are not favored, With the pains of material life are they beleaguered. But within a second the snake can turn into a swan, By on holy names and form of Rama concentrating on.

WALKING WITH THE WOUNDED - FRANK GARDNER REPORT

Crab Pulsar Beams Most Energetic Gamma Rays Ever Detected from a Pulsar

One of the most studied objects in the sky, the Crab Nebula is powered by a pulsar. This composite image of the Crab Nebula uses data from the Chandra X-ray Observatory (x-ray image in blue), Hubble Space Telescope (optical image in red and yellow), and Spitzer Space Telescope (infrared image in purple). (Credit: X-ray: NASA/CXC/SAO/F.Seward; Optical: NASA/ESA/ASU/J.Hester & A.Loll; Infrared: NASA/JPL-Caltech/Univ. Minn./R.Gehrz)

Science Daily  — Astrophysicists have detected pulsed gamma-ray emission from the Crab pulsar at energies far beyond what current theoretical models of pulsars can explain.

"It turns out that being persistent and stubborn helps," Otte said. "These results put new constraints on the mechanism for how the gamma-ray emission is generated."

With energies exceeding 100 billion electron-volts (100 GeV), the surprising gamma-ray pulses were detected by the VERITAS telescope array at the Whipple Observatory in Arizona and reported by an international team of scientists in a paper in the October 7 issue ofScience. Corresponding author Nepomuk Otte, a postdoctoral researcher at the University of California, Santa Cruz, said that some researchers had told him he was crazy to even look for pulsar emission in this energy realm.

Otte, Andrew McCann of McGill University in Montreal, and Martin Schroedter of the Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory performed most of the analytic work for the study, which involved nearly 100 scientists in the VERITAS collaboration. VERITAS spokesperson Rene Ong, professor of physics and astronomy at UCLA, credited Otte as the leading advocate for using the powerful gamma-ray observatory to study the Crab pulsar.

"To me it's a real triumph of the experimental approach, not going along with the flow and making assumptions, but just observing to see what there is. And lo and behold, we see something different than what everybody expected," Ong said.

The Crab pulsar is a rapidly spinning neutron star, the collapsed core of a massive star that exploded in a spectacular supernova in the year 1054, leaving behind the brilliant Crab Nebula, with the pulsar at its heart. It is one of the most intensively studied objects in the sky. Rotating about 30 times a second, the pulsar has an intense, co-rotating magnetic field from which it emits beams of radiation. The beams sweep around like a lighthouse beacon because they are not aligned with the star's rotation axis. So although the beams are steady, they are detected on Earth as rapid pulses of radiation.

Scientists have long agreed on a general picture of what causes pulsar emission. Electromagnetic forces created by the star's rapidly rotating magnetic field accelerate charged particles to near the speed of light, producing radiation over a broad spectrum. But the details remain a mystery.

"After many years of observations and results from the Crab, we thought we had an understanding of how it worked, and the models predicted an exponential decay of the emission spectrum above around 10 GeV. So it came as a real surprise when we found pulsed gamma-ray emission at energies above 100 GeV," said coauthor David Williams, adjunct professor of physics at UC Santa Cruz and a member of the VERITAS collaboration.

Prior to these new results, a phenomenon known as curvature radiation was the leading explanation for the Crab's pulsed gamma-ray emission. Curvature radiation is produced when a high-energy charged particle moves along a curved magnetic field. But according to Otte, this mechanism cannot account for gamma rays with energies above 100 GeV.

"The conventional wisdom was that the dominant mechanism is curvature radiation. But the VERITAS results have shown that there must be a different mechanism at work," Otte said. "Curvature radiation can explain the lower-energy emission, but we really don't know what causes the very high-energy emission."

One possible scenario may be a process known as inverse Compton scattering, which involves energy transfer from charged particles to photons. "That seems to be a more likely scenario now, but we still don't know the details of how this works," Otte said. It is also not clear whether one mechanism dominates at all gamma-ray energies, or if curvature radiation dominates at lower energies and something like inverse Compton scattering dominates at higher energies.

According to Ong, researchers will need to characterize the very high-energy gamma-ray emission in much greater detail in order to gain more insight into the mechanisms behind it. "We need to take more measurements and get the exact shape of the spectrum at these very high energies," he said.

The VERITAS observations open up a new avenue for testing Einstein's theory of special relativity, which says that the speed of light is a universal constant. One of the predictions of a quantum theory of gravity, which emerges from efforts to reconcile quantum mechanics and general relativity, is that the speed of light actually may have a small dependence on the energy of the photon. This would be a violation of "Lorentz invariance," which is at the core of special relativity, but it might be detectable in the VERITAS data, Otte said. Photons with a range of energies are emitted by the pulsar at the same time. If photons with different energies travel at different speeds, the effect would manifest itself as a slight shift in the position of the pulses at different energies

Ionic Liquid Catalyst Helps Turn Emissions Into Fuel

Biofuel production (left) compared to fuel produced via artificial synthesis. Crops takes in CO2, water and sunlight to create biomass, which then is transferred to a refinery to create fuel. In the artificial photosynthesis route, a solar collector or windmill collects energy that powers an electrolyzer, which converts CO2 to a synthesis gas that is piped to a refinery to create fuel. (Credit: Graphic by Dioxide Materials)

Science Daily  — An Illinois research team has succeeded in overcoming one major obstacle to a promising technology that simultaneously reduces atmospheric carbon dioxide and produces fuel.

Artificial photosynthesis is the process of converting carbon dioxide gas into useful carbon-based chemicals, most notably fuel or other compounds usually derived from petroleum, as an alternative to extracting them from biomass.

University of Illinois chemical and biological engineering professor Paul Kenis and his research group joined forces with researchers at Dioxide Materials, a startup company, to produce a catalyst that improves artificial photosynthesis. The company, in the university Research Park, was founded by retired chemical engineering professor Richard Masel. The team reported their results in the journal Science.

In plants, photosynthesis uses solar energy to convert carbon dioxide (CO₂) and water to sugars and other hydrocarbons. Biofuels are refined from sugars extracted from crops such as corn. However, in artificial photosynthesis, an electrochemical cell uses energy from a solar collector or a wind turbine to convert CO₂ to simple carbon fuels such as formic acid or methanol, which are further refined to make ethanol and other fuels.

"The key advantage is that there is no competition with the food supply," said Masel, a co-principal investigator of the paper and CEO of Dioxide Materials, "and it is a lot cheaper to transmit electricity than it is to ship biomass to a refinery."

However, one big hurdle has kept artificial photosynthesis from vaulting into the mainstream: The first step to making fuel, turning carbon dioxide into carbon monoxide, is too energy intensive. It requires so much electricity to drive this first reaction that more energy is used to produce the fuel than can be stored in the fuel.

The Illinois group used a novel approach involving an ionic liquid to catalyze the reaction, greatly reducing the energy required to drive the process. The ionic liquids stabilize the intermediates in the reaction so that less electricity is needed to complete the conversion.

The researchers used an electrochemical cell as a flow reactor, separating the gaseous CO₂ input and oxygen output from the liquid electrolyte catalyst with gas-diffusion electrodes. The cell design allowed the researchers to fine-tune the composition of the electrolyte stream to improve reaction kinetics, including adding ionic liquids as a co-catalyst.

"It lowers the overpotential for CO₂ reduction tremendously," said Kenis, who is also a professor of mechanical science and engineering and affiliated with the Beckman Institute for Advanced Science and Technology. "Therefore, a much lower potential has to be applied. Applying a much lower potential corresponds to consuming less energy to drive the process."

Next, the researchers hope to tackle the problem of throughput. To make their technology useful for commercial applications, they need to speed up the reaction and maximize conversion.

"More work is needed, but this research brings us a significant step closer to reducing our dependence on fossil fuels while simultaneously reducing CO₂ emissions that are linked to unwanted climate change," Kenis said.

Graduate students Brian Rosen, Michael Thorson, Wei Zhu and Devin Whipple and postdoctoral researcher Amin Salehi-Khojin were co-authors of the paper. The U.S. Department of Energy supported this work.

Ancient Supernovas Discovered: 10-Billion-Year-Old Exploding Stars Were a Source of Earth's Iron, Researchers Say

One of ten supernovas in the Subaru Deep Field, which exploded 10 billion years ago. (Credit: Tel Aviv University.)

Science Daily — Supernovas -- stars in the process of exploding -- open a window onto the history of the elements of Earth's periodic table as well as the history of the universe. All of those heavier than oxygen were formed in nuclear reactions that occurred during these explosions.

The discovery sharpens our understanding of the nature of supernovas and their role in element formation, say study leaders Prof. Dan Maoz, Dr. Dovi Poznanski and Or Graur of TAU's Department of Astrophysics at the Raymond and Beverly Sackler School of Physics and Astronomy. These "thermonuclear" supernovas in particular are a major source of iron in the universe.

The most ancient explosions, far enough away that their light is reaching us only now, can be difficult to spot. A project spearheaded by Tel Aviv University researchers has uncovered a record-breaking number of supernovas in the Subaru Deep Field, a patch of sky the size of a full moon. Out of the 150 supernovas observed, 12 were among the most distant and ancient ever seen.

The research, which appears in the Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society this month, was done in collaboration with teams from a number of Japanese and American institutions, including the University of Tokyo, Kyoto University, the University of California Berkeley, and Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory.

A key element of the universe

Supernovas are nature's "element factories." During these explosions, elements are both formed and flung into interstellar space, where they serve as raw materials for new generations of stars and planets. Closer to home, says Prof. Maoz, "these elements are the atoms that form the ground we stand on, our bodies, and the iron in the blood that flows through our veins." By tracking the frequency and types of supernova explosions back through cosmic time, astronomers can reconstruct the universe's history of element creation.

In order to observe the 150,000 galaxies of the Subaru Deep Field, the team used the Japanese Subaru Telescope in Hawaii, on the 14,000-foot summit of the extinct Mauna Kea volcano. The telescope's light-collecting power, sharp images, and wide field of view allowed the researchers to overcome the challenge of viewing such distant supernovas.

By "staring" with the telescope at the Subaru Deep Field, the faint light of the most distant galaxies and supernovas accumulated over several nights at a time, forming a long and deep exposure of the field. Over the course of observations, the team "caught" the supernovas in the act of exploding, identifying 150 supernovas in all.

Sourcing man's life-blood

According to the team's analysis, thermonuclear type supernovas, also called Type-la, were exploding about five times more frequently 10 billion years ago than they are today. These supernovas are a major source of iron in the universe, the main component of Earth's core and an essential ingredient of the blood in our bodies.

Scientists have long been aware of the "universal expansion," the fact that galaxies are receding from one another. Observations using Type-Ia supernovas as beacons have shown that the expansion is accelerating, apparently under the influence of a mysterious "dark energy" -- the 2011 Nobel Prize in Physics will be awarded to three astronomers for this work. However, the nature of the supernovas themselves is poorly understood. This study improves our understanding by revealing the range of the ages of the stars that explode as Type-Ia supernovas. Eventually, this will enhance their usefulness for studying dark energy and the universal expansion, the researchers explain.

Natural Compound Helps Reverse Diabetes in Mice

Researchers (from left) Shin-ichiro Imai, MD, PhD, Jun Yoshino, MD, PhD, and Kathryn Mills showed that a natural compound, NMN, helps to treat symptoms of diabetes in mice. (Credit: Julia Evangelou Strait)

Science Daily  — Researchers at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis have restored normal blood sugar metabolism in diabetic mice using a compound the body makes naturally. The finding suggests that it may one day be possible for people to take the compound much like a daily vitamin as a way to treat or even prevent type 2 diabetes.

"After giving NMN, glucose tolerance goes completely back to normal in female diabetic mice," says Shin-ichiro Imai, MD, PhD, associate professor of developmental biology. "In males, we see a milder effect compared to females, but we still see an effect. These are really remarkable results. NMN improves diabetic symptoms, at least in mice."

This naturally occurring compound is called nicotinamide mononucleotide, or NMN, and it plays a vital role in how cells use energy.

The research appears online Oct. 4 in Cell Metabolism.

Imai says this discovery holds promise for people because the mechanisms that NMN influences are largely the same in mice and humans.

"But whether this mechanism is equally compromised in human patients with type 2 diabetes is something we have to check," Imai says. "We have plans to do this in the very near future."

All cells in the body make NMN in a chain of reactions leading to production of NAD, a vital molecule that harvests energy from nutrients and puts it into a form cells can use. Among other things, NAD activates a protein called SIRT1 that has been shown to promote healthy metabolism throughout the body, from the pancreas to the liver to muscle and fat tissue.

According to the study, aging and eating a high-fat diet reduce production of NMN, slowing the body's production of NAD and leading to abnormal metabolic conditions such as diabetes. NAD cannot be given to the mice directly because of toxic effects. But after administering NMN, levels of NAD rise and the diabetic mice show dramatically improved responses to glucose. In some cases, they return to normal.

"I'm very excited to see these results because the effect of NMN is much bigger than other known compounds or chemicals," says first author Jun Yoshino, MD, PhD, postdoctoral research associate. "Plus, the fact that the body naturally makes NMN is promising for translating these findings into humans."

Imai and his colleagues found that young, healthy mice on a high-fat diet developed diabetes in six months or less. In these mice, they found that NAD levels were reduced. But after administering NMN, levels of NAD increased and the female mice had normal results in glucose tolerance tests -- a measure of how well the body moves glucose from the blood to the organs and tissues for use. Glucose tolerance was also improved after male diabetic mice received NMN but did not quite return to normal. The researchers are interested in learning more about these differences between male and female mice.

"We don't have a clear answer, but we are speculating that sex hormones, such as estrogen, may be important downstream for NAD synthesis," Yoshino says.

In older mice, they observed that about 15 percent of healthy males fed a normal diet developed diabetes.

"When we injected these older diabetic mice with NMN, they had improved glucose tolerance, even after one injection," says Kathryn F. Mills, research lab supervisor and an equally contributing first author of the study. "We also injected older healthy mice and found that they weren't adversely affected. It's good to know that even if the mice are not diabetic, giving NMN is not going to hurt them."

Imai says few studies have examined normal mice that naturally develop diabetes as a simple result of aging because the experiments take so long. In an interesting twist, few elderly female mice developed diabetes at all. But after switching to a high fat diet, older female mice quickly developed severe diabetes.

"Again, when we injected these females with NMN, we came up with a completely normal glucose tolerance curve," Mills says. "We can also see that the NMN has completely reversed and normalized the levels of cholesterol, triglycerides and free fatty acids."

Though the mice received NMN by injection in this study, Imai's group is now conducting a long-term study of diabetic mice that get NMN dissolved in their drinking water. Imai calls this work a first step toward a possible "nutriceutical" that people could take almost like a vitamin to treat or even prevent type 2 diabetes.

"Once we can get a grade of NMN that humans can take, we would really like to launch a pilot human study," Imai says.

Astrophysics and Extinctions: News About Planet-Threatening Events

Black hole devours a neutron star. Scientists say they have seen tantalizing, first-time evidence of a black hole eating a neutron star-first stretching the neutron star into a crescent, swallowing it, and then gulping up crumbs of the broken star in the minutes and hours that followed. (Credit: Dana Berry/NASA)

Science Daily  — Space is a violent place. If a star explodes or black holes collide anywhere in our part of the Milky Way, they'd give off colossal blasts of lethal gamma-rays, X-rays and cosmic rays and it's perfectly reasonable to expect Earth to be bathed in them. A new study of such events has yielded some new information about the potential effects of what are called "short-hard" interstellar radiation events.

"We find that a kind of gamma ray burst -- a short gamma ray burst -- is probably more significant than a longer gamma ray burst," said astrophysicist Brian Thomas of Washburn University. Improved and accumulated data collected by the SWIFT satellite, which catches gamma ray bursts in action in other galaxies, is providing a better case for the power and threat of the short bursts to life on Earth.

Several studies in the past have demonstrated how longer high-energy radiation bursts, such as those caused by supernovae, and extreme solar flares can deplete stratospheric ozone, allowing the most powerful and damaging forms of ultraviolet radiation to penetrate to Earth's surface. The probability of an event intense enough to disrupt life on the land or in the oceans becomes large, if considered on geological timescales. So getting a handle on the rates and intensities of such events is important for efforts to connect them to extinctions in the fossil record.

The shorter bursts are really short: less than one second long. They are thought to be caused by the collision of two neutron stars or maybe even colliding black holes. No one is certain which. What is clear is that they are incredibly powerful events.

"The duration is not as important as the amount of radiation," said Thomas. If such a burst were to happen inside the Milky Way, it its effects would be much longer lasting to Earth's surface and oceans.

"What I focused on was the longer term effects," said Thomas. The first effect is to deplete the ozone layer by knocking free oxygen and nitrogen atoms so they can recombine into ozone-destroying nitrous oxides. These long-lived molecules keep destroying ozone until they rain out. "So we see a big impact on the ozone layer."

Those effects are likely to have been devastating for many forms of life on the surface -- including terrestrial and marine plants which are the foundation of the food web.

Based on what is seen among other galaxies, these short bursts, it seems that they occur in any given galaxy at a rate of about once per 100 million years. If that is correct, then it's very likely that Earth has been exposed to such events scores of times over its history. The question is whether they left a calling card in the sky or Earth's geological record.

Astronomical evidence is not likely, said Thomas, because the galaxy spins and mixes pretty thoroughly every million years, so any remnants of blasts are probably long gone from view. There might, however, be evidence in the ground here on Earth, he said. Some researchers are looking at the isotope iron-60, for instance, which has been argued as a possible proxy for radiation events.

If isotopes like iron-60 can reveal the strata of the events, it then becomes a matter of looking for extinction events that correlate and seeing what died and what survived -- which could shed more light on the event itself.

"I work with some paleontologists and we try to look for correlations with extinctions, but they are skeptical," said Thomas. "So if you go and give a talk to paleontologists, they are not quite into it. But to astrophysicists, it seems pretty plausible."

Thomas will be presenting his work on October 9, 2011, at the annual meeting of the Geological Society of America in Minneapolis. This work was supported by the NASA Astrobiology: Exobiology and Evolutionary Biology Program.