Can a comet explode? Detailed answer

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Can a comet explode? Detailed answer

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Can a comet explode?

In former ages, people trembled with fear when they saw a comet in the sky. They believed that comets portend terrible disasters, epidemics of terrible diseases, wars, earthquakes and the like. Now this superstitious fear is a thing of the past, but still many people think that comets can cause great harm to the Earth. For example, what happens if a comet that is currently close to our planet explodes? As far as we know, comets don't explode.

However, sometimes they fall apart. For example, one comet, the appearance of which was observed repeatedly, in 1846 broke up into two. In the end, each of them crumbled into small fragments, forming a meteor shower, which can be regularly observed in the last days of November. Thus, sooner or later, each comet dies, breaking up into small pieces, which then crumble along its orbit in the form of meteoric dust.

A comet, contrary to a widespread misconception, is by no means one huge boulder rushing at a terrible speed through outer space. According to scientists, it is a giant stream of solid particles and gases held near them by the force of attraction.

The brightest part of a comet is its head. The center of a comet's head is made up of the heaviest particles and is called the nucleus. Around the nucleus is concentrated part of the comet, called the shell. It is a hazy, cloud-like formation with a diameter of 250 km or more. Behind the comet is a tail of rarefied gases and very small particles.

Author: Likum A.

Random interesting fact from the Great Encyclopedia:

Why did one Hindu raise his right hand in 1973 and never lower it?

Hindus often deliberately renounce the blessings of life in the name of their religion and want to prove their faith by unusual methods. Mahant Amar Bharti Ji lives in New Delhi, who raised his right hand in 1973 and has not lowered it since then. According to him, at first the pain was terrible, but over time it subsided, and the hand atrophied. This old man has many followers who deify him, and some of them also raised their hands and live like this for years.

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Opioid pain reliever without side effects 07.03.2017

Opioid drugs act as a powerful pain reliever, but have a number of side effects and can be addictive. But now this problem has been solved: German scientists have created a drug that effectively copes with pain and does not have a negative effect on the patient at all.

Opiate-based drugs have many disadvantages. They often bring the patient both minor discomfort, such as intestinal obstruction, and serious life-threatening, such as respiratory distress syndrome. But modern medicine cannot refuse opiates: they cope with pain extremely effectively. Unfortunately, until now, scientists have not been able to make opioid drugs bring only one benefit.

But that problem is in the past. Researchers have developed a new type of opioid that selectively targets only inflamed tissues. Theoretically, such a drug will not only relieve pain, but also will not cause side effects and addiction. The invention has already been tested on rats, and the result was purely positive, so that in the near future a new drug can become a real panacea for various types of pain.

Opioids act on special receptors located throughout the human body. The molecules of the substance are compatible with them like a key with a lock, and when they interact, dopamine is released into the blood, which suppresses pain. This is great for inflamed areas, but for healthy tissue, the benefit is highly questionable. When opioids attach to receptors in the brain, they can interact with the nerves that control a person's breathing rate, slowing them down to dangerously low levels. In the gastrointestinal tract, opioids can also negatively affect the nervous system, causing intestinal obstruction (in other words, constipation). In addition to all of the above, the release of doraphin causes euphoria and relaxation, which in the future can, with a high probability, provoke dependence on drugs.

But what if we create a painkiller that selectively interacts with opioid receptors only in damaged tissues? To find out, the research team first looked at what distinguishes inflamed tissue from healthy tissue in terms of acidity. It turned out that the acidity of damaged areas is much higher than that of healthy ones, which means that the matter was small: opioids were obtained in the laboratory that bind to receptors only under conditions of increased acidity.

Christoph Stein, professor at the Department of Anesthesiology and Intensive Care at the Free University of Berlin and co-author of the article, says that such measures eliminate the risk of side effects and addiction - opioids simply do not bind to receptors either in the gastrointestinal tract or in the brain. The results of his team's study were published today in the journal Science. The new drug is called NFEPP, and it was tested in rats with a positive result: rodents stopped feeling pain without any respiratory or stomach discomfort. Even after several rats were kept on opioids for a long time, after the dose was abruptly stopped, they did not react to this fact, although usually opioid dependence develops in rats in much the same way as in humans. As for effectiveness, the new drug and the old, long-proven in practice remedy "fentanyl" turned out to be equally effective.

The next step, according to Stein, will be testing the drug in humans. Unfortunately, bureaucratic red tape comes into play here, so scientists will be lucky if they receive all the necessary permits within at least the next few months. If their work is successful, it could be a real revolution in the field of pain medication.

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