AK Learning Box

1. Water In Surah Al-Anbya, it was revealed: “We made every living thing from water, will they not believe?” (Quran, 21:30) and it was only after the discovery of the microscope that it was concluded that all living things consist mostly of water – while in the deserts of Arabia, the last thing a man could guess is that all of life ultimately came from water.  2. Universe: The Big Bang Theory In Surah Al-Anbya, Allah (SWT) also states: “Have those who disbelieved not considered that the heavens and the earth were a joined entity, and We separated them” (Quran, 21:30). In 1929, American astronomer Edwin Hubble proposed the Hubble’s Law according to which all entities in space are moving away from the Earth at speeds proportional to their distance i.e. the greater the distance from earth, the faster they are moving. Soon after this, he discovered that galaxies are moving away from each other as well which means that the universe is expanding overall. This laid the basis for the Bi...

  An asteroid or meteor is more likely to hit Earth because Earth is a lot bigger than the Moon, giving a meteoroid more area to hit! But we can see many thousands of craters on the Moon and we only know of about 180 on Earth! Why is that? The truth is both the Earth and the Moon have been hit many, many times throughout their long 4.5 billion year history. This view of the Moon's cratered South Pole was seen by NASA's Clementine spacecraft in 1996. Credit: NASA/JPL/USGS Where did all of Earth's craters go? The main difference between the two is that Earth has processes that can erase almost all evidence of past impacts. The Moon does not. Pretty much any tiny dent made on the Moon’s surface is going to stay there. Three processes help Earth keep its surface crater free. The first is called erosion. Earth has weather, water, and plants. These act together to break apart and wear down the ground. Eventually erosion can break a crater down to virtually nothing. Lake Manicouag...

How Scary Is Space? Get Ready for Galactic Goosebumps! In a scary Halloween movie, monsters, ghouls, and haunted houses can give you the creeps! Those things are, of course, just stories that were made up to give you a fright. If you want a real scare, check out these nine unearthly nightmares that could be happening right now in our own galaxy. Eek! Miranda the Monster Moon Miranda is an icy moon of Uranus, the seventh planet from our Sun. If you look closely at Miranda, you’ll notice a mismatched appearance. Are those scars a sign that this moon was patched together like Frankenstein’s monster? Nope! Those patches are actually deep craters, high ridges, and extreme cliffs. A Frightening Face on the Sun When NASA’s Solar Dynamics Observatory captured this picture of our Sun in October 2014, it looked like the Sun was getting ready for Halloween! You can light up the face of a jack-o-lantern at home with a candle or flashlight. What’s lighting up this Sun pumpkin’s face? Active reg...

  What Is a Barycenter? We say that planets orbit stars, but that’s not the whole truth. Planets and stars actually orbit around their common center of mass. This common center of mass is called the  barycenter . Barycenters also help astronomers search for planets beyond our solar system! What is a center of mass? Every object has a  center of mass . It is the exact center of all the material an object is made of. An object's center of mass is the point at which it can be balanced. Sometimes the center of mass is directly in the center of an object. For example, you can easily find the center of mass of a ruler. Try holding your finger under the middle of a ruler in a few different spots. You'll find a spot where you can balance the whole ruler on just one fingertip. That's the ruler's center of mass. The center of mass is also called the center of gravity. But sometimes the center of mass is  not  in the center of the object. Some parts of an object may have m...

  SOLAR WIND The solar wind continuously flows outward from the Sun and consists mainly of protons and electrons in a state known as a plasma. Solar magnetic field is embedded in the plasma and flows outward with the solar wind. Different regions on the Sun produce solar wind of different speeds and densities. Coronal holes produce solar wind of high speed, ranging from 500 to 800 kilometers per second. The north and south poles of the Sun have large, persistent coronal holes, so high latitudes are filled with fast solar wind. In the equatorial plane, where the Earth and the other planets orbit, the most common state of the solar wind is the slow speed wind, with speeds of about 400 kilometers per second. This portion of the solar wind forms the equatorial current sheet. During quiet periods, the current sheet can be nearly flat. As solar activity increases, the solar surface fills with active regions, coronal holes, and other complex structures, which modify the solar wind and cur...

  What Is Space Weather? The Short Answer: Activity on the Sun’s surface creates a type of weather called  space weather . The Sun is really far away—about 93 million miles (150 million kilometers)—from Earth. However, space weather can affect Earth and the rest of the solar system. Activity on the Sun’s surface creates a type of weather called  space weather . The Sun is really far away—about 93 million miles (150 million kilometers)—from Earth. However, space weather can affect Earth and the rest of the solar system. At its worst, it can even damage satellites and cause electrical blackouts on Earth! How can space weather travel all the way to Earth? The Sun is always spewing gas and particles into space. This stream of particles is known as the  solar wind . The gas and particles come from the Sun’s hot outer atmosphere, called the  corona . These particles from the corona are charged with electricity. The solar wind carries these particles toward Earth at up...

  If you're ever near the North or South Pole, you may be in for a very special treat. Frequently there are beautiful light shows in the sky. These lights are called   auroras . If you're near the North Pole, it is called an   aurora borealis   or northern lights. If you're near the South Pole, it is called an   aurora australis   or the southern lights. This beautiful view of the aurora was taken from the International Space Station as it crossed over the southern Indian Ocean on September 17, 2011. What makes this happen? Even though auroras are best seen at night, they are actually caused by the Sun. The Sun sends us more than heat and light; it sends lots of other  energy  and  small particles  our way. The protective  magnetic field  around Earth shields us from most of the energy and particles, and we don't even notice them. But the Sun doesn't send the same amount of energy all the time. There is a constant streaming sol...