Related papers: Can a variable gravitational constant resolve the …

Only astronomical observations can effectively probe in space-time the variabil ity of the physical dimensionless constants such as the fine structure constant and proton-to-electron mass ratio, \mu, which are related to fund amental forces…

We have proposed a model to obtain the length of the day and month at any geologic time. The day is found to increase by 0.002 sec/century since the seventeenth century. The lengthening of the day is attributed entirely to the increasing…

Much of our understanding of the internal structure of the Sun derives from so-called standard theoretical solar models. Unfortunately, none of those models agrees completely with observation. The discrepancy is commonly associated with…

The grand minimum in the Sun's activity is a distinctive mode characterized by a magnetic lull that almost completely lacks the emergence of sunspots on the solar surface for an extended duration. The factors driving this transition of an…

We have found that long-wavelength neutrino oscillations induced by a tiny breakdown of the weak equivalence principle of general relativity can provide a viable solution to the solar neutrino problem.

An instability among the giant planets' orbits can match many aspects of the Solar System's current orbital architecture. We explore the possibility that this dynamical instability was triggered by the close passage of a star or substellar…

This paper is in response to a technical paper, entitled "Evidence for a New Component of High-Energy Solar Gamma-Ray Production" (Linden, et al., 2018). An article in Scientific American entitled "The Sun Is Spitting Out Strange Patterns…

A mechanism for suppressing the cosmological constant is described, using a superconducting analogy in which fermions coupled to gravitons are in an unstable false vauum. The coupling of the fermions to gravitons and a screened attractive…

Helioseismology has shown that the chemical composition of the Sun has changed over its lifetime. The surface abundance of helium and heavy elements is believed to have decreased by up to 10% relative to their initial values. However, this…

A scalar-tensor theory of gravity is formulated in which $G$ and particle masses are allowed to vary. The theory yields a globally static cosmological model with no evolutionary timescales, no cosmological coincidences, and no flatness and…

Observations from Juno and Cassini suggest that Jupiter and Saturn may possess fuzzy cores -- central regions where the abundance of heavy elements varies smoothly with depth. Such gradients pose a longstanding puzzle for models of…

Recent observations of solar twin stars with planetary systems like the Sun, have uncovered that these present a peculiar surface chemical composition. This is believed to be related to the formation of earth-like planets. This suggests…

It is shown that, the wavelet regression detrended fluctuations of the reconstructed temperature for the past 400,000 years (Antarctic ice cores data) are completely dominated by one-third subharmonic resonance, presumably related to Earth…

Observations of comets and asteroids show that the Solar Nebula that spawned our planetary system was rich in water and organic molecules. Bombardment brought these organics to the young Earth's surface, seeding its early chemistry. Unlike…

Solar X-ray and UV radiation (0.1-320 nm) received at Earth's surface is an important aspect of the circumstances under which life formed on Earth. The quantity that is received depends on two main variables: the emission of radiation by…

The solar coronal heating problem refers to the question why the temperature of the Sun's corona is more than two orders of magnitude higher than that of its surface. Almost 70 years after the discovery, this puzzle is still one of the…

We present late-time Hubble and Spitzer Space Telescope imaging of SN 2008S and NGC 300 2008OT-1, the prototypes of a common class of stellar transients whose true nature is debated. Both objects are still fading and are now >15 times…

Some entities, such as humans, survive longest if their environment is neither too hot nor too cold, and the sun is no exception. It is rather obvious that if the sun were enclosed inside a thermally conducting sphere surrounded by a heat…

Present day estimates of the Hubble constant based on Cepheids and on the cosmic microwave background radiation are uncertain by roughly 10% (on the conservative assumption that the universe may not be PERFECTLY flat). Gravitational lens…

The standard electroweak theory of leptons and the conformal groups of spacetime Weyl's transformations are at the core of a general relativistic, conformally covariant scalar tensor theory aimed at the resolution of the most intriguing…