While we’re unsure about the status of chocolates and flowers in locations far beyond Earth, there certainly is no lack of hearts for us to look at to enjoy Valentine’s Day. If you look at enough geologic features or gas clouds, statistically some of them will take on shapes that we recognize (such as faces).
Below, we’ve collected some hearts on Mars and other places in the universe. Have we missed any? Share other astronomy hearts in the comments!
This heart-shaped feature on Mars “is actually a pit formed by collapse within a straight-walled trough known in geological terms as a graben,” wrote Malin Space Systems in 1999. Picture taken by Mars Global Surveyor. Credit: Malin Space Science Systems, MGS, JPL, NASAA heart-shaped mesa captured by Mars Global Surveyor in 1999, in the Promethei Rupes region. Credit: Malin Space Science Systems, MGS, JPL, NASAThe Heart and Soul nebulae in an infrared mosaic from NASA’s Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer (WISE). It is located about about 6,000 light-years from Earth. Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/UCLA
There is nothing in the Universe more awe inspiring or mysterious than a black hole. Because of their massive gravity and ability to absorb even light, they defy our attempts to understand them. All their secrets hide behind the veil of the event horizon.
What do they look like? We don’t know. They absorb all the radiation they emit. How big are they? Do they have a size, or could they be infinitely dense? We just don’t know. But there are a few things we can know. Like how massive they are, and how fast they’re spinning.
Wait, what? Spinning?
Consider the massive star that came before the black hole. It was formed from a solar nebula, gaining its rotation by averaging out the momentum of all the individual particles in the cloud. As mutual gravity pulled the star together, through the conservation of angular momentum it rotated more rapidly. When a star becomes a black hole, it still has all that mass, but now compressed down into an infinitesimally smaller space. And to conserve that angular momentum, the black hole’s rate of rotation speeds up… a lot.The entire history of everything the black hole ever consumed, averaged down to a single number: the spin rate.
If the black hole could shrink down to an infinitely small size, you would think that the spin rate might increase to infinity too. But black holes have a speed limit.
“There is a speed limit to the spin of a black hole. It’s sort of set by the faster a black hole spins, the smaller is its event horizon.”
That’s Dr. Mark Morris, a professor of astronomy at UCLA. He has devoted much of his time to researching the mysteries of black holes.
“There is this region, called the ergosphere between the event horizon and another boundary, outside. The ergosphere is a very interesting region outside the event horizon in which a variety of interesting effects can occur.”
Scientists measure the spin rates of supermassive black holes by spreading the X-ray light into different colors. Image credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech
Imagine the event horizon of a black hole as a sphere in space, and then surrounding this black hole is the ergosphere. The faster the black hole spins, the more this ergosphere flattens out.
“The speed limit is set by the event horizon, eventually, at a high enough spin, reaches the singularity. You can’t have what’s called a naked singularity. You can’t have a singularity exposed to the rest of the Universe. That would mean that the singularity itself could emit energy or light and somebody outside could actually see it. And that can’t happen. That’s the physical limitation of how fast it can spin. Physicists use units for angular momentum that are cast in terms of mass, which is a curious thing, and the speed limit can be described as the angular momentum equals the mass of the black hole, and that sets the speed limit.”
Just imagine. The black hole spins up to the point that it’s just about to reveal itself. But that’s impossible. The laws of physics won’t let it spin any faster. And here’s the amazing part. Astronomers have actually detected supermassive black holes spinning at the limits predicted by these theories.
One black hole, at the heart of galaxy NGC 1365 is turning at 84% the speed of light. It has reached the cosmic speed limit, and can’t spin any faster without revealing its singularity.
The issue of “what to wear?” takes on an extra dimension of life and death when it comes to space travel. Upon exiting a spacecraft on a spacewalk, an astronaut becomes his very own personal satellite in orbit about the Earth and must rely on the flimsy layer of his suit to provide them with a small degree of protection from radiation and extreme fluctuations of heat and cold.
We recently had a chance to see the past, present and future of space suit technology in the Smithsonian Institutions’ touring Suited for Space exhibit currently on display at the Tampa Bay History Center in Tampa, Florida.
Tampa Bay History Center Director of Marketing Manny Leto recently gave Universe Today an exclusive look at the traveling display. If you think you know space suits, Suited for Space will show you otherwise, as well as give you a unique perspective on a familiar but often overlooked and essential piece of space hardware. And heck, it’s just plain fascinating to see the design and development of some of these earlier suits as well as videos and stills of astronauts at work – and yes, sometimes even at play – in them.
One of the highlights of the exhibit are some unique x-ray images of iconic suits from space travel history. Familiar suits become new again in these images by Smithsonian photographer Mark Avino, which includes a penetrating view of Neil Armstrong’s space suit that he wore on Apollo 11.
X-ray images of Neil Armstrong’s historic suit on display in Suited for Space. (Photo by author).
Space suits evolved from pressure suits developed for high-altitude flights in the 1950’s, and Suited for Space traces that progression. It was particularly interesting to see the depiction of Wiley Post’s 1934 suit, complete with steel cylindrical helmet and glass portal! Such early suits resembled diving bell suits of yore — think Captain Nemo in a chemsuit. Still, this antiquated contraption was the first practical full pressure suit that functioned successfully at over 13,000 metres altitude.
Wiley Post’s 1934 “rubber bladder suit.” (Photo by author).
No suit that has been into space is allowed to tour due to the fragility of many historic originals that are now kept at the Smithsonian, though several authentic suits used in training during the U.S. space program are on display. We thought it was interesting to note how the evolution of the spacesuit closely followed the development of composites and materials through the mid-20th century. You can see the progression from canvas, glass and steel in the early suits right up though the advent of the age of plastic and modern fabrics. Designs have flirted with the idea of rigid and semi-rigid suits before settling on the modern day familiar white astronaut suit.
A x-ray photo of an EX-1A spacesuit. (Photo by author).
Spacesuit technology has also always faced the ultimate challenge of protecting an astronaut from the rigors of space during Extra-Vehicular Activity, or EVA.
Cosmonaut Alexey Leonov performed the first 12 minute space walk during Voskhod 2 back in 1965, and NASA astronaut Ed White became the first American to walk in space on Gemini 4 just months later. Both space walkers had issues with over-heating, and White nearly didn’t make it back into his Gemini capsule.
Early evolution of space suits on display at the Suited for Space exhibit. (Photo by author).
Designing a proper spacesuit was a major challenge that had to be overcome. In 1962, Playtex (yes THAT Playtex) was awarded a contract to develop the suits that astronauts would wear on the Moon. Said suits had 13 distinct layers and weighed 35 kilograms here on Earth. The Playtex industrial division eventually became known as the International Latex Corporation or ILC Dover, which still makes spacesuits for ISS crewmembers today. It’s also fascinating to see some of the alternate suits proposed, including one “bubble suit” with arms and legs (!) that was actually tested but, thankfully, was never used.
These suits were used by astronauts on the Moon, to repair Hubble, build the International Space Station and much more. Al Worden recounts performing the “most distant EVA ever” on the return from the Moon in his book Falling to Earth. This record will still stand until the proposed asteroid retrieval mission in the coming decade, which will see astronauts performing the first EVA ever in orbit around Earth’s Moon.
An A5-L Spacesuit. Credit: Smithsonian/Suited for Space.
And working in a modern spacesuit during an EVA is anything but routine. CSA Astronaut Chris Hadfield said in his recent book An Astronaut’s Guide to Life on Earth that “Spacewalking is like rock climbing, weightlifting, repairing a small engine and performing an intricate pas de deux – simultaneously, while encased in a bulky suit that’s scraping your knuckle, fingertips and collarbone raw.”
And one only has to look at the recent drama that cut ESA astronaut Luca Parmitamo’s EVA short last year to realize that your spacesuit is the only thin barrier that exists between yourself and the perils of space.
“We’re delighted to host our first Smithsonian Institution Travelling Exhibition Service (SITES) and we think that Florida’s close ties to NASA and the space program make it a great fit for us,” said Rodney Kite-Powell, the Tampa Bay History Center’s Saunders Foundation Curator of History.
Be sure to catch this fascinating exhibit coming to a city near you!
-And you can see these suits in action on the up and coming future EVAs for 2014.
-Here’s the schedule for Suited for Space Exhibit tour.
-Astronaut Nicole Stott (veteran of STS-128, -129, -133, & ISS Expeditions 20 and 21) will also be on hand at the Tampa Bay History Center on March 2014 (Date to be Announced) to present Suited for Space: An Astronaut’s View.
– Follow the Tampa Bay History Museum of Twitter as @TampaBayHistory.
Artist's impression of the Herschel Space Telescope. Credit: ESA/AOES Medialab/NASA/ESA/STScI
Doing something extraordinary often requires teamwork for humans, and the same can be said for telescopes. Witness the success of the Herschel and Planck observatories, whose data was combined in such a way to spot four galaxy clusters 10 billion years away — an era when the universe was just getting started.
Now that they have the technique down, astronomers believe they’ll be able to find about 2,000 other distant clusters that could show us more about how these collections of galaxies first came together.
Although very far away, the huge clumps of gas and dust coming together into stars is still visible, allowing telescopes to see the process in action.
“What we believe we are seeing in these distant clusters are giant elliptical galaxies in the process of being formed,” stated David Clements, a physicist at Imperial College London who led the research, referring to one of the two kinds of galaxies the universe has today. Elliptical galaxies are dominated by stars that are already formed, while spiral galaxies (like the Milky Way) include much more gas and dust.
Three false-color images of Herschel images identified by Planck. Infrared light is represented in three colors — blue, green, and red — that respectively show longer wavelengths. The green circle shows where Planck aimed. The co-ordinates show the location in right ascension and declination. Credit: D. Clements/ESA/NASA
This finding is yet another example of how the data from telescopes lives on, and can be used, long after the telescope missions have finished. Both Planck and Herschel finished their operations last year.
“The researchers used Planck data to find sources of far-infrared emission in areas covered by the Herschel satellite, then cross-referenced with Herschel data to look at these sources more closely,” the Royal Astronomical Society stated.
The two telescopes had complementary views, with Planck looking at the entire sky while Herschel surveyed smaller sections in higher resolution. By combining the data, researchers found 16 sources in total. A dozen of them were already discovered single galaxies, but four were the newly discovered galaxy clusters. Fresh observations were then used to figure out the distance.
The International Space Station will be getting its very own laser at the end of 2014. And unlike the planet-smashing capabilities of the Death Star of Star Wars fame, this laser will to be enlisted for the purpose of science.
It’s called CATS, and no, it isn’t the latest attempt to put feline astronauts in space. CATS stands for the Cloud Aerosol Transport System. The goal of CATS is to study the distribution of tiny particles of dust and air contaminants known as aerosols.
Developed by research scientist Matt McGill at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt Maryland, CATS is slated to head to the International Space Station later this year on September 12th aboard SpaceX’s CRS-5 flight of the Dragon spacecraft. CATS will be installed on the Japanese Experiment Module-Exposed Facility (JEM-EF) and will demonstrate the utility of state-of-the-art multi-wavelength laser technology to study aerosol distribution and transport in the atmosphere.
Such knowledge is critical in understanding the path and circulation of aerosols and pollutants worldwide. When the Eyjafjallajökull volcano erupted in Iceland back in 2010, many trans-Atlantic flights were grounded as a precaution. These measures are necessary as several flights have suffered engine failures in the past due to encounters with volcanic ash clouds, such as the four engine failure of KLM Fight 867 in 1989 and the British Airways Flight 9 incident over Southeast Asia in 1982. Knowing where these dangerous ash clouds are is crucial to the safety of air travel.
The expanding ash cloud spewing from Iceland’s Eyjafjallajökull volcano as seen from space in 2010. Credit: NASA.
To accomplish this, CATS will emit 5,000 1 milliJoule laser pulses a second at the 1064, 532 and 355 nanometer wavelengths. This represents a vast improvement in power requirements and thermal capabilities over a similar instrument currently in service aboard the Cloud-Aerosol Lidar and Infrared Pathfinder Satellite Observations (CALIPSO) Earth remote sensing spacecraft.
And it’s that third 355 nanometer wavelength that will make CATS stand out from CALIPSO. This will also allow researchers to differentiate between particle size and measure the horizontal and vertical distribution of aerosol particles in the atmosphere. CATS will also be capable of measuring the number of individual photons being reflected back at it, which will provide a much better resolution and understanding of current atmospheric activity.
“You get better data quality because you make fewer assumptions, and you get, presumably, a more accurate determination of what kind of particles you’re seeing in the atmosphere,” McGill said in a recent press release.
The International Space Station also provides a unique vantage point for CATS. In a highly inclined 51.7 degree orbit, the station passes over a good swath of the planet on 16 orbits daily on a westward moving ground track that repeats roughly every three days. This will assure CATS has coverage over a large percentage of the planet, including known pollutant transport routes across the northern Pacific and down from Canada over the U.S. Great Lakes region.
While the first two lasers will operate in the infrared and visual wavelengths, said third laser will work in the ultraviolet. And while this will give CATS an enhanced capability, engineers also worry that it may also be susceptible to contamination. “If you get contamination on any of your outgoing optics, they can self-destruct, and then your system is dead. You end up with a very limited instrument lifetime,” McGill said.
Still, if CATS is successful, it may pave the way for larger, free-flying versions that will monitor long-range atmospheric patterns and shifts in climate due to natural and man-made activity. And the ISS makes a good platform to test pathfinder missions like CATS at low cost. “In our current budget-constrained environment, we need to use what we already have, such as the [station], to do more with less,” McGill said.
CALIPSO’s LiDAR imagedfrom the ground by Gregg Hendry in 2008. Used with permission.
The advent of a LiDAR system aboard the ISS has also generated a spirited discussion in the satellite tracking community concerning prospects for spotting CATS in operation from the ground. The CALIPSO LiDAR has been captured by ground spotters in the past. However, CALIPSO fires a much more powerful 110 milliJoule pulse at a rate of 20 times a second. Still, the lower power CATS system will be firing at a much faster rate, delivering a cumulative 5,000 milliJoules a second. CATS won’t be bright enough to show up on an illuminated pass of the ISS, but it just might be visible during darkened passes of the ISS through the Earth’s shadow. And, unlike CALLIPSO — which is part of the difficult to observe A-Train of Earth-observing satellites — the ISS passes in view of a majority of humanity. At very least, activity from CATS will be worth watching out for, and may well be seen either visually or photographically.
We’ll soon be adding CATS to the long list of outstanding science experiments being conducted aboard the International Space Station, and the sight of this “fully armed and operational battle station” may soon be coming to a dark sky site near you!
Comparison images from just before the supernova in M82 until Feb 7, 2014. Credit and copyright: Tom Wildoner.
In only three weeks since its discovery on January 21, 2014, much has been learned about the new supernova SN 2014J in Messier 82, the “Cigar” galaxy. In addition to early confirmation based on its spectrum that it is indeed a type Ia supernova, it is now understood to be the nearest type Ia explosion to our Milky Way galaxy since 1986.
Its unique proximity alone makes SN 2014J one the most important supernova ever observed. It will impact our understanding both of the type Ia-class of supernovae and of the Universe as a whole, because our Universe’s size, age, and ultimate fate are linked intimately to observations of type Ia supernovae, and because the precision with which they can be applied to estimate Universal-scale distances depends crucially on the nearest examples. SN 2014J is very likely to remain the nearest anchor-point in the type Ia supernovae-based distance scale for decades to come.
“Being the nearest supernova of this kind, SN 2014J will help us to better calibrate the expansion of the Universe,” said Adam Riess, co-leader of the Supernova H0 for Equation of State (SHOES) project, and co-winner of the 2011 Nobel Prize in Physics.
Observations of type Ia supernovae led to the discovery that our Universe is made mostly of dark energy, and that its expansion rate is apparently accelerating. That discovery earned the 2011 Nobel Prize in Physics for Riess, Saul Perlmutter, and Brian Schmidt.
Measuring ever more accurately our Universe’s exact expansion rate has been the Holy Grail of cosmology since Hubble’s discovery of expansion in 1929. Type Ia are perfect for probing cosmological scale distances, because these stellar explosions occur only when white dwarf stars exceed a certain critical mass, equivalent to 1.4 solar masses. M82 with Supernova 2014J imaged on January 23, 2014. Credit and copyright: Anna Morris.
As a result, most type Ia supernova explode with roughly the same intrinsic or absolute magnitude. They therefore provide a unique kind of “standard candle,” by which any type Ia supernova observed to be one hundred times fainter than another can be understood to be exactly ten times farther than the other. In practice, subtle differences between actual type Ia supernovae, amounting to around ten percent on average in their net effect on distance estimates, are accounted for. Technically, therefore, type Ia supernova provide “standardizable candles.”
Normal type Ia supernovae are well understood. Within just days of its discovery, Robert Quimby of the Kavli Institute for the Physics and Mathematics of the Universe at the University of Tokyo was able to predict the peak apparent magnitude of m_V = 10.5 and time of peak brightness of February 2 for SN 2014J, more than a week prior to their occurrence. As observations now available show, as summarized in the light-curve available thanks to the American Association of Variable Star Observers, Quimby’s prediction based on the light-curves of other similar type Ia supernova, was spot on (see Figure 1, below).
Light curves for SN 2014J and SN 2011fe, the next nearest type Ia supernova, show blue magnitudes are ~1.3 mag fainter (blue dots) than visual magnitudes (green dots) for SN 2014J, due to obscuring dust in host galaxy Messier 82, compared to the normal, non-obscured, and nearly over-lapping blue and visual magnitudes for SN 2011fe. Courtesy of the American Association of Variable Star Observers.
While SN 2014J is a normal type Ia supernova, its light-curve reveals it is highly reddened, as in dimmed and obscured by large amounts of dust present and intervening in its host galaxy. The amount of reddening is indicated by the difference between the blue and visual magnitudes. Known as extinction, measured as E = (B-V), for SN 2014J the extinction amounts to ~1.3 mag. That compares to the next nearest recent type Ia supernova, SN 2011fe in galaxy Messier 101, at 23 million light-years (7.0 Megaparsecs). It’s light-curve shows SN 2011fe was reddened very little in comparison, i.e.- both spectrum and colour are normal.
The date of SN 2014J explosion’s first light has now been established to be January 14.72 UT, around one week prior to discovery January 21. That was reported in one of at least two papers already published online regarding SN 2014J, the one by WeiKang Zheng et al., and which has already been submitted to Astrophysical Journal Letters (see e-print here). SN 2014J is one of only four type Ia supernova with observations as early as one day after first light, the others including SN 2011fe mentioned, and SN 2009ig in galaxy NGC 1015 at 130 million light-years (41 Megaparsecs), and SN 2013dy in galaxy NGC 7250 at 46 million light-years (14 Megaparsecs).
Two rivals for nearest recent type Ia supernovae, SN 1972E in galaxy NGC 5253 and SN 1986G in NGC 5128, the Centaurus A galaxy, were cited early. Neither however, are argued to be directly relevant to the current distance scale zero point because neither have modern, complete, multi-band and multi-epoch observations including pre-maximum observations, which are quintessential to defining zero point type Ia supernovae, and data that is now being gathered for SN 2014J. For example, SN 2002fk in galaxy NGC 1309 at 100 million light-years (31 Megaparsecs) is one of only eight type Ia supernovae employed as zero point calibrators, because of their complete, multi-epoch, multi-band light-curve data, as employed for example by Riess et al. (see: 2011ApJ…730..119R).
In terms of which recent type Ia supernova was relatively nearest, the distances to the galaxies involved can be estimated based on analyzing essentially all of the redshift-independent distance estimates that have been published for galaxies since 1980, meaning in the modern era using CCDs and including observations based on NASA’s Hubble Space Telescope. Such galaxy distance estimates are tabulated in the NASA/IPAC Extragalactic Database of galaxy Distances (NED-D).
Galaxy Messier 82, the host of SN 2014J, is located at 12.0 million light-years (3.6 Megaparsecs), based on the mean of three kinds of distance indicator employing 8 different estimates. The standard deviation among those indicators is ~10%.
Galaxy NGC 5128, the host of SN 1986G, is also located at 12.0 million light-years, based on 11 different indicators employing 46 different distance estimates, and also with a standard deviation among indicators of ~10%. So, to within the precision of the indicators, both supernova occurred at essentially the same distance, confirming SN 2014J is the nearest since SN 1986G. Galaxy NGC 5253, the host of SN 1972E, is actually the nearest galaxy, at 11.0 million light-years (3.4 Megaparsecs) known to have hosted a type Ia supernova in the modern era, based on 6 indicators with 48 estimates.
M82 and Supernova 2014J imaged on January 23, 2014. Credit and copyright: Mick Hyde.
Accounting for its dimming due to the dust in Messier 82 is just one part of several involved in applying data from SN 2014J to estimate its distance. Future observations of its declining magnitude will reveal its complete light-curve. That will enable estimates to be made of its decline time and light-curve stretch factors. Once these are in hand, within the next few to several weeks at most, SN 2014J will begin its use as the nearest type Ia supernova anchor point.
More of a milestone than a Rosetta stone, SN 2014J will nevertheless have an impact of lasting legacy on future applications of type Ia supernova observations in cosmology. It will be especially significant to enhancing the use of type Ia supernova as cosmological distance indicators. That is important to ongoing projects, including the SHOES project, the Carnegie Hubble Program, and others, all of which aim to measure the Universe’s expansion rate or Hubble constant to an accuracy of better than one percent within the next decade. That level of accuracy is required in order to understand not only our Universe’s exact size and age, but also the exact Equation-of-State governing our Universe’s total energy, including its dark energy.
If you’ve got a space-related blog, you should really join the carnival. Just email an entry to [email protected], and the next host will link to it. It will help get awareness out there about your writing, help you meet others in the space community – and community is what blogging is all about. And if you really want to help out, sign up to be a host. Send an email to the above address.
Artist's conception of Planck, a space observatory operated by the European Space Agency, and the cosmic microwave background. Credit: ESA and the Planck Collaboration - D. Ducros
There have been a lot of attempts over the years to figure out the mass of a neutrino (a type of elementary particle). A new analysis not only comes up with a number, but also combines that with a new understanding of the universe’s evolution.
The research team investigated the mass further after observing galaxy clusters with the Planck observatory, a space telescope with the European Space Agency. As the researchers examined the cosmic microwave background (the afterglow of the Big Bang), they saw a difference between their observations and other predictions.
“We observe fewer galaxy clusters than we would expect from the Planck results and there is a weaker signal from gravitational lensing of galaxies than the CMB would suggest. A possible way of resolving this discrepancy is for neutrinos to have mass. The effect of these massive neutrinos would be to suppress the growth of dense structures that lead to the formation of clusters of galaxies,” the researchers stated.
The HST WFPC2 image of gravitational lensing in the galaxy cluster Abell 2218, indicating the presence of large amount of dark matter (credit Andrew Fruchter at STScI).
Neutrinos are a tiny piece of matter (along with other particles such as quarks and electrons). The challenge is, they’re hard to observe because they don’t react very easily to matter. Originally believed to be massless, newer particle physics experiments have shown that they do indeed have mass, but how much was not known.
There are three different flavors or types of neutrinos, and previous analysis suggested the sum was somewhere above 0.06 eV (less than a billionth of a proton’s mass.) The new result suggests it is closer to 0.320 +/- 0.081 eV, but that still has to be confirmed by further study. The researchers arrived at that by using the Planck data with “gravitational lensing observations in which images of galaxies are warped by the curvature of space-time,” they stated.
“If this result is borne out by further analysis, it not only adds significantly to our understanding of the sub-atomic world studied by particle physicists, but it would also be an important extension to the standard model of cosmology which has been developed over the last decade,” the researchers stated.
Astrophotographers are already getting some great images of Mars, such as this sequence captured by Efrain Morales Rivera on January 9th, 2014.
Get those telescopes ready: the coming months offer Earthbound viewers some great views of the planet Mars.
Mars reaches opposition for 2014 on April 8th. This is approaching season represents the best time to observe Mars, as the Red Planet is closest to us in April and rises in the east as the Sun sets opposite to it in the west. Mars reaches 10” in apparent size this week. Mars is already beginning to show surface detail through a moderate-sized telescope as it continues to grow. In mid-February, Mars currently rises at around midnight local, and rides high to the south at local sunrise.
Mars imaged by Leo Aerts on February 3rd. Shot using a Celestron 14″ scope, DMK 21AU618 webcam with a 2.5 powermate projection and a RGB Baader filter set.
The 2014 opposition of Mars offers a mixed bag for observers. Hanging around 5-10 degrees south of the celestial equator just east of the September equinoctial point in Virgo, viewing opportunities are roughly equal for both northern and southern hemisphere observers. At opposition, Mars will shine at magnitude -1.5 and present a 15.2” disk, only slightly larger than the near minimum apparition of 2012, when it appeared 13.9” across. This is a far cry from the historic 2003 appearance, when Mars nearly maxed out at 25.1” across.
Why such a difference? Because the planet Mars has an exceptionally eccentric orbit. In fact, the eccentricity for Mars is 9.3% compared to 1.7% for the relatively sedate Earth.
A decade plus of Mars oppositions, from 2012 through 2025. Graphic created by the author.
This guarantees that all oppositions of Mars – which occur roughly 26 months/780 days apart – are not created equal. In our current epoch, Mars can pass anywhere from 0.683 to 0.373 Astronomical Units (A.U.s) from the Earth. This year’s passage sees Mars overtake us at 0.62 A.U.s or over 96 million kilometres from Earth on the night of opposition. Mars is slightly closer to us at 0.618 A.U.s six nights later on April 14th.
Why the slight difference? Well, the speedier Earth is on the inside track headed towards aphelion in July, while Mars is lagging but headed slightly inward towards perihelion just afterwards in September. This combined motion makes for a slightly closer approach just after opposition until the Earth begins to pull away.
And this also means that Mars will make its apparent retrograde loop through Virgo on the months surrounding opposition:
The motion of Mars through Virgo from March 1st through July 31st. Created by the author using Starry Night Education software.
Now for the good news. Oppositions of Mars also follow a rough 15-year cycle, meaning that they get successively closer or more distant with every two year passage. For example, the 1999 opposition of Mars had a very similar geometry to this year’s, as will to the future opposition in 2029.
And we’re currently on an improving trend: the next opposition in 2016 is much better than this year’s at 18.6” in size, and during the 2018 opposition, Mars will present a disc 24.3” across and will be nearly as favorable as the one in 2003!
It’s also worth noting that Mars sits within four degrees of the rising Moon on the evening of April 14th. The bright star Spica also sits even closer to the Full Moon on the same evening, at less than two degrees away. This particular evening is also noteworthy as it hosts the first of two lunar eclipses for 2014, both of which favor North America.
Mars, the Full Moon and Spica rising in the east on April 14th. Created using Stellarium.
Can you catch Mars near the Moon before sundown on the 14th using binoculars? The Moon will also occult Mars on July 6th for viewers across central and South America.
Though Mars is nicknamed the Red Planet, we’ve seen it appear anywhere from a pumpkin orange to a sickly yellow hue. In fact, such a jaundiced color change can be a sign that a planet-wide dust storm is under way. Such a variation can be readily seen with the naked eye. What color does Mars appear like to you tonight?
On Mars, northern hemisphere summer starts on February 15th, 2014. This means that the northern pole cap of the planet is tipped towards us at opposition during 2014. The day on Mars is only slightly longer than Earth’s at 24 hours and 37 minutes, meaning that Mars will have seemed to rotated only an extra ~8 degrees if you observe it at the same time on each successive evening.
The white pole caps of the planet are the first feature that becomes apparent to the observer at the eyepiece. In February, Mars shows a noticeable gibbous phase in February as we get a peek at the edge of the nighttime side of the planet. Mars will be nearly “full” at opposition, after which it’ll once again take on a slightly distorted football shape.
A growing (& shrinking) Mars through the 2014 opposition season. Created by the author using Starry Night Education software.
Tracking the features of the Red Planet is also possible at moderate magnification. One of the largest features apparent is the dark area known as Syrtis Major. Sky & Telescope has an excellent and easy to use application named Mars Previewer that will show you which longitude is currently facing Earth.
Sketching the regions of Mars is a fun exercise. You’ll find that drawing planetary features at the eyepiece can sharpen your observing skills and give you a more critical eye to discern subtle detail. And this season also provides an excellent reason to turn that newly constructed planetary webcam towards Mars.
Up for a challenge? Opposition is also a great time to try and observe the moons of Mars.
The moons of Mars as seen on April 8th at around 9:00 Universal Time. Created by the author using Starry Night Education software.
Phobos and Deimos are a tough catch, but are indeed within range of amateur instruments. The chief problem lies in their close proximity to dazzling Mars: +11.5 magnitude, Phobos never strays 14” from the Red Planet in 2014, and 12.4 magnitude Deimos never travels farther than 45” away. Phobos orbits Mars once 7.7 hours — faster than the planet rotates beneath it — and Deimos orbits once every 30.3 hours. The best strategy for a successful Martian moon hunt is to either place Mars just out of the field of view at high power when a moon reaches greatest elongation or block it from view using an eyepiece equipped with an occulting bar.
Extra credit for anyone who nabs pics of the pair!
And opposition is also “Visit Mars season,” as MAVEN and India’s Mars Orbiter Mission arrive later this year. In 2016, NASA’s Mars InSight mission is slated to make the trip, and the window is fast-closing for Dennis Tito’s proposed crewed fly-by mission of Mars in 2018.
And finally, to aid you in your quest for those elusive Martian moons, reader and human astronomical calculator extraordinaire Ed Kotapish was kind enough to compile a list of favorable apparitions of the moons of Mars on the weeks surrounding opposition. (see below)
Good luck, and be sure to send in those pics of Mars and more to Universe Today!
ELONGATIONS OF THE MARTIAN MOONS
DATES AND TIMES IN UT
STARTING 3/30/2014
MAR 30
PHOBOS 0300 W
PHOBOS 0645 E
DEIMOS 0900 W
PHOBOS 1040 W
PHOBOS 1425 E
PHOBOS 1815 W
PHOBOS 2205 EMAR 31
DEIMOS 0005 E
PHOBOS 0155 W
PHOBOS 0545 E
PHOBOS 0935 W
PHOBOS 1320 E
DEIMOS 1515 W
PHOBOS 1715 W
PHOBOS 2100 E
APR 01
PHOBOS 0055 W
PHOBOS 0440 E
DEIMOS 0620 E
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PHOBOS 1220 E
PHOBOS 1610 W
PHOBOS 2000 E
DEIMOS 2130 W
PHOBOS 2350 W
APR 02
PHOBOS 0340 E
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PHOBOS 1115 E
DEIMOS 1235 E
PHOBOS 1510 W
PHOBOS 1855 E
PHOBOS 2245 W
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PHOBOS 0235 E
DEIMOS 0345 W
PHOBOS 0625 W
PHOBOS 1015 E
PHOBOS 1405 W
PHOBOS 1755 E
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PHOBOS 2145 W
APR 04
PHOBOS 0130 E
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PHOBOS 0910 E
DEIMOS 1000 W
PHOBOS 1305 W
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PHOBOS 0030 E
DEIMOS 0110 E
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PHOBOS 1200 W
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APR 06
PHOBOS 0320 W
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DEIMOS 0725 E
PHOBOS 1055 W
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DEIMOS 2230 WAPR 07
PHOBOS 0215 W
PHOBOS 0605 E
PHOBOS 0955 W
PHOBOS 1340 EDEIMOS 1340 E (Mutual)
PHOBOS 1735 W
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APR 08
PHOBOS 0115 W
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DEIMOS 1955 E
PHOBOS 2020 E
APR 09
PHOBOS 0010 W
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PHOBOS 1135 E
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PHOBOS 2305 W
APR 10
DEIMOS 0210 E
PHOBOS 0255 E
PHOBOS 0645 W
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PHOBOS 1425 W
DEIMOS 1715 W
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APR 11
PHOBOS 0150 E
PHOBOS 0545 W
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PHOBOS 1320 W
PHOBOS 1710 E
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APR 12
PHOBOS 0050 E
PHOBOS 0440 W
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PHOBOS 1220 W
DEIMOS 1440 E
PHOBOS 1605 E
PHOBOS 2000 W
PHOBOS 2345 EAPR 13
PHOBOS 0340 W
DEIMOS 0550 W
PHOBOS 0725 E
PHOBOS 1115 W
PHOBOS 1505 E
PHOBOS 1855 W
DEIMOS 2055 E
PHOBOS 2245 E
APR 14
PHOBOS 0235 W
PHOBOS 0620 E
PHOBOS 1015 W
DEIMOS 1205 W
PHOBOS 1400 E
PHOBOS 1755 W
PHOBOS 2140 E
APR 15
PHOBOS 0130 W
DEIMOS 0310 E
PHOBOS 0520 E
PHOBOS 0910 W
PHOBOS 1300 E
PHOBOS 1650 W
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APR 16
PHOBOS 0030 W
PHOBOS 0415 E
PHOBOS 0810 W
DEIMOS 0925 E
PHOBOS 1155 E
PHOBOS 1545 W
PHOBOS 1935 E
PHOBOS 2325 W
APR 17
DEIMOS 0035 W
PHOBOS 0315 E
PHOBOS 0705 W
PHOBOS 1055 E
PHOBOS 1445 W
DEIMOS 1540 E
PHOBOS 1830 E
PHOBOS 2225 W
APR 18
PHOBOS 0210 E
PHOBOS 0605 W
DEIMOS 0650 W
PHOBOS 0950 E
PHOBOS 1340 W
PHOBOS 1730 E
PHOBOS 2120 W
DEIMOS 2200 E
Credit: Inside Science News Service and Amanda Page
As the Beatles strummed the opening notes to “All My Loving” on the Ed Sullivan Show 50 years ago yesterday, few could have imagined how wide-ranging that music would be. The broadcast gave birth to a global music phenomenon. And like all TV broadcasts of the day, the music carried out into space at the speed of light.
The Inside Science infographic above (see below for the full version) traces the history of the Beatles in relation to how far the broadcast travelled in that time. While those waves were washing out, er, across the universe, the Beatles have been taking over human space exploration in other ways. Below the jump are seven of the more memorable moments.
Rocking The Space Station With ‘Back at the ISS’
Technically speaking, this isn’t the Beatles, but it sure was inspired by them. ‘Back at the ISS’ — the remake of ‘Back in the U.S.S.R.’ by Dutch band Love & Mersey — is about a billion shades of awesome. Not only because of the lyrics, not only because of the high-energy space-themed video, but also because they sang in three languages. The song was released in March 2012 as a “rocking musical greeting” to Andre Kuipers (a European Space Agency astronaut) and the rest of the Expedition 30 crew days before the docking of the Automated Transfer Vehicle Edoardo Amaldi that month.
The Beatles have been used to wake up several shuttle crews, and also the Curiosity rover. Explained Eric Blood, Curiosity’s surface systems engineer: “She tends to be less cranky with a good wakeup song.”
Playing (And Drinking?) English Tea In Space
Here’s Paul McCartney in 2005 casually playing two tunes to the Expedition 12 crew — NASA astronaut Bill McArthur and Russian cosmonaut Valery Tokarev — during a live concert. It’s a bit hard to tell who had bigger stars in their eyes after the experience. “I told the audience ‘I think I need about 20 minutes to go have a lie down,’ McCartney stated in a NASA release from the time. “What do you do after that? We haven’t stopped talking about it since.”
Roll Over Beethoven: How The Beatles Almost Made Voyager’s ‘Golden Record’
Remember when scientists announced last year that Voyager 1 entered interstellar space? On board the spacecraft was a Golden Record intended to give aliens a glimpse into what Earth’s life is like. Included were songs from artists ranging from Bach to Blind Willie Johnson, but not the Beatles. They were almost included, though, as astronomer Carl Sagan (who chaired the selection committee) explained in his 1978 book Murmers of Earth. “We wanted to send ‘Here Comes The Sun’ by the Beatles, and all four Beatles gave their approval. But the Beatles did not own the copyright, and the legal status of the piece seemed too murky to risk,” he wrote.
Joining Mr. Mercury’s Light
There are so many earthly memorials to John Lennon after the singer’s untimely death in 1980, but late last year he got an extraterrestrial honor. Lennon was among 10 names approved for craters on the planet Mercury. “It’s unlikely that Mercury’s surface is populated with tangerine trees and marmalade skies, but the famous British musician who coined that phrase now has a physical presence on the planet closest to the Sun,” NASA said.
Sending Love To The Aliens With Jai Guru Deva Om
February 4, 2008 marked the first time NASA beamed any song into deep space, and what better choice than “Across The Universe”? The date marked the 40th anniversary of when the Beatles recorded the song, and came around the same time as the 45th anniversary of NASA’s Deep Space Network and the 50th anniversary of NASA’s first satellite, Explorer 1, among other milestones. In a statement, McCartney asked to “send my love to the aliens.”
What Beatles milestones in space have we missed? Let us know in the comments.
