Universe Today

July 12, 2008December 24, 2015 by Ian O'Neill

NASA Needs to Take Space Sex Seriously

The US space agency needs to have better consideration for the sexual needs of their astronauts during long missions in space. Also, more research needs to be done to investigate human embryo development in zero-gravity or low-gravity environments, especially if NASA is serious about setting up a colony on Mars in the next 30 years. These warnings have been issued by a NASA advisor at a time when the agency doesn’t have enough funds allocated for human space physiology. These concerns are by no means trivial, basic human needs and the ability to procreate beyond Earth may be critical for missions lasting years…

At a time when the question “Can we have sex in space?” is becoming more and more popular by the future space tourists hoping to become a member of the 100-mile high club, a serious issue is beginning to surface for our long-term presence in space. Humans have needs, and although the astronauts selected by NASA, ESA and the other international space agencies are highly professional individuals, Dr Jason Kring, a NASA advisor and assistant professor at Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University in Florida, has pointed out that sexual desire is as potent as the need for water and food. “But the bottom line is that, like hunger and thirst, sex is a basic biological motive,” he said in an interview with the UK’s Sunday Telegraph. “The potential round-trip mission to Mars could take three years. It doesnâ€™t make sense to assume that these men and women are going to have no thoughts of it for three years. Nasa and other space agencies should address this in their training and in crew selection.” Kring suggests our future long-term space explorers should replicate what the early polar explorers did and take a colleague as a lover to minimize sexual frustration.

It is difficult to predict the stresses long-term missions into space and to other planets may cause, but there is a very practical reason for this worry. Heightened stress on a spaceship will create an increased risk of confrontations, lack of focus and mission failure. When considering a possible 3-year mission to Mars, mission scientists will want the crew to be as calm and stress-free as possible.

Kring adds that future manned spacecraft to the Moon and Mars should be designed to optimize the privacy of astronauts so relationships can be consummated. This basic human need was recognized by explorers here on Earth where South Pole expedition members took on “expedition spouses” as sexual partners for the duration. When the expedition was over, the explorers would return home to their families and spouses. Pairing up with a colleague therefore sidesteps the biological issues of the possibility of “going without” for months, or years at a time. There are obvious questions surrounding the psychological effect of taking on “expedition spouses” (especially the effect on the partners waiting here on Earth for the astronauts return!), but the biological question will at least have an answer.

The fact remains however, that we are naive of the effects of sex in space, let alone if it is even a pleasurable experience. The mechanics of “human docking procedures” (as described by tests carried out by the Russian space agency) are a lot more complicated when in zero gravity. NASA researchers have pointed out that additional problems include motion sickness, increased sweating and a drop in blood pressure – all of which are big problems for astronauts in space.

There are also huge ethical questions hanging over possible pregnancies in space. Zero-G tests on rat embryos produced decreased skeletal and brain development, the effects on a human embryo will remain a mystery. Also, even if astronauts are having sex for purely recreational reasons, the effectiveness of oral contraception has been brought into question, making the whole procedure highly problematic, risking accidental pregnancies (something no space agency is prepared for, especially during missions to the Moon or Mars).

The fact remains that NASA continues to cut back biological research in favor of future Moon missions, so much about human sexuality in space will remain a mystery. This point is highlighted by a NASA spokesperson who stated, “We don’t study sexuality in space.”

Source: Sunday Telegraph

July 11, 2008April 4, 2016 by Matt Williams

What is the Largest Moon in the Solar System?

Many people think that the answer to ‘what is the largest moon in the Solar System’ is our Moon. It is not. Our Moon is the fifth largest natural satellite. Ganymede, a moon of Jupiter, is the largest in this solar system. At 5,268 km at the equator, it is larger than Mercury, the dwarf planet Pluto, and three times larger than the Moon orbiting Earth. According to information from NASA,if Ganymede were to break free of Jupiter’s gravitational pull it would be classified as a planet.

Ganymede has an iron-metallic core that generates a magnetic field. The core is surrounded by a mantle of rock, which is, in turn, covered by a thick shell of ice and rock. The outer shell is up to 800 km thick. On top of the outer shell is a thin layer of material(accreted?) that is a mixture of ice and rock. In images taken by the Hubble Space Telescope in 1996, astronomers discovered a tenuous atmosphere of oxygen. The atmosphere would not support known life forms, but its very existence is interesting to science.

Through spacecraft observation, there are several facts known about the surface of Ganymede. Its surface shows two types of terrain. Forty percent of the surface is covered with highly cratered dark regions, while the remainder is covered by light grooved terrain. The light grooving forms intricate patterns across surface of the moon, some of which are thousands of km long. Sulcus, a term that means a groove or burrow, is often used to describe the grooving. This portion of the terrain was most likely formed by tensional faulting or the release of water from beneath the surface. Ridges as high as 700 m have been observed. The dark regions are heavily cratered, old and rough, and are believed to be the original crust of the moon.

Ganymede was discovered by Galileo on January 7, 1610. He made the discovery, along with three other Jovian moons. It marked the first time a moon was discovered orbiting a planet other than Earth. The discovery contributed to the acceptance of the heliocentric viewpoint over the geocentric that held sway prior to that.

Now you know the answer to ‘what is the largest moon in the Solar System’ and a few interesting facts about Ganymede. Jupiter has 63 moons, so there are plenty more facts for you to discover.

Here’s another article about Ganymede, and one about Ganymede’s lumpy interior.

Here’s a list of all the largest moons in the Solar System, and a listing of the largest moons and smallest planets at Solar Views.

We have recorded a whole series of podcasts about the Solar System at Astronomy Cast. Check them out here.

References:
NASA Solar System Guide: Ganymede
Wikipedia: Ganymede
NASA Multimedia

July 11, 2008December 24, 2015 by Tammy Plotner

Weekend SkyWatcher’s Forecast: July 11-13, 2008

Greetings, fellow SkyWatchers! Our weekend begins with one very hot look at a very cool area of the Moon – the lunar poles. Why is finding ice just so important? Hang on to your eyepiece because we’ll continue this lunar expedition with some mountain climbing and a look at the big lunar picture. Before our weekend is out, we’ll take a trip to the land of Yed and find out what’s coming up on Monday night. Time to slip into the night… Together.

Friday, July 11 – Tonight let’s take look at the lunar poles by returning to an old previous study crater, Plato. North of Plato you will see a long horizontal area of grey floor – Mare Frigoris – the “Cold Sea.” North of it you will note a “double crater.” This elongated diamond-shape is Goldschmidt, and the crater which cuts across its western border is Anaxagoras. The lunar north pole isn’t far from Goldschmidt, and since Anaxagoras is just about one degree outside of the Moon’s theoretical “arctic” area, the lunar sunrise will never go high enough to clear the southernmost rim. As proposed with yesterday’s study, this “permanent darkness” must mean there is ice! For that very reason, NASA’s Lunar Prospector probe was sent to explore here. Did it find what it was looking for? Answer – Yes!

The probe discovered vast quantities of cometary ice which has hidden inside the crater’s depths untouched for millions of years. If this sounds rather boring to you, then realize this type of resource may aid our plans to eventually establish a manned base on the lunar surface!

On March 5, 1998 NASA announced that Lunar Prospector’s neutron spectrometer data showed water-based ice was discovered at both lunar poles. The first results showed the “ice” mixed in with lunar regolith (soil, rocks and dust), but long-term data confirmed nearly pure pockets hidden beneath about 40 centimeters of surface material – with the results being strongest in the northern polar region. It is estimated there may be as much as 6 trillion kilograms (6.6 billion tons) of this valuable resource! If this still doesn’t get your motor running, then realize that without it we could never establish a manned lunar base because of the tremendous expense involved in transporting our most basic human need – water.

The presence of lunar water could also mean a source of oxygen, another vital material we need to survive. In order to return home or voyage onward, these same deposits could provide hydrogen which could be used as rocket fuel. So as you view Anaxagoras tonight, realize you may be viewing one of mankind’s future “homes” on a distant world!

Saturday, July 12 – Tonight let’s take an entirely different view of the Moon as we do a little “mountain climbing!” The most outstanding feature on the visible surface will be the emerging Copernicus, but since we’ve delved into the deepest areas of the lunar surface, why not climb to some of its peaks?

Using Copernicus as our guide, to the north and northwest of this ancient crater lie the Carpathian Mountains ringing the southern edge of Mare Imbrium. As you can see, they begin well east of the terminator, but look into the shadow! Extending some 40 kilometers beyond the line of daylight, you will continue to see bright peaks – some of which reach a height of 2072 meters. When the area is fully revealed tomorrow, you will see the Carpathian Mountains disappear into the lava flow that once formed them.

Continuing onward to Plato, which sits on the northern shore of Imbrium, we will look for the disjointed line of (1) Montes Recta – the “Straight Range.” Further east you will find the scattered peaks of (2) the Teneriffe Mountains. It is possible these are the remnants of much taller summits of a once stronger range, but only around 1890 meters of them still survive above the surface.

To the southeast, (3) Mons Pico stands like a monument 2400 meters above the grey sands – a height which places it level with Kindersley Summit at Kootenay Park in British Columbia. Further southeast is the peak of (6) Mons Piton – also standing alone in the barren landscape of Imbrium. Perhaps once a member of the (5) Montes Alpes to the east, Piton still towers 2450 meters above the surface with a base 25 kilometers in diameter still remaining in the lava flow. Yet look closely at the lunar Alpes, for (4) Mons Blanc is 3600 meters high!

Just north of shallow Archimedes stand (7) the Montes Spitzbergen whose remaining expanse trails away for 60 kilometers on the southern edge of a rille which begins at the small punctuation of crater Kirch to the north. While they only extend 1500 meters above the surface, that’s still comparable with the outer Himalayans!

Sunday, July 13 – So what if it’s the 13th? If you’re not superstitious, but only having bad luck in finding lunar features – then how about if we take a look at one that’s incredibly easy to find? We’ll continue our lunar mountain climbing expedition and look at the “big picture” on the lunar surface.

Tonight all of Mare Imbrium is bathed in sunlight and we can truly see its shape. Appearing as a featureless ellipse bordered by mountain ranges, let’s identify them again. Starting at Plato and moving east to south to west you will find the Alps, the Caucasus, and the Apennines (where Apollo 15 landed) at the western edge of Palus Putredinus. Next come the Carpathian Mountains just north of Copernicus. Look at the form closely: doesn’t it appear that perhaps once upon a time an enormous impact created the entire area? This was the Imbrium impact: compare it to the younger Sinus Iridum. Ringed by the Juras Mountains, it may have also been formed by a much later and very similar impact.

And you thought they were just mountains…

Now let’s have a look with our eyes first at Delta Ophiuchi. Known as Yed Prior (“the hand”), look for its optical double Epsilon to the southeast, symmetrically named Yed Posterior. Try using binoculars or a telescope at absolute minimum power for another undiscovered gem…

Delta Ophiuchi is 170 light-years from us, while Epsilon is 108 – but look at the magnificent field they share. Stars of every spectral type are in an area of sky which could easily be covered by a small coin held at arm’s length. Enjoy this fantastic field – from the hot, blue youngsters to the old red giants!

Now, keep a watch out for a certain old, red giant named Antares on Monday night, June 14. For many of us, the Moon and the Rival of Mars are going to be hauntingly close – close enough to be an occultation event for some lucky observers!

Have a great weekend….

This week’s images are: Lunar North Pole – Credit: NASA, Lunar Mountain Peaks – Image Credit: Greg Konkel Annotations: Tammy Plotner, Half and Gibbous Moon – Credit: Roger Warner, and Delta Ophiuchi – Credit: Palomar Observatory courtesy of Caltech.

July 11, 2008December 24, 2015 by Nancy Atkinson

Spacewalk Retrieves Explosive Bolt

Two cosmonauts at the International Space Station conducted a spacewalk on Thursday and performed the delicate operation of removing an explosive bolt from the Soyuz capsule attached to the station. Ten explosive bolts in all on the Soyuz break the connections between the spacecraft’s crew capsule and its propulsion module during descent back to Earth. Engineers suspect one bad bolt delayed the compartment’s jettison during landings in October 2007 and April 2008, leading to steep, high-G descents, causing the capsule to land off-course and hit the ground harder than it should. Sergei Volkov and Oleg Kononenko removed the bolt located in the same spot as the ones diagnosed as being faulty on the other capsules. They placed it inside a blast-proof canister, which will be returned home aboard the Soyuz when the crew completes its mission in October.

The spacewalk took 6 hours and 18 minutes to complete. US astronaut Greg Chamitoff remained in the Soyuz during the spacewalk, part of the contingency plan for the unlikely event the Pirs airlock could not be repressurized. Otherwise he would not have had access to the station’s lifeboat through a depressurized Pirs. “We do not like to separate the crew from (the) escape vehicle,” flight director Bob Dempsey told reporters in a briefing last week. “Therefore Greg will be staying in there. He will have some laptops, books and computers to work on while he’s there.”

Although engineers assured the bolt would not denoted, Russian mission control repeatedly told the cosmonauts to go slow and take their time. About halfway into the spacewalk, the bolt had been removed and placed in the container. “Good! Thank God, it is in,” one cosmonaut exclaimed. Mission control then told the cosmonauts to take a five minute break “without any motions, without moving,” before moving on to complete their tasks.

Chamitoff will have another stay in the Soyuz next Tuesday, as Volkov and Kononenko will conduct another spacewalk on July 15 to outfit the Russian segment’s exterior, install one scientific experiment and retrieve another.

News Sources: NASA, NASA TV

July 11, 2008December 24, 2015 by Nancy Atkinson

Phoenix Lander Tries Out Soil Probe and Atomic Microscope

It’s not that the Phoenix lander’s mission to Mars is over â€“ not by a longshot. But Phoenix did stick a fork in it. The “fork” is a four-pronged thermal and electrical conductivity probe that Phoenix poked into the Martian soil for the first time. The probe tool can help the science team assess how easily heat and electricity move through the soil from one spike to another. These measurements can provide information about frozen or unfrozen water in the soil. The probe is mounted on the “knuckle” of Phoenix’s Robotic Arm. The probe has already been used for assessing water vapor in the atmosphere when it is held above the ground.

The image above is a series of six images, taken on July 8, 2008, during the Phoenix mission’s 43rd Martian day, or sol, since landing. The insertion visible from the shadows cast on the ground on that sol was a validation test of the procedure. The spikes on the probe are about 1.5 centimeters or half an inch long.

Phoenix also tried out another instrument: atomic force microscope. This Swiss-made microscope builds an image of the surface of a particle by sensing it with a sharp tip at the end of a spring, all micro- fabricated from a sliver of silicon. The sensor rides up and down following the contour of the surface, providing information about the target’s shape.

“The same day we first touched a target with the thermal and electrical conductivity probe, we first touched another target with a needle about threeorders of magnitude smaller — one of the tips of our atomic force microscope,”said Michael Hecht of NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif., lead
scientist for the suite of instruments on Phoenix that includes both the conductivity probe and the microscopy station.

The atomic force microscope can provide details of soil-particle shapes as small as about 100 nanometers, less than one-hundredth the width of a human hair. This is about 20 times smaller than what can be resolved with Phoenix’s opticalmicroscope, which has provided much higher-magnification imaging than anythingseen on Mars previously.

The team for the robotic arm is still working out the best way to get samples of ice from the trench dug earlier called “Snow White,” and be able to transfer the samples quickly into the Thermal and Evolved-Gas Analyzer (TEGA) which heats samples and identifies vapors from them.

Scientists have yet to release any information about the second test from the Wet Chemistry Lab. They are still analyzing the results.

Original News Source: NASA’s Phoenix site

July 10, 2008December 24, 2015 by Fraser Cain

What is the Hottest Place in the Solar System?

Solar prominences on the Sun. Image credit: NASA

The hottest place in the Solar System is the Sun, obviously. And the hottest part of the Sun is its core. The surface of the Sun is a mere 5,800 Kelvin, while the center of the Sun is around 15 million Kelvin. That’s hot.

Although the surface of the Sun is relatively cool, the corona can get much hotter. This is the region just above the surface of the Sun, where flares and coronal mass ejections come from. Temperatures in this region can get upwards of 2 million Kelvin.

Okay, outside of the Sun, the hottest place in the Solar System is the core of Jupiter. Once again, while the cloud tops of Jupiter are more than 100 degrees below zero, the core of the planet could be up to 30,000 Kelvin. This high temperature comes from the intense pressure that comes from the entire mass of the planet bearing down on the core and compressing it.

What’s the hottest surface in the Solar System? That would have to be the surface of Venus, which is always an average temperature of 461 Â°C. In fact, Venus is even hotter than the planet Mercury when it’s in the Sun. Noontime temperatures on the surface of Mercury only get up to 426 Â°C.

Here’s an article from Universe Today about the hottest place on Earth, and more about the Sun.

Here’s more information about the Sun, and just how hot Venus is.

We have recorded a whole series of podcasts about the Solar System at Astronomy Cast. Check them out here.

July 10, 2008December 24, 2015 by Nancy Atkinson

Nano-materials Could Protect Spacecraft and Satellites From Debris

Space junk in Earth orbit is becoming a big problem (here’s an previous UT article that illustrates the problem.) If the International Space Station or an operating communications or science satellite were struck by debris such as an old satellite, launch vehicle parts, or even something as small as a paint chip, it could mean disaster. Space debris also threatens the lives of astronauts and the launch of new satellites today, says Dr. Noam Eliaz, Head of the Biomaterials and Corrosion Laboratory at the School of Mechanical Engineering at Tel Aviv University. An expert in materials science and engineering, Dr. Eliaz is working to create and test new nano-materials and polymers to protect satellites and astronauts alike.

Eliaz is developing nano-based materials with special mechanical properties, such as high strength and wear resistance, and controllable electrical and thermal properties. “This could lead to a superior material for the external blankets of spacecraft,” says Eliaz. Some of the materials Eliaz has researched are being used by biomedical device companies and by aircraft industries worldwide.

One candidate Eliaz and his colleagues have investigated is a hybrid nano-material which incorporates small silicon-containing cages that can open and react with atomic oxygen to prevent further polymer degradation. Basically, a silicon skin would form to “patch” a puncture caused by a debris hit.

The team has also conducted space durability studies on polymers developed by the U.S. Air Force and Hybrid Plastics Inc, and the results are being reviewed by NASA and the European Space Agency (ESA). “Our simulation studies were done on Earth to determine how space debris will impact new polymers developed to protect space vehicles,” says Dr. Eliaz.

Original News Source: American Friends of Tel Aviv University

July 10, 2008December 24, 2015 by Ian O'Neill

Listen to Terra Chat Live Tonight: Cosmic Occurances, Planet X and Space Travel (Update)

Update: The Terra Chat show recording is now available online as an mp3 if you missed the live broadcast…

In a follow-up radio interview on Blog Talk Radio’s Terra Chat, I will be Colin Knight’s special guest to briefly discuss my recent Universe Today 2012 articles and then chat about my thoughts on space travel and Mars colonization. I previously appeared with Colin on June 8th to discuss the Mayan 2012 Prophecy, so I’m overjoyed to be invited back.

If you are interested and want to listen in to Colin Knight’s Terra Chat show, with me as his guest, go to the Blog Talk Radio: Terra Chat homepage and you’ll find the live radio feed.

Time: Thursday July 10th 2008, 10pm Eastern Time (7pm Pacific Time)

More information on tonight’s show Â»

I have another follow-up show on Paranormal Radio at the end of the month with Captain Jack, so I’ll keep you posted (listen to my previous appearance). Cheers, Ian

July 10, 2008December 24, 2015 by Nancy Atkinson

Cruising the Cloud Tops of Venus With a Solar-Powered Airplane

With all the orbital missions at the various planets in our solar system, scientists have been able to glean an amazing amount of data to help us understand our neighboring worlds. But imagine a mission that could fly lower than orbital altitudes — actually flying in the atmosphere of another planet and closer to the surface — and imagine how much more detailed the data could be. This type of mission would be especially helpful on Venus, where the intense heat and crushing air pressure at the surface basically precludes the success of any type of lander mission. So, last year, when NASA formed a Science and Technology Definition Team (STDT) to study the concept of a flagship mission to Venus, waiting in the wings was Dr. Geoffrey Landis. For the past several years Landis and a group of scientists and engineers from NASA’s Glenn Research Center have been studying the concept of a solar-powered airplane at Venus. Landis says a small aircraft powered by solar energy could fly continuously in Venus’ atmosphere, and would be an ideal vehicle for gathering data on both the planet’s atmosphere and surface, with the ability to maneuver almost anywhere.

“There’s a lot of interest in Venus at the moment,” said Landis. “We’ve been looking at Mars quite a bit lately, and in some ways Mars is Earth’s twin, but in even more ways, Venus is Earth’s twin. So we learn a lot about Earth by studying Venus.”

A solar powered airplane has been a long-time interest for Landis. “I spent a lot of time in college building model airplanes, so the idea of flying an airplane on Venus sounded very interesting to me,” he said.

Since 2000, Landis and his team have been studying this concept, and Landis recently presented their findings to NASA’s STDT for Venus. “I’ve been trying to drum up enthusiasm for the things we’ve done,” he said. The main work the group has done so far has been focusing on the airplane itself, verifying that the concept is actually going to work.

“We’ve done a thorough design study to determine if there are any showstoppers,” said Landis. “We don’t think there are. We think itâ€™s a very doable project.”

The airplane would have to fold up to fit inside a small aeroshell for a “Discovery” class scientific mission. After arriving at Venus the craft would deploy from the aeroshell, unfold and begin gliding through the atmosphere. With solar cells covering the entire surface, the airplane would fly strictly on solar power, not needing fuel. The team has come up with a foldable design that has a wingspan of 9 meters and a length of just under 7 meters.

Surprisingly, the density of Venus’ atmosphere shouldn’t be a problem for a solar airplane mission. “At the altitudes we’ll be flying, it would be like flying at moderate altitudes on Earth,” said Landis. “Venus is actually a very easy planet to fly on. Interestingly, the problem on Venus is the wind. It turns out it’s a very windy planet, and we would like to be able to keep our solar airplane flying underneath the sun, so we have to fly faster than the wind so we can stay in the sunlight. If we can do that we can basically fly forever.”

The craft would have to be capable of sustained flight at or above the wind speed, about 95 m/sec at the cloud-top level, 65 to 75 km above the surface. For exploration at lower altitudes, the aircraft could glide down for periods of several hours and then climb back to higher altitudes, allowing the cloud layers to be probed. But the airplane would have to be in sunlight for a majority of the time. The team’s analysis of a flight using battery storage shows that it wouldn’t work to keep the aircraft aloft on battery power during the passage across the night side of the planet.

As far as the science that can be gleaned from a solar-powered airplane at Venus, Landis’ team has primarily envisioned a mission to study Venus’ atmosphere. However, they’ve also looked at using it for a radar mission, and in particular if two airplanes could be used, one could be a transmitter and the other a receiver to do what’s called “bistatic radar” where you vary the angle between the transmission and the receiver to provide additional information about the planet. But mainly, an airplane flies much closer to the surface than an orbiting spacecraft, to gather greater detailed information about the planet.

The current focus of Landis’ team has been deciding what type of science could be done, and how it could best be achieved. “What we’ve been doing lately is just studying Venus and asking ourselves, what do we want to do,” said Landis. “Is an airplane the right thing? We’ve also been looking at airships. You can make a zeppelin fly at the planet Venus, which has both advantages and disadvantages over an airplane, so we’re asking ourselves, at what altitude in the clouds do we want to fly — above, below, or in the clouds — and what science we can do? The very hard part on Venus is flying low. It’s very easy to fly high, but the lower you could fly, the better the science you could accomplish. But flying low will be tricky.”

Interestingly enough, last year, students from Boston University also conducted a design study of a solar airplane at Venus, and they looked at the design that Landis’ team had come up with. The BU students also concluded such as mission was quite feasible. “They looked at the basic airplane design: Can you actually fly on Venus? We looked at things like, could you fold it up into the aeroshell, and how would it be deployed, etc.,” Landis said. “We found this second study to be a very useful sanity check for us, that an independent group of people looked at our ideas, and said that no, this isn’t out of the question.”

So, when could a solar-powered airplane mission be ready to fly over Venus? “It depends on how hard the mission you want to do is,” said Landis. “If you’re doing a simple solar airplane mission, we’ve shown that there aren’t any technology showstoppers in the airplane itself, so I think it’s something we could do in the near term, by the next decade. But the more difficult the mission you’re interested in, say if you’re interested in flying low or in the polar regions, places where it’s harder to fly, we’d have to back off and think about what the correct type of vehicle would be.”

This paper discusses more information about the Venus Solar Powered Airplane

July 10, 2008December 24, 2015 by Nancy Atkinson

Baby Boomer Galaxy Found

This galaxy, Zw II 96 (about 500 million light-years away) resembles the Baby Boom galaxy which lies about 12.3 billion light-years away and appears in images as only a smudge.

A group of telescopes got together recently to check out a little hanky-panky going on in a galaxy in a very remote part of the universe. The Hubble and Spitzer Space Telescopes, Japan’s Subaru Telescope, the James Clerk Maxwell and the Keck Telescopes, all on Mauna Kea in Hawaii, and the Very Large Array in New Mexico pooled their various optical, infrared, submillimeter and radio capabilities to see why a distant galaxy appears to be conceiving stars at a tremendously fast rate. This galaxy, which has now been dubbed the “Baby Boom” galaxy, is giving birth to about 4,000 stars per year. In comparison, our own Milky Way galaxy turns out an average of just 10 stars per year. These telescopes weren’t just playing the part of a Peeping Tom; astronomers want to find out more about this incredibly fertile galaxy.

“This galaxy is undergoing a major baby boom, producing most of its stars all at once,” said Peter Capak of NASA’s Spitzer Science Center at the California Institute of Technology, Pasadena. “If our human population was produced in a similar boom, then almost all of the people alive today would be the same age.”

The discovery goes against the most common theory of galaxy formation, the Hierarchical Model. According to the theory galaxies slowly bulk up their stars over time, and not in one big burst as “Baby Boom” appears to be doing.

The Baby Boom galaxy, which belongs to a class of galaxies called starbursts, is the new record holder for the brightest starburst galaxy in the very distant universe, with brightness being a measure of its extreme star-formation rate. It was discovered and characterized using a suite of telescopes operating at different wavelengths. NASA’s Hubble Space Telescope and Japan’s Subaru Telescope, atop Mauna Kea in Hawaii, first spotted the galaxy in visible-light images, where it appeared as an inconspicuous smudge due to is great distance.

It wasn’t until Spitzer and the James Clerk Maxwell Telescope, also on Mauna Kea in Hawaii, observed the galaxy at infrared and submillimeter wavelengths, respectively, that the galaxy stood out as the brightest of the bunch. This is because it has a huge number of youthful stars. When stars are born, they shine with a lot of ultraviolet light and produce a lot of dust. The dust absorbs the ultraviolet light but, like a car sitting in the sun, it warms up and re-emits light at infrared and submillimeter wavelengths, making the galaxy unusually bright to Spitzer and the James Clerk Maxwell Telescope.

To learn more about this galaxy’s unique youthful glow, Capak and his team followed up with a number of telescopes. They used optical measurements from Keck to determine the exact distance to the galaxy — a whopping12.3 billion light-years. That’s looking back to a time when the universe was 1.3 billion years old (the universe is approximately 13.7 billion years old today).

The astronomers made measurements at radio wavelengths with the National Science Foundation’s Very Large Array in New Mexico. Together with Spitzer and James Clerk Maxwell data, these observations allowed the astronomers to calculate a star-forming rate of about 1,000 to 4,000 stars per year. At that rate, the galaxy needs only 50 million years, not very long on cosmic timescales, to grow into a galaxy equivalent to the most massive ones we see today.

“Before now, we had only seen galaxies form stars like this in the teenaged universe, but this galaxy is forming when the universe was only a child,” said Capak. “The question now is whether the majority of the very most massive galaxies form very early in the universe like the Baby Boom galaxy, or whether this is an exceptional case. Answering this question will help us determine to what degree the Hierarchical Model of galaxy formation still holds true.”

“The incredible star-formation activity we have observed suggests that we may be witnessing, for the first time, the formation of one of the most massive elliptical galaxies in the universe,” said co-author Nick Scoville of Caltech.

Original News Source: JPL