Universe Today

January 10, 2023January 10, 2023 by Carolyn Collins Petersen

Newly Found Stars are Technically in the Milky Way, but They’re Halfway to Andromeda

This illustration shows the Milky Way galaxy's inner and outer halos. A halo is a spherical cloud of stars surrounding a galaxy. (Image Credits: NASA, ESA, and A. Feild [STScI]) — This illustration shows the Milky Way galaxy's inner and outer halos. A halo is a spherical cloud of stars surrounding a galaxy. A population of RR Lyrae variables in the halo is giving clues to its distance. (Image Credits: NASA, ESA, and A. Feild [STScI])

We all know our galaxy, the Milky Way, is big. Really big. But, exactly how far out does it extend? Where are the outer limits? Astronomers aren’t exactly sure, precisely. However, a study of galaxies in the Virgo Cluster accidentally turned up a population of stars in the outer part of the Milky Way. They may answer those questions.

January 10, 2023January 10, 2023 by Paul M. Sutter

Blue Straggler Stars are Weird

This spectacular image of the star cluster Messier 47 was taken using the Wide Field Imager camera, installed on the MPG/ESO 2.2-metre telescope at ESO’s La Silla Observatory in Chile. This young open cluster is dominated by a sprinkling of brilliant blue stars but also contains a few contrasting red giant stars. Credit: ESO

All stars follow a particular path in their lives once they start fusing hydrogen. As they live they steadily get brighter and hotter until they turn to fusing other elements. Every star follows this exact same path…except the blue straggler stars.

January 10, 2023July 11, 2023 by Nancy Atkinson

Need a Project? You can Build a Paper Model of the Extremely Large Telescope

Paper model of the Extremely Large Telescope. Credit: ESO

The Extremely Large Telescope (ELT) will be the world’s largest optical/near-infrared telescope. It is under construction on top of a mountain named Cerro Armazones in the Atacama Desert of northern Chile. Now you can build your own slightly smaller, incredibly lower cost version of your own ELT – using paper.

January 9, 2023January 9, 2023 by Evan Gough

The JWST is the Shiny New Space Telescope, but the Dependable Hubble is Still Going Strong

The scattered stars of the globular cluster NGC 6355 are strewn across this image from the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope. This globular cluster lies less than 50,000 light-years from Earth in the Ophiuchus constellation. Image Credit: ESA/Hubble & NASA, E. Noyola, R. Cohen

The Venerable Hubble Space Telescope has cemented its place in history. Some call it the most successful science experiment ever. And while the James Webb Space Telescope might vie for that title, the Hubble does things that even the powerful JWST can’t do.

Exhibit A: this stunning image of NGC 6355.

January 9, 2023January 9, 2023 by Matt Williams

How Could We Detect Life Inside Enceladus?

Scientists recently determined that a certain strain of Earth bacteria could thrive under conditions found on Enceladus. Credit: NASA/JPL/Space Science Institute

For astrobiologists, the scientists dedicated to the search for life beyond Earth, the moons of Saturn are a virtual treasure trove of possibilities. Enceladus is especially compelling because of the active plumes of water emanating from its southern polar region. Not only are these vents thought to be connected directly to an ocean beneath the moon’s icy surface, but the Cassini mission detected traces of organic molecules and other chemicals associated with biological processes. Like Europa, Ganymede, and other “Ocean Worlds,” astrobiologists think this could indicate hydrothermal activity at the core-mantle boundary.

Both NASA and the ESA are hoping to send missions to Enceladus that could study its plumes in more detail. These include the Enceladus Orbitlander recommended in the Planetary Science and Astrobiology Decadal Survey 2023-2032 and the ESA’s Enceladus Moonraker, which could depart Earth in the next decade, taking advantage of a favorable alignment between the planets. In anticipation of what these missions could find, an international team of researchers used data from the Cassini mission to establish how samples of plume material could constrain how much biomass Enceladus has within it.

January 9, 2023January 9, 2023 by Evan Gough

133 Days of the Sun’s Glory

NASA has created a video based on 133 days of observations by the Solar Dynamics Observatory. The hour-long video is a captivating look at four months of the Sun's approximately 10 billion year lifetime. Image Credit: NASA/Goddard Space Flight Center/SDO

NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center has released an hour-long time-lapse video that shows 133 days of the Sun’s life. The video shows the Sun’s chaotic surface, where great loops of plasma arch above the star along magnetic field lines. Sometimes the looping plasma reconnects to the star, and other times it’s ejected into space, creating hazardous space weather.

January 9, 2023January 9, 2023 by Nancy Atkinson

China Unable to Reestablish Contact With its Zhurong Mars Rover

A wireless camera took this 'group photo' of China's Tianwen-1 lander and rover on Mars' surface. Credit: Chinese Space Agency

China’s National Space Administration (CNSA) has been hoping to reestablish communications with the Zhurong Mars rover, but so far, their efforts have been unsuccessful. Zhurong was put into hibernation over six months ago as it hunkered down in attempts to survive the Martian winter.

January 9, 2023January 9, 2023 by Evan Gough

This Serpent’s Tail is Made of Starry Nebulae

This image of the spectacular Sh2-54 nebula was taken in infrared light using ESO’s VISTA telescope at Paranal Observatory in Chile. The clouds of dust and gas that are normally obvious in visible light are less evident here, and in this light we can see the light of the stars behind the nebulae now piercing through. Image Credit: ESO/VVVX

The ancients didn’t have the scientific understanding of nature that we have now. All they could do was look up at the night sky and wonder, which isn’t a bad way to spend time. Part of understanding something is naming it, and when the ancients looked up at the patterns in the stars, they gave them simple names based entirely on their appearances. That’s likely how the Greeks named the constellation Serpens: it looks like a snake, so they called it that.

The Greeks lacked astronomical telescopes, so they never saw any of the rich detail in Serpens that a new image from the European Southern Observatory reveals.

January 9, 2023January 16, 2023 by David Dickinson

Comet E3 ZTF Brightens as the First Good Comet of 2023

The first good comet of the year, Comet E3 ZTF is a fine object for northern hemisphere observers in January.

As in years previous, 2023 kicks of with another decent binocular comet.

If you haven’t seen C/2022 E3 ZTF yet, you’ll soon have your chance. Discovered by the Zwicky Transient Survey searching for supernovae, E3 ZTF was first spotted as a +17^th magnitude object gliding through the constellation of Aquila the Eagle on the night of March 2^nd, 2022.

January 8, 2023January 9, 2023 by Matt Williams

Is Space Power a Good Idea? A New Spacecraft is Going to Find Out!

Artist's impression of the Caltech Space Solar Power Demonstrator (SSPD), Credit: Caltech

Solar power, long considered the leading contender among renewable energy sources, has advanced significantly over the past few decades. The cost of manufacturing and installing solar panels has dropped considerably, and efficiency has increased, making it price competitive with coal, oil, and fossil fuels. However, some barriers, like distribution and storage, still prevent solar power from being adopted more aggressively. In addition, there’s the ever-present issue of intermittency, where arrays cannot collect power in bad weather and during evenings.

These issues have led to the concept of space-based solar power (SBSP), where satellites equipped with solar arrays could gather solar energy twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week, three-hundred and sixty-five days a year. To test this method, researchers at the California Institute of Technology (Caltech) recently launched a technology demonstrator to space. It’s called the Space Solar Power Demonstrator (SSPD), which will test several key components of SBSP and evaluate the method’s ability to harvest clean energy and beam it back to Earth.