Universe Today

June 12, 2020June 12, 2020 by Evan Gough

A 2nd Planet has been Confirmed for Proxima Centauri

An artist's illustration of the Proxima Centauri system. Proxima b is on the left, while Proxima C is on the right. Image Credit: Lorenzo Santinelli

Our closest stellar neighbour is Proxima Centauri, a small red dwarf star about 4.2 light years away from us. It’s the third member of the Alpha Centauri group, and even though it’s so close, it can’t be seen with the naked eye. In 2016 astronomers discovered a planet orbiting Proxima Centuari, named Proxima Centauri b. That planet was confirmed only a few days ago.

Now, astronomers have confirmed the existence of a second planet, Proxima Centauri c.

June 12, 2020June 12, 2020 by Matt Williams

How SpaceX is Changing Starship to be Able to Land on the Moon

Artist concept of the SpaceX Starship on the surface of the Moon. Credits: SpaceX

In May of last year, NASA announced that it had selected 11 aerospace companies to study and produce prototypes for a Human Landing System (HLS). This decision was made as part of Project Artemis and NASA’s commitment to return humans to the Moon by 2024. A year later, the administration shared that they had narrowed the field down to three companies – SpaceX, Blue Origin, and relative newcomer Dynetics.

For their part, SpaceX is working on a modified version of the Starship, the commercial vehicle SpaceX is currently testing at Boca Chica. As an HLS, this spacecraft would be a fully reusable system, and also capable of integrating with the Orion spacecraft and the Lunar Gateway. According to recent statements Musk made on Twitter, the HLS version of the Starship will also have some interesting design features.

June 12, 2020June 12, 2020 by Evan Gough

This is a Binary Star in the Process of Formation

Zoom into the Ophiuchus molecular cloud, highlighting the star forming system IRAS 16293-2422 with the proto-star B in the upper right corner and the now clearly identified binary proto-stars A1 and A2 on the bottom left. The binary system is shown also in a further zoom-in panel. Image: © MPE; background: ESO/Digitized Sky Survey 2; Davide De Martin)

About 460 light years away lies the Rho Ophiuchi cloud complex. It’s a molecular cloud—an active star-forming region—and it’s one of the closest ones. R. Ophiuchi is a dark nebula, a region so thick with dust that the visible light from stars is almost completely obscured.

But scientists working with ALMA have pin-pointed a pair of young proto-stars inside all that dust, doing the busy work of becoming active stars.

June 12, 2020July 2, 2020 by Matt Williams

Ideas for Sustainable Cities and Urban Farming… on Mars?

“The core essence of Mars City Design is —not to repeat the same mistakes that we did to our planet. The hope to start a new design for living on Mars, every single thing needs to have a sustainable answer within the big picture, of the regenerative circle of life and of the product itself. All things need an exit plan that allows them to be reusable or repurposed. That can hopefully inspire change on Earth.”

-Vera Mulyani (Vera Mars), Founder/CEO Mars City Design

Once the stuff of science fiction, the possibility that humans could establish a permanent settlement on Mars now appears to be a genuine possibility. While doing so represents a major challenge and there are many hurdles that still need to be overcome, the challenge itself is inspiring some truly creative solutions. But what is especially interesting is how these same solutions can also address problems here on Earth.

This is especially clear where the Mars City Design Challenges are concerned. This annual competition was founded with the purpose of inspiring innovative ideas that could lead to sustainable living on Mars. For this year’s challenge, “Urban Farming for Extreme Environment,” Mars City Design and its founder (Vera Mulyani) are looking for designs that incorporate urban farming to support a colony of 100 people.

June 12, 2020June 12, 2020 by Evan Gough

Early Life Was Pumping Out Oxygen, But the Earth’s Mantle Was Absorbing it

The Earth straddling the limb of the Moon, as seen from above Compton crater on the lunar farside, taken by the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter spacecraft. Credit: NASA/GSFC/Arizona State University.

About 2.4 billion years ago, everything changed for Earth. That was the time of the Great Oxidation Event (GOE), when photosynthetic bacteria flooded the atmosphere with oxygen, banishing early, non-oxygen using lifeforms to the fringes of the Earth. The GOE laid the groundwork for the Earth we see today, dominated by complex, oxygen-breathing lifeforms.

But there’s one detail about the timing of the GOE that has scientists stumped. Photosynthetic bacteria were pumping out oxygen long before the actual GOE; hundreds of millions of years before, in fact.

Where did all the oxygen go?

June 11, 2020June 11, 2020 by Matt Williams

Once Starship Prototypes are Done Exploding, we could see an Orbital Launch this Year

SpaceX has had a lot of ups and downs lately. On Saturday, May 30th, the company made history when their Crew Dragon spacecraft took off from the NASA Kennedy Space Center, carrying two astronauts to space. But just a day before, SpaceX engineers and ground crews watched their fourth Starship prototype (SN4) explode on its testbed during a static fire test, making it the fourth prototype in a row to be lost.

But according to recent news from a SpaceX engineer and executive, as well as an internal email from Elon Musk to SpaceX employees, it is clear that the company is all-in with the Starship prototype and could conduct an orbital flight before the end of the year. An ambitious goal, but you don’t get to be the head of a company that makes reusability a thing and restores domestic launch capability to US soil by being a pessimist!

June 11, 2020June 11, 2020 by Evan Gough

Titan is Drifting Away from Saturn Surprisingly Quickly

Titan in front of Saturn. Image Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/Space Science Institute

Where did Saturn’s bizarro-moon Titan form? Did it form where it is now, or has it migrated? We have decades of data to look back on, so scientists should have some idea.

A new study based on all that data says that Titan is drifting away from Saturn more quickly than thought, and that has implications for where the moon initially formed.

June 11, 2020June 11, 2020 by Brian Koberlein

Neutron Stars Could Have a Layer of Exotic Quark Matter Inside Them

Illustration of a quark core in a neutron star. Credit: Jyrki Hokkanen, CSC - IT Center for Science

Neutron stars are strange things. They can form when gravity kills a star, crushing its remains into a dense ball the size of a small city. They are so dense that only quantum forces and the Pauli exclusion principle keeps it from collapsing into a black hole singularity. The interior of a neutron star is so dense that matter behaves in ways we still don’t fully understand.

June 11, 2020June 11, 2020 by Evan Gough

It Should Be Easiest to Search for Young Earth-like Planets When They’re Completely Covered in Magma

Artist's impression of magma ocean planet. Credit: Mark Garlick

How did Earth evolve from an ocean of magma to the vibrant, life-supporting, blue jewel it is now? In its early years, the Earth was a blistering hot ball of magma. Now, 4.5 billion years later, it’s barely recognizable.

Is it possible to find exoplanets out there in the vast expanse, which are young molten globes much like young Earth was? How many of them can we expect to find? Where will we find them?

June 9, 2020June 9, 2020 by Evan Gough

Hubble Photo of Globular Cluster NGC 6441, One of the Most Massive in the Milky Way

NGC 6441 is one of the most luminous and massive globular clusters in the Milky Way. It also hosts fours pulsars. Image Credit: ESA/Hubble & NASA, G. Piotto

The Hubble Space Telescope has delivered another outstanding image. This one is of NGC 6441, a massive globular cluster in the constellation Scorpius. It’s one of the most massive ones in the Milky Way, and the stars in it have a combined mass of 1.6 million solar masses.