Universe Today
Are Jupiter's Spots Disappearing?
Jupiter's stormy surface could be settling down, according to calculations by UC Berkeley physicist Philip Marcus. According to Marcus, Jupiter's temperature and the number of storms on its surface are directly connected. As the number of vortices decrease, its temperature should go up by about 10-degrees Celsius - warmer near the equator and cooler near the poles. This cycle seems to repeat itself about every 70 years. But don't worry; the Great Red Spot isn't going anywhere.
Continue reading
Satellites Show How the Earth is Warming Up
NASA satellites have been used to create an 18-year record of temperatures on the Earth's surface, and not surprisingly, they're going up. So far, the data shows that global average temperatures are going up approximately 0.43 Celsius/decade; by comparison, ground station data only shows a rise of 0.34 C. This is an average, though, so different regions of the Earth are seeing greater or lesser temperature increases. These new readings should help scientists make better predictions about the future of the Earth's environment.
Continue reading
Gravity Probe B Launches
A special NASA spacecraft designed to test two aspects of Einstein's General Theory of Relativity, Gravity Probe B, lifted off Tuesday from Vandenberg Air Force Base on board a Boeing Delta II rocket. The spacecraft was inserted into a perfectly circular polar orbit, and operators will begin calibrating its instruments over the next 60-days. If everything checks out, the spacecraft will begin making precise measurements about the effect of the Earth's gravity for 12 months - analysis of the data will take a further year.
Continue reading
Chandra Reveals a Supernova's Power
The latest image released from the Chandra X-Ray Observatory shows the monstrous power of a supernova. The image is of SNR 0540-69.3, a remnant of a supernova that blew up 160,000 light-years away. The centre of the image is the rapidly rotating neutron star, which spins 20 times/second, and generates the same amount of energy as 30,000 Suns. The supernova is believed to have exploded within a cloud of gas, so this created a super hot shell of material that surrounds the object, which blazes in the X-ray spectrum.
Continue reading
NASA Turns Down Year Long Stays in the Station
Martian Dust Devils Could Be Charged Up
By chasing dust devils across the desert with a specially equipped truck, scientists have discovered that on Earth at least, they can generate a high-voltage electric field. This has implications for future exploration on Mars since much larger dust devils crisscross the surface of the Red Planet. This situation happens because the dust particles in the mini-twister rub together and become charged; the negative particles are carried high into the air while the positive particles stay lower down. Future robotic missions to Mars will hope to measure the strength and danger these electric devils might pose down the road.
Continue reading
Bounce Rock's Mystery Ends
"It figures that if there was only one rock for what seems like miles in every direction, we'd find a way to hit it," said Steven Squyres, the principal investigator for the Mars Exploration Rover mission. He was describing an unusual object, later called "Bounce Rock" that Spirit bounced off of during its airbag landing. Scientists were split over whether this unusual object was a rock at all - they thought it could have been a piece of Spirit's landing equipment, or maybe even a meteorite. But when Spirit finally analyzed it up close, the case was closed: it's a rock that was probably blasted out of an impact crater 50 km away.
Continue reading
Two Space Celebrations this Week
A Movie of Titan's Hazy Atmosphere
Astronomers have used the enormous Keck telescope to capture several images of the hydrocarbon haze of Titan, Saturn's largest moon, and piece them together into a short movie. These observations will help scientists make sense of the data that the Huygens probe sends back as it descends through Titan's unusual atmosphere in early 2005 and hopefully survives to land on its surface. Titan is interesting because its atmosphere is very similar to conditions that probably existed early on Earth.
Continue reading
Meteorite Matches Rock on Mars
NASA has reported this week that a rock analyzed by Spirit bears a resemblance to a meteorite found in Antarctica. The meteorite is called EETA79001, and it's known to be from Mars because of gases preserved in glassy material match the chemical composition of the Martian atmosphere. The basalt lava rock "Bounce", recently analyzed by Spirit, has a very similar composition to EETA79001. They have different amounts of a chemical called pyroxene, so they didn't come from the same impact event, but probably formed in a similar fashion on Mars.
Continue reading
Gravitational Lens Reveals Distant Planet
Astronomers have watched how the gravity of a star bends the light from a more distant star to discover a Jupiter-sized planet orbiting it. The technique is called gravitational microlensing, and in this case, the astronomers carefully measured the brightness of a star 17,000 light-years away which was focusing the light from a star located 24,000 light-years away. They realized that there was a regular pattern of brightening and dimming which meant there were two objects working together to focus the light. Further calculations indicated that it was a planet with approximately the mass of Jupiter making the fluctuations.
Continue reading
Atlas Launches Superbird-6
An Atlas 2AS rocket launched from Florida's Cape Canaveral on Friday morning, carrying a Japanese Superbird-6 communications satellite into orbit. The rocket lifted off at 0045 UTC (8:45 pm EDT, April 15), and the satellite was released into its transfer orbit 30 minutes later. Superbird-6 will provide video and data services across much of the Asia-Pacific region. Atlas 2AS rockets will only launch two more times before the vehicle is retired.
Continue reading
Scientists Analyze Meteor Fragments
Researchers from the University of Chicago are analyzing hundreds of meteorite fragments that struck Park Forest, Ill. in the evening of March 26, 2003. Witnesses in several states saw the tremendous fireball when it struck last year, and volunteers eventually collected 30 kg of fragments; some that crashed through the roofs of their houses. It's believed that the original meteor weighed 900 kg when it exploded in the sky. The heavier pieces fell nearly straight down, and the lighter pieces were carried downwind a bit to create a huge swath of fragments.
Continue reading
Cassini Sees Shepherding Moons
NASA's Cassini spacecraft is now close enough to Saturn that it's able to resolve the two F-ring-shepherding moons: Prometheus and Pandora. Prometheus is 102 km across, and Pandora is 84 km across, and they interact with Saturn's outermost ring causing clumps and other unusual formations. They have very chaotic orbits, which can change unpredictably when they get close to each other. The moons were originally discovered by Voyager 1 in 1980, and follow-up observations have been made by the Hubble Space Telescope.
Continue reading
New Planet Hunter Gets to Work
Astronomers will have a powerful new tool for finding extrasolar planets on Friday, when SuperWASP, a new observatory in the Canary Islands, begins operations. SuperWASP has an extremely wide field of view (2000 times larger than a regular telescope) and is able to measure the brightness of hundreds of thousands of stars. It will take enormous surveys of the sky every night, which astronomers will process with a computer. They'll be looking for stars which dim slightly on a regular basis, which would indicate planets passing in front.
Continue reading
Magnesium Could Be a Source of Fuel on Mars
One of the problems of sending humans to Mars will be how to let them explore the surface of the planet without having to carry tons of fuel from Earth. Fortunately, there's a potential source of fuel right on the surface of the planet: magnesium. Researchers from the University of Michigan have performed zero-gravity experiments that demonstrated that magnesium will burn perfectly well in a carbon dioxide atmosphere as long as you use iodine catalyst. It works even better in microgravity - Mars has 1/3rd the gravity of Earth.
Continue reading
Fourth Public Hearing on Space Exploration
Christian Huygen's 375th Birthday
Dutch astronomer Christian Huygens was born on April 14, 1629; exactly 375 years ago. He was an influential astronomer who improved on Galileo's original telescope design by developing new techniques to grind and polish lenses. With his improved telescope, Huygens was able to resolve the rings of Saturn better than anyone at the time, and realize their true shape as rings. He also discovered Titan, Saturn's largest moon. He died in 1695.
Continue reading
Hubble Looks at Sedna
After the announcement of Sedna last month, the solar system's furthest object, astronomers have had the opportunity to look at it better with the Hubble Space Telescope. Sedna's discoverer, Mike Brown from Caltech, was sure it also had a moon, but these new observations didn't turn anything up. This is unusual because Sedna's rotation takes 20 days instead of a few hours like most other asteroids - usually it's a moon that slows down an object's rotation. Based on Hubble's observations, astronomers believe Sedna is no larger than 1,770 km across (3/4 the size of Pluto).
Continue reading
Best Image Ever Taken of Titan's Surface
The European Southern Observatory has released the most detailed images ever taken of the surface of Titan, Saturn's largest moon. The images were taken using a new instrument called the Simultaneous Differential Imager (SDI), which was originally designed to help image extrasolar planets. The images show a number of surface regions with different reflectivity, including several dark areas with very low reflectivity, which could be huge reservoirs of liquid hydrocarbons. Scientists will get a better look when the Huygens probe arrives in early 2005.
Continue reading
What's Next for the Rovers?
With the announcement that the twin Mars Exploration Rovers have had their missions extended, scientists and engineers have big plans for the robots. The extended mission for Spirit will see the rover make the journey to the distant Columbia Hills. Opportunity will make a similarly long series of drives to reach Endurance Crater and then to some unusual "etched terrain" further to the South. One short term goal will be for the rovers to calibrate the dusty Martian skies by pointing their panoramic cameras up while overhead satellites look down.
Continue reading
Desert Soil Will Teach How to Search for Life on Mars
Techniques that helped sequence the human genome over the last decade could help researchers prove, once and for all, if life ever existed on Mars. Researchers from UC Berkeley have sampled the dry, irradiated soil in Chile's Atacama Desert, which could be a similar situation on Mars, and used techniques that study DNA to search for evidence of amino acids. An instrument that uses this technique, called the Mars Organic Analyzer, could be built into future rovers. It was able to detect the presence of life in the Atacama soil - we'll see if it'll work on Mars.
Continue reading
Spitzer Reveals Hidden Massive Stars
The latest image released from the Spitzer Space Telescope shows an incredible stellar nursery which is so enshrouded in dust that no visible light escapes it. This region, called DR21, is a nest of giant newborn stars located about 10,000 light-years away in the Cygnus constellation of our Milky Way galaxy. Previous observations in visible and radio wavelengths indicated that something hidden was producing incredibly powerful jets of material, but nothing more was known until now.
Continue reading
Book Review: Moon Observer's Guide
The Moon is definitely not made of cheese, though viewing it can be much more rewarding than nibbling on cheese. Its many unique features with descriptors like rilles, craterlets, and wrinkles give a certain closeness to our nearest satellite. The "Moon Observer's Guide", by Peter Grego defines these, pinpoints where they occur on the Moon's surface and then adds the familial names for easy reference. You might want to bring cheese when viewing the Moon at night but also bring this book as it certainly will guide you.
Continue reading
8.4 Metre Mirror Installed on Huge Binoculars
The first of two 8.4 metre mirrors has been installed into the Large Binocular Telescope, which will become one of the world's most powerful telescopes. The 16 tonne mirror made the 240 km journey from Tucson, Arizona to the top of Mount Graham. Technicians are now testing the mirror support system hardware and software. Once the second mirror is installed, the combined light-gathering power will make the LBT the equivalent of an 11.8 metre telescope - it should be able to produce images 10 times sharper than the Hubble Space Telescope.
Continue reading
Humans on Mars by 2011?
Rover Mission Extended
NASA has extended the mission for its Mars Exploration Rovers, Spirit and Opportunity, after Spirit met the success criteria for its mission. It spent a total of 90 days roaming the surface of Mars, and traveled a total distance of 600 metres. Opportunity will achieve its successful mission on April 26. This extension includes an additional $15 million in funding to keep operating the rovers until September. Even though the mission has been approved until then, the rovers could last much longer on the surface of Mars.
Continue reading
New Asteroid Impact Simulator Available
Scientists from the University of Arizona have developed a handy calculator that you can use to determine your fate in the event of an asteroid impact. This tool takes into account not only the size of the asteroid and its composition, but what it slams into. It calculates the blast, depth of ejecta, and the force of the air blast at a distance from ground zero. Now you can see if you'll be safe from the devastation of an asteroid strike, or if you'll need to hop in your car and drive... far.
Continue reading
Question: Are There Plans to Deal With a Potential Asteroid Strike?
Are there any contigencies currently in place to stop an asteroid from hitting if say one was detected to hit within days, weeks, months, years? - Damien Igoe, Alice Springs, Australia
Continue reading
Wallpaper: Louros Valles
Here's a beautiful 1024x768 desktop wallpaper of a series of sapping channels on Mars called Louros Valles. On the right side of the image is the Ius Chasma canyon, which has dark deposits at the bottom that could be related to wind and water erosion (North is to the right in this image). The image was taken by the European Space Agency's Mars Express spacecraft at an altitude of 269 kilometres during its 97th orbit.
Continue reading
Field Reversal Takes 7,000 Years
Scientists have known for a long time now that the Earth's magnetic field unexpectedly reverses polarity over long periods of time, but how often this happens was still a mystery. Brad Clement, a geologist funded by the National Science Foundation, has concluded that the reversal seems to happen every 7,000 years, on average. He gathered this data by analyzing deep-ocean sediment cores. One surprise is that the variation seems to alter with latitude - the directional change takes half as long at low-latitude sites as it does at mid- to high-latitude sites.
Continue reading
Cassini Sees Merging Storms on Saturn
NASA's Cassini spacecraft continues its approach to Saturn, and its latest images show incredible detail of two storms in the act of merging. The storms were both at least 1,000 km wide, and they were moving westward across the surface of the planet, relative to its rotation. After about a month of dancing, the storms actually merged on March 19-20, and the new storm now sits almost stationary on the surface of the planet. Saturn is the windiest planet in the Solar System, and the reason for these winds is one of the mysteries that scientists hope to solve with Cassini.
Continue reading
Hubble Peers Into the Heart of Galaxy NGC 300
The Hubble Space Telescope has been focused to peer deep into the heart of nearby galaxy NGC 300, and revealed the stars as individual points of light; even though it's 6.5 million light-years away. Hubble's Advanced Camera for Surveys has resolved the galaxy 10 times better than ground-based telescopes, which can only see the brightest individual stars.
Continue reading
Book Review: Practical Astronomy
The book, "Practical Astronomy", by Storm Dunlop, is a wonderful beginner's guide that brings order to the multitude of light sources in the night sky. In easy to understand descriptions and photographs you can learn to identify zodiacal lights, emission nebulae and of course the major constellations. This is an easy to use, easy to carry reference to help plan for and get the most out of your evening's sky watching.
Continue reading
Aura Satellite Delivered to Launch Facility
NASA's Aura satellite - the latest in a series of Earth observing spacecraft - arrived at Vandenberg Air Force Base this week to be prepared for its June launch. Aura has four instruments which will study the chemistry and dynamics of the Earth's atmosphere to provide scientists with data about ozone levels, air quality and climate change. Aura will undergo final tests and then be mated to the top of its Boeing Delta II rocket.
Continue reading
Outer Planets Could Warm Up as Sun Dies
The Sun is heating up, and in 4 billion years from now it will swell up to become a red giant - Earth and the rest of the inner planets will be destroyed. But the deadly conditions that destroy the Earth will mean warmer temperatures in the outer Solar System, possibly supporting life. The region from Saturn to Pluto will warm up to the point that frozen water will melt on moons and planets. Scientists think the best chances for life will be found on Pluto and its moon Charon as well as Neptune's moon Triton because they're rich in organic chemicals.
Continue reading
Genesis Prepares to Return to Earth
NASA ordered the Genesis spacecraft to close up its particle collectors this week, to prepare its sample-return capsule to enter the Earth's atmosphere. Over the last three years, Genesis has been collecting particles blown by the Sun on a special array made from exotic materials. This material should give scientists detailed information about the composition of the Sun. Genesis will release its capsule on September 8, 2004, and helicopter pilots will snag it in mid-air with giant hooks.
Continue reading
Milky Way is a Dangerous, Turbulent Place
After 15 years of observation, over the course of more than 1,000 nights, a European team of astronomers has collected the most thorough survey of our local stellar neighborhood. The team performed an analysis of more than 14,000 stars to calculate their distance, age, chemical analysis, velocity and orbit around the Milky Way. Each star was measured 4 times over the course of this period. It turns out that the motion of stars through the Milky Way is much more chaotic and turbulent than previously thought.
Continue reading
Asteroid Search Looks South
Most of the asteroid sky surveys have been carried out in the Northern Hemisphere, but astronomers from the University of Arizona have taken the hunt down under. They're using a refurbished telescope at the Australian National University's Siding Spring Observatory. The new survey is funded by NASA's Near Earth Asteroid Survey, that hopes to locate 90% of the spacerocks larger than 1 kilometre, which have the potential to cause severe devastation if they strike the Earth.
Continue reading
SOHO Has Seen 750 Comets
On March 22, 2004, the ESA/NASA SOHO solar observatory spacecraft observed its 750th comet since its launch in late 1995. SOHO has a special instrument that blocks out the glare of the Sun, and allows it to see comets that graze the Sun. Amateur astronomers from around the world analyze the photographs taken by SOHO, which are published on the Internet - more than 75% of the discoveries have been made by amateurs. This one was discovered by Sebastian H?nig from Germany.
Continue reading
Chandra Sees Titan's X-Ray Shadow
The Chandra X-Ray Observatory captured a rare event in January when Saturn's moon, Titan, passed in front of the Crab Nebula. The large moon was illuminated by the X-rays from the nebula, so it cast a shadow. This allowed astronomers to measure its atmosphere in the X-ray spectrum to be about 880 kilometres thick. This might be the first transit of Titan over the Crab Nebula since it was formed from a supernova explosion in 1054.
Continue reading
Two Directions for Sample Return Mission
Since it was awarded a contract to study the feasibility of return samples of Mars back Earth, EADS Space has come up with two different directions. The first is to launch the sample ascent vehicle from the surface of Mars and dock with the return vehicle in space. In the second design, the ascent vehicle would reach orbit and then eject the samples for the return vehicle to "catch". How the samples are returned to Earth will make a big difference on the mission's cost, mass and complexity.
Continue reading
SpaceDev Wins Its Largest Satellite Contract
SpaceDev announced on Thursday that it has won a $43 million contract to build micro satellites for the Missile Defense Agency (MDA). The four-phase, five-year contract will see SpaceDev build a micro satellite distributed sensing experiment (three to six microsats), and an option for a laser communications experiment. SpaceDev launched its first and only satellite, CHIPSat, just over a year ago.
Continue reading
Astronauts Hear Mystery Sound Again
Andromeda's Carnage
An international team of astronomers have mapped a sizable region of space around the Andromeda Galaxy (M31) and have found the wreckage of many galaxies, torn apart by its massive gravity. One stream of stars has been found stretching back 50,000 to a satellite galaxy which is in the process of being consumed. They also found 14 globular star clusters floating far from Andromeda's centre; the remnants of destroyed galaxies. By studying these galactic fossils, astronomers can better understand the evolution of Andromeda.
Continue reading
Milky Way's Centre Measured
Radio astronomers have successfully measured an object that surrounds the supermassive black hole at the heart of our Milky Way galaxy. The centre of our galaxy lies 26,000 light-years from Earth, but it's normally obscured by gas and dust, so visible light telescopes can't see it. By focusing on the object, called Sagittarius A, with high radio wavelengths, the astronomers were determine that its size is as about the same as the orbit of the Earth around the Sun. The supermassive black hole at the centre is likely the size of the orbit of Mercury, but it contains 4 million solar masses.
Continue reading
Spirit Finds Hints of Past Martian Water
NASA's Spirit Rover has found a rock that seems to have been acted on by water in the past. The rock is called "Mazatzal", and lies partially buried near the rim of the Crater Bonneville; its light-toned appearance caught the eye of NASA scientists. Spirit used its rock abrasion tool to grind under the surface, and found a darker interior with a bright stripe that cut across both layers. This seems to indicate a fracture that water flowed through. More data about the rock is being transferred back to Earth while Spirit drives to Columbia Hills, located 2.3 kilometres away.
Continue reading
Gravity Probe B Launch in Two Weeks
The Gravity Probe B spacecraft, which is designed to test two predictions of Einstein's General Theory of Relativity, has been scheduled to launch on April 17. The spacecraft will use four precise gyroscopes to determine how space and time are distorted by the gravity of the Earth and its rotation. The spacecraft will orbit the Earth once every 90 minutes, and gather data for more than a year, comparing any drift in its gyroscopes to the position of a guide star.
Continue reading
Wallpaper: Getting Closer to Saturn
Here's the latest desktop wallpaper of Saturn (1024x768), taken by Cassini when it was 56.4 million kilometres from Saturn. The resolution is about 25% better than its last full image, taken a month ago, and you can see fine details, like spots in the atmosphere. Three of Saturn's moons are also visible in this image: Mimas, Dione, and Enceladus. Cassini will arrive at Saturn this summer.
Continue reading