Universe Today

June 28, 2019June 28, 2019 by Fraser Cain

Earth To Mars In 100 Days? The Power Of Nuclear Rockets

Artist's concept of a Bimodal Nuclear Thermal Rocket in Low Earth Orbit. Credit: NASA

The Solar System is a really big place, and it takes forever to travel from world to world with traditional chemical rockets. But one technique, developed back in the 1960s might provide a way to dramatically shorten our travel times: nuclear rockets.

June 28, 2019June 28, 2019 by Evan Gough

NASA is Going Back to Saturn’s Moon Titan, this Time With a Nuclear Battery-Powered Quadcopter

An illustration of NASA's Dragonfly rotorcraft on Titan. Image Credit: NASA

The official announcement has been made. NASA is sending the Dragonfly, its rotary-winged flying robot, to Titan. We’ll have to control our excitement for a while, though. The launch date isn’t until 2026.

June 27, 2019June 28, 2019 by Matt Williams

French Scientists Claim to Have Created Metallic Hydrogen

Using two diamonds, scientists squeezed hydrogen to pressures above those in Earth's core. Credit: Sang-Heon Shim, Arizona State University

Scientists have long speculated that at the heart of a gas giant, the laws of material physics undergo some radical changes. In these kinds of extreme pressure environments, hydrogen gas is compressed to the point that it actually becomes a metal. For years, scientists have been looking for a way to create metallic hydrogen synthetically because of the endless applications it would offer.

At present, the only known way to do this is to compress hydrogen atoms using a diamond anvil until they change their state. And after decades of attempts (and 80 years since it was first theorized), a team of French scientists may have finally created metallic hydrogen in a laboratory setting. While there is plenty of skepticism, there are many in scientific community who believe this latest claim could be true.

June 27, 2019June 27, 2019 by Evan Gough

Eruption of the Raikoke Volcano, Seen From Space

The Raikoke Volcano erupting on June 22nd, as imaged by NASA astronauts on the ISS. Image Credit: NASA

The Raikoke Volcano, dormant for a very long time, has awoken from its slumber. The volcanic island is in the Kuril Island chain, near the Kamchatka Peninsula in Russia. Unlike its more volcanically active neighbours, Raikoke has been dormant since 1924.

Thanks to astronauts on the International Space Station, we have gorgeous photos of the eruption.

June 27, 2019June 27, 2019 by David Dickinson

Our Complete Guide to the July 2019 Total Solar Eclipse

This image combines many exposures of different durations taken to reveal aspects of the widely-viewed total solar eclipse of 21 August 2017, which was visible from the United States. In the centre the faint circle of the Moon can be seen, with its surface features dimly illuminated in light reflected from the Earth. Around the edge red prominences can be seen and further out the white glow of the corona is sculpted by the Sun's magnetic field.

You couldn’t order up a geekier solar eclipse from the cosmos. Next Tuesday on July 2^nd, the second of three eclipse seasons begins for 2019, with the only total solar eclipse of the year spanning the southern tip of South America, including the nations of Chile and Argentina. As an extra-special part of the spectacle, however, the path of totality for the eclipse passes right over the La Silla observatory complex in the Atacama Desert.

June 26, 2019June 26, 2019 by Matt Williams

The Most Efficient Way to Explore the Entire Milky Way, Star by Star

Modelling galactic settlement. Credit: ESA/ACT

It seems like the stuff of dreams, the idea that humanity will one day venture beyond the Solar System and become an interstellar species. Who knows? Given enough time and the right technology (and assuming there’s not some serious competition), we might even be able to colonize the entire Milky Way galaxy someday. And while this seems like a far-off prospect at best, it makes sense to contemplate what a process like this would entail.

That’s what a think tank from the ESA’s Advanced Concepts Team (ACT) managed to do recently. As part of the tenth annual Global Trajectory Optimization Competition (GOTC X), they created a simulation that showed how humanity could optimally colonize the Milky Way. This was in keeping with the competition’s theme of “Settlers of the Galaxy“, which challenged teams to find the most energy-efficient way of settling as many star systems as possible.

June 26, 2019June 26, 2019 by Evan Gough

SpaceIL Scraps its Plans to go Back to the Moon. Instead, it’s Got a New Secret “Significant Objective” for Beresheet 2

Mystery. Secrecy. A Need-To-Know Basis. These are the hallmarks of science. Wait a minute: no they’re not. So what’s with all the mysterious secret objective talk from SpaceIL about Beresheet2?

June 26, 2019June 26, 2019 by Evan Gough

Lakes on Titan Might Have Exotic Crystals Encrusted Around Their Shores

This true-color image of Titan, taken by the Cassini spacecraft, shows the moon's thick, hazy atmosphere. Image: By NASA - http://photojournal.jpl.nasa.gov/catalog/PIA14602, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=44822294 — This true-color image of Titan, taken by the Cassini spacecraft, shows the moon's thick, hazy atmosphere. Credit: NASA

Titan is a mysterious, strange place for human eyes. It’s a frigid world, with seas of liquid hydrocarbons, and a structure made up of layers of water, different kinds of ice, and a core of hydrous silicates. It may even have cryovolcanoes. Adding to the odd nature of Saturn’s largest moon is the presence of exotic crystals on the shores of its hydrocarbon lakes.

June 26, 2019June 26, 2019 by Evan Gough

Hubble Finds Buckyballs in Space

For the first time, NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope has detected little spheres of carbon, called buckyballs, in a galaxy beyond our Milky Way galaxy. The space balls were detected in a dying star, called a planetary nebula, within the nearby galaxy, the Small Magellanic Cloud. What's more, huge quantities were found -- the equivalent in mass to 15 of our moons. An infrared photo of the Small Magellanic Cloud taken by Spitzer is shown here in this artist's illustration, with two callouts. The middle callout shows a magnified view of an example of a planetary nebula, and the right callout shows an even further magnified depiction of buckyballs, which consist of 60 carbon atoms arranged like soccer balls. In July 2010, astronomers reported using Spitzer to find the first confirmed proof of buckyballs. Since then, Spitzer has detected the molecules again in our own galaxy -- as well as in the Small Magellanic Cloud. Image Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech

Scientists working with the Hubble Space Telescope have found a very complex molecule out there in space. Called Buckyballs, after renowned thinker Buckminster Fuller, they are a molecular arrangement of 60 carbon atoms (C60) in the rough shape of a soccer ball. Though it’s not the first time these exotic molecules have been spotted in space, it is the first time that Buckyball ions have been found.

June 25, 2019June 25, 2019 by Matt Williams

Of Course Mars 2020 is Going to Get a New Name. NASA is Looking for Judges for an Upcoming Naming Contest

This artist's concept depicts NASA's Mars 2020 rover exploring Mars. Credit: NASA

A little over a year from now, NASA’s Mars 2020 rover will launch for Cape Canaveral and begin its journey to the Red Planet. When it arrives, in February 2021, it will begin exploring the Jezero Crater to learn more about Mars’ past and search for evidence of past and present life. But before that happens, this robotic explorer still needs a proper name.

Like its predecessors, Spirit, Opportunity, and Curiosity, the Mars 2020 rover will get its official name with the help of a nationwide contest. Towards this end, NASA recently announced that it has partnered with two organizations to give K-12 students all across the US a chance to name the rover that will continue in the search for life and pave the way for humans to begin exploring Mars.