Featured Posts
Riding with Robots on the High Frontier
18 Jun 2013, 17:15 UTC
I’m sure better animations will appear online, but here’s a quick-and-dirty look at the motion of Saturn’s north polar vortex–as seen just last Friday by the robotic spacecraft Cassini. The eye is about 50 times larger than an Earthly hurricane. Learn more.
The Storm!
18 Jun 2013, 17:15 UTC
I’m sure better animations will appear online, but here’s a quick-and-dirty look at the motion of Saturn’s north polar vortex–as seen just last Friday by the robotic spacecraft Cassini. The eye is about 50 times larger than an Earthly hurricane. Learn more.
The Daily Galaxy
18 Jun 2013, 16:02 UTC
Building a terrestrial planet requires raw materials that weren't available in the early history of the universe. The Big Bang filled space with hydrogen and helium. Chemical elements like silicon and oxygen - key components of rocks - had to be cooked up over time by stars. But how long did that take? How many of such heavy elements do you need to form planets? Studies have shown that Jupiter-sized gas giants tend to form around stars containing more heavy elements than the Sun. However, research by a team of astronomers completed last year found that planets smaller than Neptune are located around a wide variety of stars, including those with fewer heavy elements than the Sun. As a result, rocky worlds like Earth could have formed earlier than expected in the universe's history. "This work suggests that terrestrial worlds could form at almost any time in our galaxy's history," said Smithsonian astronomer David Latham (Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics). "You don't need many earlier generations of stars." Latham played a lead role in the study, which was led by Lars A. Buchhave from the University of Copenhagen published in the journal Nature. Astronomers call chemical elements heavier than hydrogen and ...
"Planets Billions of Years Older Than Earth May Exist in the Milky Way" (A June Featured Post)
18 Jun 2013, 16:02 UTC
Building a terrestrial planet requires raw materials that weren't available in the early history of the universe. The Big Bang filled space with hydrogen and helium. Chemical elements like silicon and oxygen - key components of rocks - had to be cooked up over time by stars. But how long did that take? How many of such heavy elements do you need to form planets? Studies have shown that Jupiter-sized gas giants tend to form around stars containing more heavy elements than the Sun. However, research by a team of astronomers completed last year found that planets smaller than Neptune are located around a wide variety of stars, including those with fewer heavy elements than the Sun. As a result, rocky worlds like Earth could have formed earlier than expected in the universe's history. "This work suggests that terrestrial worlds could form at almost any time in our galaxy's history," said Smithsonian astronomer David Latham (Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics). "You don't need many earlier generations of stars." Latham played a lead role in the study, which was led by Lars A. Buchhave from the University of Copenhagen published in the journal Nature. Astronomers call chemical elements heavier than hydrogen and ...
Universe Today
18 Jun 2013, 14:57 UTC
As Uranus speeds in its orbit in the solar system, there are three large space rocks that are in lockstep with the gas giant, according to new simulations. Two of them are wobbling in unstable “horseshoe” orbits near Uranus, while the third is in a more reliable Trojan orbit that is always 60 degrees in [...] Image Credit: Lawrence Sromovsky, (Univ. Wisconsin-Madison), Keck Observatory As Uranus speeds in its orbit in the solar system, there are three large space rocks that are in lockstep with the gas giant, according to new simulations. Two of them are wobbling in unstable “horseshoe” orbits near Uranus, while the third is in a more reliable Trojan orbit that is always 60 degrees in front of the planet. The largest of this small group is the asteroid Crantor, which is 44 miles (70 kilometers) wide. Its horseshoe orbit, and that of companion 2010 EU65, means the space rocks seesaw between being close to Uranus and further away. They should stay in that configuration for a few million years. The last of the group is 2011 QF99, in a Trojan orbit near one of Uranus’ Lagrangian points — sort of like a celestial parking spot where ...
Uranus Is Being Chased By Asteroids!
18 Jun 2013, 14:57 UTC
As Uranus speeds in its orbit in the solar system, there are three large space rocks that are in lockstep with the gas giant, according to new simulations. Two of them are wobbling in unstable “horseshoe” orbits near Uranus, while the third is in a more reliable Trojan orbit that is always 60 degrees in [...] Image Credit: Lawrence Sromovsky, (Univ. Wisconsin-Madison), Keck Observatory As Uranus speeds in its orbit in the solar system, there are three large space rocks that are in lockstep with the gas giant, according to new simulations. Two of them are wobbling in unstable “horseshoe” orbits near Uranus, while the third is in a more reliable Trojan orbit that is always 60 degrees in front of the planet. The largest of this small group is the asteroid Crantor, which is 44 miles (70 kilometers) wide. Its horseshoe orbit, and that of companion 2010 EU65, means the space rocks seesaw between being close to Uranus and further away. They should stay in that configuration for a few million years. The last of the group is 2011 QF99, in a Trojan orbit near one of Uranus’ Lagrangian points — sort of like a celestial parking spot where ...
collectSPACE.com: Today In Space History
18 Jun 2013, 14:25 UTC
NASA's 2013 class of astronaut candidates, or "ascans" for short, were all very excited to be selected from the more than 6,000 applications received to be the space agency's 21st group of astronaut trainees. At least one of the eight new ascans admitted to letting out a scream at the news, as did her mom. Beyond their being chosen though, the candidates said they were excited by the opportunity to contribute to exploration.
Astronaut 'I scream'
18 Jun 2013, 14:25 UTC
NASA's 2013 class of astronaut candidates, or "ascans" for short, were all very excited to be selected from the more than 6,000 applications received to be the space agency's 21st group of astronaut trainees. At least one of the eight new ascans admitted to letting out a scream at the news, as did her mom. Beyond their being chosen though, the candidates said they were excited by the opportunity to contribute to exploration.
Centauri Dreams
18 Jun 2013, 13:08 UTC
I’m a coffee fanatic. Not only do I drink a lot of the stuff, but I roast my own beans and love fiddling with roasting times and fan speeds, trying to hit exactly the right note. And with a just-brewed carafe of Burundi by my side this morning, it’s natural enough that I would be drawn to an exoplanet tool called ESPRESSO. Echelle SPectrograph or Rocky Exoplanet and Stable Spectroscopic Observations is the next generation spectrograph for the European Southern Observatory’s Very Large Telescope, which has already played such a huge role in finding distant worlds. Using the HARPS spectrograph, the VLT already holds the record for most exoplanet discoveries from equipment on the ground. Upgraded with ESPRESSO, the VLT should be primed for even more fine-tuned radial velocity measurements. HARPS was designed to get us down to about the 1 m/s level, although its effective precision is considerably tighter. But we’re still not in range of Earth-like planets in the habitable zone. The Earth creates a radial velocity variation of 9 cm/s on the Sun, about three times smaller than HARPS can work with. ESPRESSO makes up the difference, taking us down to a few cm/s if all goes ...
Exoplanet Targets in Nearby Space
18 Jun 2013, 13:08 UTC
I’m a coffee fanatic. Not only do I drink a lot of the stuff, but I roast my own beans and love fiddling with roasting times and fan speeds, trying to hit exactly the right note. And with a just-brewed carafe of Burundi by my side this morning, it’s natural enough that I would be drawn to an exoplanet tool called ESPRESSO. Echelle SPectrograph or Rocky Exoplanet and Stable Spectroscopic Observations is the next generation spectrograph for the European Southern Observatory’s Very Large Telescope, which has already played such a huge role in finding distant worlds. Using the HARPS spectrograph, the VLT already holds the record for most exoplanet discoveries from equipment on the ground. Upgraded with ESPRESSO, the VLT should be primed for even more fine-tuned radial velocity measurements. HARPS was designed to get us down to about the 1 m/s level, although its effective precision is considerably tighter. But we’re still not in range of Earth-like planets in the habitable zone. The Earth creates a radial velocity variation of 9 cm/s on the Sun, about three times smaller than HARPS can work with. ESPRESSO makes up the difference, taking us down to a few cm/s if all goes ...
AmericaSpace
18 Jun 2013, 13:00 UTC
NASA is currently working to prepare the A-1 Test Stand at the space agency’s Stennis Space Center in Mississippi for testing the RS-25 rocket engine seen in the inset. Photo Credit: NASA (Inset Alan Walters / AmericaSpace) In the latter half of 2014 NASA plans to launch the first of its Orion spacecraft and [...]
Test Stand Readied to Test RS-25 Rocket Engine for SLS
18 Jun 2013, 13:00 UTC
NASA is currently working to prepare the A-1 Test Stand at the space agency’s Stennis Space Center in Mississippi for testing the RS-25 rocket engine seen in the inset. Photo Credit: NASA (Inset Alan Walters / AmericaSpace) In the latter half of 2014 NASA plans to launch the first of its Orion spacecraft and [...]
Skymania News
18 Jun 2013, 12:02 UTC
I don't want to sound alarmist but according to some, I might just have helped spark an alien invasion. For yesterday I was part of the first sustained attempt to message the stars. The day I messaged an alien star system is a post from: Skymania News and Guide The post The day I messaged an alien star system appeared first on Skymania News. [[ This is a content summary only. Visit my website for full links, other content, and more! ]]
The day I messaged an alien star system
18 Jun 2013, 12:02 UTC
I don't want to sound alarmist but according to some, I might just have helped spark an alien invasion. For yesterday I was part of the first sustained attempt to message the stars. The day I messaged an alien star system is a post from: Skymania News and Guide The post The day I messaged an alien star system appeared first on Skymania News. [[ This is a content summary only. Visit my website for full links, other content, and more! ]]
