Space news topic and space related news

Started by Tsanten Eywa 'eveng, September 23, 2011, 03:31:21 PM

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`Eylan Ayfalulukanä

Going after 46P/Wirtanen this evening as part of a public astronomy program. It's my understanding its faded quite a bit.

Yawey ngahu!
pamrel si ro [email protected]

Toliman

Yeah, brightness already quite decrease however it's still nice comet through telescope :)

Toliman

Interesting exoplanets ;D

Sapphires and Rubies in the Sky

Researchers at the Universities of Zurich and Cambridge have discovered a new, exotic class of planets outside our solar system. These so-called super-Earths were formed at high temperatures close to their host star and contain high quantities of calcium, aluminium and their oxides - including sapphire and ruby.

21 light years away from us in the constellation Cassiopeia, a planet orbits its star with a year that is just three days long. Its name is HD219134 b. With a mass almost five times that of Earth it is a so-called "super-Earth". Unlike the Earth however, it most likely does not have a massive core of iron, but is rich in calcium and aluminium. "Perhaps it shimmers red to blue like rubies and sapphires, because these gemstones are aluminium oxides which are common on the exoplanet," says Caroline Dorn, astrophysicist at the Institute for Computational Science of the University of Zurich. HD219134 b is one of three candidates likely to belong to a new, exotic class of exoplanets, as Caroline Dorn and her colleagues at the Universities of Zurich and Cambridge now report in the British journal MNRAS.

The researchers study the formation of planets using theoretical models and compare their results with data from observations. It is known that during their formation, stars such as the Sun were surrounded by a disc of gas and dust in which planets were born. Rocky planets like the Earth were formed out of the solid bodies leftover when the proto-planetary gas disc dispersed. These building blocks condensed out of the nebula gas as the disc cooled. "Normally, these building blocks are formed in regions where rock-forming elements such as iron, magnesium and silicon have condensed," explains Dorn who is associated to the NCCR PlanetS. The resulting planets have an Earth-like composition with an iron core. Most of the super-Earths known so far have been formed in such regions. ...
...

https://www.ast.cam.ac.uk/content/sapphires.and.rubies.sky

Vawmataw

In a world first, China lands a spacecraft gently on the Moon's far side

This evening, China became the first nation to land a spacecraft gently on the far side of the Moon, according to China Global Television Network America. A Chinese robotic lander and rover, which launched from China in early December, descended into a crater on the side of the Moon that's always facing away from Earth. The touchdown marks a significant technological feat for the country, and puts China in an elite category of spaceflight achievement all its own.

The landing is part of China's Chang'e-4 mission — one of a series of planned missions to explore the lunar surface. Prior to this program, China sent a lander and a rover to the Moon, making it the third country to ever softly land on the lunar surface. That lander, part of the Chang'e-3 mission, went to the Moon's near side, the one we see at all times.

https://www.theverge.com/2019/1/2/18165807/china-change-4-mission-lunar-lander-rover-moon-farside
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Toliman

Great :) Moon's far side really deserve more detailed exploration!

Vawmataw

#1925
Our universe has antimatter partner on the other side of the Big Bang, say physicists

Our universe could be the mirror image of an antimatter universe extending backwards in time before the Big Bang. So claim physicists in Canada, who have devised a new cosmological model positing the existence of an "antiuniverse" which, paired to our own, preserves a fundamental rule of physics called CPT symmetry. The researchers still need to work out many details of their theory, but they say it naturally explains the existence of dark matter.

https://physicsworld.com/a/our-universe-has-antimatter-partner-on-the-other-side-of-the-big-bang-say-physicists/

This reminds me our discussion about antisingularity on Discord. ;D
Fmawn Ta 'Rrta - News IN NA'VI ONLY (Discord)
Traducteur francophone de Kelutral.org, dict-navi et Reykunyu

Toliman

Eltur tìtxen si :) Interesting theory! I heard something similar already earlier.

Quote from: Vawmataw on January 03, 2019, 08:32:11 PM
This reminds me our discussion about antisingularity on Discord. ;D
Yeah ;D ;D

Toliman

How it's seen by TESS...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BxO1-gX1Xgs

This is an animation of one piece of the first sector of data from NASA's TESS space telescope. TESS takes an image of the same region of sky every 30 minutes for a month (one sector) to study the stars and search for exoplanets. It then moves on to a new sector and new stars. Halfway through each sector, the spacecraft pauses data collection to turn and send data back to Earth.

This video focuses on one of TESS's 16 CCDs.



https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=76xguUB6yE4

This is an animation of the first sector of data from NASA's TESS space telescope. TESS takes an image of the same region of sky every 30 minutes for a month (one sector) to study the stars and search for exoplanets. It then moves on to a new sector and new stars. Halfway through each sector, the spacecraft pauses data collection to turn and send data back to Earth.

Light from Mars leaking into the field of view causes artifacts in Camera 1 at the beginning and end of the sector.

Vawmataw

How To Dial 911 From Space
Used to dialing 9 to call out when you're at work? So are astronauts.

But that pesky, extra digit tripped up Dutch astronaut André Kuipers, when he accidentally called 911 from the International Space Station.

The astronaut was trying to dial an international number, he told Dutch public broadcaster Nederlandse Omroep Stichting, when he erred. Floating inside the space station, he made a mistake many people make in regular gravity — he missed a number.

https://www.npr.org/2019/01/04/682247286/how-to-dial-911-from-space
Fmawn Ta 'Rrta - News IN NA'VI ONLY (Discord)
Traducteur francophone de Kelutral.org, dict-navi et Reykunyu

Toliman


archaic

Quote from: Vawmataw on January 03, 2019, 08:32:11 PM
Our universe has antimatter partner on the other side of the Big Bang, say physicists

Our universe could be the mirror image of an antimatter universe extending backwards in time before the Big Bang. So claim physicists in Canada, who have devised a new cosmological model positing the existence of an "antiuniverse" which, paired to our own, preserves a fundamental rule of physics called CPT symmetry. The researchers still need to work out many details of their theory, but they say it naturally explains the existence of dark matter.

https://physicsworld.com/a/our-universe-has-antimatter-partner-on-the-other-side-of-the-big-bang-say-physicists/

This reminds me our discussion about antisingularity on Discord. ;D
Deffo not new.
I was wondering about this way back in the late eighties/early nineties.
Pasha, an Avatar story, my most recent fanfic, Avatar related, now complete.

The Dragon Affair my last fanfic, non Avatar related.

Toliman

Faint Glow Within Galaxy Clusters Illuminates Dark Matter

A new look at Hubble images of galaxies could be a step toward illuminating the elusive nature of dark matter, the unobservable material that makes up the majority of the universe, according to a study published online today in the Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society.

Utilizing Hubble's past observations of six massive galaxy clusters in the Frontier Fields program, astronomers demonstrated that intracluster light — the diffuse glow between galaxies in a cluster — traces the path of dark matter, illuminating its distribution more accurately than existing methods that observe X-ray light.

Intracluster light is the byproduct of interactions between galaxies that disrupt their structures; in the chaos, individual stars are thrown free of their gravitational moorings in their home galaxy to realign themselves with the gravity map of the overall cluster. This is also where the vast majority of dark matter resides. X-ray light indicates where groups of galaxies are colliding, but not the underlying structure of the cluster. This makes it a less precise tracer of dark matter.

"The reason that intracluster light is such an excellent tracer of dark matter in a galaxy cluster is that both the dark matter and these stars forming the intracluster light are free-floating on the gravitational potential of the cluster itself — so they are following exactly the same gravity," said Mireia Montes of the University of New South Wales in Sydney, Australia, who is co-author of the study. "We have found a new way to see the location where the dark matter should be, because you are tracing exactly the same gravitational potential. We can illuminate, with a very faint glow, the position of dark matter."

Montes also highlights that not only is the method accurate, but it is more efficient in that it utilizes only deep imaging, rather than the more complex, time-intensive techniques of spectroscopy. This means more clusters and objects in space can be studied in less time — meaning more potential evidence of what dark matter consists of and how it behaves.

"This method puts us in the position to characterize, in a statistical way, the ultimate nature of dark matter," Montes said.


https://www.nasa.gov/image-feature/goddard/2018/faint-glow-within-galaxy-clusters-illuminates-dark-matter



Toliman

Wide Field Camera 3 Anomaly on Hubble Space Telescope

At 17:23 UTC on Jan. 8, the Wide Field Camera 3 on the Hubble Space Telescope suspended operations due to a hardware problem. Hubble will continue to perform science observations with its other three active instruments, while the Wide Field Camera 3 anomaly is investigated. Wide Field Camera 3, installed during Servicing Mission 4 in 2009, is equipped with redundant electronics should they be needed to recover the instrument.

https://www.nasa.gov/feature/goddard/2019/wide-field-camera-3-anomaly-on-hubble-space-telescope

Toliman

What 100,000 Star Factories in 74 Galaxies Tell Us about Star Formation across the Universe

Galaxies come in a wide variety of shapes and sizes. Some of the most significant differences among galaxies, however, relate to where and how they form new stars. Compelling research to explain these differences has been elusive, but that is about to change. The Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA) is conducting an unprecedented survey of nearby disk galaxies to study their stellar nurseries. With it, astronomers are beginning to unravel the complex and as-yet poorly understood relationship between star-forming clouds and their host galaxies.

A vast, new research project with ALMA, known as PHANGS-ALMA (Physics at High Angular Resolution in Nearby GalaxieS), delves into this question with far greater power and precision than ever before by measuring the demographics and characteristics of a staggering 100,000 individual stellar nurseries spread throughout 74 galaxies.

PHANGS-ALMA, an unprecedented and ongoing research campaign, has already amassed a total of 750 hours of observations and given astronomers a much clearer understanding of how the cycle of star formation changes, depending on the size, age, and internal dynamics of each individual galaxy. This campaign is ten- to one-hundred-times more powerful (depending on your parameters) than any prior survey of its kind.

"Some galaxies are furiously bursting with new stars while others have long ago used up most of their fuel for star formation. The origin of this diversity may very likely lie in the properties of the stellar nurseries themselves," said Erik Rosolowsky, an astronomer at the University of Alberta in Canada and a co-Principal Investigator of the PHANGS-ALMA research team.

https://www.almaobservatory.org/en/press-release/what-100000-star-factories-in-74-galaxies-tell-us-about-star-formation-across-the-universe/





Toliman

NASA's Hubble Helps Astronomers Uncover the Brightest Quasar in the Early Universe

Less than a billion years after the big bang, a monster black hole began devouring anything within its gravitational grasp. This triggered a firestorm of star formation around the black hole. A galaxy was being born. A blowtorch of energy, equivalent to the light from 600 trillion Suns, blazed across the universe. Now, 12.8 billion years later, the Hubble Space Telescope captured the beacon from this event. But Hubble astronomers needed help to spot it. The gravitational warping of space by a comparatively nearby intervening galaxy greatly amplified and distorted the quasar's light, making it the brightest such object seen in the early universe. It offers a rare opportunity to study a zoomed-in image of how supermassive black holes accompanied star formation in the very early universe and influenced the assembly of galaxies.

http://hubblesite.org/news_release/news/2019-03

Toliman

Quote from: Toliman on January 09, 2019, 10:19:55 AM
It works again now :)

Hubble's Wide Field Camera 3 Recovered and Collecting Science

The Hubble Space Telescope's Wide Field Camera 3 was brought back to full operational status and completed its first science observations just after noon EST today, Jan. 17. The instrument autonomously shut down on Jan. 8 after internal data erroneously indicated invalid voltage levels.

The Wide Field Camera 3 was installed on Hubble in May 2009 during the last servicing mission. It has taken over 240,000 observations to date and is the most used instrument of Hubble's current complement.

https://www.nasa.gov/feature/goddard/2019/wide-field-camera-3-anomaly-on-hubble-space-telescope


Toliman

Retreating snow line reveals organic molecules around young star

Astronomers using ALMA have detected various complex organic molecules around the young star V883 Ori. A sudden outburst from this star is releasing molecules from the icy compounds in the planet forming disk. The chemical composition of the disk is similar to that of comets in the modern Solar System. Sensitive ALMA observations enable astronomers to reconstruct the evolution of organic molecules from the birth of the Solar System to the objects we see today.

The research team led by Jeong-Eun Lee (Kyung Hee University, Korea) used the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA) to detect complex organic molecules including methanol (CH3OH), acetone (CH3COCH3), acetaldehyde (CH3CHO), methyl formate (CH3OCHO), and acetonitrile (CH3CN). This is the first time that acetone was unambiguously detected in a planet forming region or protoplanetary disk.

Various molecules are frozen in ice around micrometer-sized dust particles in protoplanetary disks. V883 Ori's sudden flare-up is heating the disk and sublimating the ice, which releases the molecules into gas. The region in a disk where the temperature reaches the sublimation temperature of the molecules is called the "snow line." The radii of snow lines are about a few astronomical units (au) around normal young stars, however, they are enlarged almost 10 times around bursting stars.

https://www.almaobservatory.org/en/press-release/retreating-snow-line-reveals-organic-molecules-around-young-star/

Toliman

NASA's Record-Setting Opportunity Rover Mission on Mars Comes to End

One of the most successful and enduring feats of interplanetary exploration, NASA's Opportunity rover mission is at an end after almost 15 years exploring the surface of Mars and helping lay the groundwork for NASA's return to the Red Planet.

The Opportunity rover stopped communicating with Earth when a severe Mars-wide dust storm blanketed its location in June 2018. After more than a thousand commands to restore contact, engineers in the Space Flight Operations Facility at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) made their last attempt to revive Opportunity Tuesday, to no avail. The solar-powered rover's final communication was received June 10.

"It is because of trailblazing missions such as Opportunity that there will come a day when our brave astronauts walk on the surface of Mars," said NASA Administrator Jim Bridenstine. "And when that day arrives, some portion of that first footprint will be owned by the men and women of Opportunity, and a little rover that defied the odds and did so much in the name of exploration."

Designed to last just 90 Martian days and travel 1,100 yards (1,000 meters), Opportunity vastly surpassed all expectations in its endurance, scientific value and longevity. In addition to exceeding its life expectancy by 60 times, the rover traveled more than 28 miles (45 kilometers) by the time it reached its most appropriate final resting spot on Mars – Perseverance Valley.

"For more than a decade, Opportunity has been an icon in the field of planetary exploration, teaching us about Mars' ancient past as a wet, potentially habitable planet, and revealing uncharted Martian landscapes," said Thomas Zurbuchen, associate administrator for NASA's Science Mission Directorate. "Whatever loss we feel now must be tempered with the knowledge that the legacy of Opportunity continues – both on the surface of Mars with the Curiosity rover and InSight lander – and in the clean rooms of JPL, where the upcoming Mars 2020 rover is taking shape."

The final transmission, sent via the 70-meter Mars Station antenna at NASA's Goldstone Deep Space Complex in California, ended a multifaceted, eight-month recovery strategy in an attempt to compel the rover to communicate.


https://www.nasa.gov/press-release/nasas-record-setting-opportunity-rover-mission-on-mars-comes-to-end

Vawmataw

Did You Know the Earth's Atmosphere Extends Beyond the Orbit of the Moon?

Strictly speaking, there aren't strict boundaries between Earth and space. Our atmosphere doesn't just end at a certain altitude; it peters out gradually. A new study from Russia's Space Research Institute (SRI) shows that our atmosphere extends out to 630,000 km into space.

The lead author of this study is Igor Baliukin. a researcher at Russia's SRI, Department of Planets, Physics, and Solar System Small Bodies. Jean-Loup Bertaux, of LATMOS at Université de Versailles-Saint-Quentin-en-Yvelines, France was also involved in the study. The study used archival data from SOHO (Solar and Heliospheric Observatory) to find the gaseous extension of Earth's atmosphere.
https://www.universetoday.com/141560/did-you-know-the-earths-atmosphere-extends-beyond-the-orbit-of-the-moon/
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Toliman

There were any problems on HST but seems that now all work well again.

Advanced Camera for Surveys Anomaly on Hubble Space Telescope
http://hubblesite.org/news_release/news/2019-21

Hubble's Advanced Camera for Surveys Resumes Operations
http://hubblesite.org/news_release/news/2019-23