Monday, July 21, 2014

Hubble Sees Evidence of Water Vapor at Jupiter Moon

Hubble Sees Evidence of Water Vapor at Jupiter Moon:

This is an artist's concept of a plume of water vapor thought to be ejected off the frigid, icy surface of the Jovian moon Europa
This is an artist's concept of a plume of water vapor thought to be ejected off the frigid, icy surface of the Jovian moon Europa, located about 500 million miles (800 million kilometers) from the sun. Image credit: NASA/ESA/K. Retherford/SWRI
› Full image and caption


December 12, 2013

NASA's Hubble Space Telescope has observed water vapor above the frigid south polar region of Jupiter's moon Europa, providing the first strong evidence of water plumes erupting off the moon's surface.


Previous scientific findings from other sources already point to the existence of an ocean located under Europa's icy crust. Researchers are not yet fully certain whether the detected water vapor is generated by erupting water plumes on the surface, but they are confident this is the most likely explanation.


Should further observations support the finding, this would make Europa the second moon in the solar system known to have water vapor plumes. The findings are being published in the Dec. 12 online issue of Science Express, and reported at the meeting of the American Geophysical Union in San Francisco.


"By far the simplest explanation for this water vapor is that it erupted from plumes on the surface of Europa," said lead author Lorenz Roth of Southwest Research Institute in San Antonio. "If those plumes are connected with the subsurface water ocean we are confident exists under Europa's crust, then this means that future investigations can directly investigate the chemical makeup of Europa's potentially habitable environment without drilling through layers of ice. And that is tremendously exciting."


In 2005, NASA's Cassini orbiter detected jets of water vapor and dust spewing off the surface of Saturn's moon Enceladus. Although ice and dust particles have subsequently been found in the Enceladus plumes, only water vapor gases have been measured at Europa so far.


Hubble spectroscopic observations provided the evidence for Europa plumes in December 2012. Time sampling of Europa's auroral emissions measured by Hubble's imaging spectrograph enabled the researchers to distinguish between features created by charged particles from Jupiter's magnetic bubble and plumes from Europa's surface, and also to rule out more exotic explanations such as serendipitously observing a rare meteorite impact.


The imaging spectrograph detected faint ultraviolet light from an aurora, powered by Jupiter's intense magnetic field, near the moon's south pole. Excited atomic oxygen and hydrogen produce a variable auroral glow and leave a telltale sign that are the products of water molecules being broken apart by electrons along magnetic field lines.


"We pushed Hubble to its limits to see this very faint emission. These could be stealth plumes, because they might be tenuous and difficult to observe in the visible light," said Joachim Saur of the University of Cologne, Germany. Saur, who is principal investigator of the Hubble observation campaign, co-wrote the paper with Roth.


Roth suggested that long cracks on Europa's surface, known as lineae, might be venting water vapor into space. Cassini has seen similar fissures that host the Enceladus jets.


Also the Hubble team found that the intensity of the Europa plumes, like those at Enceladus, varies with Europa's orbital position. Active jets have only been seen when the moon is farthest from Jupiter. The researchers could not detect any sign of venting when Europa is closer to Jupiter.


One explanation for the variability is that these lineae experience more stress as gravitational tidal forces push and pull on the moon and open vents at larger distances from Jupiter. The vents are narrowed or closed when the moon is closest to the gas-giant planet.


"The apparent plume variability supports a key prediction that Europa should tidally flex by a significant amount if it has a subsurface ocean," said Kurt Retherford, also of Southwest Research Institute.


The Europa and Enceladus plumes have remarkably similar abundances of water vapor. Because Europa has a roughly 12 times stronger gravitational pull than Enceladus, the minus-40-degree-Fahrenheit (minus-40-degree-Celsius) vapor for the most part doesn't escape into space as it does at Enceladus, but rather falls back onto the surface after reaching an altitude of 125 miles (201 kilometers), according to the Hubble measurements. This could leave bright surface features near the moon's south polar region, the researchers hypothesize.


"If confirmed, this new observation once again shows the power of the Hubble Space Telescope to explore and opens a new chapter in our search for potentially habitable environments in our solar system," said John Grunsfeld, an astronaut who participated Hubble servicing missions and now serves as NASA's associate administrator for science in Washington. "The effort and risk we took to upgrade and repair Hubble becomes all the more worthwhile when we learn about exciting discoveries like this one from Europa."


The Hubble Space Telescope is a project of international cooperation between NASA and the European Space Agency. NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center manages the telescope. The Space Telescope Science Institute (STScI) conducts Hubble science operations. STScI is operated for NASA by the Association of Universities for Research in Astronomy, Inc., in Washington, D.C.


To view the images of the evidence for plumes visit: http://www.nasa.gov/content/goddard/hubble-europa-water-vapor .
For more information about the Hubble Space Telescope, visit: http://www.nasa.gov/hubble .

Jia-Rui C. Cook 818-354-0850

Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif.

jccook@jpl.nasa.gov


Rob Gutro 301-286-4044

Goddard Space Flight Center

robert.j.gutro@nasa.gov


Dwayne Brown/J.D. Harrington

Headquarters, Washington

202-358-1726/202-358-5241

dwayne.c.brown@nasa.gov, j.d.harrington@nasa.gov


Joe Fohn

Southwest Research Institute, San Antonio

210-522-4630

jfohn@swri.org


2013-363
Posted by Nelio Inacio at 5:03 PM 0 comments

Chemical Surprise Found in Crab Nebula

Chemical Surprise Found in Crab Nebula:

This image shows a composite view of the Crab nebula, an iconic supernova remnant in our Milky Way galaxy, as viewed by the Herschel Space Observatory and the Hubble Space Telescope
This image shows a composite view of the Crab nebula, an iconic supernova remnant in our Milky Way galaxy, as viewed by the Herschel Space Observatory and the Hubble Space Telescope. Image credit: ESA/Herschel/PACS/MESS Key Programme Supernova Remnant Team; NASA, ESA and Allison Loll/Jeff Hester (Arizona State University)
› Full image and caption


December 12, 2013

Astronomers have discovered a rare chemical pairing in the remains of an exploded star, called the Crab nebula. A gas thought to be a loner has made a "friend," linking up with a chemical partner to form a molecule. The discovery, made with the Herschel space observatory, a European Space Agency mission with important NASA contributions, will help scientists better understand supernovas, the violent deaths of massive stars.


The unexpected find involves a noble gas called Argon, named for its chemical aloofness after the Greek word for "inactive." Noble gases, which also include helium and neon among others, rarely engage in chemical reactions. They prefer to go it alone.


A new study, led by Michael Barlow from University College London, United Kingdom, and based on spectral data from Herschel, has found the first evidence of such a noble gas-based compound in space, a molecule called argon hydride. The results are published in the journal Science.


"The strange thing is that it is the harsh conditions in a supernova remnant that seem to be responsible for some of the argon finding a partner with hydrogen," said Paul Goldsmith of NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif.


"This is not only the first detection of a noble-gas based molecule in space, but also a new perspective on the Crab nebula. Herschel has directly measured the argon isotope we expect to be produced via explosive nucleosynthesis in a core-collapse supernova, refining our understanding of the origin of this supernova remnant," concludes Göran Pilbratt, Herschel project scientist at the European Space Agency.


Read the full ESA news release at:

http://sci.esa.int/herschel/53332-herschel-spies-active-argon-in-crab-nebula/ .


Herschel is a European Space Agency mission, with science instruments provided by consortia of European institutes and with important participation by NASA. NASA's Herschel Project Office is based at JPL. JPL contributed mission-enabling technology for two of Herschel's three science instruments. The NASA Herschel Science Center, part of the Infrared Processing and Analysis Center at the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena, supports the United States astronomical community. Caltech manages JPL for NASA.


More information is online at http://www.herschel.caltech.edu , http://www.nasa.gov/herschel and http://www.esa.int/SPECIALS/Herschel .

Whitney Clavin 818-354-4673

Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif.

whitney.clavin@jpl.nasa.gov


2013-365
Posted by Nelio Inacio at 5:02 PM 0 comments

Surprise Picture for WISE's Fourth Anniversary

Surprise Picture for WISE's Fourth Anniversary:

March of Asteroids Across Dying Star
A dying star, called the Helix nebula, is shown surrounded by the tracks of asteroids in an image captured by NASA's Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer, or WISE. Image credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/UCLA
› Full image and caption

December 12, 2013

In an unexpected juxtaposition of cosmic objects that are actually quite far from each other, a newly released image from NASA's Wide-Field Infrared Survey Explorer (WISE) shows a dying star, called the Helix nebula, surrounded by the tracks of asteroids. The nebula is far outside our solar system, while the asteroid tracks are inside our solar system.


The portrait, discovered by chance in a search for asteroids, comes at a time when the mission's team is celebrating its fourth launch anniversary -- and new lease on life. In August, NASA decided to bring WISE out of hibernation to search for more asteroids. The mission was rechristened NEOWISE, formerly the name of the asteroid-hunting portion of WISE.


"I was recently looking for asteroids in images collected in 2010, and this picture jumped out at me," said Amy Mainzer, the NEOWISE principal investigator at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif. "I recognized the Helix nebula right away."


WISE launched into the morning skies above Vandenberg Air Force Base in central California on Dec. 14, 2009. By early 2011, it had finished scanning the entire sky twice in infrared light, snapping pictures of nearly one billion objects, including remote galaxies, stars and asteroids. Upon completing its main goals, WISE was put to sleep. Now, engineers are bringing the spacecraft out of slumber, as it cools back down to the chilly temperatures required for infrared observations. The spacecraft no longer has onboard coolant, but two of its infrared channels still work and can be used for asteroid hunting.


"WISE is the spacecraft that keeps on giving," said Ned Wright of UCLA, the principal investigator of WISE before it transitioned into NEOWISE.


In the Helix nebula image, infrared wavelengths of light have been assigned different colors, with longer wavelengths being red, and shorter, blue. The bluish-green and red materials are expelled remnants of what was once a star similar to our sun. As the star aged, it puffed up and its outer layers sloughed off. The burnt-out core of the star, called a white dwarf, is heating the expelled material, inducing it to glow with infrared light. Over time, the brilliant object, known as a planetary nebula, will fade away, leaving just the white dwarf.


Skirting around the edges of the Helix nebula are the footprints of asteroids marching across the field of view. Each set of yellow dots is a series of pictures of an asteroid. As the asteroid moved, WISE snapped several pictures, all of which are represented in this view. Scientists use these data to discover and characterize asteroids, including those that pass relatively close to Earth, called near-Earth asteroids. Infrared data are particularly useful for finding the smaller, darker asteroids that are more difficult to see with visible light, and for measuring the asteroids' sizes.


The other streaks in the picture are Earth-orbiting satellites and cosmic rays.


JPL manages and operates NEOWISE for NASA's Science Mission Directorate. The WISE mission was selected competitively under NASA's Explorers Program managed by the agency's Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Md. The science instrument was built by the Space Dynamics Laboratory in Logan, Utah. The spacecraft was built by Ball Aerospace & Technologies Corp. in Boulder, Colo. Science operations and data processing take place at the Infrared Processing and Analysis Center at the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena. Caltech manages JPL for NASA. More information is online at http://neowise.ipac.caltech.edu, http://www.nasa.gov/wise and http://wise.astro.ucla.edu .

Whitney Clavin 818-354-4673

Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif.

whitney.clavin@jpl.nasa.gov


2013-366
Posted by Nelio Inacio at 5:02 PM 0 comments

New Animals on Display at Spitzer's Citizen Science Zoo

New Animals on Display at Spitzer's Citizen Science Zoo:

A screen shot from the Milky Way Project illustrates how users are asked to catalog objects in our galaxy.
A screen shot from the Milky Way Project illustrates how users are asked to catalog objects in our galaxy. Image credit: Zooniverse
› Larger image


December 16, 2013

Since 2010, about 50,000 volunteers have taken to their computers to help astronomers catalog star-blown bubbles captured in images from NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope. Their efforts resulted in several scientific papers, and a deeper understanding of our Milky Way galaxy and its frothy star-forming clouds.


Now, an updated version of the campaign, called the Milky Way Project, is releasing more images with a whole new set of "animals" to track in the cosmic zoo. Volunteers are asked to catalog a host of objects, including towering pillars of dust, bow shocks rammed into cosmic dust by speeding stars and even other galaxies hiding behind dust.


"Spitzer has made a hugely detailed survey of our galaxy so expansive you can't take it all in at once," said Robert Hurt, an imaging specialist at NASA's Spitzer Science Center at the California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, Calif. "This project guarantees that every pixel will be seen by many people. No corner will go unexplored."


The Milky Way Project is part of the Zooniverse group, a collection of online citizen science activities. The idea is to recruit volunteers from all walks of life, all over the world, to help tackle big science problems, and learn something in the process.


The Spitzer images were taken as part of the mission's GLIMPSE project, which stands for Galactic Legacy Infrared Mid-Plane Survey Extraordinaire. GLIMPSE and its follow-up surveys have mapped out a strip of sky all around us, covering most of our Milky Way galaxy. Spitzer's infrared vision allows it to cut through the dust, unveiling cosmic creatures that remain unseen in visible-light views.


If you'd like to join the cosmic safari, visit: http://www.milkywayproject.org .


NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif., manages the Spitzer Space Telescope mission for NASA's Science Mission Directorate, Washington. Science operations are conducted at the Spitzer Science Center at Caltech. Spacecraft operations are based at Lockheed Martin Space Systems Company, Littleton, Colo. Data are archived at the Infrared Science Archive housed at the Infrared Processing and Analysis Center at Caltech. Caltech manages JPL for NASA. For more information about Spitzer, visit http://spitzer.caltech.edu and http://www.nasa.gov/spitzer .

Whitney Clavin 818-354-4673

Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif.

whitney.clavin@jpl.nasa.gov


2013-368
Posted by Nelio Inacio at 5:02 PM 0 comments

Dawn Creates Guide to Vesta's Hidden Attractions

Dawn Creates Guide to Vesta's Hidden Attractions:

Flowing in, Flowing out of Aelia
This colorful composite image from NASA's Dawn mission shows the flow of material inside and outside a crater called Aelia on the giant asteroid Vesta. The area is around 14 degrees south latitude. The images that went into this composite were obtained by Dawn's framing camera from September to October 2011. Image credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/UCLAMPS/DLR/IDA
› Full image and caption


December 16, 2013

Some beauty is revealed only at a second glance. When viewed with the human eye, the giant asteroid Vesta, which was the object of scrutiny by the Dawn spacecraft from 2011 to 2012, is quite unspectacular color-wise. Vesta looks grayish, pitted by a variety of large and small craters.


But scientists at the Max Planck Institute for Solar System Research in Katlenburg-Lindau, Germany, have re-analyzed the images of this giant asteroid obtained by Dawn's framing camera. They assigned colors to different wavelengths of light and, in the process, revealed in unprecedented detail not only geological structures that are invisible to the naked eye, but also landscapes of incomparable beauty.


Researchers at Max Planck can now see structures such as melts from impacts, craters buried by quakes and foreign material brought by space rocks, visible with a resolution of 200 feet (60 meters) per pixel.


"The key to these images is the seven color filters of the camera system on board the spacecraft," said Andreas Nathues, the framing camera team lead at Max Planck. Since different minerals reflect light of different wavelengths to different degrees, the filters help reveal compositional differences that remain hidden without them. In addition, scientists calibrated the data so that the finest variations in brightness can be seen.


In the new colorized images, different colors indicate different materials on the surface of Vesta. They reveal impressive formations and a wide range of geological diversity, said Nathues. But above all, the color-coded images are impressive because of their beauty.


"No artist could paint something like that. Only nature can do this," said Martin Hoffman, a member of the framing camera team also at Max Planck. Pictures of the crater Aelia, the crater Antonia and an area near the crater Sextilia show some of Vesta's most impressive sites.


Dawn visited Vesta from July 2011 to September 2012. The spacecraft is currently on its way to its second destination, the dwarf planet Ceres. Ceres is the largest object in the main asteroid belt between Mars and Jupiter.


The Dawn mission to Vesta and Ceres is managed by NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, a division of the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena, for NASA's Science Mission Directorate, Washington. UCLA is responsible for overall Dawn mission science. The Dawn framing cameras were developed and built under the leadership of the Max Planck Institute for Solar System Research, Katlenburg-Lindau, Germany, with significant contributions by DLR German Aerospace Center, Institute of Planetary Research, Berlin, and in coordination with the Institute of Computer and Communication Network Engineering, Braunschweig. The framing camera project is funded by the Max Planck Society, DLR and NASA.


More information on Dawn is available at: http://www.nasa.gov/dawn and http://dawn.jpl.nasa.gov .

Jia-Rui Cook 818-354-0850

Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif.

jccook@jpl.nasa.gov


Birgit Krummheuer +49 5556-979-462

Max Planck Institute for Solar System Research, Katlenburg-Lindau, Germany

presse@mps.mpg.de


2013-367
Posted by Nelio Inacio at 5:01 PM 0 comments

NASA's Deep Space Network Turns 50

NASA's Deep Space Network Turns 50:

Dawn in the Apollo Valley
Beam Wave Guide antennas at Goldstone, known as the "Beam Waveguide Cluster." Each antenna is 111.5-feet (34-m) in diameter. They're located in an area at Goldstone called "Apollo Valley." This photograph was taken on Jan. 11, 2012. Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech › Full image and caption


December 18, 2013

NASA's Deep Space Network, the world's largest and most powerful communications system for "talking to" spacecraft, will reach a milestone on Dec. 24: the 50th anniversary of its official creation.


Over the past 50 years, antennas of the Deep Space Network (DSN) have communicated with just about every mission that has gone to the moon or beyond. The historic communiqués include "That's one small step for man. One giant leap for mankind"; numerous encounters with the outer planets of our solar system; images taken by rovers exploring Mars; and the data confirming that NASA's Voyager spacecraft had finally entered interstellar space.


The Deep Space Network has been so critical to so many missions over the decades, the network's team members like to use the phrase "Don't leave Earth without us."


From the very beginning of NASA's space program, it was clear that a simple, direct way to communicate with missions in deep space would be needed. For example, what is the purpose of sending a spacecraft to Mars if we can't receive data, images and other vital information from that spacecraft?


More information about the Deep Space Network is online at:

http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/dsn50/


What is now known as the Deep Space Network first existed as just a few small antennas called the Deep Space Instrumentation Facility. The facility was originally operated by the U.S. Army in the 1950s and then later moved over to the jurisdiction of the newly created National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA).


On December 24, 1963, the Deep Space Instrumentation Facility officially morphed into the Deep Space Network and quickly became the de facto network for any planned missions into deep space. Three antenna complexes were established around the globe, spread out at roughly 120 degrees of longitude so that even as Earth rotated, spacecraft would always be above the horizon of at least one complex. While some of the communication facilities have moved over the decades, today the three complexes, which operate 24/7/365, are located in Canberra, Australia; Madrid, Spain; and Goldstone, Calif.


Space agencies in Europe, Japan and Russia have all relied on the Deep Space Network when planning and communicating with their own missions over the decades. The Deep Space Network has been used recently by India's first interplanetary probe, the Mars Orbiter Mission (MOM).


"Today, the DSN supports a fleet of more than 30 U.S. and international robotic space missions," said DSN Project Manager Al Bhanji of NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif., which manages the Deep Space Network. "Without the DSN, we would never have been able to undertake voyages to Mercury and Venus, visit asteroids and comets, we'd never have seen the stunning images of robots on Mars, or close-up views of the majestic rings of Saturn."


In addition to allowing missions to upload and download data to and from dozens of spacecraft, the network helps navigators pinpoint spots for landings and conduct burns that place spacecraft into orbit around other planets, or fine-tune their trajectory. Currently, the list of spacecraft supported by the DSN includes NASA's Curiosity rover on Mars, the Spitzer Space Telescope, the Saturn explorer Cassini and the two Voyager spacecraft, which are more than 9.6 billion miles (15.5 billion kilometers) away from Earth.


The Deep Space Network is also instrumental in carrying out its own science investigations. For instance, the 230-foot (70-meter) antenna at Goldstone is capable of using its radar to "ping" the near-Earth asteroids to determine a highly accurate position and velocity, and scientists are then able to calculate trajectories the asteroids will take over the next 100 years or more. This is crucial for tracking asteroids that could potentially cause damage were they to impact Earth. If the asteroid is close enough, they can also use the radar to "image" the objects to determine its size, shape and rotation.


Additionally, by combining signals from the DSN antennas with other radio telescopes in an appropriate manner, one can create a "synthetic telescope" that's able to peer into the cores of active galaxies halfway across the observable universe. Likewise, the DSN can be used to probe interiors of planets in our own galaxy, study the solar wind and study gravitational physics.


The future of the Deep Space Network looks bright, with optical communications on the horizon to augment the traditional RF-technology (radio waves moving at the speed of light). Optical communications, when operational, will provide a dramatic increase in data return from science missions; the potential bandwidth carried by an optical communications laser beam is far greater than with traditional radio frequencies. In fact, the DSN team envisions the day, not so far off, when, in addition to returning photos of robotic wheel tracks in the dusty surface of Mars, they will be streaming video to a wide-eyed public as the first humans leave their own footprints on its surface.


"In 2063, when we celebrate the Deep Space Network's 100th anniversary, we can imagine that we might be recalling the amazing days when our antennas streamed high-res video as the first humans stepped onto the surface of Mars," said Al Bhanji. "Or that day when we discovered a new living 'Earth' orbiting a distant star."


Of course, no one knows if or when that day might come. But the DSN will likely play a paramount role in breaking the "Earth-shattering" news.


JPL, a division of the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena, manages the Deep Space Network for NASA.


More information about NASA's Space Communications and Navigation program is at:


http://www.spacecomm.nasa.gov

David Israel 818-354-4797

Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif.

david.israel@jpl.nasa.gov


Joshua Buck 202-358-1100

NASA Headquarters, Washington

jbuck@nasa.gov


2013-370
Posted by Nelio Inacio at 5:01 PM 0 comments

The Rise and Fall of Galactic Cities

The Rise and Fall of Galactic Cities:

Galactic Metropolis
The collection of red dots seen near the center of this image show one of several very distant galaxy clusters discovered by combining ground-based optical data from the National Optical Astronomy Observatory's Kitt Peak National Observatory with infrared data from NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope. This galaxy cluster, named ISCS J1434.7+3519, is located about 9 billion light-years from Earth. Image credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/KPNO/University of Missouri-Kansas City
› Full image and caption


December 18, 2013

In the fable of the town and country mice, the country mouse visits his city-dwelling cousin to discover a world of opulence. In the early cosmos, billions of years ago, galaxies resided in the equivalent of urban or country environments. Those that dwelled in crowded areas called clusters also experienced a kind of opulence, with lots of cold gas, or fuel, for making stars.


Today, however, these galactic metropolises are ghost towns, populated by galaxies that can no longer form stars. How did they get this way and when did the fall of galactic cities occur?


A new study from NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope finds evidence that these urban galaxies, or those that grew up in clusters, dramatically ceased their star-making ways about 9 billion years ago (our universe is 13.8 billion years old). These galactic metropolises either consumed or lost their fuel. Galaxies in the countryside, by contrast, are still actively forming stars.


"We know the cluster galaxies we see around us today are basically dead, but how did they get that way?" wondered Mark Brodwin of the University of Missouri-Kansas City, lead author of this paper, published in the Astrophysical Journal. "In this study, we addressed this question by observing the last major growth spurt of galaxy clusters, which happened billions of years ago."


Researchers studying distant galaxies get a peek into the past since the galaxies' light takes time, sometimes billions of years, to reach us. Brodwin and his colleagues used Spitzer to study 16 galaxy clusters that existed between the time our universe was 4.3 and 6 billion years old. Spitzer's infrared vision allows it see the dust warmed by new stars, revealing star-formation rates. NASA's Hubble Space Telescope and the W.M. Keck Observatory were used to measure the galaxies' distances from Earth.


This is one of the most comprehensive looks at distant galaxy clusters yet, revealing new surprises about their environments. Previous observations of relatively nearby clusters suggested that the urban, cluster galaxies produced all their stars early in the history of our universe in one big burst. This theory, called monolithic collapse, predicted that these tight-knit galaxies would have used all their fuel at once in an early, youthful frenzy. But the new study shows this not to be the case: The urban galaxies continued to make stars longer than expected, until suddenly production came to a halt around 9 billion years ago, or about 3 billion years later than previously thought.


A second study using observations from the Herschel Space Observatory, led by Stacey Alberts at the University of Massachusetts-Amherst and published in the Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society journal, finds a similar transition epoch. Alberts and colleagues observed 300 clusters over a longer period of time, dating back to when the universe was 4 to 10 billion years old. Herschel, which ran out of coolant in April of 2013 as expected, detected longer wavelengths of infrared light than Spitzer, which is still up and running. The two telescopes complement each other, allowing scientists to confirm results and probe different aspects of cosmic conundrums.


"We find that around 9 billion years ago, cluster galaxies were as active as their counterparts outside of clusters; however, their rate of star formation decreases dramatically between then and now, much more quickly than we see in isolated galaxies," said Alberts.


Why do the urban galaxies shut down their star formation sooner and more rapidly than the country bumpkins? Brodwin says this may have to do with galaxy mergers. The more crowded a galactic environment, as is the case in young, growing galaxy clusters, the more often two galaxies will collide and merge. Galaxy mergers induce bursts of fuel-consuming star formation, and also feed growing supermassive black holes, which then blast out radiation that heats up the gas and quickly shuts off the star formation.


"It's as if boom times for galaxies in clusters ended with a sudden widespread collapse," said Peter Eisenhardt of NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif., who led a previous study that identified the distant galaxy cluster sample used by Brodwin and Alberts. "They go from vibrantly forming new stars to the quiescent state they've been in for the last half of the history of the universe, and the switch happens surprisingly fast."


JPL manages the Spitzer Space Telescope mission for NASA's Science Mission Directorate, Washington. Science operations are conducted at the Spitzer Science Center at the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena. Spacecraft operations are based at Lockheed Martin Space Systems Company, Littleton, Colorado. Data are archived at the Infrared Science Archive housed at the Infrared Processing and Analysis Center at Caltech. Caltech manages JPL for NASA. For more information about Spitzer, visit http://spitzer.caltech.edu and http://www.nasa.gov/spitzer .

Whitney Clavin 818-354-4673

Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif.

whitney.clavin@jpl.nasa.gov


2013-371
Posted by Nelio Inacio at 5:00 PM 0 comments

Eight Essential Facts About NASA's Deep Space Network

Eight Essential Facts About NASA's Deep Space Network:

Artist's concept of eight facts about NASA's Deep Space Network.
Artist's concept of eight facts about NASA's Deep Space Network. Image credit: NASA/JPL
› Larger image


December 18, 2013

Get to know the Deep Space Network (DSN)-NASA's worldwide radio telescope array that communicates with spacecraft throughout the solar system.


As the World Turns: The DSN is Earth's only global spacecraft communication network

The Deep Space Network has three facilities - at Goldstone, Calif.; near Madrid, Spain; and Canberra, Australia, all with multiple parabolic dish antennas, including one dish each that is 230 feet (70 meters) across. Located about 120 degrees apart around Earth, the placement of the complexes provides round-the-clock coverage of the solar system. (A telescope needs a direct line of sight to "speak" with a spacecraft.)


One Small Step: The DSN showed us the first moonwalk

"That's one small step for man. One giant leap for mankind." The DSN received and relayed to the world the first TV images of astronaut Neil Armstrong setting foot on the surface of the moon in 1969.


Solar System Ambassador: DSN relays first close-up views of other planets

The historic network enabled the world to see the first-ever image of Mars, obtained by NASA's Mariner 4 spacecraft in 1965. Mariner 10 returned images of Mercury's surface in 1974. NASA's twin Voyager spacecraft were the first to fly by Jupiter, Saturn, Neptune and Uranus, capturing the first close-up images of these planets, plus some of their rings and moons. The DSN also relayed Voyager 1's portrait of Earth from 6 billion miles away, the iconic image Carl Sagan called "The Pale Blue Dot," as well as the spacecraft's entry into interstellar space.


Now Hear This: The DSN speaks with 33 spacecraft

During 1963, the DSN's first year of operation, it communicated with three spacecraft. In 2013, space is a much busier place. The DSN is currently communicating with 33 spacecraft across the solar system. The DSN sends commands to spacecraft and receives telemetry, engineering and scientific data.


Not Just NASA: The DSN relays data on behalf of international space agencies

While the DSN tracks, sends commands to and receives data from all NASA spacecraft beyond the moon, the network also supports spacecraft from the European Space Agency, Japanese Space Agency and Indian Space Agency.


There's Always Room for Science: The DSN is used for scientific observation

In addition to its crucial role in two-way spacecraft communication, DSN dishes make direct science observations. There's radar science, in which waves are bounced off objects such as passing asteroids to create radar images; radio science, where changes in the steady radio link between a spacecraft and the DSN reveal the internal structure of another world; radio astronomy, which looks at naturally occurring radio sources such as pulsars and quasars; and geodetic measurements, which reveal changes in the crust of Earth by tracking how long it takes a radio signal from a quasar or other astronomical source to reach different telescopes.


Houston, We've Had a Problem: Apollo 13 relied on the DSN in its hour of need.

The DSN was called on to support the nerve-wracking Apollo 13 mission after the rupture of an oxygen tank forced NASA to abort the planned lunar landing. During the critical re-entry of the capsule, it was essential that engineers on the ground maintain contact with the astronauts on board. The spacecraft's minimal power was needed for re-entry, with little left over for communications. The DSN was able to capture the "whispers from space," and helped bring home safely Jim Lovell, Jack Swigert and Fred Haise.


Animal Planet: Each DSN facility has a different critter companion

Each of the three DSN facilities around the globe has a different native species as an unofficial mascot. Goldstone in the California desert has burros; Madrid has bulls; and Canberra, Australia, has kangaroos.


More information about the Deep Space Network and its 50th anniversary celebration can be found at http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/dsn50 .

David Israel 818-354-4797

Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif.

david.israel@jpl.nasa.gov


2013-372
Posted by Nelio Inacio at 5:00 PM 0 comments

NASA's Asteroid Hunter Spacecraft Returns First Images after Reactivation

NASA's Asteroid Hunter Spacecraft Returns First Images after Reactivation:

NEOWISE's Next Light
NASA's NEOWISE spacecraft opened its "eyes" after more than two years of slumber to see the starry sky. Image credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech
› Full image and caption


December 19, 2013

Probe Will Assist Agency in Search for Candidates to Explore


NASA's Near-Earth Object Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer (NEOWISE), a spacecraft that made the most comprehensive survey to date of asteroids and comets, has returned its first set of test images in preparation for a renewed mission.


NEOWISE discovered more than 34,000 asteroids and characterized 158,000 throughout the solar system during its prime mission in 2010 and early 2011. It was reactivated in September following 31 months in hibernation, to assist NASA's efforts to identify the population of potentially hazardous near-Earth objects (NEOs). NEOWISE also can assist in characterizing previously detected asteroids that could be considered potential targets for future exploration missions.


"NEOWISE not only gives us a better understanding of the asteroids and comets we study directly, but it will help us refine our concepts and mission operation plans for future, space-based near-Earth object cataloging missions," said Amy Mainzer, principal investigator for NEOWISE at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif. "The spacecraft is in excellent health, and the new images look just as good as they were before hibernation. Over the next weeks and months we will be gearing up our ground-based data processing and expect to get back into the asteroid hunting business, and acquire our first previously undiscovered space rock, in the next few months."


Some of the deep-space images taken by the spacecraft include a previously detected asteroid named (872) Holda. With a diameter of 26 miles (42 kilometers), this asteroid orbits the sun between Mars and Jupiter in a region astronomers call the asteroid belt. The images tell researchers the quality of the spacecraft's observations is the same as during its primary mission.


The spacecraft uses a 16-inch (40-centimeter) telescope and infrared cameras to seek out and discover unknown NEOs and characterize their size, albedo or reflectivity, and thermal properties. Asteroids reflect, but do not emit visible light, so data collected with optical telescopes using visible light can be deceiving.


Infrared sensors, similar to the cameras on NEOWISE, are a powerful tool for discovering, cataloging and understanding the asteroid population. Some of the objects about which NEOWISE will be collecting data could become candidates for the agency's announced asteroid initiative.


NASA's initiative will be the first mission to identify, capture and relocate an asteroid. It represents an unprecedented technological feat that will lead to new scientific discoveries and technological capabilities that will help protect our home planet. The asteroid initiative brings together the best of NASA's science, technology and human exploration efforts to achieve President Obama's goal of sending humans to an asteroid by 2025.


"It is important that we accumulate as much of this type of data as possible while the spacecraft remains a viable asset," said Lindley Johnson, NASA's NEOWISE program executive in Washington. "NEOWISE is an important element to enhance our ability to support the initiative."


NEOWISE began as WISE. The prime mission, which was launched in December 2009, was to scan the entire celestial sky in infrared light. WISE captured more than 2.7 million images in multiple infrared wavelengths and cataloged more than 747 million objects in space, ranging from galaxies faraway to asteroids and comets much closer to Earth. NASA turned off most of WISE's electronics when it completed its primary mission in February 2011.


Upon reactivation, the spacecraft was renamed NEOWISE, with the goal of discovering and characterizing asteroids and comets whose orbits approach within 28 million miles (45 million kilometers) from Earth's path around the sun.


More information about NEOWISE is available online at:

http://www.nasa.gov/wise


For more information on the asteroid initiative, visit:

http://www.nasa.gov/asteroidinitiative


JPL manages the project for NASA's Science Mission Directorate in Washington. The Space Dynamics Laboratory in Logan, Utah, built the science instrument. Ball Aerospace & Technologies Corp. of Boulder, Colo., built the spacecraft. Science operations and data processing take place at the Infrared Processing and Analysis Center at the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena. Caltech manages JPL for NASA.

DC Agle 818-393-9011

Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif.

agle@jpl.nasa.gov


Dwayne Brown 202-358-1726

NASA Headquarters, Washington

Dwayne.c.brown@nasa.gov


2013-373
Posted by Nelio Inacio at 4:59 PM 0 comments

NASA's Deep Space Network Celebrates 50 Years

NASA's Deep Space Network Celebrates 50 Years:

This aerial photo shows the NASA Deep Space Network complex outside of Canberra, Australia in 1997
This aerial photo shows the NASA Deep Space Network complex outside of Canberra, Australia in 1997. The Canberra complex officially opened in 1965. Because of celestial mechanics and trajectories, the best spacecraft tracking requires stations located in both the northern and southern hemispheres. Image credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech
› Larger view


December 24, 2013

The Deep Space Network first existed as just a few small antennas as part of the Deep Space Instrumentation Facility. That facility, originally operated by the U.S. Army in the 1950s, morphed into the Deep Space Network on Dec. 24, 1963, and quickly became the de facto network for missions into deep space.


During its first year of operation, the network communicated with three spacecraft - Mariner 2, IMP-A and Atlas Centaur 2. Today, it communicates with 33 via three antenna complexes in Goldstone, Calif.; near Madrid, Spain; and near Canberra, Australia, maintaining round-the-clock coverage of the solar system.


During the past 50 years, antennas of the Deep Space Network have communicated with most of the missions that have gone to the moon and far into deep space. The highlights include relaying the moment when astronaut Neil Armstrong stepped onto the surface of the moon in a "giant leap for mankind"; transmitting data from numerous encounters with the outer planets of our solar system; communicating images taken by rovers exploring Mars; and relaying the data confirming that NASA's Voyager 1 spacecraft had entered interstellar space.


Space agencies in Europe, Japan and Russia have also relied on the Deep Space Network when planning and communicating with their own missions over the decades. The Deep Space Network has been used recently by India's first interplanetary probe, the Mars Orbiter Mission.


JPL, a division of the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena, manages the Deep Space Network for NASA.


Full news release, video, slideshow and more at: http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/dsn50/ .

David Israel

Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif.

818-354-4797

david.israel@jpl.nasa.gov


2013-378
Posted by Nelio Inacio at 4:57 PM 0 comments

First 2014 Asteroid Discovered

First 2014 Asteroid Discovered:

animated GIF of asteroid AA 2014
Figure 1 - This animated GIF shows Asteroid 2014 AA, discovered by the NASA-sponsored Catalina Sky Survey on Jan. 1, 2014, as it moved across the sky. Image credit: CSS/LPL/UA


January 02, 2014

Update: Jan. 3, 2014, 5 p.m. PST


Several sources confirm that the first discovered asteroid in 2014, designated 2014 AA, entered Earth's atmosphere late Jan. 1 (Jan. 2 Universal time) over the mid-Atlantic Ocean. The Catalina Sky Survey operating near Tucson, Ariz. discovered this very small asteroid -- 6 to 9 feet (2 to 3 meters) in size -- early on the morning of Jan. 1, and immediately followed up on it. (An animation of the discovery images is shown in Figure 1). The asteroid entered Earth's atmosphere about 21 hours later, and probably broke up.


The high-precision astrometry data and rapid follow-up observations provided by the Catalina Sky Survey team made it possible for orbit analysts from NASA's Near-Earth Object Program Office at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif., to determine possible Earth impact locations. Before that, and based upon the Catalina Sky Survey observations, Steve Chesley of JPL produced a plot of the possible impact locations for asteroid 2014 AA. (Chesley's graphic is shown in Figure 2, where the blue, nearly horizontal band represents the region of possible impacts).


The geolocation derived by Chesley allowed Peter Brown of the University of Western Ontario, and Petrus Jenniskens of the SETI Institute, Mountain View, Calif., to search the data from low-frequency infrasound observation sites of the Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty Organization. They found weak signals from stations in Bolivia, Brazil and Bermuda that indicated that the likely impact location was indeed positioned within the predicted area. The location, marked with a red dot, is still somewhat uncertain due to observational factors, including atmospheric effects on the propagation of infrasound signals.


Infrasound stations record ultra-low-frequency sound waves to monitor the location of atmospheric explosions. These sites often pick up airbursts from small asteroid impacts, commonly called fireballs or bolides. There are about a billion near-Earth objects in the size range of 2014 AA, and impacts of comparably sized objects occur several times each year.


Uncertainties present in the infrasound technique and the very limited amount of optical tracking data before impact make it difficult to pinpoint the impact time and location. Even so, Chesley provides the following estimate:


Impact time: Jan. 1, 2014 at 11:02 p.m. EST (Jan. 2 4:02 UTC)
Impact location coordinates: 11.7 degrees north latitude, 319.7 degrees latitude.


This information is preliminary and has uncertainties of perhaps a few hundred kilometers, or miles, in location, and tens of minutes in time.


Prior to impact, the orbit of 2014 AA had a very low inclination (about 1 degree) with respect to the ecliptic plane and an orbit that ranged from 0.9 to 1.3 astronomical units from the sun, with an orbital period of about 1.2 years.



January 2, 2014


Early Wednesday morning (Jan. 1, 2014), while New Year's 2014 celebrations were still underway in the United States, the Catalina Sky Survey near Tucson, Ariz., collected a single track of observations with an immediate follow-up on what was possibly a very small asteroid -- 7 to 10 feet (2 to 3 meters) in size -- on a potential impact trajectory with Earth.


Designated 2014 AA, which would make it the first asteroid discovery of 2014, the track of observations on the object allowed only an uncertain orbit to be calculated. However, if this was a very small asteroid on an Earth-impacting trajectory, it most likely entered Earth's atmosphere sometime between 11 a.m. PST (2 p.m. EST) Wednesday and 6 a.m. PST (9 a.m. EST) Thursday.


Using the only available observations, three independent projections of the possible orbit by the independent orbit analyst Bill Gray, the Minor Planet Center in Cambridge, Mass., and Steve Chesley, of NASA's Near-Earth Object Program Office at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif., are in agreement that 2014 AA would hit Earth's atmosphere. According to Chesley, the potential impact locations are widely distributed because of the orbit uncertainty, falling along an arc extending from Central America to East Africa. The most likely impact location of the object was just off the coast of West Africa at about 6 p.m. PST (9 p.m. EST) Jan. 1.


It is unlikely asteroid 2014 AA would have survived atmospheric entry intact, as it was comparable in size to asteroid 2008 TC3, which was about 7 to 10 feet (2 to 3 meters) in size. 2008 TC3 completely broke up over northern Sudan in October 2008. Asteroid 2008 TC3 is the only other example of an object discovered just prior to hitting Earth. So far, there have been a few weak signals collected from infrasound stations in that region of the world that are being analyzed to see if they could be correlated to the atmospheric entry of 2014 AA.


NASA's Near-Earth Object Program at NASA Headquarters, Washington, manages and funds the search, study and monitoring of asteroids and comets whose orbits periodically bring them close to Earth. JPL manages the Near-Earth Object Program Office for NASA's Science Mission Directorate in Washington. JPL is a division of the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena.


More information about asteroids and near-Earth objects is available at: http://neo.jpl.nasa.gov/ , http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/asteroidwatch and via Twitter at http://www.twitter.com/asteroidwatch.

DC Agle 818-393-9011

Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif.

agle@jpl.nasa.gov



2014-001
Posted by Nelio Inacio at 4:57 PM 0 comments

Decade-Old Rover Adventure Continues on Mars and Earth

Decade-Old Rover Adventure Continues on Mars and Earth:

outcrop on the 'Murray Ridge' portion of the rim of Endeavour Crater
NASA's Mars Exploration Rover Opportunity observed this outcrop on the "Murray Ridge" portion of the rim of Endeavour Crater as the rover approached the 10th anniversary of its landing on Mars.
› Full image and caption


January 03, 2014

Eighth graders didn't have Facebook or Twitter to share news back then, in January 2004. Bekah Sosland, 14 at the time, learned about a NASA rover landing on Mars when the bouncing-ball video on the next morning's Channel One news in her Fredericksburg, Texas, classroom caught her eye.


"I wasn't particularly interested in space at the time," she recalled last week inside the spacecraft operations facility where she now works at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif. "I remember I was talking with friends, and out of the corner of my eye I noticed this thing bouncing and rolling on a red surface. I watched as it stopped and opened up, and it had this rover inside."


That animation portrayed how NASA landed the Mars rovers Spirit and Opportunity three weeks apart, using airbags to cushion the impact at the start of the missions, planned to last for three months. Spirit reached Mars on Jan. 4, 2004, Universal Time (Jan. 3, PST) and worked for six years. Opportunity landed on Jan. 25, UT (Jan. 24, PST) and is still exploring, with Sosland now on the team planning what it does each day.


"I watched that news and said, 'This is amazing: a rover on another planet!' Gears started turning in my head that day about engineering and space -- thinking about a career. It was definitely a milestone in my life and something I'll always remember."


On her path to that career, high-school teacher Brett Williams in Fredericksburg inspired her to build real rockets, and she completed a 2013 engineering degree from the University of Texas, Austin. But nobody in 2004 was predicting that either Spirit or Opportunity might still be roving Mars in summer 2013, which is when Sosland joined JPL.


"I certainly never thought I'd have an opportunity to work on Opportunity," she said. "That only became possible because this mission has been going so incredibly long. The reason Opportunity has worked so long is the people who built it and operate it. I'm loving that I can be a part of this team now."


Most of the engineers who operated Spirit and Opportunity during the three-month prime missions in 2004 have switched to other projects, including later Mars spacecraft. Sosland is among several on Opportunity's team today who were in school a decade ago.


Unlike her, Mike Seibert in late 2003 was eagerly tracking the run-up to the rover landings, while he was an engineering undergraduate at the University of Colorado. He had even ordered cardboard 3-D glasses in anticipation of images from stereo cameras on Spirit and Opportunity.


"I was living in my fraternity's house in Boulder that January. People thought I was weird, wearing 3-D glasses and looking at those pictures from Mars," said Seibert.


Less than two years later, he was working on the rover team at JPL. He has, since then, served as a mission manager and in other roles for both Spirit and Opportunity and participated in many key moments of the extended missions.


The dramatic landings and overland expeditions of Spirit and Opportunity have also inspired countless students who have not gained a chance to work on the rover team, but have participated in the adventure online by exploring images from the rovers or other activities.


What an adventure it's been. Though Spirit and Opportunity were built as nearly identical twins, and both succeeded in the main goal of finding evidence for ancient watery environments on Mars, their stories diverged early.


Spirit was sent to a crater where the basin's shape and apparent inflow channels seen from orbit suggested a lake once existed. Opportunity's landing area, almost exactly halfway around the planet, was selected mainly on the basis of a water-clue mineral detected from orbit, rather than landform shapes. Spirit's destination did not pan out initially. The crater may have held a lake, but if there are any lakebed sediments, they are thoroughly buried under later volcanic deposits. Opportunity, the luckier twin, landed a stone's throw from an exposure of layered rock that within weeks yielded compositional and textural evidence of a water-rich ancient environment.


Within the initial three-month missions and without expectation of surviving a full year, each rover set out cross-country toward other destinations: hills on the horizon for Spirit and craters exposing deeper layers for Opportunity. Spirit drove a total of 4.8 miles (7.7 kilometers), some of that with one of its six wheels not rotating. Loss of use of a second wheel while the rover was in a sand trap contributed to the 2010 end of that mission. Opportunity has driven 24 miles (38.7 kilometers) and is still going strong.


One key to Spirit and Opportunity working for years, instead of a few months, has been winds that occasionally remove some of the dust accumulating on solar panels that generate the rovers' electricity. Also, the ground crew became adept at managing each rover's power consumption and taking advantage of slopes for favorably tilting the rovers toward the sun during Martian winters.


"Ultimately, it's not only how long the rovers work or how far they drive that's most important, but how much exploration and scientific discovery these missions have accomplished," said JPL's John Callas, project manager for NASA's Mars Exploration Rover Project, who has worked on the Spirit and Opportunity missions for more than 13 years.


By driving to outcrops miles from their landing sites, both rovers reached evidence about multiple episodes of Martian history, "traveling across time as well as across Martian terrain," he said. Opportunity is currently exploring outcrops on the rim of Endeavour Crater, which is 14 miles (22 kilometers) in diameter.


"Opportunity is still in excellent health for a vehicle of its age," Callas said. "The biggest science may still be ahead of us, even after 10 years of exploration."


The science achievements have already provided major advances in understanding of Mars.


The rovers' principal investigator, Steve Squyres of Cornell University, Ithaca, N.Y., described some of the key findings, starting with what Spirit found after driving from the crater floor where it landed into hills to the east:


"In the Columbia Hills, we discovered compelling evidence of an ancient Mars that was a hot, wet, violent place, with volcanic explosions, hydrothermal activity, steam vents -- nothing like Mars today.


"At Opportunity's landing site, we found evidence of an early Mars that had acidic groundwater that sometimes reached the surface and evaporated away, leaving salts behind. It was an environment with liquid water, but very different from the environment that Spirit told us about.


"When Opportunity got to the rim of Endeavour Crater, we began a whole new mission. We found gypsum veins and a rich concentration of clay minerals. The clay minerals tell us about water chemistry that was neutral, instead of acidic -- more favorable for microbial life, if any ever began on Mars."


"Because of the rovers' longevity, we essentially got four different landing sites for the price of two."


The evidence the rovers glean from rocks at these sites may not be the only huge benefit of the adventures, though. Bekah Sosland and Mike Seibert may be examples of something even greater.


Squyres said, "I'm incredibly proud of the science we've done on this mission, but in the end, perhaps our most important legacy will turn out to be the young people who have seen what we've done and made career choices based on that. If an outcome of our mission is to help inspire a new generation of explorers to do even better than we did, that will be the greatest thing we could have accomplished."


The Mars Exploration Rover Project is one strong element in a robust program of NASA's ongoing and future Mars missions preparing for human missions there by the 2030s.


The Mars Odyssey and Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter missions have been studying the Red Planet since arriving there in 2001 and 2006, respectively. NASA's next-generation Mars rover, Curiosity, is examining an area that once offered conditions favorable for microbial life. NASA launched the Mars Atmosphere and Volatile Evolution, or MAVEN, mission two months ago, to begin orbiting in September 2014. The agency plans to launch a mission to Mars in 2016 called Interior Exploration using Seismic Investigations, Geodesy and Heat Transport, or InSight, to learn about the deep interior of Mars. A Curiosity-size rover planned for launch in 2020 has the task to check for evidence of past life on Mars.


Special products for the 10th anniversary of the twin rovers' landings, including a gallery of selected images, are at http://mars.nasa.gov/mer10/ .


JPL, a division of the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena, manages the Mars Exploration Rover Project for NASA's Science Mission Directorate, Washington. For more information about the project's twin rovers, Spirit and Opportunity, visit http://www.nasa.gov/rovers and http://marsrovers.jpl.nasa.gov . You can follow the project on Twitter and on Facebook at: http://twitter.com/MarsRovers and http://www.facebook.com/mars.rovers .

Guy Webster 818-354-6278

Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif.

guy.webster@jpl.nasa.gov


2014-002
Posted by Nelio Inacio at 4:56 PM 0 comments

NASA and Smithsonian to Host 10-Year Anniversary Events for Mars Rovers

NASA and Smithsonian to Host 10-Year Anniversary Events for Mars Rovers:

View of Victoria Crater from Duck Bay
This image taken by the panoramic camera on the Mars Exploration Rover Opportunity shows the view of Victoria Crater from Duck Bay. Opportunity reached Victoria Crater on Sol 951 (September 27, 2006) after traversing 9.28 kilometers (5.77 miles) since her landing site at Eagle Crater.
› Full image and caption


January 06, 2014

NASA and the Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum (NASM) in Washington are sponsoring events to commemorate 10 years of roving across the Red Planet by the Mars Exploration Rovers (MER).

Anniversary activities will showcase the images and achievements of Spirit and Opportunity, both launched by NASA in the summer of 2003. Activities also will highlight how Mars robotic exploration and discovery will aid plans for a future human mission to Mars.

Spirit and Opportunity completed their three-month prime missions in April 2004 and went on to perform extended missions for years. The rovers made important discoveries about wet environments on ancient Mars that may have been favorable for supporting microbial life. Although Spirit ceased communicating with Earth in March 2010, the Opportunity rover continues its work on the Red Planet.

Anniversary events include:

On Tuesday, Jan. 7, starting at 7:30 a.m. PST (10:30 a.m. EST), NASA and the museum will facilitate two panel discussions on Mars robotic and human missions. Held in the museum's Moving Beyond Earth gallery, participants will discuss the MER program and its scientific successes. Participants also will provide updates on the agency's activities to advance a human mission to Mars in the 2030s.

Panel I: Moderator - Pamela Conrad, Curiosity rover scientist, NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, Md.

-- John Grant, supervisory geologist at the Center for Earth and Planetary Studies, NASM, and science operations working group chair for the MER mission

-- Steven Squyres, professor of astronomy, Cornell University, Ithaca, N.Y., and principal investigator for the Mars Exploration Rover mission

-- David Lavery, program executive, Solar System Exploration, NASA Headquarters

Panel II: Moderator - James Green, director, Planetary Science, NASA Headquarters

-- John Grunsfeld, astronaut and associate administrator, Science Mission Directorate, NASA Headquarters

-- Mary Voytek, director, Astrobiology, NASA Headquarters

-- John Connolly, acting Chief Exploration Scientist, NASA Headquarters

-- Alyssa Carson, NASA Passport Winner and student from Baton Rouge, La.

NASA Television and the agency's website will provide live coverage of the event. The discussion will also be Webcast live at http://www.livestream.com/mars .

The public can ask questions via Twitter using the hashtag #10YrsOnMars.

The museum is featuring a new exhibit, "Spirit & Opportunity: 10 Years Roving Across Mars," with more than 50 mosaic and panoramic photographs taken by the rovers. From a view of the sun setting over the rim of a crater, to a study of "abstract dunes," to a shot of rover tracks disappearing over the horizon, the images were chosen for their scientific and aesthetic content by MER mission team members.

On Thursday, Jan. 16 at 7 p.m. PST (10 p.m. EST), JPL will host a public celebration of a decade of the twin Mars Exploration rovers. The event will be held in the Beckman Auditorium on the California Institute of Technology campus, 1200 E. California Blvd., Pasadena.

The participants are:

-- Charles Elachi, director, JPL

-- Steve Squyres

-- John Callas, project manager, Mars Exploration Rover Project, JPL

-- Bill Nye, chief executive officer of the Planetary Society, Pasadena, Calif.

The event will be streamed live on the Web at http://ustream.tv/NASAJPL .

Friday, Jan. 17, 7 p.m. PST: JPL will host a public lecture delivered by John Callas, entitled "The Mars Exploration Rovers: A Decade of Exploration," at the Vosloh Forum on the campus of Pasadena City College, 1570 E. Colorado Blvd., Pasadena.

Thursday, Jan. 23, 11 a.m. PST (2 p.m. EST), JPL will host a media briefing on the Opportunity rover's decade of exploration.  NASA Television and the agency's website will provide live coverage of the event. Reporters and the public can ask questions from NASA centers and via Twitter using the hashtag #10YrsOnMars.

Participants will include:

-- John Callas

-- Steve Squyres

-- Ray Arvidson, Mars Exploration Rovers deputy principal investigator, Washington University in St. Louis, Mo.

The discussion will also be webcast live at http://ustream.tv/NASAJPL . For NASA TV streaming video, downlink and scheduling information, visit http://www.nasa.gov/nasatv .

JPL manages the Spirit and Opportunity rovers for NASA's Science Mission Directorate in Washington. For more information on the rovers and the Mars Exploration Program, visit http://www.nasa.gov/mars .

JPL is managed for NASA by Caltech.

Guy Webster 818-354-6278

Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif.

guy.webster@jpl.nasa.gov


Dwayne Brown 202-358-1726

NASA Headquarters, Washington

dwayne.c.brown@nasa.gov


Alison Mitchell 202-633-2376

Smithsonian's National Air and Space Museum

mitchellac@si.edu


2014-004
Posted by Nelio Inacio at 4:56 PM 0 comments

Stormy Stars? NASA's Spitzer Probes Weather on Brown Dwarfs

Stormy Stars? NASA's Spitzer Probes Weather on Brown Dwarfs:

This Just In: Storms Expected on Brown Dwarfs
This artist's concept shows what the weather might look like on cool star-like bodies known as brown dwarfs. These giant balls of gas start out life like stars, but lack the mass to sustain nuclear fusion at their cores, and instead, fade and cool with time. Image credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/University of Western Ontario/Stony Brook University
› Full image and caption


January 07, 2014

Swirling, stormy clouds may be ever-present on cool celestial orbs called brown dwarfs. New observations from NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope suggest that most brown dwarfs are roiling with one or more planet-size storms akin to Jupiter's "Great Red Spot."

"As the brown dwarfs spin on their axis, the alternation of what we think are cloud-free and cloudy regions produces a periodic brightness variation that we can observe," said Stanimir Metchev of Western University, Ontario, Canada. "These are signs of patchiness in the cloud cover."

Metchev is principal investigator of the brown dwarf research. The results were presented at a news conference today at the 223rd annual meeting of the American Astronomical Society in Washington by Metchev's colleague, Aren Heinze, of Stony Brook University, New York. 

Brown dwarfs form as stars do, but lack the mass to fuse atoms continually and blossom into full-fledged stars. They are, in some ways, the massive kin to Jupiter.

Scientists think that the cloudy regions on brown dwarfs take the form of torrential storms, accompanied by winds and, possibly, lightning more violent than that at Jupiter or any other planet in our solar system. However, the brown dwarfs studied so far are too hot for water rain; instead, astronomers believe the rain in these storms, like the clouds themselves, is made of hot sand, molten iron or salts. 

In a Spitzer program named "Weather on Other Worlds," astronomers used the infrared space telescope to watch 44 brown dwarfs as they rotated on their axis for up to 20 hours. Previous results had suggested that some brown dwarfs have turbulent weather, so the scientists had expected to see a small fraction vary in brightness over time. However, to their surprise, half of the brown dwarfs showed the variations. When you take into account that half of the objects would be oriented in such a way that their storms would be either hidden or always in view and unchanging, the results indicate that most, if not all, brown dwarfs are racked by storms.

"We needed Spitzer to do this," said Metchev. "Spitzer is in space, above the thermal glow of the Earth's atmosphere, and it has the sensitivity required to see variations in the brown dwarfs' brightness."

The results led to another surprise as well. Some of the brown dwarfs rotated much more slowly than any previously measured, a finding that could not have been possible without Spitzer's long, uninterrupted observations from space. Astronomers had thought that brown dwarfs sped up to very fast rotations when they formed and contracted, and that this rotation didn't wind down with age.

"We don't yet know why these particular brown dwarfs spin so slowly, but several interesting possibilities exist," said Heinze.  "A brown dwarf that rotates slowly may have formed in an unusual way -- or it may even have been slowed down by the gravity of a yet-undiscovered planet in a close orbit around it."

The work may lead to a better understanding of not just brown dwarfs but their "little brothers": the gas-giant planets. Researchers say that studying the weather on brown dwarfs will open new windows onto weather on planets outside our solar system, which are harder to study under the glare of their stars. Brown dwarfs are weather laboratories for planets, and, according to the new results, those laboratories are everywhere.

Other researchers on the team include: Daniel Apai and Davin Flateau of the University of Arizona, Tucson; Mark Marley of NASA Ames Research Center, Moffett Field; Jacqueline Radigan of the Space Telescope Science Institute, Baltimore, Md.; Etienne Artigau of Universite de Montreal, Canada; Adam Burgasser of University of California San Diego; Peter Plavchan of NASA's Exoplanet Science Institute at the California Institute of Technology, Pasadena; and Bertrand Goldman of Max-Planck Institute for Astronomy, Germany.

NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif., manages the Spitzer Space Telescope mission for NASA's Science Mission Directorate, Washington. Science operations are conducted at the Spitzer Science Center at the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena. Spacecraft operations are based at Lockheed Martin Space Systems Company, Littleton, Colorado. Data are archived at the Infrared Science Archive housed at the Infrared Processing and Analysis Center at Caltech. Caltech manages JPL for NASA.For more information about Spitzer, visit http://spitzer.caltech.edu and http://www.nasa.gov/spitzer .

Whitney Clavin 818-354-4673

Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif.

whitney.clavin@jpl.nasa.gov

2014-005
Posted by Nelio Inacio at 4:55 PM 0 comments
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