Wednesday, February 15, 2012

Scientists Find New Clues About the Interiors of ‘Super-Earth’ Exoplanets

Scientists Find New Clues About the Interiors of ‘Super-Earth’ Exoplanets:

Artist's conception of "Super-Earth" exoplanet Kepler-22b, which is about 2.4 times larger than Earth. Credit: NASA

As we learned in science class in school, the Earth has a molten interior (the outer core) deep beneath its mantle and crust. The temperatures and pressures are increasingly extreme, the farther down you go. The liquid magmas can “melt” into different types, a process referred to as pressure-induced liquid-liquid phase separation. Graphite can turn into diamond under similar extreme pressures. Now, new research is showing that a similar process could take place inside “Super-Earth” exoplanets, rocky worlds larger than Earth, where a molten magnesium silicate interior would likely be transformed into a denser state as well.

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‘Stealth Merger’ of Dwarf Galaxies Seen in New Images

‘Stealth Merger’ of Dwarf Galaxies Seen in New Images:

NGC449 and its smaller, fainter companion (upper right). Credit: Subaru Telescope, National Astronomical Observatory of Japan (NAOJ)

Space may be vast, but accidents can still happen, like when galaxies “collide,” usually resulting in the smaller one having its stars scattered by the larger one. New high-resolution images of two dwarf galaxies merging together have now been obtained by astronomers, providing a more detailed look at something which could only barely be seen before. While the larger galaxy of the two, NGC 4449, is easily visible, its smaller companion was little more than just a faint smudge until now.

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A Swirling Oasis of Life

A Swirling Oasis of Life:

A 150-km (93-mile) - wide eddy in the southern Indian Ocean. (NASA/Terra-MODIS)

A serpentine eddy swirls in the southern Indian Ocean several hundred kilometers off the coast of South Africa in this natural-color image, acquired by NASA’s Terra satellite on December 26, 2011.

The blue color is created by blooms of phytoplankton, fertilized by the nutrient-rich deep water drawn up by the 150-km-wide eddy.

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Kuiper’s Color Close-Up

Kuiper’s Color Close-Up:

MESSENGER color image of Mercury's Kuiper crater

The pale-orange coloration around the 39-mile (62-km) -wide Kuiper crater on Mercury is evident in this image, a color composition made from targeted images acquired by NASA’s MESSENGER spacecraft on September 2, 2011.

The color may be due to compositional differences in the material that was ejected during the impact that formed the crater.

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Starbursts May Actually Destroy Globular Clusters

Starbursts May Actually Destroy Globular Clusters:

The Galactic globular cluster M80 in the constellation Scorpius contains several hundred thousand stars. Credit: HST/NASA/ESA

It seems logical to assume that long ago, the amount of globular clusters increased in our galaxy during star-making frenzies called ‘starbursts.’ But a new computer simulation shows just the opposite: 13 billion years ago, starbursts may have actually destroyed many of the globular clusters that they helped to create.

“It is ironic to see that starbursts may produce many young stellar clusters, but at the same time also destroy the majority of them,” said Dr. Diederik Kruijssen of the Max Planck Institute for Astrophysics. “This occurs not only in galaxy collisions, but should be expected in any starburst environment”
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NASA’s Picture of the Future of Human Spaceflight

NASA’s Picture of the Future of Human Spaceflight:

NASA infographic on the future of human spaceflight. Credit: NASA. Click for larger pdf poster version.

NASA released a new interactive infographic that attempts to give a picture of future of human spaceflight activities and where NASA might be going. The new Space Launch system and the Orion MPCV figure prominently in going to future destinations such as the Moon, Mars, Near Earth Asteroids and even LaGrange Points. It would be awesome to go to all those destinations, but – call me pessimistic — in reality, we’ll be lucky if we even get to one of them in the next 30 years. But since human spaceflight received favorable funding nods in the new NASA budget proposal, we can hopefully look forward to the first un-crewed test flight of the MPCV in 2013 or 2014.
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Beginner’s Guide to Seeing the International Space Station (ISS)

Beginner’s Guide to Seeing the International Space Station (ISS):

The International Space Station Credit: @VirtualAstro

Most readers of Universe Today are familiar with the International Space Station or “ISS” as it’s often referred to. But just in case you are visiting our site for the first time, the ISS is a huge space station orbiting Earth that serves as an orbital laboratory, factory, testing ground and home; crew members conduct experiments from biology to astronomy, including experiments for prolonged exposure to life in space for future missions to the Moon and beyond.

The ISS is major accomplishment for NASA (US), ESA (Europe), JAXA (Japan) CSA (Canada) and all the countries involved (16 in all). The space station is just over 72 m long by 108 m wide and 20 m high; it is maintained at an orbital altitude of between 330 km (205 mi) and 410 km (255 mi) and travels at an average speed of 27,724 kilometres (17,227 mi) per hour, completing 15.7 orbits per day.

One of the best things about the ISS is that you can see it with your own eyes from Earth! It’s very easy to watch the International Space Station pass over your own backyard! (...)
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‘Dark Markings of the Sky’ are Hiding Star Formation

‘Dark Markings of the Sky’ are Hiding Star Formation:

This image from the APEX telescope, part of the Taurus Molecular Cloud, shows a sinuous filament of cosmic dust more than ten light-years long. Credit: ESO/APEX (MPIfR/ESO/OSO)/A. Hacar et al./Digitized Sky Survey 2. Acknowledgment: Davide De Martin.

This stunning new image shows a sinuous filament of cosmic dust more than ten light-years long. The makeup of filamentary cloud structures like this used to be a mystery, and in the early 20th century, Edward Emerson Barnard compiled a photographic atlas of these features, calling them “dark markings of the sky,” as these regions appeared as dark lanes, with no stars visible. Barnard correctly argued that this appearance was due to “obscuring matter in space.” Today we call segments in this particular cloud Barnard 211 and Barnard 213, or the Taurus Molecular Cloud. And we now know that these are clouds of interstellar gas and dust grains. But also, within these clouds, newborn stars are hidden, and dense clouds of gas are on the verge of collapsing to form yet more stars.
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NEOShield: a Preemptive Strike Against Asteroids

NEOShield: a Preemptive Strike Against Asteroids:

What an asteroid hitting the Earth might look like. Image credit: NASA/Don Davis.

Scientists aren’t entirely sure when the last major asteroid hit the Earth, but it’s certain to happen again. Alan Harris, asteroid researcher at the German Aerospace Center (Deutsches Zentrum für Luft- und Raumfahrt; DLR), is hoping to head the next one off. Last month, Harris established an international collaboration of 13 researchers to investigate methods of shielding the Earth from near Earth objects (NEOs). The project is, appropriately, called NEOShield.(...)
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Astrophoto: Near-Earth Asteroid Eros by Efrain Morales

Astrophoto: Near-Earth Asteroid Eros by Efrain Morales:

Astrophoto: Near-Earth Asteroid Eros by Efrain Morales

Near-Earth Asteroid Eros. Image Credit: Efrain Morales. Click on the image to see animation.e.

Efrain Morales captured this image of four sequences of the NEA Eros (Asteroid) from the night of February 1, 2012.

Eros, also known as 433 Eros, is the second-largest near-Earth asteroid. The orbit of asteroid Eros is known to cross that of Mars. It was visited by the NEAR-Shoemaker space probe twice in 1998 and 2000.

Check out Efrain’s website for more photos.


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Young Star Cluster In Disintegrated Galaxy Reveals First-Ever Intermediate Mass Black Hole

Young Star Cluster In Disintegrated Galaxy Reveals First-Ever Intermediate Mass Black Hole:

This spectacular edge-on galaxy, called ESO 243-49, is home to an intermediate-mass black hole that may have been stripped off of a cannibalized dwarf galaxy. Credit: NASA, ESA, and S. Farrell (Sydney Institute for Astronomy, University of Sydney)

Score another first for NASA’s Hubble Space Telescope! Along with observations taken with the Swift X-ray telescope, a team of astronomers have identified a young stellar cluster of stars pointing the way towards the first verified intermediate mass black hole. This grouping of stars provides significant indication that black holes of this type may have been at the center of a now shredded dwarf galaxy – a finding which increases our knowledge of galaxy evolution. (...)
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Sunday, February 12, 2012

Blue Marble 2012: Amazing High Definition Image of Earth

Blue Marble 2012: Amazing High Definition Image of Earth:

A 'Blue Marble' image of the Earth taken from the VIIRS instrument aboard NASA's most recently launched Earth-observing satellite - Suomi NPP. This composite image uses a number of swaths of the Earth's surface taken on January 4, 2012. Credit: NASA/NOAA/GSFC/Suomi NPP/VIIRS/Norman Kuring. Click on image for access to larger versions.

A new high-definition version of the ‘Blue Marble’ has been taken from the newest Earth observation satellite. The just-renamed Suomi NPP satellite took numerous images on January 4, 2012 and this composite image was created from several “swaths” of Earth. It is a stunningly beautiful look at our home planet, with the largest versions of the image showing about 1.6 km (1 mile) per pixel. This Sun-synchronous Earth-orbiting satellite is 824 kilometers (512 miles) above Earth, and it gets a complete view of our planet every day. It is the first of a new generation of satellites that will observe many facets of how our Earth may be changing.

Originally launched as the National Polar-orbiting Operational Environmental Satellite System Preparatory Project (NPP), it was just renamed ‘Suomi NPP’ on to honor a pioneer in the use of satellites, the late Verner E. Suomi.

See below for an image showing these “swaths” from global images taken on November 24, 2011.
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Astrophoto: Purple Orion

Astrophoto: Purple Orion:

The Orion Nebula imaged on January 25, 2012 by Marco T. in Italy.

This beautiful photo of the Orion Nebula was taken by Marco T. in Italy on January 25, 2012. It was taken with a Canon 500d, and a Skywatcher Black Diamond ED80 Pro
“Sum of 32 shots of 85 seconds at 800 iso and 10 darks,” Marco says. “From Rome so light pollution is high as always, temperature 2 degrees.”


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Cold Plasma Flourishes In Earth’s Upper Atmosphere

Cold Plasma Flourishes In Earth’s Upper Atmosphere:

A rendering of the Cluster satellite, designed to measure electric fields, which Andre and Cully used to detect low-energy ions high above the Earth. (Credit: European Space Agency)

Thousands of miles above Earth, space weather rules. Here storms of high-energy particles mix the atmosphere, create auroras, challenge satellites and even cause disturbances with electric grids and electronic devices below. It’s a seemingly empty and lonely place – one where a mystery called “cold plasma” has been found in abundance and may well have implications with our connection to the Sun. While it has remained virtually hidden, Swedish researchers have created a new method to measure these cold, charged ions. With evidence of more there than once thought, these new findings may very well give us clues as to what’s happening around other planets and their natural satellites. (...)
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8-Meter-Wide Asteroid Will Pass Close to Earth January 27

8-Meter-Wide Asteroid Will Pass Close to Earth January 27:

Orbital parameters of Asteroid 2012 BX34 from JPL's Small Body Database.

A small asteroid will pass extremely close to Earth tomorrow (January 27, 2012). Named 2012 BX34, this 11 meter- (36 feet-) wide 8 meter- (26-foot-) space rock (astronomers have updated their estimates of the size) will skim Earth less than 60,000 km (37,000 miles, .0004 AU)>, at around 15:30 UTC, (10:30 am EST) according to the Minor Planet Center. The latest estimates have this small bus-sized asteroid it traveling at about about 8,900 meters/second (about 20,000 miles per hour). 2012 BX34 has been observed by the Catalina Sky Survey and the Survey Mt. Lemmonin Arizona, and the Magdalena Ridge Observatory in New Mexico, so its orbit is well defined and there is no risk of impact to Earth.

Via the @AsteroidWatch Twitter feed, scientists from JPL said “It wouldn’t get through our atmosphere intact even if it dared to try.”

Amateur astronomers in the right place and time could view this object, as it should be about magnitude 14 at the time of closest approach. Click here to see a current orbit diagram, and here to view the ephemeris data. Nick Howes, with the Faulkes Telescope Project said his team is hoping to observe and image the asteroid, — although they aren’t sure if they will be able — but we hope to share their images later.
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New Research Suggests Fomalhaut b May Not Be a Planet After All

New Research Suggests Fomalhaut b May Not Be a Planet After All:

The Fomalhaut b photograph. Credit: NASA, ESA, and P. Kalas (University of California, Berkeley, USA)

When the Hubble Space Telescope photographed the apparent exoplanet Fomalhaut b in 2008, it was regarded as the first visible light image obtained of a planet orbiting another star. The breakthrough was announced by a research team led by Paul Kalas of the University of California, Berkeley. The planet was estimated to be approximately the size of Saturn, but no more than three times Jupiter’s mass, or perhaps smaller than Saturn according to some other studies, and might even have rings. It resides within a debris ring which encircles the star Fomalhaut, about 25 light-years away.

Another team at Princeton, however, has just announced that they believe the original findings are in error, and that the planet is actually a dust cloud, based on new observations by the Spitzer Space Telescope. Their paper has just been accepted by the Astrophysical Journal.

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11 New Planetary Systems… 26 New Planets… Kepler Racks ‘Em Up!

11 New Planetary Systems… 26 New Planets… Kepler Racks ‘Em Up!:

Artist's Concept of New Planetary Systems - Credit: NASA

Eleven ball in the side pocket. Whack! And another 26 planets are discovered! NASA just announced the latest tally and the new discoveries come close to doubling the amount of verified planets and tripling the number of stars which are confirmed to have more than one transiting planet. It’s just another score for understanding how planets came to be… planets which run the gambit from about one and half times the size of Earth up to the size of Jupiter. Of these, fifteen are judged to be between the size of Earth and Neptune – while more observations will reveal their structure. The new bodies orbit the parent star between 6 and 143 days and all are closer than our Sun/Venus distance. (...)
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Mystery Moon Flashes Caused by Meteorite Impacts

Mystery Moon Flashes Caused by Meteorite Impacts:

Example of a lunar flash, photographed in 1953. Credit: Leon Stuart/Columbia University Department of Astronomy

For hundreds of years, people have seen tiny flashes of light on the surface of the Moon. Very brief, but bright enough to be seen from Earth, these odd flashes still hadn’t been adequately explained up until now. Also known as Transient Lunar Phenomena (TLPs), they’ve been observed on many occasions, but rarely photographed. On Earth, meteorites burning up in the atmosphere can produce similar flashes, but the Moon has no atmosphere for anything to burn up in, so what could be causing them? As it turns out, according to a new study, the answer is still meteorites, but for a slightly different reason.

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Astrophoto: Transit of Europa by David Billington

Astrophoto: Transit of Europa by David Billington:

Astrophoto: Transit of Europa by David Billington

Transit of Europa. Image Credit: David Billington

David Billington captured this image of the transit of Jupiter’s moon Europa, 10:20PM on November 4, 2011 at St. Agnes, Cornwall, UK.

Europa is the smallest of the four Galilean moons of Jupiter. Together with Io, Ganymede, and Callisto, Europa was discovered by Galileo Galilei in January 1610.

David used a US Orion 12inch Dobsonian telescope, Watch House Equatorial Platform and Phillips SPC 880 webcam. The image was processed with Registax5.


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NASA’s New Eyes in the Sky

NASA’s New Eyes in the Sky:

An artist's concept of NuSTAR in space. Image credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/Orbital

On March 14, NASA will launch the Nuclear Spectroscopic Telescope Array or NuSTAR. This is the first time a telescope will focus on high energy X-rays, effectively opening up the sky for more sensitive study. The telescope will target black holes, supernova explosions, and will study the most extreme active galaxies. NuSTAR’s use of high-energy X-rays have an added bonus: it will be able to capture and compose the most detailed images ever taken in this end of the electromagnetic spectrum. (...)
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Russia Sets Its Sights on the Moon for 2020

Russia Sets Its Sights on the Moon for 2020:

The Moon. Image credit: NASA.

Looks like Republican Presidential hopeful Newt Gingrich might have some competition if he wants to be the first to build a base on the Moon. Last week, the Russian Space Agency Roscosmos announced plans to put a man on the Moon by the end of the decade with a lunar base as its next step. (...)
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When Stars Play Planetary Pinball

When Stars Play Planetary Pinball:

Artist's conception of a binary star sunset as seen from the exoplanet Kepler-16b. For some planets, such views may be only temporary. Credit: NASA/Ames Research Center/Kepler Mission

Many of us remember playing pinball at the local arcade while growing up; it turns out that some stars like it as well. Binary stars can play tug-of-war with an unfortunate planet, flinging it into a wide orbit that allows it to be captured by first one star and then the other, in effect “bouncing” it between them before it is eventually flung out into deep space.

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Special Delivery, Low-Earth Orbit Style!

Special Delivery, Low-Earth Orbit Style!:

A Progress resupply vehicle seen on approach to the ISS on Jan. 27, 2012. (NASA)

When you’re cruising along in low-Earth orbit, running out of supplies is not an option. Fortunately there are Progress vehicles: Russian spacecraft that carry much-needed supplies and equipment to the astronauts aboard the Space Station.

The photo above, taken by Expedition 30 crew members, shows the unmanned Progress 46 vehicle approaching the ISS on January 27, 2012.

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Most Detailed Look Ever Into the Carina Nebula

Most Detailed Look Ever Into the Carina Nebula:

This broad panorama of the Carina Nebula, a region of massive star formation in the southern skies, was taken in infrared light using the HAWK-I camera on ESO’s Very Large Telescope. Many previously hidden features, scattered across a spectacular celestial landscape of gas, dust and young stars, have emerged. Credit: ESO/T. Preibisch

Like finding buried treasure, this new image of the Carina Nebula has uncovered details not seen before. This vibrant image, from ESO’s Very Large Telescope shows not just the brilliant massive stars, but uncovers hundreds of thousands of much fainter stars that were previously hidden from view. Hundreds of individual images have been combined to create this picture, which is the most detailed infrared mosaic of the nebula ever taken and one of the most dramatic images ever created by the VLT.
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Milky Way’s Supermassive Black Hole is Feasting on Asteroids

Milky Way’s Supermassive Black Hole is Feasting on Asteroids:

Mysterious X-ray flares caught by Chandra may be asteroids falling into the Milky Way's giant black hole. Credit: X-ray: NASA/CXC/MIT/F. Baganoff et al.; Illustrations: NASA/CXC/M.Weiss

For the past several years, the Chandra telescope has detected X-ray flares occurring about once a day from the supermassive black hole at the center of the Milky Way Galaxy. These flares last a few hours with brightness ranging from a few times to nearly one hundred times that of the black hole’s regular output. What could be causing these unusual, mysterious flares? Scientists have determined that the black hole could be feasting hungrily on asteroids that come too close and vaporizing them, creating the flares. Basically, the black hole is eating asteroids and then belching out X-ray gas.

If confirmed, this result would mean that there is a huge, bustling cloud around the black hole containing hundreds of trillions of asteroids and comets.

“People have had doubts about whether asteroids could form at all in the harsh environment near a supermassive black hole,” said Kastytis Zubovas of the University of Leicester in the United Kingdom, and lead author of a new paper. “It’s exciting because our study suggests that a huge number of them are needed to produce these flares.”
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Do Alien Civilizations Inevitably ‘Go Green’?

Do Alien Civilizations Inevitably ‘Go Green’?:

Beautiful view of our Milky Way Galaxy. If other alien civilizations are out there, can we find them? Credit: ESO/S. Guisard

In the famous words of Arthur C. Clarke, “Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.” This phrase is often quoted to express the idea that an alien civilization which may be thousands or millions of years older than us would have technology so far ahead of ours that to us it would appear to be “magic.”

Now, a variation of that thought has come from Canadian science fiction writer Karl Schroeder, who posits that ”any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from nature.” The reasoning is that if a civilization manages to exist that long, it would inevitably “go green” to such an extent that it would no longer leave any detectable waste products behind. Its artificial signatures would blend in with those of the natural universe, making it much more difficult to detect them by simply searching for artificial constructs versus natural ones.

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Tidal Heating on Some Exoplanets May Leave Them Waterless

Tidal Heating on Some Exoplanets May Leave Them Waterless:

Venus as photographed by the Pioneer Venus Orbiter spacecraft in 1978. Some exoplanets may suffer a similar fate as this scorched world. Credit: NASA/JPL/Caltech

As the number of exoplanets being discovered continues to increase dramatically, a growing number are now being found which orbit within their stars’ habitable zones. For smaller, rocky worlds, this makes it more likely that some of them could harbour life of some kind, as this is the region where temperatures (albeit depending on other factors as well) can allow liquid water to exist on their surfaces. But there is another factor which may prevent some of them from being habitable after all – tidal heating, caused by the gravitational pull of one star, planet or moon on another; this effect which creates tides on Earth’s oceans can also create heat inside a planet or moon.

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NASA’s Going Green

NASA’s Going Green:

The Phoenix spacecraft launches on a Delta II rocket in 2007. NASA is looking for alternatives to hydrazine monopropellant, which Phoenix used for its navigational thrusters. Image credit: NASA/Sandra Joseph and John Kechele

NASA announced yesterday that it’s looking for new technology proposals using environmentally friendly fuels to launch payload. The space agency is hoping to move away from hydrazine, the fuel that currently launches anything that travels beyond the atmosphere from commercial satellites to private spaceflight and exploration probes. (...)
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Weekly SkyWatcher’s Forecast – February 12-18, 2012

Weekly SkyWatcher’s Forecast – February 12-18, 2012:

Spirograph Nebula Courtesy of the Hubble Space Telescope

Greetings, fellow SkyWatchers! As the Moon fades away, dark sky studies return and so do we as we take a look at a great collection of nebulae this week and expand your Herschel studies. Get out your binoculars and telescopes, because here’s what’s up! (...)
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Far Above the World

Far Above the World:

Astronaut Bruce McCandless untethered above the Earth on Feb. 12, 1984. (NASA)

28 years ago today, NASA astronaut Bruce McCandless left the relative safety of Challenger’s payload bay and went untethered into orbit around Earth, venturing farther than anyone ever before.

The historic photo above was taken when McCandless was 320 feet from the orbiter — about the length of an American football field, or just shy of the width of the International Space Station.

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Monday, February 6, 2012

‘Oceanus Borealis’ – Mars Express Finds New Evidence for Ancient Ocean on Mars

‘Oceanus Borealis’ – Mars Express Finds New Evidence for Ancient Ocean on Mars:

Topographic map from Mars Global Surveyor showing colour-coded altitudes; the blue areas are the lowest and correspond to the possible ancient ocean in the northern hemisphere. Credit: NASA/JPL

For a long time now, evidence has continued to indicate that Mars was once a water world – near-surface groundwater, lakes, rivers, hot springs and, according to some planetary models, even an ancient ocean in the northern hemisphere. That last one in particular has been a subject of intense debate; some scientists see evidence for it while others do not. Even if it was there, it may have been a warm ocean or it may have been colder, like the polar seas here on Earth. The prospect of an ocean of any kind on early Mars is an exciting one, regarding the question of possible life way back then. The argument has swung both ways over the years, but now another new report has been published which comes down on the “yes” side.

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Students Discover Millisecond Pulsar, Help in the Search for Gravitational Waves

Students Discover Millisecond Pulsar, Help in the Search for Gravitational Waves:

Using an array of millisecond pulsars, astronomers can detect tiny changes in the pulse arrival times in order to detect the influence of gravitational waves. Credit: NRAO

A special project to search for pulsars has bagged the first student discovery of a millisecond pulsar – a super-fast spinning star, and this one rotates about 324 times per second. The Pulsar Search Collaboratory (PSC) has students analyzing real data from the National Radio Astronomy Observatory’s (NRAO) Robert C. Byrd Green Bank Telescope (GBT) to find pulsars. Astronomers involved with the project said the discovery could help detect elusive ripples in spacetime known as gravitational waves.

“Gravitational waves are ripples in the fabric of spacetime predicted by Einstein’s theory of General Relativity,” said Dr. Maura McLaughlin, from West Virginia University. “We have very good proof for their existence but, despite Einstein’s prediction back in the early 1900s, they have never been detected.”
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How Well Can Astronomers Study Exoplanet Atmospheres?

How Well Can Astronomers Study Exoplanet Atmospheres?:

Artist's impression of exoplanets around other stars. Credits: ESA/AOES Medialab

Exoplanet discoveries are happening at a frenetic pace, and some of the latest newly discovered worlds are sometimes described as “Earth-Like” and “potentially habitable.”

The basis of this comparison is, in many cases, based on the distance between the exoplanet and its host star. Unfortunately the distance between a planet and its host star is only half the picture. The other half is determining if an exoplanet has an atmosphere, and what the contents of said atmosphere may be.

Basically, just because an exoplanet is in the “habitable zone” around its host star, it may not necessarily be habitable. If an exoplanet has a thick, crushing, Venus-Like atmosphere, it would most likely be too hot for surface water. The opposite holds true as well, as it could be entirely possible for an exoplanet to have a thin, wispy Mars-like atmosphere where any water would be locked up as ice.

At this point, how well can astronomers study the atmosphere around an exoplanet?

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Posted by Nelio Inacio at 6:49 PM 0 comments
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New Insights into the Moon’s Mysterious Magnetic Field

New Insights into the Moon’s Mysterious Magnetic Field:

Lunar Dynamo
Ever since the Apollo era, scientist have known that the Moon had some kind of magnetic field in the past, but doesn’t have one now. Understanding why is important, because it can tell us how magnetic fields are generated, how long they last, and how they shut down. New studies of Apollo lunar samples answer some of these questions, but they also create many more questions to be answered.
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Posted by Nelio Inacio at 6:47 PM 0 comments
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Help Astronomers Measure the Solar System!

Help Astronomers Measure the Solar System!:

The orbit of asteroid 433 Eros brings it close to Earth on Jan. 31. (www.astronomerswithoutborders.org)

As the bright Mars-crossing asteroid 433 Eros makes its closest approach to Earth since 1975, astronomers around the globe are taking the opportunity to measure its position in the sky, thereby fine-tuning our working knowledge of distances in the solar system. Using the optical principle of parallax, whereby different viewpoints of the same object show slightly shifted positions relative to background objects, skywatchers in different parts of the world can observe Eros over the next few nights and share their images online.

The endeavor is called the Eros Parallax Project, and you can participate too!

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Read the rest of Help Astronomers Measure the Solar System! (366 words)


Posted by Nelio Inacio at 6:46 PM 0 comments
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Carnival of Space #234

Carnival of Space #234:

This week’s Carnival of Space is hosted by our very own Ray Sanders at his very own website, Dear Astronomer

Click here to read the Carnival of Space #234.

And if you’re interested in looking back, here’s an archive to all the past Carnivals of Space. If you’ve got a space-related blog, you should really join the carnival. Just email an entry to carnivalofspace@gmail.com, and the next host will link to it. It will help get awareness out there about your writing, help you meet others in the space community – and community is what blogging is all about. And if you really want to help out, sign up to be a host. Send and email to the above address.


Posted by Nelio Inacio at 6:45 PM 0 comments
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