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UNDER CONSTRUCTION
Space & Astronomy Earth
- scientists estimate 100billion, trillion planets exist where life
could flourish. I was 7 years old when Sputnik 1 was launched into
space by the former USSR, now Russia and neighbouring states. I was
enralled. Even today, when I look at the night sky, I marvel that is
the same that friends all over the world saw a few hours before, or
will see in a few hours.
Moon may be shrinking, say scientists 
Cracks in the surface of the moon suggest that our nearest neighbour in space is shrinking.
Like a deflating balloon, the satellite is contracting as its interior cools, scientists believe.
The discovery was made after a probe captured images of
unusual fault lines called "lobate scarps" in the lunar highlands.
Similar cracks were first seen in photos taken near the moon's equator
by the Apollo astronauts.
Fourteen new lobate scarps have now been identified by the Lunar
Reconnaissance Orbiter spacecraft, researchers reported in the journal
Science. They were found mainly in the highlands, showing that the
lines are globally distributed. Experts believe the cracks were created
by rupturing of the brittle lunar crust as the moon shrank - a process
that appears to be geologically recent. Spectacular meteor shower to grace British skies 10.08.2010.
British
stargazers can look forward to a dazzling meteor shower lighting up our
skies this week in what is predicted to be the most impressive of
annual celestial events.
Nasa
experts say that as many as 100 shooting stars could fall every hour
during the spectacular show, hitting the earth at an incredible 140,000
mph before burning up in our atmosphere. The storm of meteor
activity is set to peak on Thursday night alongside 'near perfect
viewing conditions.' Scots have the best chance of seeing the shower
clearly with Galloway Forest Dark Sky Park tipped as the place to be.
The highest rates of meteor activity are likely to be seen in the early
hours of Friday morning. This year's event is said to be even
more spectacular because a new moon this week means there will be no
overpowering moonlight to spoil the show. Nasa experts say the
stream of meteor activity is created from the earth travelling through
a river of debris from an ancient comet, producing a display of
shooting stars called the Perseids. A Nasa spokesman told The Telegraph that'it promises to be one of the best displays of the year'. 'Monster star': R136a1 compared with our solar system
See how the newly discovered R136a1 star would dwarf our own sun and planets
Zooming in on a monster: Three images which
shows how the astronomers zoomed in on the massive star, The cluster is
seen in the bottom right section of the third image
Nasa's Hubble Space Telescope discovers 'superheated planet with comet tail'
A planet orbits so close to its sun that it surface
evaporates, leaving it with a comet-like tail, scientists using Nasa’s
Hubble Space Telescope have discovered.
By Andrew Hough, and Amanda Thomas Published: 16.07.2010 The Daily Telegraph
An
artist's impression of the gas giant planet, named HD 209458b. It is
orbiting so close to its star that its heated atmosphere is escaping
into space. Photo: NASA
The planet, nicknamed Osiris, is 153 light-years from Earth and is
only slightly smaller than Jupiter, our solar system’s biggest
planet. It was first detected in 1999 when scientists noticed a
minute reduction in the brightness of its star, caused by the planet
passing in front of it.
But astronomers at the space agency
have only just found that powerful stellar winds are sweeping the
"superheated" planet’s atmosphere out behind it. Experts say this has
led to the tail-like effect being captured by the Hubble. The "tail"
theory had been hinted at previously but not confirmed until now.
In 2003 astronomers used the Space Telescope Imaging Spectrograph,
a Hubble instrument, to investigate the planet and its atmosphere but
could not prove their theory.
The planet, officially called HD 209458b, orbits around the star
once every three and a half days, travelling so close to the star that
its surface becomes scorched. Some of this scorched material is
released as gas into the atmosphere, and swept by powerful stellar
winds into a tail similar to that of a comet.
The innermost planet in our Solar System is Mercury, which takes
88 days to orbit the Sun once, 25 times longer than Osiris takes to
orbit its star.
Scientists from the University of Colorado used the space agency’s
Cosmic Origins Spectrograph, another instrument on the Hubble, which
determines the nature of gases by examining how light from stars passes
through them. They found heavy elements such as silicon and carbon in
the planet’s atmosphere, which suggested that the planet was being
heated to 1000 degrees Fahrenheit (2000° C).
The researchers also found that gas was travelling behind the
planet at different velocities and in different directions, rather than
in a conventional atmosphere, leading them to believe that this
material was akin to the planet’s “tail”.
Dr Jeffrey Linsky,
who led the study, said it was the first time that astronomers had been
able to measure the gas coming off the planet at specific speeds.
"Since 2003 scientists have theorised the lost mass is being pushed
back into a tail, and they have even calculated what it looks like," he
said. "We think we have the best observational evidence to support
that theory. We have measured gas coming off the planet at specific
speeds, some coming toward Earth. “The most likely interpretation is
that we have measured the velocity of material in a tail."
The loss of material caused by the extreme heat and speed of the
planet is only very slight, meaning it will take “about a trillion
years for the planet to evaporate,” Dr Linksy added.
More:
Rare solar eclipse over Easter Island guardian.co.uk, 12.07.2010. Reuters
Thousands gathered in Rapa Nui National Park to watch the full eclipse of the sun which darkened the sky for four minutes
Link to video: http://www.guardian.co.uk/science/video/2010/jul/12/solar-eclipse-easter-island
European probe Rosetta successfully flies by asteroid: ESA 
The European spacecraft Rosetta performed a fly-by of a massive asteroid on Saturday, the European Space Agency said, taking images that could one day help Earth defend itself from destruction.
Racing
through the asteroid belt between Mars and Jupiter at 47,800 kph
(29,925 mph), the billion-euro (1.25-billion-dollar) probe flew within
3,200 kms (2,000 miles) of the huge potato-shaped rock, Lutetia.
"The fly-by has been a spectacular success with Rosetta performing
fautlessly," ESA said in a statement. "Just 24 hours ago, Lutetia was
a distant stranger. Now, thanks to Rosetta, it has become a close
friend," the agency added.
Holger Sierks of Germany's Max Planck Institute, who is in charge
of the spacecraft's Osiris (Optical, Spectroscopic and Infrared Remote
Imaging System) camera said the more than 400 "phantastic images"
showed many craters and details.
"Rosetta opened up a new world which will keep scientists busy for years," he added.
"We have completed the fly-by phase," Rosetta's director of
operations Andrea Accomazzo said earlier on the ESA's website from the
European Space Operations Centre in Darmstadt, Germany.
The aim of the fly-by of the asteroid, measuring 134 kms (83.75
miles) in diameter, is to measure Lutetia's mass and then calculate its
density, knowledge which could one day be a lifesaver, according to ESA
scientists.
If a rogue asteroid enters on a collision course with Earth,
knowing its density will help the planet's defenders to determine
whether they should try to deflect the rock or, instead, blow it up.
As Rosetta is around half a million kilometres from Earth, the probe's signal and images took 25 minutes to be received.
Once widely dismissed as bland lumps of debris left over from the
building of the planets, asteroids have turned out to be intriguingly
individual. They are extremely different in shape and size, from just
hundreds of metres (yards) across to behemoths of 100 kms (60 miles) or
more, and also vary in mineral flavours.
Most measurements suggest Lutetia is a "C" type of asteroid,
meaning that it contains primitive compounds of carbon. But others
indicate it could be an "M" type, meaning that it holds metals.
New data proving this could rewrite the theory about asteroid
classification. Metallic asteroids are far smaller than Lutetia: they
are deemed to be fragments of far larger rocks that, in the bump and
grind of the asteroid belt, were smashed apart.
The fly-by comes halfway through the extraordinary voyage of
Rosetta, launched in 2004 on a 12-year, 7.1-billion-kilometre
(4.4-billion-mile) mission.
One of the biggest gambles in the history of space exploration,
the unmanned explorer is designed to meet up in 2014 with Comet 67/P
Churyumov-Gerasimenko 675 million kms (422 million miles) from home.
The goal is to unlock the secrets of these lonely wanderers of the
cosmos, whose origins date back to the dawn of the Solar System, some
4.5 billion years ago, before planets existed.
To get to its distant meeting point, Rosetta has had to play
planetary billiards for five years, using four "gravitational assists"
from Earth and Mars as slingshots to build up speed. Image of Big Bang ghost captured
 05.07.2010.
A striking image showing the ghost of the Big Bang has been captured by a new space telescope.
The Planck satellite was launched by the European Space
Agency in May 2009 to study the early universe. It is designed to scan
the sky with instruments sensitive to nine different bands of normally
invisible microwave light.
Picking up cosmic microwaves makes it possible to see the
"afterglow" of radiation produced by the Big Bang that gave birth to
the universe around 14 billion years ago.
Known as the Cosmic Microwave Background (CMB), it contains
information that can help scientists piece together what happened when
the universe began.
The Planck image shows the main disc of the Milky Way galaxy, the
Sun's starry "home", with the yellow-mottled CMB above and below it.
The radiation was released as the first atoms were forming, just
400,000 years after the Big Bang brought matter, space and time into
existence.
Dr David Parker, director of space science and exploration at the
UK Space Agency, said: "Planck has 'painted' us its first spectacular
picture of the universe. This single image captures both our own cosmic
backyard - the Milky Way galaxy that we live in - but also the subtle
imprint of the Big Bang from which the whole universe emerged."
The image shows dust strewn throughout the galaxy in blue, with a
red band across the centre showing hot regions. Variations in the CMB
backdrop represent minute differences in the temperature and density of
matter when the galaxies had not yet formed.
 Satellite Earth Images - May
This panorama was taken by an astronaut looking south-east across
the South American continent when the International Space Station (ISS)
was almost directly over the Atacama desert near Chile’s Pacific coast.
The high plains (3,000–5,000 metres) of the Andes mountains appear in
the foreground, with a line of young volcanoes (dashed line) facing the
much lower Atacama desert (1,000–2,000m elevation). Several
salt-crusted dry lakes occupy the basins between major thrust faults in
the Puna. The largest of these, Salar de Arizaro, is seen in the
foreground in this view. The Atlantic Ocean coastline, where
Argentina’s capital city of Buenos Aires sits along the Río de la
Plata, is dimly visible at image top left Photograph: ISS/NASA
Japanese probe yields insights into Moon's inner life 04.07.2010.
Japanese astronomers on Sunday said they had
found traces of a mineral that adds an important piece of knowledge to
the puzzle of the Moon's geological past. Skip related content
Using a instrument-laden probe, Kaguya, which
was placed in orbit around the Moon in 2007, the team found abundant
signatures of the mineral in concentric rings in three big crater
regions.
The mineral, called olivine, is deemed to be a telltale of mantle,
the deep inner layer of iron- and magnesium-rich rock that lies beneath
the Moon's crust.
A leading theory is that the Moon was created about 4.5 billion
years ago after the "Big Whack" -- it was ripped from Earth after our
planet suffered a gigantic collision from some space object.
As the material coalesced into a ball, its surface gradually
cooled, forming a crust made of a light-coloured aluminous mineral,
feldspar, which floated in a dense, molten liquid.
Kaguya's data add a chapter to this "lunar magma ocean" hypothesis.
It suggests that after the crust had formed, there was some
massive overturn in the fiery liquid beneath. Olivine-rich mantle was
brought from deep within the lunar bowels to within the base of the
crust.
At the craters sampled by the probe -- the South Pole-Aitken,
Imbrium and Moscoviense impact basins -- the Moon's crust is very thin,
and the olivine mantle may have been exposed by asteroids that smashed
into the lunar surface, the paper suggests.
The Moon's crust is believed to be far thicker than Earth's,
averaging around 70 kilometres (45 miles) in depth, although the
thickness varies significantly.
The structure and origins of the Moon's mantle have been fiercely
debated by astro-geologists. The famous Moon rocks brought back by the
Apollo missions shed no light on the question, as they were all from
the lunar crust. As a result, pointers to the existence of the mantle
were, for decades, either sketchy or indirect.
The study, published online by the journal Nature Geoscience, is
headed by Satoru Yamamoto of the National Institute for Environmental
Studies in Tsukuba. Star wars: Planet being devoured by yellow dwarf's heavenly inferno
An exoplanet known as Wasp-12b is being roasted and ripped apart after getting too close to its parent star
 Artist's conception of
the explanet Wasp-12b being mangled by the heat of its parent star,
after being caught in its gravitational pull. Illustration: G
Bacon/STScI/Nasa/Esa
In a far-away region of the galaxy, a planet is learning the
lesson that Icarus taught the ancient Greeks thousands of years ago.
A planet known as Wasp-12b is passing so close to its parent star
that it is being roasted and ripped apart in an extraordinary display
of celestial violence.
The gravitational pull of the star is so strong it has stretched
the planet into the shape of a rugby ball. The planet has reached a
temperature of more than 1,500C and material has begun spilling from it
onto the star.
The planet's precarious situation was revealed by observations made with a new instrument on Nasa's Hubble space telescope, the Cosmic Origins Spectrograph (Cos).
"We see a huge cloud of material around the planet which is
escaping and will be captured by the star. We have identified chemical
elements never before seen on planets outside our own solar system,"
said Carole Haswell, lead scientist at the Open University.
The planet may have only 10m years left before it is completely devoured, according to a report in the Astrophysical Journal Letters.
The star, a yellow dwarf called Wasp-12, is about 600 light years
from Earth in the winter constellation of Auriga, the charioteer. The
planet was spotted and named by the UK's Wide Area Search for Planets
(Wasp) team in 2008.
The Wasp telescope looks for periodic dimming caused by planets
moving across the faces of their parent stars. Wasp-12b is so close to
its star, it completes an orbit in 1.1 days.
The Cos equipment monitors ultraviolet light coming from stars and
was sensitive enough to show that the atmosphere of the planet had
expanded greatly because it is so hot.
Space yacht Ikaros ready to cast off for far side of the sun
Interplanetary cruise of Japan's solar-powered 'sail craft' aims at deeper knowledge of Venus
The space craft Ikaros, above, with its
20-metre sail, will be driven forward by both photon propulsion and
solar power generation. Photograph: Jaxa
Japan hopes to turn the wildest fantasies of science fiction into reality today with a "space yacht" that will draw on the power of the sun to take it to Venus and, perhaps, far beyond.
A Mitsubishi H-2A rocket carrying Ikaros (an acronym for
Interplanetary Kite-craft Accelerated by Radiation of the Sun) is set
to blast off from Tanegashima island in south-west Japan at 6.44am
local time.
The long-awaited launch is seen as part of a mission that could
change the course of interplanetary exploration. If it is successful,
Ikaros will be carried through deep space at high speed with the help
of a 20-metre sail, propelled by the pressure from solar particles.
The flexible membrane sail, which at 32.5 micrometers is about
half the thickness of a human hair, is covered with thin-film solar
panels that will create a hybrid of electricity and pressure, according
to Jaxa, the Japanese space exploration agency. Solar photons will
bounce off thousands of tiny mirrors to give Ikaros the thrust it needs
to complete manoeuvres such as rotating and hovering.
Although the name of Japan's craft may give rise to anxiety
(Icarus, the figure from Greek mythology, having fallen into the sea
after flying too close to the sun) Jaxa officials say they are
confident the high-tech version will stick to its planned trajectory.
The craft will spend a few weeks rotating before unfurling its
sail. If all goes to plan, the craft will use draw on the energy
provided by the sun's photons to gather speed during its six-month
journey. Experts believe that by developing hyper-powerful sails
drawing on laser light instead of sunlight, solar yachts could one day
reach speeds of 500,000mph.
After passing Venus, Ikaros is expected to continue its voyage for
three years towards the far side of the sun, although contact is likely
to be lost after a year. Jaxa officials say that, if the technology
proves viable, they could send a similar craft, Akatsuki, to Jupiter by
2020.
That mission could deepen our understanding of how Venus, thought
to have once resembled Earth, became the mysterious, cloud-covered,
planet of today. The probe is equipped with instruments that will
observe the planet's atmosphere from distances of between 186 miles and
49,710 miles.
The $16m project will be the first to deploy the new technology
deep in space. Previous space yachts have achieved no more than
orbiting Earth, while Nasa and Europe's space agency appear to have
resigned themselves to losing out to Japan in the race to test solar
sails in outer space.
Welcome to a new Eden – two billion miles from Earth
No other body in the
solar system more closely resembles Earth than Saturn's moon, Titan. It
has methane lakes and seas and scientists now believe that an
underground ocean could even harbour life, says Robin McKie
 Titan has large areas of liquid methane on its surface. Illustration by Ron Miller
Five years ago, several hundred scientists gathered at the European Space Operations Centre
in Darmstadt, Germany, to witness a remarkable event: the reception of
the first signals to be sent from the surface of Saturn's largest moon,
Titan.
It had taken engineers a decade to plan and construct Huygens,
Europe's unmanned mission to this mysterious world. In addition, the
probe's 2-billion-mile journey there, on board its Nasa-built
mother craft, Cassini, took a further seven years. A great many careers
depended on the mission's success. Hence the tension in the control
room on 14 January, 2005.
"If Huygens had failed, it would have been a disaster. We knew we
wouldn't get another shot at Titan for 20 years," says Professor John
Zarnecki. His Open University team designed key instruments for the
probe, which is named after the 17th-century Dutchastronomer Christopher Huygens who discovered Titan.
"There was another nagging worry. We had talked up Titan as an incredibly exciting place in order to get the space
agencies to fund Huygens. Yet we only had the word of the theoreticians
that this orange fuzzball, as it appeared in our best images, was
interesting. If it turned out to be dull and boring, we would have egg
all over our faces."
Then the data arrived and from the very first results, greeted with jubilation at Darmstadt, it was clear that the European Space Agency's
probe had performed superbly. More to the point, Titan appeared to be a
very exciting place indeed. Photographs revealed shorelines bounding
dark lakes while the surface was found to have a crunchy constituency,
likened by one researcher to creme brulee.
Since then, scientists have been studying signals sent back by
Huygens during its two-and-a-half-hour parachute descent through
Titan's thick, orange-coloured, nitrogen-rich atmosphere. These
provided enough data to fill no more than a simple memory stick, making
Huygens's results some of the most expensive and precious to be
collected by scientists.
At the same time, its mother ship, Cassini, has continued its
camera and radar sweeps of the haze-covered moon to uncover key surface
features. In combination, these two sets of results – only recently
fully analysed – have uncovered a world far more extraordinary than
ever suspected.
"There are lakes and seas that make Titan the only other place,
other than the Earth, in the solar system with large, stable bodies of
liquid on its surface," says Zarnecki. "There are also river channels;
great stretches of dunes; weather and meteorology; complex
hydrocarbons; and – most excitingly – powerful signs that Titan has a
subsurface ocean that could provide a home for primitive life. Titan
turns out to be an incredible place. It's a moon that would be a
planet."
In fact, Titan looks like Earth in many ways – with one critical
exception. It is extraordinarily cold, with atmospheric temperatures
200 degrees below that of our planet. Ten times further from the Sun
than Earth, Titan consequently receives a hundredth of the solar heat
that bathes our world. There may be complex organic material littering
the place, but conditions are simply too cold on Titan for life to
evolve from this material on the surface.
It turns out that those rivers, lakes and seas on the surface are
not watery affairs but are made of methane which plays the same
meteorological role on Titan as water does on Earth. It evaporates from
great seas of liquid methane, like the giant Kraken Mare. Then it
condenses and falls as methane rain, sometimes setting off flash floods
that carve out riverbeds like the ones picked out by the cameras on
Huygens.
"Water exists in three forms on Earth: liquid, vapour and ice,"
says Zarnecki. "The same is true for methane on Titan. Hence its role
in driving the moon's weather systems."
As for the existence of Titan's complex hydrocarbons, these are
formed in its upper atmosphere where the Sun's weak, ultra-violet
radiation breaks down methane into molecules that re-form into more
complex, petrol-like hydrocarbons. These are responsible for much of
the haze that has hidden Titan's surface like a smog over Los Angeles.
Devices on board Huygens have detected ethane, acetylene and other
complex hydrocarbon molecules – an oilman's dream. These hydrocarbons
are then swept to the ground by the moon's rain, though gravity on
Titan is so weak that the resulting oily droplets would be far larger
than raindrops on Earth.
These seas and lakes don't tell the whole story, however. As
Huygens settled on the moon's surface, it photographed a landscape of
pebbles that turn out to be made not of stone, but of ice, evidence
that water exists at least in one form on Titan.
The fact is that if Titan were not so cold, it would probably be
bursting with life, so plentiful are its supplies of organic raw
materials, scientists suggest. The moon is, in effect, a chilled
leftover from the formation of the early solar system. It is,
therefore, of enormous scientific importance, according to Al Diaz,
science associate administrator of Nasa, which collaborated with Europe
on Huygens. "Titan is a time machine that gives us a chance to look at
conditions that existed on early Earth," he said after Huygens's
results were received.
In any case, this moon may yet have its day as a home of complex
lifeforms. "In a couple of billion years, our Sun will expand to become
a type of star called a red giant and will envelop Earth in superhot
plasma," says Zarnecki. "Our oceans will boil off and the Earth will
become a very unpleasant place to live. By contrast, temperatures will
go up nicely by a couple of hundred degrees on Titan. This will be the
new Eden."
Crucial to this scenario are Cassini's radar observations which
reveal that Titan has a highly irregular rotation. "All planets and
moons have slight spin irregularities, including Earth," explains
Zarnecki. "This lengthens or shortens our day by a microsecond or two.
But on Titan the effect is much greater, suggesting the existence of an
underground ocean which separates the moon's crust from its core. This
layer acts as the fluid in a giant ballbearing which allows Titan's
crust and core to spin at different rates, hence those irregularities."
As for the make-up of that liquid layer, evidence points to water
as the prime candidate. And that, in turn, has exciting consequences,
say scientists. Titan probably has a hot core which is keeping that
layer of water in a warm liquid state. Thus, we have the prospect of a
rich soup of hydrocarbons filtering through Titan's crust to a
subterranean ocean.
"These discoveries make Titan very interesting biologically. We
have got loads of organics on the surface and liquid water down below.
Can the two mix? Have they been mixing for billions of years? In other
words, are there thriving colonies of bugs down there, crawling about
and living very happily below Titan's surface?"
Not surprisingly, such a prospect is fuelling scientists'
appetites for a return mission to Titan. Several probes are being
planned including a joint European-American mission that would carry
airships and balloons. These would take advantage of the moon's thick
atmosphere, which is denser than Earth's, and its low gravity, which is
a seventh of ours.
"Flying on Titan should be easy and by following its winds, we
should be able to sail round it in a couple of weeks, looking for
promising places to land and investigate," says Zarnecki. "We could
also sail robot ships on its methane seas and become the first
extraterrestrial mariners. Most important, however, we could try and
find signs of simple biology on Titan. That would be pure gold."
Jupiter loses one of its stripes By Claire Bates 13.05.2010
The largest planet in our
solar system is usually dominated by two dark bands in its atmosphere,
with one in the northern hemisphere and one in the southern hemisphere.
However, the most recent
images taken by amateur astronomers have revealed the lower stripe
known as the Southern Equatorial Belt has disappeared leaving the
southern half of the planet looking unusually bare. The band was present in
at the end of last year before Jupiter ducked behind the Sun on its
orbit. However, when it emerged three months later the belt had
disappeared.
Jupiter was pictured
this month (left) looking unusually bare, compared to July 2009
(right). It has lost its dark red Southern Equatorial Belt although
scientists are unclear as to why. The pictures have different tones
because they were snapped a year apart. Journalist and amateur
astronomer Bob King, also known as Astro_Bob, was one of the first to
note the strange phenomenon. He said: 'Jupiter with
only one belt is almost like seeing Saturn when its rings are edge-on
and invisible for a time - it just doesn't look right.'
It is not the first time
this unusual phenomenon has been noticed. Jupiter loses or regains one
of its belts every ten of 15 years, although exactly why this happens
is a mystery.
Enlarge  Jupiter has a complex belt system
The planet is
a giant ball of gas and liquid around 500million miles from the Sun.
It's surface is composed of dense red, brown, yellow, and white clouds
arranged in light-coloured areas called zones and darker regions called
belts.
These clouds are created
by chemicals that have formed at different heights. The highest white
clouds in the zones are made of crystals of frozen ammonia. Darker,
lower clouds are created from chemicals including sulphur and
phosphorus. The clouds are blown into bands by 350mph winds caused by
Jupiter's rapid rotation.
Noted Jupiter watcher
Anthony Wesley, who spotted an impact spot on its surface last year,
has tracked the disappearing belt from his back garden in Australia.
'It was obvious last year
that it was fading. It was closely observed by anyone watching
Jupiter,' he told The Planetary Society.
'There was a big rush on to find out what had changed once it came back into view.'
Mr Wesley said while it
was a mystery as to what had caused the belt to fade, the most likely
explanation was that it was linked to storm activity that preceded the
change.
'The question now is when will the South Equatorial belt erupt back into activity and reappear?' Mr Wesley said.
The pattern for this
happening is when a brilliant white spot forms in the southern zone.
Gradually it will start to spout dark blobs of material which will be
stretched by Jupiter's fierce winds into a new belt, and the planet
will return to its familiar 'tyre track' appearance.
Jupiter will be closest to Earth on September 24, offering stargazers their best chance of seeing it without its stripe.
Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-1277734/Jupiter-loses-stripes-scientists-idea-why.html#ixzz0nnHgacEEHubble Space Telescope: the first 20 years in pictures
The Hubble Space Telescope was launched on April 24, 1990. To
celebrate its 20th anniversary, NASA have released this image of
chaotic activity atop a three-light-year-tall pillar of gas and dust
that is being eaten away by the brilliant light from nearby bright
stars. The pillar is also being assaulted from within, as infant stars
buried inside it fire off jets of gas that can be seen streaming from
towering peaks. This turbulent cosmic pinnacle lies within a
tempestuous stellar nursery called the Carina Nebula, located 7,500
light-years away in the southern constellation Carina
SDO reveals the sun in all its glory (7 pictures)
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More on this story
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Solar Dynamics Observatory (SDO) records video footage of a 'prominence eruption' arcing from the surface of the sun
Launched on 11 February 2010, SDO is the most advanced spacecraft ever to study the sun Photograph: Nasa/EPA
NASA Releases Dramatic New Sun Pictures  © Sky News 2010
Astonishing new pictures that could help unlock the secrets of the Sun have been released by Nasa.
The dramatic videos and images - 10 times
clearer than high definition TV - show giant flares and clouds of
ionised gas erupting from the surface of the star.
One video captures a blast know as a coronal mass ejection, in
which the same amount of material contained in the whole Mississippi
River is ejected at one million miles per hour - in 30 seconds.
The images were taken by Nasa's Solar Dynamics Observatory.
The satellite, which carries four telescopes along with a plethora
of other hi-tech equipment, will examine the Sun's magnetic field and
its impact on the Earth's atmosphere and climate.
Solar flares are known to affect the world's weather, knock out power supplies and affect navigational equipment.
Madhulika Guhathakurta, the mission's programme scientist at Nasa,
said: "It is the most comprehensive view of the Sun. "When you see the
whole Sun, it is showing connections we have never seen before."
The £522m million observatory will operate for at least five years.
US air force set to launch unmanned shuttle
The US air force quietly
prepares to launch the X-37B, a robotic spacecraft, into space just
days after the return of the Discovery shuttle
http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/video/2010/apr/21/us-shuttle-x-37b-discovery
Space shuttle performs back flip to dock on to International Space Station
The thought of parking
even the smallest car in a tight space can often leave nervous drivers
terrified. But astronauts on the space shuttle Discovery took
performing a three-point turn to a whole new level yesterday when they
performed a back flip before docking the shuttle underneath the
International Space Station (ISS).
The shuttle commander Alan Poindexter skillfully docked Discovery at 2.30am on Wednesday morning.
You have reached your destination: The space shuttle Discovery pulls into position for the manoeuvre
1, 2, 3, turn! Discovery begins its unusual three point turn
Result: The shuttle ends up upside down, in the perfect position to dock onto the space statio
Later the same day
astronauts from Discovery used a robotic arm to lift a 13-ton cargo
carrier from the payload bay onto the space station. Half of container
is taken up by science experiments and supplies, as well as a new
bedroom and freezer.
Nasa said the sleeping
compartment may be turned into a powder room, where space station
residents can take sponge baths in an enclosed space. At the moment
astronauts run the risk of drops of water floating away and getting
into electronic equipment when they clean up.
In total the crew will unload and transfer 17,000 pounds of science racks and other supplies.
A
shuttle crew member is seen waving (top right) as the commander of the
Discovery shuttle prepared to dock without radar support
The Italian-built cargo
carrier - named Leonardo after Signor da Vinci - will return to Earth
filled with rubbish and old equipment.
Then it will be
beefed up and flown back up in September as a permanent storage unit
for the space station. That will be the last shuttle flight.
Meanwhile the crew have been busy sending huge reams of data from the station to Mission Control.
The files contain laser images of the space shuttle Discovery, which
was unable to send the information directly due to a broken antenna
that was revealed when it reached orbit.
A
close-up view of one of the space shuttle Discovery's wings. Every
shuttle is checked for damage post-launch after the 2003 Columbia
disaster
Nasa will study the
pictures sent from the ISS of Discovery's wings and nose cone. Ever
since the 2003 Columbia tragedy, Nasa has checked each shuttle for any
launch damage to the heat shields following lift-off.
The fault meant the Discovery crew also had to dock without the use of the normal radar tracking system.
Commander Poindexter used
a video feed of the docking hatches to line the shuttle up with the
ISS. It was only the second docking without radar assistance in 10 years.
 Astronaut Soichi Noguchi captured the shuttle Discovery approaching the station during docking
The latest mission marks the achievement of having four women aboard the same spacecraft for the first time.
Americans Dorothy Metcalf-Lindenburger and Stephanie Wilson and Japanese astronaut Naoko Yamazak, joined American
Tracy Caldwell Dyson, who was launched aboard a Soyuz rocket from
Kazakhstan on Friday with two Russian male astronauts.
It was also the first time two Japanese astronauts have been aboard the space station simultaneously.
Space Shuttle Discovery launches
The Space Shuttle Discovery has launched, taking off for the International Space Station. 05.04.2010
The space shuttle Discovery lifts off from the Kennedy Space Center in Florida on April 5, 2010 Photo: AFP
The space shuttle Discovery STS-131 lifts off from launch pad 39 A at the Kennedy Space Center in Cape Canaveral, Florida. Photo: REUTERS
It blasted off from the Kennedy
Space Center in Florida at 6.21am (1121 BST). The shuttle and its crew
of seven will deliver spare parts and science experiments to the nearly
completed space station.
Discovery 7's mission will last nearly two weeks
and coincide with the 29th anniversary of the first shuttle flight on
April 12. Three days later, President Barack Obama will visit the Cape
Canaveral area to outline his post-shuttle plans for NASA.
The US president already has cancelled NASA's follow-up moon program.
Commander Alan Poindexter paused at the base of
Discovery to take pictures of his crew. Before boarding the shuttle, he
held up a handwritten sign telling his wife and two sons, "I love you!
See you soon".
There were screams of excitement from the crowd for
Japanese astronaut Naoko Yamazaki, set to become the second woman from
her country to soar into space.
Fuelling was delayed a little on Sunday because of
a voltage spike in one of Discovery's fuel cells. Engineers suspected
the brief surge was related to the cockpit lights, and said it posed no
problem for lift-off.
Only four shuttle flights remain. NASA plans to retire the fleet this autumn.
Once that happens, the space station will rely exclusively on other countries' vessels for crews and supplies.
Three new residents arrived on Sunday — one American and two Russians.
The station's population will temporarily swell
from six to 13 when Discovery arrives. Four will be women, the most
ever in space at once.
Two of the astronauts will be Japanese — another
first. Scores of journalists and space officials from Japan descended
on the launch site to witness the big event.
Liftoff:
The shuttle Discovery creates a stunning arc of light as it lifts off
from the Kennedy Space Centre in Florida this morning
Mission:
The shuttle is carrying a cargo hauler filled with equipment,
experiments, food and supplies for the International Space Station,
which is expected to be finished in September after 12 years of
construction
Up, up and away: The pre-dawn launch set a record for the most number of women in space at once
Discovery is seen streaking into space as a plume of smoke floats through the air
Rare sight: The International Space Station flies over Space Shuttle Discovery as it sits on launch pad at Kennedy Space Centre
Enlarge 
Exploration:
Crew members (left to right) Clayton Anderson, Naoko Yamazaki,
Stephanie Wilson, Dorothy Metcalf-Lindenburger, Rick Mastracchio, pilot
James Dutton Jr and commander Alan Poindexter wave ahead of this
morning's launch
"Catastrophic event" stopped growth of galaxy  12.03.2010
A "catastrophic event" halted the birth of stars in a galaxy in the early Universe, scientists have revealed.
Related photos / videos
The researchers from Durham University's
Department of Physics observed the massive galaxy as it would have
appeared billions of years ago.
They say the galaxy, which is similar to our Milky Way,
exploded in a series of blasts trillions of times more powerful than
any caused by an atomic bomb.
The blasts apparently happened every second for millions of years.
The explosion was said to have been caused from powerful winds
prompted by dying stars or when debris overflowed from a black hole in
the galaxy.
Dr Dave Alexander, who lead the research, said: "We are looking
into the past and seeing a catastrophic event that essentially switched
off star formation and halted the growth of a typical massive galaxy in
the local Universe."
The team now plans to study other massive star-forming galaxies in
the early Universe to see if they display similar characteristics.
Nasa mission to unravel sun’s threat to Earth. From The Sunday Times 31.01. 2010. A new probe could help scientists predict the solar storms that cause chaos for us
Scientists have designed a space probe to peer deep beneath the solar surface and observe how sunlight is generated Chris Hastings and Jonathan Leakeours time. In my mind, it keeps us united in some intangible way. AC. - under re-construction
NASA is to embark on one of its most ambitious missions in an attempt to unlock the secrets of the sun.
Following
its launch in nine days’ time, the US space agency’s Solar Dynamics
Observatory (SDO) will spend five years in orbit trying to discover the
causes of extreme solar activity, such as sun spots and solar winds and
flares.
Scientists
have long been aware that disturbances on the sun can trigger dangerous
x-rays, charged particles and magnetic fields that can disrupt power
supplies, communication signals and aircraft navigation systems on
Earth.
By
understanding how such solar phenomena are created, they hope to be
able to produce reliable forecasts of “space weather” and provide
advance warnings of any threat.
Orbiting
the Earth at a distance of 22,300 miles, the observatory will measure
fluctuations in the sun’s ultraviolet output, map magnetic fields and
photograph its surface and atmosphere.
Experts
have likened the mission to a “giant microscope” that will capture for
the first time every nuance of the sun’s exterior. The images relayed
to Earth will be 10 times clearer than high-definition television.
Barbara
Thompson, project scientist, said: “It is Nasa’s first weather mission
and it aims to characterise everything on the sun that can impact on
the Earth and near Earth. “We know things happen on the sun which
affect spacecraft, communications and radio signals. If we can
understand the underlying causes of what is happening then we can turn
this information into forecasts. “The key thing about the mission is
that it is not just pure science for its own sake. There is likely to
be a direct and immediate benefit for people.”
Solar magnetic storms and space weather disturbances have had a number of dramatic consequences over the years.
On
March 13, 1989, millions of people in Canada and the United States were
left without electricity for more than nine hours after a magnetic
storm sent shockwaves through the Hydro-Québec power grid.
Five
years later, a geomagnetic storm temporarily knocked out two Canadian
satellites and Intelsat-K, an international communications satellite.
The
most powerful solar storm in history, known as a “superstorm”, occurred
on September 1, 1859. It caused the failure of telegraph systems in
Europe and North America.
The
storm produced auroras — phenomena normally only seen near the poles —
which were visible in Cuba, Mexico and Italy. The lights were so bright
in California’s Rocky Mountains that gold prospectors mistook them for
dawn and began preparing breakfast.
Transpolar
aircraft are particularly sensitive to space weather because they rely
on navigation systems for the entire duration of a flight.
Nasa
estimates that the SDO will transmit as much as 50 times more
scientific data than any other mission in the space agency’s history.
Each
image will consist of more than 16m pixels and the amount of data sent
back to Earth daily will be equivalent to downloading 500,000 songs a
day from the internet.
In order to process the data, the organisation has set up a pair of dedicated radio antennae near Las Cruces, New Mexico.
The
SDO’s orbit will match the speed of the rotation of the Earth, meaning
that it will be in constant view of the two 59ft dishes throughout the
mission.
The UK-based Science and Technology Facilities Council is supplying some of the equipment for the observatory.
Professor
Richard Harrison, of the Rutherford Appleton Laboratory in Oxfordshire,
said understanding the impact of the sun’s magnetic fields was key to
the mission.
“The
idea is to image different layers of the sun’s atmosphere all the way
down to the surface and measure magnetic fields,” he said.
“The
bottom line is that you are trying to understand how this atmosphere
works. We can already see phenomena like the flares. The question is
how does the magnetic field form to allow this sort of thing to happen.”
Related photos / videos
The
object, known as P/2010 A2, was circling about 90 million miles (144
million km) from Earth in the main asteroid belt between Mars and
Jupiter when it was spotted last week by the Hubble Space Telescope.
"The truth is we're still struggling to understand what this means,"
lead scientist David Jewitt with the University of California at Los
Angeles, told Reuters on Tuesday. "It's most likely the result of a
recent collision between two asteroids." If so, he said, "It'd be the first case we've seen of an asteroid smash happening, basically caught in the act."
The
object resembles a comet, but its nucleus is severed from its tail,
which "has a very strange appearance, the likes of which we've never
seen before," Jewitt said
Studies
of the object -- and searches for similar ones -- would improve
scientists' understanding of how asteroids break apart, information
that may be useful to thwart a future asteroid strike on Earth. "The
thing that we want to understand is how the asteroids smash into each
other and destroy each other," Jewett said. "It might help us
understand even how to destroy an asteroid and prevent one from hitting
us."
Scientists
believe a giant comet or asteroid that hit Earth about 65 million years
ago was linked to the extinction of the dinosaurs, possibly by throwing
up dust or chemical clouds that blocked the sun or by igniting global
wildfires.
Calculations
show the orbit of P/2010 A2 is related to the group of asteroids, known
at the Flora family, that produced that asteroid.
NASA
is working to catalogue at least 90 percent of the estimated 1,000
objects that approach Earth and are larger across than one kilometre,
about two-thirds of a mile. The agency's proposed budget for the year
beginning October 1 includes a $16 million (10 million pound) annual
increase to step up that effort.
(Editing by Jane Sutton and Peter Cooney)
 We will find 'twins of Earth' this year, says astronomer Michel Mayor Hannah Devlin
Scientists
will have detected the first truly Earth-like planet outside the solar
system by the end of the year, one of the world’s leading astronomers
predicted yesterday.
Professor
Michel Mayor, of Geneva University, who led the team that discovered
the first extrasolar planet (or exoplanet) in 1995, said he was
confident that a planet of a similar size and composition to Earth
would be found in the near future.
Addressing
a Royal Society conference to mark the 50th anniversary of the Search
for Extra-Terrestrial Intelligence (SETI) programme, he said: “The
search for twins of Earth is motivated by the ultimate prospect of
finding sites with favourable conditions for the development of life.
We’ve entered a new phase in this search.”
He
told the audience, which included representatives from Nasa, the
European Space Agency and the UN Office for Outer Space Affairs, that
dramatic technological progress over the past 15 years had led to the
discovery of more than 400 exoplanets orbiting stars similar to the Sun
Related Links
- However,
very few if any of the the planets discovered so far are likely to be
viable candidates for incubating life, as most of them are too large.
Very large planets are likely to have very active tectonic plates,
making for a highly turbulent environment. To date, the smallest
exoplanet found is 1.7 times the mass of the Earth.
- A
further condition for a planet to be habitable is that it orbits its
star at such a distance that its water would be liquid. “If the
planet’s too close, it will be blazing hot and all the water will
evaporate and if it’s too far away, it will be ice,” Professor Mayor
sai
- He
said that Nasa’s Kepler spacecraft, which is carrying the largest
telescope to have been sent beyond the Earth’s orbit, will be the first
to find a planet that meets both these criteria.
The
telescope, which has been in orbit around the Sun since March last
year, is focused on a dense star field in the Orion spiral arm of the
Milky Way. Monitoring more than 100,000 stars every half-hour for three
years, it is looking for variations in the brightness of stars caused
by planets as small as Earth passing in front of them.
Within about four years Kepler is likely to have found planets of the same size as Earth that are also in the “habitable zone”.
Professor
Paul Davies, an astrophysicist at Arizona State University, also spoke.
“When I was a student, I couldn’t find anyone who took the idea of life
elsewhere in the Universe seriously. Now it’s pretty much the party
line in the scientific community. A big part of that has been the
discovery of extrasolar planets,” he said.
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