Matt Williams, Author at Universe Today

April 9, 2022April 9, 2022 by Matt Williams

Jupiter and Ganymede are Connected by Magnetic Fields

On July 5th, 2016, NASA’s Juno spacecraft arrived at Jupiter and began its four-year mission (which has since been extended to 2025) to study the gas giant’s atmosphere, composition, magnetosphere, and gravitational environment. Juno is the first dedicated mission to study Jupiter since the Galileo probe studied the system between 1995 and 2003. The images and data it has sent back to Earth have revealed much about Jupiter’s atmosphere, aurorae, polar storms, internal structure, and moons.

In addition, the Juno mission has allowed astronomers to learn more about how magnetic interaction between some of Jupiter’s moons and its atmosphere leads the gas giant to experience aurorae around its northern and southern poles. After analyzing data from Juno’s payload, a team of researchers from the Southwest Research Institute (SwRI) observed how streams of electrons from Ganymede (Jupiter’s largest moon) leave an “auroral footprint” in Jupiter’s atmosphere.

April 8, 2022April 8, 2022 by Matt Williams

The Four Private Axiom Astronauts are off to the International Space Station

The Ax-1 crew aboard the Dragon Endeavor spacecraft. Credit: SpaceX

This morning, at 11:17 AM EDT (08:17 AM PDT), the first all-private astronaut mission to the International Space Station (ISS) lifted off from Launch Complex 39A at NASA Kennedy Space Center in Florida. Designated Axiom Mission 1 (Ax-1), this mission consists of four commercial astronauts flying aboard the SpaceX Dragon Endeavour spacecraft that launched atop a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket. The launch was live-streamed via NASA’s official Youtube channel (you can catch the replay here).

April 8, 2022April 8, 2022 by Matt Williams

A New Record for the Most Distant Galaxy, Seen Just 300 Million Years After the Big Bang

Three-color image of HD1, the most distant galaxy candidate to date, created using data from the VISTA telescope. The red object in the center of the zoom-in image is HD1. Credit: Harikane et al.

Since the Renaissance astronomer Galileo Galilee first studied the heavens using a telescope he built himself, astronomers have been pushing the boundaries of what they can observe. After centuries of progress, they have been able to study and catalog objects in all but the earliest periods of the Universe. But thanks to next-generation instruments and technologies, astronomers will soon be able to observe the “Cosmic Dawn” era – ca. 50 million to billion years after the Big Bang.

In recent years, astronomers have made discoveries that preview what this will be like, the most recent of which is the galaxy candidate known as HD1. This galaxy is about 13.5 billion light-years from Earth (32.2 billion light-years in terms of “proper distance“), making it the farthest ever observed. This discovery implies that galaxies existed as early as 300 million years after the Big Bang, a finding which could have drastic implications for astronomy and cosmology!

April 7, 2022April 7, 2022 by Matt Williams

Canada's CHIME is Getting More Observatories to Search for Fast Radio Bursts

CHIME consists of four metal "half-pipes", each one 100 meters long. Image Credit: CHIME/Andre Renard, Dunlap Institute.

In 2017, the Canadian Hydrogen Intensity Mapping Experiment (CHIME) began to gather light from the Universe to address some of the biggest questions and astrophysics and cosmology. Located at the Dominion Radio Astrophysical Observatory (DRAO) in British Columbia, this interferometric radio telescope has been a game-changer for studying Fast Radio Bursts (FRBs), which remain one of the most mysterious cosmic mysteries facing astronomers today.

In the near future, CHIME will be getting an expansion that will help it more accurately identify where FRBs are coming from. This will consist of a new radio telescope outrigger located at the SETI Institute’s Hat Creek Radio Observatory (HCRO), new outriggers near Princeton, British Columbia, and at the Green Bank Observatory in West Virginia. These will work with the main CHIME telescope to localize CHIME-detected FRBs precisely in the night sky.

April 7, 2022April 7, 2022 by Matt Williams

If Aliens Were Sending us Signals, This is What They Might Look Like

For over sixty years, scientists have been searching the cosmos for possible signs of radio transmission that would indicate the existence of extraterrestrial intelligence (ETI). In that time, the technology and methods have matured considerably, but the greatest challenges remain. In addition to having never detected a radio signal of extraterrestrial origin, there is a wide range of possible forms that such a broadcast could take.

In short, SETI researchers must assume what a signal would look like, but without the benefit of any known examples. Recently, an international team led by the University of California Berkeley and the SETI Institute developed a new machine learning tool that simulates what a message from extraterrestrial intelligence (ETI) might look like. It’s known as Setigen, an open-source library that could be a game-changer for future SETI research!

April 5, 2022April 5, 2022 by Matt Williams

Cultured Meat Could Keep Astronauts fed in Space

The term “cultured meat” has become a bit of a buzzword for the health food industry. This refers to meat produced in a lab using in vitro cell cultures derived from animal proteins. For many, this “alternative meat” is vital to combatting climate change by removing one of the chief causes of deforestation (making room for cattle ranches) and global warming (bovine methane emissions). For others, it’s an environmentally-friendly way of ensuring food security in an era of climate change.

But what about as a means of feeding astronauts on long-duration missions or living for extended periods beyond Earth? In this case, cultured meat would be a way of fulfilling the dietary needs of astronauts who would otherwise be entirely dependent on vegetable proteins. The possibility is currently being explored by the European Space Agency (ESA) and could be a game-changer for future missions to the Moon, Mars, and beyond!

April 4, 2022April 4, 2022 by Matt Williams

The Milky Way has an Inner Ring, Just Outside the Core

This image from the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope reveals a spiral galaxy named Messier 95 (also known as M95 or NGC 3351). Located about 35 million light-years away in the constellation of Leo (The Lion), this swirling spiral was discovered by astronomer Pierre Méchain in 1781, and catalogued by French astronomer Charles Messier just four days later. Messier was primarily a comet hunter, and was often left frustrated by objects in the sky that resembled comets but turned out not to be. To help other astronomers avoid confusing these objects in the future, he created his famous catalogue of Messier objects. Most definitely not a comet, Messier 95 is actually a barred spiral galaxy. The galaxy has a bar cutting through its centre, surrounded by an inner ring currently forming new stars. Also our own Milky Way is a barred spiral. As well as hosting this stellar nursery, Messier 95 is a known host of the dramatic and explosive final stages in the lives of massive stars: supernovae. In March 2016 a spectacular supernova named SN 2012aw was observed in the outer regions of one of Messier 95’s spiral arms. Once the light from the supernova had faded, astronomers were able to compare observations of the region before and after the explosion to find out which star had “disappeared” — the progenitor star. In this case, the star was an especially huge red supergiant up to 26 times more massive than the Sun.

In the past century, astronomers have learned a great deal about the cosmos and our place in it. From discovering that the Universe is in a constant state of expansion to the discovery of the Cosmic Microwave Background (CMB) and the Big Bang cosmological model, our perception of the cosmos has expanded immensely. And yet, many of the most profound astronomical discoveries still occur within our cosmic backyard – the Milky Way Galaxy.

Compared to other galaxies, which astronomers can resolve with relative ease, the structure and size of the Milky Way have been the subject of ongoing discovery. The most recent comes from the Max Planck Institute for Extraterrestrial Physics (MPE), where scientists have found a previously undiscovered inner ring of metal-rich stars just outside the Galactic Bar. The existence of this ring has revealed new insights into star formation in this region of the galaxy during its early history.

April 3, 2022April 3, 2022 by Matt Williams

The ExoMars Rover is Ready, now it Just Needs a new Ride to Mars

An artist's illustration of the ExoMars/Rosalind Franklin rover on Mars. Image Credit: ESA/ATG medialab

When it arrives on Mars, the ESA’s Rosalind Franklin rover will join a growing fleet of robotic rovers, landers, and orbiters dedicated to searching for life on Mars. As part of the Exomars program, this mission was a collaborative effort between the ESA and the Russian State Space Corporation (Roscosmos). Whereas the ESA would provide the rover, Roscosmos was to provide the launch services and the Kazachok lander that would deliver Rosalind Franklin to the surface.

After many years of development, testing, and some delays, the Rosalind Franklin rover passed its System Qualification and Flight Acceptance Review in March. The Review Board confirmed that the rover was ready to be shipped to the launch site at Baikonur Cosmodrome and would make the launch window opening on September 20th, 2022. Unfortunately, due to the suspension of cooperation with Roscosmos, the ESA’s rover finds itself stranded on Earth for the time being.

April 2, 2022April 5, 2022 by Matt Williams

NASA Will be Testing SLS Over the Weekend

The Space Launch System (SLS) has just one more hurdle to clear before this summer’s historic launch. This is known as the Wet Dress Rehearsal, where the fully-stacked SLS and Orion spacecraft will conduct a series of operations at the NASA Kennedy Space Center in Florida. This test follows the arrival of the SLS to Launch Complex 39B after making its big rollout on March 17th from the Vehicle Assembly Building (VLB).

The Wet Dress Rehearsal will run from Friday, April 1st, through Sunday, April 3rd, and will see the Artemis I launch team load propellant into the rocket’s tanks, conduct a full launch countdown, demonstrate the ability to recycle the countdown clock, and also drain propellants to give them an opportunity to practice the timelines and procedures they will use for launch. The weekend-long event will be live-streamed via the Kennedy Newsroom YouTube channel.

March 31, 2022April 2, 2022 by Matt Williams

New Simulation Recreates an Early Time in the Universe That Still Hasn't Been Seen Directly

The fields of astronomy and astrophysics are poised for a revolution in the coming years. Thanks to next-generation observatories like the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST), scientists will finally be able to witness the formation of the first stars and galaxies in the Universe. In effect, they will be able to pierce the veil of the Cosmic Dark Ages, which lasted from roughly 370,000 years to 1 billion years after the Big Bang.

During this period, the Universe was filled with clouds of neutral hydrogen and decoupled photons that were not visible to astronomers. In anticipation of what astronomers will see, researchers from the Harvard & Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics (CfA), the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), and the Max Planck Institute for Astrophysics (MPIA) created a new simulation suite called Thesan that simulates the earliest period of galaxy formation.