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| Artist illustration of the Terrestrial Planet Finder. Image credit: NASA/JPL. Click to enlarge. |
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| Let's Find Life |
| Sep 14, 2005 - A recent conversation on the Bad Astronomy/Universe Today forum got me thinking. Member "parallaxicity" wanted to know where the next generation of unmanned probes should be sent. Should we investigate Europa, and dig through its icy skin? Or what about building a blimp that could float in Titan's thick atmosphere analyzing the surface in incredible detail? Let me just wipe the drool from my chin; some of these missions would be so cool. But you know, I'll have to take a pass. Right now, I think we need to focus on one thing... (Full Story) |
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| Early Atmosphere Looked Very Different From Today |
| Sep 14, 2005 - Researchers at Washington University in St. Louis have used primitive meteorites called chondrites to develop a model of the Earth's early atmosphere. And it looked nothing like what we have today. Instead of the familiar oxygen and nitrogen, our early atmosphere would have been a toxic mixture of methane, ammonia, hydrogen and water vapour. Simulating this early environment was actually quite difficult to calculate because the minerals of the early Earth reacted to the hot environment in hard-to-predict ways. (Full Story) |
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| Fensal-Aztlan Region on Titan |
| Sep 14, 2005 - Cassini scientists have assembled this mosaic image of a region on Titan called Fensal-Aztlan. The northern part of the region, "Fensal", has small islands which range in size from 5 to 40 km (3 to 25 miles) across, while the southern "Aztlan" region mostly lacks these islands. The "islands" are thought to be raised areas of water ice, surrounded by dark particulate material which came out of the atmosphere. (Full Story) |
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| Investigation Into One of Mars Express' Instruments |
| Sep 14, 2005 - The Planetary Fourier Spectrometer (PFS) on board the ESA's Mars Express spacecraft malfunctioned a few months ago, and the agency wants to know why. The instrument was working perfectly for two years, and made the surprising discovery of methane in Mars' atmosphere. It might be malfunctioning because of spacecraft vibration, but the source of the problem is still under investigation. Even if engineers can't get the instrument working again, the spacecraft still has another 6 which are working fine. (Full Story) |
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