Matt Williams, Author at Universe Today

May 25, 2019May 28, 2019 by Matt Williams

Theory proposes that Venus could have been habitable, but a large ocean slowed down its rotation, killing it

Observations suggest Venus may have had water oceans in its distant past. A land-ocean pattern like that above was used in a climate model to show how storm clouds could have shielded ancient Venus from strong sunlight and made the planet habitable. Credits: NASA

There’s no sense in sugar-coating it – Venus is a hellish place! It is the hottest planet in the Solar System, with atmospheric temperatures that are hot enough to melt lead. The air is also a toxic plume, composed predominantly of carbon dioxide and sulfuric acid rain clouds. And yet, scientists theorize that Venus was once a much different place, with a cooler atmosphere and liquid oceans on its surface.

Unfortunately, this all changed billions of years ago as Venus experienced a runaway greenhouse effect, changing the landscape into the hellish world we know today. According to a NASA-supported study by an international team of scientists, it may have actually been the presence of this ocean that caused Venus to experience this transition in the first place.

May 24, 2019May 25, 2019 by Matt Williams

Sen has Launched a 4K Video Stream to Space

In 2014, British entrepreneur Charles Black founded the company Sen (an acronym for Space Exploration Network) with the vision of “democratizing space”. Behind this vision was Black’s desire to create the world’s first 4K video streaming platform that could send video from space to billions of people worldwide. The purpose of this is to educate the public on our ever-changing world and our growing presence in space.

The key to this ambitious goal is the creation of a constellation of small satellites that will provide real-time video from Low Earth Orbit (LEO). The company recently took a major step towards making that happen by using their recently-deployed satellite to gather footage of Earth and space from orbit. This effectively demonstrated the capabilities of their platform and may represent a new step in NewSpace.

May 24, 2019May 24, 2019 by Matt Williams

SpaceX just launched 60 satellites for its Starlink Constellation. Internet service providers should be very worried.

The first launch of Starlink. Credit: SpaceX

On Thursday, May 23rd, 2019, SpaceX launched the first batch of their Starlink satellites to orbit. The launch took place at 10:30 pm EDT (07:30 pm PDT) from Space Launch Complex 40 (SLC-40) at Cape Canaveral on the Florida coast. With this delivery, SpaceX founder Elon Musk is making good on his promise to begin providing global broadband internet access to the entire world, a goal that has become somewhat challenging in recent years.

May 23, 2019May 23, 2019 by Matt Williams

An Insulating Layer of Gas Could Keep a Liquid Ocean Inside Pluto

New Horizons view of Pluto — The heart-shaped region of Pluto's surface was formed at least in part by a cataclysmic "splat," scientists say. (Credit: NASA / JHUAPL / SwRI)

In July of 2015, NASA’s New Horizons mission made history by becoming the first spacecraft to ever conduct a flyby with Pluto. In addition to providing the world with the first up-close images of this distant world, New Horizons‘ suite of scientific instruments also provided scientists with a wealth of information about Pluto – including its surface features, composition, and atmosphere.

The images the spacecraft took of the surface also revealed unexpected features like the basin named Sputnik Planitia – which scientists saw as an indication of a subsurface ocean. In a new study led by researchers from the University of Hokkaido, the presence of a thin layer of clathrate hydrates at the base of Pluto’s ice shell would ensure that this world could support an ocean.

May 21, 2019May 21, 2019 by Matt Williams

Don’t Forget, Curiosity’s Sister Rover is Flying to Mars in 2020

Engineers testing the spacecraft that will carry the Mars 2020 rover to the Red Planet. Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech

Next summer, NASA will be sending it’s Mars 2020 rover to the Red Planet. In addition to being the second rover to go as part of the Mars Exploration Program, it will be one of eight functioning missions exploring the atmosphere and surface of the planet. These include the recently-arrived InSight lander, the Curiosity rover – Mars 2020s sister-mission – and
the Opportunity rover (which NASA recently lost contact with and retired).

As the launch date gets closer and closer, NASA is busily making all the final preparations for this latest member of the Mars exploration team. In addition to selecting a name (which will be selected from an essay contest), this includes finalizing the spacecraft that will take the rover on its seven-month journey to Mars. Recently, NASA posted images of the spacecraft being inspected at NASA JPL’s Space Simulator Facility (SFF) in Pasadena, California.

May 21, 2019May 21, 2019 by Matt Williams

Chang’e-4 Lander and its Rover Have Turned up new Mysteries on the Moon’s far side. The Moon’s Mantle Blasted Onto the Surface?

Image captured by Chang’E 4 showed the landscape near the landing site. (Image by NAOC/CNSA)

On January 3rd, 2019, the Chinese National Space Administration (CNSA) successfully landed their Chang’e-4 mission on the far side of the Moon. This mission represents a major milestone for China, being the fourth lander-rover mission to be sent to the Moon, and the first mission in history to land on the “dark side of the Moon”. And what it manages to uncover there is sure to excite and inspire scientists for many years to come.

For example, the mission’s Yutu-2 (Jade Rabbit-2) rover made an impressive find that may confirm a theory about lunar impacts. After collecting spectral data from the moon’s largest crater (the South Pole-Aitken Basin) the Chang’e-4 mission team from the Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS) concluded that the impact that created the Basin turned up material from deep within the Moon’s mantle. This finding could offer new insight into how the Moon evolved over the course of billions of years.

May 20, 2019May 20, 2019 by Matt Williams

Most of the Solar System Should be a Protected Wilderness. One-Eighth Left for Mining and Resource Exploitation

Artist's impression of the asteroid belt. Image credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech

There is no doubt that our world is in the midst of a climate crisis. Between increasing levels of carbon dioxide in our atmosphere, rising temperatures and sea levels, ocean acidification, species extinctions, waste production, diminishing supplies of fresh water, drought, severe weather, and all of the resulting fallout, the “Anthropocene” is not shaping up too well.

It is little wonder then why luminaries like Stephen Hawking, Buzz Aldrin, and Elon Musk believe that we must look off-world to ensure our survival. However, there are those who caution that in so doing, humans will simply shift our burdens onto new locations. Addressing this possibility, two distinguished researchers recently published a paper where they suggest that we should set aside “wilderness” spaces” in our Solar System today.

May 17, 2019May 17, 2019 by Matt Williams

Advanced Civilizations Could be Communicating with Neutrino Beams. Transmitted by Clouds of Satellites Around Neutron Stars or Black Holes

One of the Daya Bay detectors. Roy Kaltschmidt, Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory

In 1960, famed theoretical physicist Freeman Dyson made a radical proposal. In a paper titled “Search for Artificial Stellar Sources of Infrared Radiation” he suggested that advanced extra-terrestrial intelligences (ETIs) could be found by looking for signs of artificial structures so large, they encompassed entire star systems (aka. megastructures). Since then, many scientists have come up with their own ideas for possible megastructures.

Like Dyson’s proposed Sphere, these ideas were suggested as a way of giving scientists engaged in the Search for Extra-Terrestrial Intelligence (SETI) something to look for. Adding to this fascinating field, Dr. Albert Jackson of the Houston-based technology company Triton Systems recently released a study where he proposed how an advanced ETI could use rely on a neutron star or black hole to focus neutrino beams to create a beacon.

May 14, 2019May 14, 2019 by Matt Williams

NASA Senior Engineer Kobie Boykins talks About Exploring Mars. And I was There to See it!

Kobie Boykins and myself, holding replicas of the wheels used on the Sojourner and Opportunity rover. Credit: Carla Jack

As part of National Geographic Live, Chief Engineer Kobie Boykins of NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) has been touring the world of late. As part of the program’s goal of having featured speakers share their behind-the-scenes stories, Boykins has been showcasing the accomplishments of NASA’s Mars robotic exploration programs – of which he played a major role.

This week, his tour brought him to my hometown, where he delivered a presentation to a packed house at the Royal Theatre here in of Victoria, BC. Titled “Exploring Mars”, Boykins shared personal stories of what it was like to be an integral part of the team that created the Sojourner, Spirit, Opportunity, Curiosity and Mars 2020 rovers. I had the honor of attending the event, and being able to do a little Q&A with him after the show.

May 14, 2019May 14, 2019 by Matt Williams

Antimatter Behaves Exactly the Same as Regular Matter in Double Slit Experiments

In 1924, French physicist Louis de Broglie proposed that photons – the subatomic particle that constitutes light – behave as both a particle and a wave. Known as “particle-wave duality”, this property has been tested and shown to apply with other subatomic particles (electrons and neutrons) as well as larger, more complex molecules.

Recently, an experiment conducted by researchers with the QUantum Interferometry and Gravitation with Positrons and LAsers (QUPLAS) collaboration demonstrated that this same property applies to antimatter. This was done using the same kind of interference test (aka. double-slit experiment) that helped scientists to propose particle-wave duality in the first place.