Space and astronomy news
If climate change models are correct, humanity is working itself—and dragging the rest of life on Earth with it—into a corner. Scientific pleas to control emissions and battle climate change are starting to have some effect, but not enough. So now we have some tough decisions looming.
Gathering detailed information on exoplanets is extremely difficult. The light from their host star overwhelms the light from the exoplanet, making it difficult for telescopes to see them. But now a team using cutting-edge technology at the Keck Observatory has taken a big leap in exoplanet observation and has detected water in the atmosphere of a planet 179 light years away.
Continue reading “Astronomers Detect Water in the Atmosphere of a Planet 179 Light-Years Away”
Back in the 1970s, NASA’s Mariner and Viking Missions were sent out to explore other planets in our Solar System. All three of them (there were two Viking missions) captured images of Mars’ moon Phobos during their travels. They were our first images of the tiny, potato-shaped moon, and the images held a mystery: strange linear grooves on the moon’s surface.
Continue reading “Strange Grooves on Phobos Were Caused by Boulders Rolling Around on its Surface”
The architectural design behind Japan’s new space research center is mind-boggling. The futuristic building will incorporate elements of spacecraft design, which emphasize light weight and high functionality. The whole thing will be suspended over a man-made, Moon-like crater.
Continue reading “So Cool! Japanese Space Research Center will be Suspended Over a Moonlike Crater”
We have comets and asteroids to thank for Earth’s water, according to the most widely-held theory among scientists. But it’s not that cut-and-dried. It’s still a bit of a mystery, and a new study suggests that not all of Earth’s water was delivered to our planet that way.
Continue reading “Not all the Earth’s Water Came From Comets”
The most common type of star in the galaxy is the red dwarf star. None of these small, dim stars can be seen from Earth with the naked eye, but they can emit flares far more powerful than anything our Sun emits. Two astronomers using the Hubble space telescope saw a red dwarf star give off a powerful type of flare called a superflare. That’s bad news for any planets in these stars’ so-called habitable zones.
Red dwarfs make up about 75% of the stars in the Milky Way, so they probably host many exoplanets. In fact, scientists think most of the planets that are in habitable zones are orbiting red dwarfs. But the more astronomers observe these stars, the more they’re becoming aware of just how chaotic and energetic it can be in their neighbourhoods. That means we might have to re-think what habitable zone means.
“When I realized the sheer amount of light the superflare emitted, I sat looking at my computer screen for quite some time just thinking, ‘Whoa.'” – Parke Loyd, Arizona State University.
What are the big questions in modern science? All too often, the public perception of science seems to be that we know all that there is to know, and the modern game in science is to simply fill in the gaps in our knowledge.
Nothing could be further from the truth. We recently came across a fascinating documentary that not only looks at some of the big questions today in multi-interdisciplinary science, but has scientists ask and interview other scientists.
We’re talking about The Most Unknown, directed by Peabody-award winning filmmaker Ian Cheney (director of The City Dark and The Search for General Tso) and advised by filmmaker Werner Herzog (known for The Wrath of God and Grizzly Man). The film takes nine scientists for diverse disciplines such as biology and astronomy and catches them all pushing the boundaries of their respective fields into the unknown. What emerges is a fascinating look at the state of modern science, and a glimpse at where things are headed.
The largest object in our night sky—by far!—is invisible to us. The object is the Super-Massive Black Hole (SMBH) at the center of our Milky Way galaxy, called Sagittarius A. But soon we may have an image of Sagittarius A’s event horizon. And that image may pose a challenge to Einstein’s Theory of General Relativity.
Continue reading “Here’s What the First Images from the Event Horizon Might Look Like”
Time capsules are a fun and time-honored way to preserve pieces of the past. In most cases, they include photographs, mementos and other items of personal value, things that give future generations a sense of what life was like in the past. But what if we intend to preserve the memories and experiences of an entire species for thousands of years? What would we choose to squirrel away then, and where would be place it?
That’s precisely what researchers from the Molecular Information Systems Lab at the University of Washington (UW) and Microsoft had in mind when they announced their #MemoriesInDNA project. This project invites people to submit photos that will be encoded in DNA and stored for millennia. And thanks to a new partnership with the Arch Mission Foundation, this capsule will be sent to the Moon in 2020!
Continue reading “Microsoft and Partners Hope to Create a Time Capsule… On the Moon!”
When it comes time to begin conducting regular crewed missions to Mars, and perhaps even establishing a permanent outpost there, astronauts and potential Martian settlers will have to know how to work with the local environment. Remember that scene in The Martian where astronaut Mark Whatney (Matt Damon) is forced to grow his own food in a plot of Martian soil? Well, it will be much like that, except with a lot more mouths to feed.
Naturally, knowing if this can be done requires a great deal of research and experimentation. To assist these efforts, a team of astrophysicists from the University of Central Florida (UCF) recently developed a scientifically based, standardized method for creating Martian and asteroid soil simulants. This imitation Martian dirt, which goes for $20 a kilogram (about $10 a pound), will help researchers determine what it takes to grow crops on the Red Planet.