Carnival of Space #298

This week’s Carnival of Space is hosted by Pamela Hoffman at the Everyday Spacer blog.

Click here to read Carnival of Space #298.

And if you’re interested in looking back, here’s an archive to all the past Carnivals of Space. If you’ve got a space-related blog, you should really join the carnival. Just email an entry to [email protected], and the next host will link to it. It will help get awareness out there about your writing, help you meet others in the space community – and community is what blogging is all about. And if you really want to help out, sign up to be a host. Send an email to the above address.

3 Years of the Sun in 3 Minutes

This image is a composite of 25 separate images spanning the period of April 16, 2012, to April 15, 2013. It uses the SDO AIA wavelength of 171 angstroms and reveals the zones on the sun where active regions are most common during this part of the solar cycle. Credit: NASA/SDO/AIA/S. Wiessinger

Since the Solar Dynamics Observatory opened its multi-spectral eyes in space about three years ago, we’ve posted numerous videos and images from the mission, showing incredible views of our dynamic Sun. Scott Wiessinger from Goddard Space Flight Center’s Space Visualization Studio has put together great timelapse compilation of images from the past three years, as well as a one composite still image to “try to encapsulate a timelapse into one static graphic,” he told us via email. “I blended 25 stills from over the last year, and it’s interesting to see the bright bands of active regions.” Scott said he was fascinated by seeing the views of the Sun over a long range of time.

Within the video, (below) there are some great Easter egg hunts – things to see like partial eclipses, flares, comet Lovejoy, and the transit of Venus.

How many can you find?

SDO’s Atmospheric Imaging Assembly (AIA) captures a shot of the sun every 12 seconds in 10 different wavelengths, but the images shown here are based on a wavelength of 171 Angstroms, which is in the extreme ultraviolet range. It shows solar material at around 600,000 Kelvin. In this wavelength it is easy to see the Sun’s 25-day rotation as well as how solar activity has increased over three years as the Sun’s solar cycle has ramped up towards the peak of activity in its 11-year cycle.

You’ll also notice that during the course of the video, the Sun subtly increases and decreases in apparent size. This is because the distance between the SDO spacecraft and the Sun varies over time. The image is, however, remarkably consistent and stable despite the fact that SDO orbits the Earth at 6,876 miles per hour and the Earth orbits the sun at 67,062 miles per hour.

See more views, wavelengths and information at this page at the Space Visualization Studio website.

Chris Hadfield Explains Photography from Space

'A glance out the Space Station window is worth taking,' said ISS commander Chris Hadfield, of this image taken on Earth Day, April 22, 2013. Credit: NASA/CSA.

After Canadian astronaut Chris Hadfield arrived at the International Space Station in December 2012, he quickly became an internet sensation with all the tweets, Facebook and G+ posts he shared providing in inside look at living and working in space. But the biggest draw is all the incredible images he has shared throughout his ISS mission. In this video, Hadfield takes you to the best seat in the house – the Cupola on the ISS — to gaze at the visual splendor of the Earth. He shares his techniques and his passion for capturing the fleeting glimpses of our changing world.

UPDATE: NASA also chimed in for Earth Day with this video from astronaut Don Pettit sharing his images and tips for photography of Earth from space:

Defiance: What Happens After Aliens Arrive

The cast of Defiance. Credit: SyFy/Defiance.com

Wreckage, war and wrath are often the only results we see after aliens invade Earth, at least if you believe science fiction classics such as War of the Worlds. The new SyFy show Defiance, though, shows something a bit different: humans and aliens (Votans) trying to live side by side after the war.

Warning: minor spoilers ahead …

Now, this is no District 9. In 2046, the Votans roam around about as freely as the humans, although there’s a bit of ugly backstory that includes fighting and an uneasy truce. And no, this isn’t like Star Trek or Star Wars: the Votans and humans don’t work all that well together, at least not yet. Perhaps it’s too early in their history to think about it.

The show debuted on SyFy this month. Starring is Grant Bowler, previously of True Blood and Ugly Betty, as well as Dexter‘s Julie Benz.

“Nolan is an extreme pragmatist. He’s gone from war hero to scavenger and back again. He’s kind of the blunt instrument, if you like,” said Bowler of his human character in an NBC interview. Making things more interesting, Nolan has an alien adopted daughter and yes, they do actually get along (as well as most families do, anyway.)

When you have an hour on your hands, this one-hour discussion below about the show is well worth the watch. Don’t miss the part where Bowler talks about the challenge of working with “green screens”, which are essentially blank areas on set that are later filled with computer-generated graphics. Kind of disconcerting for an actor used to working on pre-arranged sets.

What other TV shows or movies featuring aliens can you recall that shows them living with humans after they get to Earth? Share them in the comments.

 

The Curious History of the Lyrid Meteor Shower

The 2013 Lyrid meteors as seen from Windy Point Vista on Mt. Lemmon, Tucson Arizona. (Credit & copyright Sean Parker Photography. In the Universe Today flickr gallery).

Today we residents of planet Earth meet up with a meteor stream with a strange and bizarre past.

The Lyrid meteors occur annually right around April 21st to the 23rd. A moderate meteor shower, observers in the northern hemisphere can expect to see about 20 meteors in the early morning hours under optimal conditions. Such has been the case for recent years past, and this year’s presence of a waxing gibbous Moon has lowered prospects for this April shower considerably in 2013.

But this has not always been the case with this meteor stream. In fact, we have records of the Lyrids stretching back over the past 2,600 years, farther back than any other meteor shower documented.

The earliest account of this shower comes from a record made by Chinese astronomers in 687 BC, stating that “at midnight, stars dropped down like rain.” Keep in mind that this now famous assertion that is generally attributed to the Lyrids was made by mathematician Johann Gottfried Galle in 1867. It was Galle along with Edmond Weiss who noticed the link between the Lyrids and Comet C/1861 G1 Thatcher discovered six years earlier.

Comet Thatcher was discovered on April 5th, 15 days before it reached perihelion about a third of an astronomical unit (A.U.) from the Earth. Comet Thatcher a periodic comet on a 415 year long orbital period.

But in the early to mid-19th century, the very idea that meteor showers were linked to comets or even non-atmospheric phenomena was still hotly contested.

One singular event more than any other triggered this realization. The Leonid meteor storm of 1833 in the early morning hours of November 13th was a stunning and terrifying spectacle for residents of the U.S eastern seaboard. This shower produces mighty outbursts, often topping a Zenithal Hourly Rate (ZHR) of over a 1,000 once every 33 to 34 years. I witnessed a fine outburst of the Leonids from Kuwait in 1998, and we may be in for a repeat performance from this shower around 2032 or 2033.

There is substantial evidence that the Lyrids may also do the same at an undetermined interval. On April 20th 1803, one of the most famous accounts of a “Lyrid meteor storm” was observed up and down the United States east coast. For example, one letter to the Virginia Gazette states;

“From one until three, those starry meteors seemed to fall from every point in the sky heavens, in such numbers as to resemble a shower of sky rockets.”

Another account published in the Raleigh, North Carolina Register states that:

“The whole hemisphere as far as the extension of the horizon seemed illuminated; the meteors kept no particular direction but appeared to move in every way.”

study of the 1803 Lyrid outburst by W.J. Fisher cites over a dozen accounts of the event and is a fascinating read. Viewers were also primed for the event by the dramatic Leonid storm of 1799 four years earlier.

Interestingly, the Moon was only one day from New phase on the night of the 1803 Lyrids. Prime meteor watching conditions.

An unrelated meteorite fall would also occur four years later over Weston, Connecticut on December 14th, 1807 as recounted by Kathryn Prince in A Professor, A President, and a Meteor. These events would place Yankee politics at odds with the origin of meteors and rocks from the sky.

An apocryphal quote is often attributed to President Thomas Jefferson that highlights the controversy of the day, saying that “I would more easily believe that two Yankee professors would lie than that stones would fall from heaven.”

While both are of cosmogenous origin, no meteorite fall has ever been linked to a meteor shower, which is spawned by dust debris from comets. For example, many in the media erroneously speculated that the Sutter’s Mill meteorite that fell to Earth on the morning of April 22nd, 2012 was in fact a Lyrid meteor.

But a Lyrid may be implicated in another unusual 19th century observation. On April 24th 1874, a professor Scharfarik of Prague, Czechoslovakia was observing the daytime First Quarter Moon with his 4” refractor. The good professor was surprised by an “Apparition on the disc of the Moon of a dazzling white star,” which was “quite sharp and without a perceptible diameter.” Possible suspects are a telescopic meteor moving towards or along the observers’ line of sight or perhaps a Lyrid impacting the dark limb of the Moon.

Moving into the 20th century, rates for the Lyrids have stayed in the ZHR=20 range, with notable peaks of 100+ per hour noted by Japanese observers in 1922 and 100 per hour noted by U.S. observers in 1982.

It should also be noted that another less understood shower radiates from the constellation Lyra in mid-June. First noted Stan Dvorak while hiking in the San Bernardino Mountains in 1966, the June Lyrids produce about 8-10 meteors per hour from June 10 to the 21st. The source of this newly discovered shower is thought to be Comet C/1915 C1 Mellish.

A June Lyrid may have even made its way into modern fiction. As recounted in a July 2004 issue of Sky & Telescope, researchers Marilynn & Donald Olson note the following line from James Joyce’s Ulysses:

“A star, precipitated with great apparent velocity across the firmament from Vega in the Lyre above the zenith.”

Joyce seems to be describing a June Lyrid decades before the shower was officially recognized. The constellation Lyra rides high in the early morning sky for mid-northern latitudes in the early summer months.

All interesting concepts to ponder as we keep an early morning vigil for the Lyrids this week. Could there be more Lyrid storms in the far off future, as Comet Thatcher reaches perihelion once again in the late 23rd century? Could more historical clues of the untold history of this and other showers be awaiting discovery?

Somewhat closer to us in time and space, Paul Wiegert of the University of Ontario has also recently speculated that Comet 2012 S1 ISON may provoke a meteor shower on January 12th, 2014. Regardless of whether ISON turns out to be the “Comet of the Century,” this could be one to watch out for!

  

50 Amazing Facts About Earth

Do you know how much material falls onto Earth from space every day? How many different species there are in the ocean? How far the continents move every year? In honor of Earth Day here’s a very cool infographic that answers those questions about our planet — and 47 more!

Check out the full version below:

50-facts-about-earth3 (1)

And for more interesting information about our planet, click here and here.

Infographic provided by Giraffe Childcare and Early Learning (Dublin, Ireland)

Antares Rocket Launches Successfully

Orbital Sciences Antares rocket successfully launched on its maiden voyage at 5 pm EDT (21:00 UTC) on Sunday, April 21 from the Mid-Atlantic Regional Spaceport at NASA’s Wallops Flight Facility in Virginia. The test flight is serving as the precursor for a demonstration flight of its Cygnus resupply ship to the International Space Station later this year. About 10 minutes after launch, it placed a mass simulator payload to orbit designed to mimic the Cygnus spacecraft’s weight and characteristics. It is in orbit at 250 km (155 miles) in altitude and moving at27,350 km/hr (17,000 mph).

Book Review: The Life and Death of Stars

“The Life and Death of Stars” is a thorough and richly detailed book that will tell you all you want to know about stars. The author, Kenneth R. Lang, is Professor of Astronomy at Tufts University, and he clearly has the knowledge and explanatory ability of someone who has spent his life studying stars. Though its density may deter the casual reader, I found this book engrossing from beginning to end.

If you’ve just been recently bitten by the astronomy bug, this book may not be for you. A more introductory book might be a better choice. But if you’re craving a deeper and more comprehensive understanding of stars, this book will deliver. Make no mistake though; for most readers, it will require some commitment to read your way through this book.

I was never an astrophysics student, but this book seems to me to have a textbook like thoroughness, though not in a dry way. The chapters and topics flow along logically and clearly, with the help of numerous charts and illustrations. For instance, the book starts off with a thorough explanation of light. Since almost all that we know about stars we’ve learned by observing light, where else should a book on astrophysics begin?

From there, the book moves on to chapters titled “Transmutation of the Elements,” “New Stars Arise from the Darkness,” and “Stellar End States,” with other stops in between. The final chapter is titled “Birth, Life, and Death of the Universe.” At the very end of the book, Lang discusses the possible endings of the Universe, and how the mystery of Dark Matter and Dark Energy may dictate the end.

My own understanding of the behaviour and lifecycle of stars has grown enormously from reading this book, and yours will too. For example, if you know that stars form when interstellar gas clouds collapse from their own gravity, but don’t understand exactly how, then “The Life and Death of Stars” will tell you all the detail you’ll need to know. If you know that heavier elements are formed via nucleosynthesis, in the hearts of stars, but you don’t grasp the finer details of that process, then the explanation in this book will bring it to life for you.

Lang is not a populariser of astronomy. His strength is in detailed descriptions, delivered in a comprehensible way. However, he’s not opposed to the occasional poetic turn of phrase: “All stars are impermanent beacons that eventually will cease to shine, vanishing like a circle of fire turning to ash.” True that. He also quotes the Bhagavad Gita, and the poet Shelley.

One of the ways I gauge a book is by my own level of excitement and interest as I’m reading it. I also judge a book by its clarity of explanation and its flow. In both these respects, Lang delivers with this book. After reading it, I’ll definitely be checking out his other books.

“The Life and Death of Stars” broadened and deepened my understanding of all things stellar. It’s a fantastic book, and I wholeheartedly recommend it to Universe Today readers who wish to expand their knowledge of astrophysics.