Get set to see the Sun… in thrilling 3-D! At the end of August, NASA will launch its twin STEREO spacecraft into orbit around the Sun, to provide the first stereoscopic views of coronal mass ejections. The spacecraft will be lofted into space on Thursday, August 31, to begin a 2-year mission; one spacecraft will fly ahead of the Earth in its orbit, and the other will tail back. With this 3-D view, scientists will be able to accurately track the direction and speed of coronal mass ejections, providing much better space weather forecast.
Continue reading “STEREO Spacecraft Set for Launch”
Seasonal Jets Darken the Surface of Mars
Scientists now have an answer for the strange dark spots near the south polar ice caps on Mars. As the ice cap warms in spring, jets of carbon dioxide erupt, spraying dark material onto the surface. The discovery was made using the cameras on board NASA’s Odyssey and Mars Global Surveyor spacecraft. They provided detailed images of the fan-shaped dark markings, which are typically 15 to 46 metres (50 to 100 feet) across, and can appear within a week.
Continue reading “Seasonal Jets Darken the Surface of Mars”
Astrophoto: Plato and the Alpine Valley by Mike Salway
For many years, there were three popular theories that tried to explain why Earth’s satellite hangs in our skies. One postulated that the Moon separated from Earth during our planet’s formation, another stated that it was captured when passing close by, and the third held that it formed in place with our planet out of the same material circling the Sun at the solar system’s birth. Each of these ideas had their own justifications but none of them provided all of the answers because each of them were well conceived, but, educated guesses.
Continue reading “Astrophoto: Plato and the Alpine Valley by Mike Salway”
A Magnetically Backwards Sunspot
Astronomers have been waiting to see a very special kind of sunspot, and this week, they saw what they were hoping for: it was backward. It only lasted a few hours, but it reveals that the Sun’s next solar cycle could be getting underway. As the Sun moves through its 11-year cycle of solar maximum and minimums, the magnetic orientation of its sunspots reverses. Solar astronomers think that the upcoming Cycle 24 should be one of the stormiest in decades, producing many sunspots and powerful solar storms. The auroras should be beautiful.
Continue reading “A Magnetically Backwards Sunspot”
Why Old Stars Seem to Lack Lithium
Astronomers using ESO’s Very Large Telescope think they’ve found a solution to the “cosmological lithium discrepancy”. A specific amount of lithium was generated at the beginning of the Universe, during the Big Bang. But some of the oldest stars in the Universe, made from this primordial material, have much lower quantities. The researchers found that these stars do have the proper amount of lithium, it’s just being mixed into the stars, sinking out of view of our telescopes. Why this mixing is happening is still a mystery.
Continue reading “Why Old Stars Seem to Lack Lithium”
Orion Revealed by Spitzer
NASA’s Spitzer Space Telescope captured this image of the Orion Nebula using its Infrared Array Camera. In this infrared view, intricate structures made up of gas and dust in the nebula are revealed. Spitzer’s camera took 10,000 exposures of the region, which were combined on computer to make up the full image. The telescope has already uncovered nearly 2,300 planet-forming disks in the region, which would be hidden to visible light telescopes like Hubble.
Continue reading “Orion Revealed by Spitzer”
Officials Propose 12 Planets in the Solar System
The International Astronomical Union, currently meeting in Prague, has announced a proposal that would boost the number of planets in the Solar System to 12. Under their new classification, the asteroid Ceres, Pluto’s moon Charon, and the newly discovered UB313 (aka Xena) would join the traditional 9 planets we’re familiar with. Any additional large bodies would also be described as planets. The IAU will make a final vote on this proposal on August 24.
Continue reading “Officials Propose 12 Planets in the Solar System”
What’s Up this Week: August 14 – August 20, 2006
Greetings, fellow SkyWatchers! I hope everyone had an excellent Perseid weekend? With the Moon further and further from early evening, studies begin again with planetary nebula, bright star clusters, globular challenges and distant galaxies. The coming weekend offers up the Delta Cygnid meteor stream and well as some great binocular studies! Get ready to rock, because…
Here’s what’s up!
Continue reading “What’s Up this Week: August 14 – August 20, 2006”
Nothing But Rings
This photograph is a close-up view of Saturn’s A ring taken by Cassini. Look closely and you’ll see that the dark regions appear to widen and then narrow, and the thin bright regions disappear altogether. Cassini took this image on July 23, 2006 when it was 285,000 kilometers (177,000 miles) from Saturn.
Continue reading “Nothing But Rings”
Hourglass-Shaped Magnetic Field Discovered
Astronomers have finally discovered an object that has long been theorized: an hourglass-shaped magnetic field in a star forming region. The field is located in the protostellar system NGC IRAS 4A, which is located about 980 light-years from Earth in the constellation Perseus. Theorists predicted that the magnetic fields of collapsing clouds of gas and dust would form this hourglass shape because of the competing forces of magnetism and gravity.
Continue reading “Hourglass-Shaped Magnetic Field Discovered”