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Showing posts with label asteroid. Show all posts
Showing posts with label asteroid. Show all posts

Wednesday 22 July 2015

See it! Moon, Venus, Jupiter, comet

Source: Earth Sky

What a glorious western twilight sky on the nights of July 17 and 18, 2015! Waxing moon, brightest planets, and Comet C/2014 Q1 (PANSTARRS).


Venus (top left), Jupiter and the moon made a triangle as seen from some parts of the world on July 18, 2015. Aimilianos Gkekas submitted this photo to EarthSky. He caught the trio from a monastery known as Meteora – literally ‘suspended in the sky’ – in Thessaly, Greece.


Moon, Venus, Jupiter and Comet C/2014 Q1 (PANSTARRS) on July 18 by John Lafferty. 


 Venus, Jupiter and the moon setting on July 18 as seen from Porto, Portual. The star above the planets is Regulus in the constellation Leo. Photo submitted by João Pedro Bessa.


Moon and Venus on July 18, 2015 by John Ashley in Kila, Montana. If you view larger, you can see both worlds are crescents as seen from Earth now. Read why Venus appears as a crescent now.


Moon and Venus on July 18, 2015 by Billie C. Barb at Mutiny Bay, Freeland, Washington. 


Another view of the moon and crescent Venus on July 18, this one in daylight, from Spencer Mann in Davis, California.


Thursday 25 June 2015

Dwarf planet Ceres reveals pyramid-shaped mystery



OK, this is just too much.
First, NASA's Dawn probe spotted curiously sparkly bright spots on the surface of Ceres, the dwarf planet that lies in the asteroid belt between Mars and Jupiter.
Beats us, the scientists said.
Now, cameras on the tractor-trailer-size spacecraft have captured a baffling structure rising 3 miles above the planet's cratered surface.
Conveniently, the thing looks an awful lot like a pyramid.
    "Intriguing," the NASA scientists said.


    To be fair, the agency offered no suggestion that the towering structure is an offering to some long-lost space emperor or home to our new alien overlords.
    And, to be even more fair, it's probably just a really tall mountain in a solar system filled with wondrous and strange natural phenomena.
    But the Dawn mission has done nothing but stoke imaginations since the discovery of mysterious bright spots on the surface of the dwarf planet in February and the beginning of the probe's orbit in March.
    Folks have claimed to have spotted giant alien motherships hovering over the planet, bat-winged spaceships parked on its surface and even evidence of alien cities.
    But the mystery only deepened with the most recent batch of images showing even more bright spots alongside the largest one, which NASA said looks to stretch some 6 miles.
    Many, of course, insist that the spots look for all the world like brightly lit cities twinkling on the shadowed surface of the distant dwarf planet.
    I knew it! There's gambling going on on Ceres! #aliens pic.twitter.com/QP6PB6JFho

    — Chris Reher (@Chris_Reher) June 13, 2015
    Of course, NASA hasn't traveled down that road. Scientists, they say, still don't know what the spots are. Maybe ice. Maybe salt.
    "But scientists are considering other options, too," NASA said coyly.
    But #itsaliens, right?
    Source : FirstPost

    Thursday 6 November 2014

    Rosetta spacecraft set to land on Comet Churyumov-Gerasimenko

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    An artist's impression of the Philae probe setting down on Comet Churyumov-Gerasimenko.

    If you have an interest in space exploration, you could not have picked a better time in history to be alive than right now. Data and images stream back to Earth daily at an unprecedented rate from robotic spacecraft active at far-flung destinations all over the solar system. To use an old political quote – we've never had it so good.

    In the past 50 years we've exploded out of our "little blue dot" to leave boot prints on the moon, land on Venus, Mars and Saturn's moon Titan, and to orbit Mercury, Jupiter, Saturn, asteroids and comets, giving us incredible visual vistas of all.

    What's missing is a detailed view of dwarf planet Pluto, but we'll have that when the New Horizons spacecraft gets there next year.

    There's also another missing first about to be achieved next week – we're going to make a soft landing on the surface of a comet.

    Comet Churyumov-Gerasimenko had to wait around patiently for billions of years for humans to discover it in 1967. However, it's been a much shorter wait for an opportunity to get up close and personal with it – we're landing a probe on the frozen dumbbell-shaped comet next Wednesday, November 12.

    The Rosetta spacecraft, carrying the Philae probe, was launched  from French Guiana in February 2004 by the European Space Agency. It arrived in August this year and has already given us great views of the comet.

    It was named for the Rosetta Stone found in Egypt that was crucial in deciphering ancient Egyptian hieroglyphics. Similarly the "lander" is named for the Nile River island Philae, where an obelisk also assisted in solving the puzzle of these symbols.

    Wednesday 29 October 2014

    JAXA shows off second-generation asteroid explorer 'Hayabusa 2'

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    Japan's space agency showed off a space probe to be launched next month that it hopes will answer questions about how life seeded Earth.

    The Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) intends to land Hayabusa 2 on an asteroid orbiting between Earth and Mars. It is set to be launched by an H-2A rocket from the Tanegashima Space Center here on Nov. 30.

    Its predecessor, launched in 2003, returned to Earth after a seven-year mission, during which it landed on an asteroid and collected sample material, an unprecedented achievement.

    JAXA showed off the near complete body of its second-generation asteroid explorer to reporters on Oct. 27.

    Hayabusa 2 will embark on a six-year journey to collect samples from an asteroid called 1999 JU3. Scientists expect the mission to shed light on the origins of the solar system and life on Earth.

    The spherical asteroid is about 900 meters diameter and is thought to contain organic compounds and water, the key to life. It was first observed in 1999.

    Hayabusa 2 arrived at Tanegashima island, south of Kagoshima, on Sept. 22. The capsule, impactor and other parts were then assembled.

    A JAXA official said Hayabusa 2 will be attached to the rocket after fueling operations are complete and the exterior of the explorer has been inspected for flaws.

    Hayabusa 2 is slated to reach the asteroid between June and July in 2018, and spend 18 months on the celestial body before returning to Earth between November and December in 2020.

    The explorer will release the impactor to smash a crater and collect mineral samples that have not been exposed to and affected by the heat of the sun.