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Comet Shoemaker-Levy 9 Approaching Jupiter in 1994
This is a composite photo, assembled from separate images of Jupiter and comet Shoemaker-Levy 9, as imaged by the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope in 1994.
Comet Shoemaker-Levy 9 was discovered by astronomers Carolyn and Eugene M. Shoemaker and David Levy on March 24, 1993. It was the first comet observed to be orbiting a planet — in this case, Jupiter — rather than the sun. The effect of Jupiter’s tidal forces had already torn the celestial body apart and, eventually, the fragments collided with Jupiter between July 16 and 22, 1994.
The image of the comet, showing 21 fragments, was taken on May 17, 1994. The image of Jupiter was taken on May 18, 1994. The dark spot on the planet is the shadow of the inner moon lo. The apparent angular size of Jupiter relative to the comet, and its angular separation from the comet when the images were taken, have been modified for illustration purposes.
Image Credit:NASA, ESA, H. Weaver and E. Smith (STScI) and J. Trauger and R. Evans (NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory)
Image Addition Date:2013-04-23 -
Mercury Mosaic (taken by the Mariner spacecraft, 1974)
This mosaic of Mercury was taken by the Mariner 10 spacecraft during its approach on 29 March 1974. The mosaic consists of 18 images taken at 42 s intervals during a 13 minute period when the spacecraft was 200,000 km (about 6 hours prior to closest approach) from the planet.
(via n-a-s-a)
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Star Plays Dizzying Dance of Doom with Black Hole
Black holes are probably among the scariest things in the universe, with gravitational forces powerful enough to warp the fabric of spacetime itself. Red dwarfs, on the other hand, are amongst the smallest of stars, shining dimly in the darkness — not exactly the sort of pairing which you might expect to be make dancing partners.
All the same, that’s exactly the pairing you’ll find in a star system known as MAXI J1659-152. This system contains just such an odd couple, locked in a tight orbit where a red dwarf is speeding around it’s heavier companion at an astonishing two million kilometers per hour (1.2 million mph)! Read more.
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Earth Perspectives
Say NASA, and many images may come to mind: a white-clad man leaping awkwardly, joyfully across the surface of the moon; probes gliding into the depths of the solar system, sending back pictures of distant worlds; two tenacious robots exploring the red rock surface of Mars, uncovering evidence of a wet past; the horrifying disintegration of the Challenger and Columbia space shuttles.
For some, another image comes to mind: a tiny blue and white planet, a fragile oasis in the black vastness of space. Recalling his thoughts while orbiting the Moon during the landmark Apollo 8 mission, astronaut Bill Anders said, “We came all this way to explore the Moon, and the most important thing is that we discovered the Earth.” (Quoted in The Societal Impact of Space Flight, p.55.)
(via earth-as-art)
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Astronomers have used NASA’s Hubble Space Telescope to photograph the iconic Horsehead Nebula in a new, infrared light.
Credit: Image courtesy of Space Telescope Science Institute (STScI)
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Top: Lining Kepler Habitable Zone Planets Up
Relative sizes of Kepler habitable zone planets discovered as of 2013 April 18. Except for Earth, these are artists’ renditions.
Middle: Kepler-62 and the Solar System
The diagram compares the planets of the inner solar system to Kepler-62, a five-planet system about 1,200 light-years from Earth in the constellation Lyra. The five planets of Kepler-62 orbit a star classified as a K2 dwarf, measuring just two thirds the size of the sun and only one fifth as bright. At seven billion years old, the star is somewhat older than the sun.
Much like our solar system, Kepler-62 is home to two habitable zone worlds, Kepler-62f and Kepler-62e. Kepler-62f orbits every 267 days and is only 40 percent larger than Earth, making it the smallest exoplanet known in the habitable zone of another star. The other habitable zone planet, Kepler-62e, orbits every 122 days and is roughly 60 percent larger than Earth.
The size of Kepler-62f is known, but its mass and composition are not. However, based on previous exoplanet discoveries of similar size that are rocky, scientists are able to determine its mass by association.
The two habitable zone worlds orbiting Kepler-62 have three interior companions, two larger than the size of Earth and one about the size of Mars. Kepler-62b, Kepler-62c and Kepler-62d, orbit every five, 12, and 18 days, respectively, making them very hot and inhospitable for life as we know it.
The artistic concepts of the Kepler-62 planets are the result of scientists and artists collaborating to help imagine the appearance of these distant worlds.
The Kepler space telescope, which simultaneously and continuously measures the brightness of more than 150,000 stars, is NASA’s first mission capable of detecting Earth-size planets around stars like our sun.
Bottom: Kepler-69 and the Solar System
The diagram compares the planets of the inner solar system to Kepler-69, a two-planet system about 2,700 light-years from Earth in the constellation Cygnus. The two planets of Kepler-69 orbit a star that belongs to the same class as our sun, called G-type.
Kepler-69c, is 70 percent larger than the size of Earth, and is the smallest yet found to orbit in the habitable zone of a sun-like star. Astronomers are uncertain about the composition of Kepler-69c, but its orbit of 242 days around a sun-like star resembles that of our neighboring planet Venus. The companion planet, Kepler-69b, is just over twice the size of Earth and whizzes around its star once every 13 days.The artistic concepts of the Kepler-69 planets are the result of scientists and artists collaborating to help imagine the appearance of these distant worlds.
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Crescent Neptune and Triton
Image Credit: Voyager 2, NASA
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Apollo 10 crew pretending to be a morning radio station—Houston doesn’t find it funny.
Apollo 10 audio transcript
(via spaceandstuffidk)
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Possible Aurora Borealis Visible In Maryland On April 13th
A solar flare that occurred around 2 a.m. Thursday morning may create a spectacular display of northern lights Saturday evening. The midlevel flare had a long duration and was directed at Earth. According to AccuWeather.com Astronomer Hunter Outten, who stated that this flare was “impressive”, these are the best conditions for seeing a direct effect on our planet. On the Kp index, the flare has been categorized at 6 to 8. This is a scale for measuring the intensity of a a geomagnetic storm. The 6 to 8 rating means that the effects of the radiation will have a greater reach.
The radiation from such a flare may cause radio wave disturbances to electronics such as cell phones, GPS and radios, causing services to occasionally cut in and out. While traveling slower than was originally anticipated, the flare effects are moving towards Earth at 1000 km per second.
The flare is also expected to cause vibrant northern lights from the Arctic as far south as New York, the Dakotas, Washington and Michigan, with a smaller possibility of it going into Pennsylvania and Iowa, even Kansas. The lights are currently estimated for 8 p.m. EDT Saturday arrival, with a possible deviation of up to seven hours. If the radiation hits much after dark settles on the East Coast the lights may be missed and will instead only be visible for the West.
Solar flares create auroras when radiation from the sun reaches Earth and interacts with charged protons in our atmosphere. The effects are greater at the magnetic poles and weaken as they move south from the Arctic or north of the Antarctic. In the northern hemisphere the results are called the aurora borealis, with the aurora australis being its southern counterpart. The result is a spectacular display of light and color for areas with clear enough views.
Viewing conditions will be best in the mid-Atlantic, specifically for parts of Pennsylvania and the Delmarva. Most of the country will have poor to fair views as a result of cloud cover, with areas further south not experiencing the aurora at all. A pocket of fair conditions sits over southeastern Oregon and the southwest corner of Idaho. A swath of partly cloudy conditions will also spread over a section of the Ohio Valley for parts of Michigan, Indiana and Illinois. Ohio will experience fair to good viewing conditions. For the rest of the country conditions will be poor.
(via spaceandstuffidk)
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I am a friend, comrades, a friend!
— Yuri Gagarin’s first words upon returning to earth, to a woman and a girl near where his capsule landed. (12 April 1961) The woman asked: “Can it be that you have come from outer space?” to which Gagarin replied: “As a matter of fact, I have!” (via asonlynasacan)(Source: billionquotes.com, via itsfullofstars)
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Hidden deep in Obama’s Fiscal Year 2014 Budget is this item: “Begins work on a mission to rendezvous with—and then move—a small asteroid.”
Yep:
A budget plan that President Barack Obama will release Wednesday would charge NASA Glenn Research Center with developing a solar electric propulsion system for a spaceship that will collect an asteroid and park it in the moon’s orbit so astronauts can conduct research on it.
Moving the giant space rock would give NASA experience deflecting asteroids that could prove vital to averting potential Earth collisions such as one believed to have caused a mass dinosaur extinction millions of years ago. Some asteroids also contain rare elements that mining companies are eager to exploit, NASA officials said.
See what else you can find that’s particularly noteworthy, and tell us.
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Crying
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The Cassini spacecraft peers through Titan’s thick clouds to spy on the region dubbed “Senkyo” by scientists. The dark features include vast fields of dunes, composed of solid hydrocarbon particles precipitated out of Titan’s atmosphere. And Titan’s southern pole is shrouded in the recently formed polar vortex.
Titan, Saturn’s largest moon, is 3,200 miles (5,150 kilometers) across.
For more on Senkyo, see PIA08231. For a color image of the south polar vortex on Titan, see PIA14919. For a movie of the vortex, see PIA14920.
Lit terrain seen here is on the Saturn-facing hemisphere of Titan. North on Titan is up and rotated 18 degrees to the right. The image was taken with the Cassini spacecraft narrow-angle camera on Jan. 5, 2013 using a spectral filter sensitive to wavelengths of near-infrared light centered at 938 nanometers.
The view was obtained at a distance of approximately 750,000 miles (1.2 million kilometers) from Titan and at a Sun-Titan-spacecraft, or phase, angle of 79 degrees. Image scale is 4 miles (7 kilometers) per pixel.
Image Credit:NASA/JPL-Caltech/Space Science Institute
Image Addition Date:2013-04-08
