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BBC News - Distant planet's clouds are mappedAstronomers have created the first map of the clouds on a planet outside our Solar System.
The planet in question is Kepler-7b, a large gaseous world like Jupiter, roughly 1,000 light-years away.
The researchers used data from Nasa's Spitzer and Kepler space telescopes to study the exoplanet, which orbits close to its parent star.
Their results suggest the hot giant is marked by high clouds in the west and clear skies in the east.
The findings have been accepted for publication in the journal Astrophysical Journal Letters.
"By observing this planet with Spitzer and Kepler for more than three years, we were able to produce a very low-resolution 'map' of this giant, gaseous planet," said co-author Brice-Olivier Demory of Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) in Cambridge, US.
"We wouldn't expect to see oceans or continents on this type of world, but we detected a clear, reflective signature that we interpreted as clouds."
A nearby alien planet six times the size of the Earth is covered with a water-rich atmosphere that includes a strange "plasma form" of water, scientists say.
Astronomers have determined that the atmosphere of super-Earth Gliese 1214 b is likely water-rich. However, this exoplanet is no Earth twin. The high temperature and density of the planet give it an atmosphere that differs dramatically from Earth.
"As the temperature and pressure are so high, water is not in a usual form (vapor, liquid, or solid), but in an ionic or plasma form at the bottom the atmosphere — namely the interior — of Gliese 1214 b," principle investigator Norio Narita of the National Astronomical Observatory of Japan told SPACE.com by email.
The Atacama desert in Chile is so dry that parts of it are utterly devoid of life down to bacteria. That and its sandy, rock-strewn terrain makes it so similar to Mars that it's a perfect spot for ESA to trial its Sample Acquisition Field Experiment with a Rover (SAFER), which will this week carry out tests related to navigation, remote control and the use of scientific instruments. The agency’s goal is the latest in a series of tests to develop technologies and gain practical experience in anticipation of ESA’s launch of the ExoMars rover to the Red Planet in 2018.
Cost-effective laser-based asteroid defense system pitched to NASALast year, the University of Strathclyde in Glasgow put forward the idea of using fleets of laser-toting satellites to deflect potentially dangerous objects away from Earth. Now, Dr. Richard Fork, principal investigator for the Laser Science and Engineering Laboratory at the University of Alabama in Huntsville (UAH), and his team have refined the idea, saying that it’s not only feasible, but could handle anything up to the size of a comet.
If an asteroid 100 m (330 ft) across hit the Earth, it would be a bad day. The impact of a comet such as Halle-Bopp, which is about 70 km (43 mi) in diameter, would make for a very, very bad day. According to Fork, "[The Hale-Bopp comet] is enormous, and if it had been on a collision course with Earth we would have had only two years from the time it was first observed to the time it arrived at Earth. If the comet happened to be on track to hit us, there would have been nothing we could have done. We would have been toast."
Because of the remote, but still present, danger of such an event happening, finding ways to deflect asteroids is of great interest to scientists and engineers. The idea floated by researchers at Strathclyde University in 2012 involves sending a fleet of small satellites that fires lasers at a potentially dangerous asteroid. The purpose wouldn't be to destroy it in a spectacular Death Star-like explosion, but to nudge it into a new orbit.
(Phys.org) —An international team of astronomers has discovered an exotic young planet that is not orbiting a star. This free-floating planet, dubbed PSO J318.5-22, is just 80 light-years away from Earth and has a mass only six times that of Jupiter. The planet formed a mere 12 million years ago—a newborn in planet lifetimes.
Recent work by planetary scientists has indicated that the deep atmospheres of Jupiter and Saturn may contain chunks of diamond floating in a liquid hydrogen/helium fluid.
Planetary scientists Mona L. Delitsky of California Specialty Engineering in Pasadena, California, and Kevin H. Baines of the University of Wisconsin-Madison have compiled recent data about the phase diagram of carbon and combined them with newly published adiabats (pressure-temperature diagrams) for Jupiter and Saturn to calculate that diamond will be stable in the deep interiors. Further, at altitudes below the regions where diamond is stable, the pressures and temperatures will be so large as to melt the diamond into liquid, creating diamond rain or liquid diamond.
A new planet-hunting survey has revealed planetary candidates with orbital periods as short as four hours and so close to their host stars that they are nearly skimming the stellar surface. If confirmed, these candidates would be among the closest planets to their stars discovered so far. Brian Jackson of the Carnegie Institution for Science's Department of Terrestrial Magnetism presented his team's findings, which are based on data from NASA's Kepler mission, at the American Astronomical Society's Division for Planetary Sciences meeting.
On Monday, October 7th, Grasshopper completed its highest leap to date, rising to 744m altitude. The view above is taken from a single camera hexacopter, getting closer to the stage than in any previous flight.
Grasshopper is a 10-story Vertical Takeoff Vertical Landing (VTVL) vehicle designed to test the technologies needed to return a rocket back to Earth intact. While most rockets are designed to burn up on atmosphere reentry, SpaceX rockets are being designed not only to withstand reentry, but also to return to the launch pad for a vertical landing. The Grasshopper VTVL vehicle represents a critical step towards this goal.
Grasshopper consists of a Falcon 9 rocket first stage tank, Merlin 1D engine, four steel and aluminum landing legs with hydraulic dampers, and a steel support structure.
On Monday, October 7th, Grasshopper completed its highest leap to date, rising to 744 meter altitude. This is two and half times the previous height of about 300 meters. The view above is taken from a single camera hexacopter, getting closer to the stage than in any previous flight.
Grasshopper is a 10-story Vertical Takeoff Vertical Landing (VTVL) vehicle designed to test the technologies needed to return a rocket back to Earth intact. While most rockets are designed to burn up on atmosphere reentry, SpaceX rockets are being designed not only to withstand reentry, but also to return to the launch pad for a vertical landing. The Grasshopper VTVL vehicle represents a critical step towards this goal.
Grasshopper consists of a Falcon 9 rocket first stage tank, Merlin 1D engine, four steel and aluminum landing legs with hydraulic dampers, and a steel support structure.
Reusable rockets can reduce the cost of launching into orbit by 100 times.
Iran is planning to send another live monkey into space within a month, a top space official said in remarks reported by media Sunday.
"The second live animal will be ready within a month to be sent into space," said Hamid Fazeli, deputy head of Iran's space organisation, the Jomhuri Eslami newspaper reported.
Iran in January claimed to have successfully launched a live monkey into space and to have brought it safely back to earth.
Would be nice if they could be part of our international space station....
SpaceX made another successful Grasshopper test flight last week, which was also the last flight for Grasshopper v1.0. Its swan song lasted 80 seconds, during which time Grasshopper reached an altitude of 744 meters (nearly half a mile), more than twice the previous record. Grasshopper v1.1 is well along the road to flight tests.
Following the successful test flight carried out on October 8, SpaceX's Grasshopper v1.0 is to be retired, and will be replaced by Grasshopper v1.1, which is also known as the Falcon 9 Reusable development vehicle. Grasshopper v1.1 will be based at New Mexico's Spaceport America following initial low-level testing in SpaceX's Texas flight test field.
Grasshopper v1.1 is being made from a Falcon 9 v1.1 first stage tank, which at 68.4 meters (224 ft) in length is more than twice the height of v1.0. It will have a 2 metric ton set of retracting landing legs spanning about 18 meters (60 feet). The legs will be extended into landing position using high pressure helium.
Preparations on for launch of India?s Mars Orbiter Mission - The Times of IndiaCHENNAI: Preparations are afoot in Sriharikota for the launch of Mars Orbiter Mission Mangalyaan on PSLV C25, ISRO chairman K Radhakrishnan said.
"The exact date and time of the launch will be decided in a meeting on October 17. So by October 18, we will get to know the exact time and date of the launch," he told reporters here.
On the launch of the GSLV D5, which was called off on August 19 after detection of a fuel leak, he said, "We are working on the GSLV for its launch in December."
A NASA plan to launch the world's largest solar sail into space and unfurl it like a giant parasol has passed a major test as the mission moves closer to a planned January 2015 launch. Sunjammer mission successfully deployed part of its huge solar sail in a test on Sept. 30, revealing the craft should be ready to function successfully following its January 2015 launch.
The giant Sunjammer solar sail, cleared a successful design test that required the deploying beam to stretch a quarter of the sail completely open. Because the Sept. 30 test took place on Earth, gravity and atmosphere made conditions more challenging than they would be in the vacuum of space, the sail's designers said.
A private cargo ship built by Orbital Sciences Corporation is preparing to leave the International Space Station early Tuesday and burn up on re-entry into Earth's atmosphere, NASA said Monday.
The Cygnus spacecraft is scheduled to detach from the orbiting research outpost at 1000 GMT Tuesday and leave the ISS an hour and a half later.
"Orbital engineers then will conduct a series of planned burns and maneuvers to move Cygnus toward a destructive re-entry in Earth's atmosphere," NASA said in a statement.
Orbital said Cygnus is expected to re-enter the atmosphere on Wednesday, October 23 at 1818 GMT over the Pacific Ocean east of New Zealand.
The unmanned spaceship attached itself to the ISS on September 29, marking the first successful demonstration mission of a cargo resupply flight by Orbital Sciences.
It is the fourth such mission by a private company to ferry supplies to global astronauts, a capacity the United States lost when the space shuttle program ended in 2011.
Balloon Rides to Near-Space for $75,000 a Seat | Space.comYou don't have to climb aboard a rocket ship to be a space tourist anymore.
For $75,000, a company called World View Enterprises will loft you 19 miles (30 kilometers) up into Earth's atmosphere using a high-altitude balloon. While the gentle ride won't earn passengers their astronaut wings — outer space is generally considered to begin at an altitude of 62 miles (100 km) — it will afford spectacular views of the blackness of space and the curvature of our planet, World View officials say.
"Seeing the Earth hanging in the ink-black void of space will help people realize our connection to our home planet and to the universe around us, and will surely offer a transformative experience to our customers," World View CEO Jane Poynter said in a statement.
Europe joins the quest to create space-faring 3D printers | DVICEThe European Space Agency (ESA) has recently announced that it will be diving headlong into the quest for 3D printers capable of printing in zero gravity. Dubbed the largest collaborative 3D printing initiative in existence, the project is called AMAZE, and if successful it certainly will.
AMAZE is short for "Additive Manufacturing Aiming Towards Zero Waste and Efficient Production of High-Tech Metal Products," which is a bit of a long and meandering title. That's fairly appropriate, seeing as AMAZE isn't really your straightforward 3D printing project. Together with 28 industrial partners, the ESA is aiming to create both a small, metal-printing 3D printer for use in the ISS and other future spacecraft as well as a highly-complex ground-based 3D printer capable of churning out whole satellites.
BBC News - Exoplanet tally soars above 1,000The number of observed exoplanets - worlds circling distant stars - has passed 1,000.
Of these, 12 could be habitable - orbiting at a distance where it is neither "too hot" nor "too cold" for water to be liquid on the surface.
The planets are given away by tiny dips in light as they pass in front of their stars or through gravitational "tugs" on the star from an orbiting world.
These new worlds are listed in the Extrasolar Planets Encyclopaedia.
Blue Origin is very close to making sub-orbital flights. Blue Origin will let researchers and other companies take a payload up into space—topping out at 100 kilometers—for about three to four minutes. The hope is that Blue Origin will be able to do this at a moment’s notice and do it often. Blue Origin is funded by Amazon.com multi-billionaire Jeff Bezos.
Blue Origin, LLC is developing technologies to enable human access to space at dramatically lower cost and increased reliability. This is a long-term effort, which we’re pursuing incrementally, step by step. We’re currently focused on developing reusable launch vehicles utilizing rocket-powered Vertical Take-off and Vertical Landing (VTVL) technology.
Japanese scientists readying to blast a crater in an asteroid to find out what it is made of said Wednesday they have successfully tested their new space cannon.
The Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) said the huge weapon would fire a metal bullet at the surface of asteroid 1999JU3 some time in 2018.
