In September 2008, the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) suffered a catastrophic quench, triggered by a faulty connection in the electronics connecting two of the supercooled magnets between Sections 3 and 4 of the 27 km-circumference particle accelerator. The "S34-incident" caused tonnes of helium coolant to explosively leak into the LHC tunnel, ripping the heavy electromagnets from their concrete mounts.
Naturally, this was a huge blow for CERN, delaying the first particle collisions by several months. However, the repair work is progressing well, and hopes are high for commencement of LHC science as early as this summer. Now engineers are working hard to avoid a recurrence of the S34 Incident, tracking down similar electrical faults between the accelerator magnets. It seems like they have found many more faults than expected… (...) Read the rest of More Faults Found in LHC, But No Further Delay to Start-up (311 words)
In a move reminiscent of Star Trek's Scotty fine-tuning the Enterprise's performance, engineers working with the Cassini spacecraft will begin work to switch the spacecraft's thrusters to a back-up set after noticing a degradation in performance from the main thrusters that have been in use for over 11 years, since the spacecraft launched in October of 1997. The thrusters are used for making small corrections to the spacecraft's course and for attitude control. In mid-March, the current set of eight thrusters, referred to as branch A, will be swapped over to a redundant and identical set, branch B. In a forward thinking move, almost all Cassini engineering subsystems have redundant backup capability. And in a testament of the spacecraft's robustness and reliability, this is only the second time during Cassini's 11-year flight that the engineering teams have gone to a backup system.
Google Earth now allows you to probe the depths of Earth's oceans as well as fly through the giant canyons or volcanoes on Mars. Google Earth 5.0 was unveiled today, with substantial upgrades for both the Earth and the Red Planet. Google worked in conjunction with NOAA and NASA to incorporate data from our undersea explorations and the spacecraft orbiting Mars. For the first time, you'll be able to look at the two-thirds of our planet covered by the oceans, take a tour below sea level, and even look at historical imagery to see things like coastal erosion. On Mars there's a rich conglomeration of images, including the most recent from the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter to provide an immersive 3D view of Mars. Marine scientists say the electronic images will boost awareness and increase public support for marine conservation, while NASA says the new features in Google Mars will aid public understanding of Mars science, while also providing researchers a platform for sharing data similar to what Google Earth provides for Earth scientists. (...) Read the rest of Google Oceans, Google Mars (307 words)
NGC281/IC1590 Hubble Heritage Parallel Vision - Jukka Metsavainio
You asked for more? You got it. This time our dimensional visualization is going to take us 9500 light years away from where you're sitting now and deep into the Perseus spiral arm of the Milky Way Galaxy. Buckle your seat belt and relax your eyes, because we're heading into two versions of a 132 light year expanse known as NGC 281 and the central core called IC 1590… (...) Read the rest of Journey Inside A Bok Globule (1,069 words)
I admit, I watched the Super Bowl with all its hype and consumerism. But who can pass up a good excuse for a party or miss a chance to see Springsteen? A couple of the advertisements caught my eye. One was a fun spot with astronauts tearing around on Titan with a space-age hot rod. The premise is old, but enjoyable nonetheless. If you didn't get a chance to see it, here it is:
Also, a trailer for the new Star Trek movie aired during the game, with more hot rods: (...) Read the rest of Super Bowl Goes to Space (19 words)
When Chi-Sheng Lin of Taiwan's Institute of Astronomy captured three images on July 11, 2007 with something strange in them, it was first believed he'd picked up just another asteroid. But, by July 17 astronomers in Table Mountain Observatory, California were noticing a coma 2-3" across, with a bright central core. That's not an asteroid… That's a comet! And now it's a comet that's doing something very strange… (...) Read the rest of Comet C/2007 N3 Lulin - A Twist In The Tail (343 words)
For those of you who like observing curiosities, it's time to take a look at R Coronae Borealis. As you may have guessed from the single letter designation, R is a variable star, but it's not just any old variable - it's the prototype of its class. What exactly is an R CorBor star, what does it do and why is taking the time to check it out now so important? Then step inside and find out… (...) Read the rest of R Coronae Borealis At Faintest (760 words)
The Mir space station hangs above the Earth in 1995 (photo by Atlantis STS-71, NASA)
The Russian space agency (Roscosmos) has announced that it will lobby Moscow with a proposal that would see the construction of a new Russian space station in low-Earth orbit. Also, the agency has expressed a desire to extend the operational lifespan of the International Space Station (ISS) until 2020 (the outpost is set for retirement in 2015). Building a Russian space station will aid Russia's desire to kick-start their lunar program, possibly acting as a staging post for future missions to Mars… (...) Read the rest of Russia Wants to Build New Space Station, Extend Life of ISS to 2020 (540 words)
Official ground-breaking ceremonies took place for a gigantic new 500 meter diameter radio telescope in China which will allow astronomers to detect galaxies and pulsars at unprecedented distances. The $102 million facility, known as the Five-hundred-meter Aperture Spherical Telescope (FAST), will have a collecting area more than twice as big as the 305 meter diameter radio telescope at Arecibo Observatory in Puerto Rico, which has been the world's largest since it opened in 1964. Not only that, the new telescope will also have the ability to change its shape and move the position its focus. (...) Read the rest of China Building Huge 500-Meter Radio Telescope (291 words)
A full-scale separation test of the forward skirt extension for the Ares I-X flight test at its facility in Utah (NASA/ATK)
The successful test of NASA's Ares I-X Forward Skirt Extension on Thursday represents a "major milestone" in the development of the launch system, according to Alliant Techsystems (ATK). The "skirt extension" in question is a solid ring of aluminium (or aluminum) connecting the first stage with the upper stages of the rocket.
This summer, the first flight of the Constellation Program is scheduled to blast off from a Cape Canaveral launch pad. The ATK pyrotechnics deep in the Utah Desert has proven to NASA that a key portion of this test flight will go as planned, allowing the reusable portion of the Ares I to return to Earth for recovery… (...) Read the rest of Ares I-X 2009 Test Flight Progress: Pyrotechnic Stage Separation (348 words)
In this image from a similar test in 2003, a rocket carried a payload designed to measure high-frequency wave signals related to aurorae. Credit: Chuck Johnson and Astronomy.com
Early Thursday morning, two sounding rockets simultaneously flew through the veil of an aurora collecting data from both the top and bottom edges of the arc. A team from the University of Iowa waited for precise conditions before launching two different NASA Black Brant rockets from the Poker Flat Research Range near Fairbanks, Alaska just before 1 a.m. Alaska Standard Time. Other rockets have flown through aurorae previously, but this is the first time two rockets were used together. As part of the Auroral Current and Electrodynamics Structure (ACES) mission, the flights will provide insight on the structural subtleties of the aurora, details that researchers may have missed when previous measurements were done using only a single vehicle. (...) Read the rest of Two Rockets Fly Through Auroral Arc (165 words)
Are you interested in taking a more in-depth look at observing? Then why not wait until the Moon sets this weekend and have a look at two splendid galaxies for any size optics - Messier 81 and Messier 82. If you've ever been curious about exactly what can be seen in a particular sized telescope, what else is in the area and what the story is behind these two, then come on in… (...) Read the rest of In Depth Observing - M81 and M82 (4,047 words)
Greetings, fellow SkyWatchers! The Moon is back again, but what a terrific target for winter studies. Why not get out your binoculars and telescopes as we take a look at strange and unusual places like the Serpent Sea, the Marsh of Sleep and the Lakes of Time, Death and Dreams? If you haven't wished upon a star lately, then there's a serious reason to take a look at Sirius this weekend! Step outside in the dark with me where we'll explore a little history, a little mystery, and just plain have us some fun… (...) Read the rest of Weekend SkyWatcher's Forecast: January 30 - February 1, 2009 (1,013 words)
Recent pictures from the Cassini spacecraft of Titan's south polar region reveal new lake features not seen in images of the same region taken a year earlier. Extensive cloud systems seen in images covering the area during past year suggest that the new lakes could be the result of a large rainstorm and that lakes on Titan owe their presence, size and distribution to the moon's weather and changing seasons. But there must also be large underground reservoirs as well of the liquids on Titan. Those liquids aren't water, of course, but super-cold hydrocarbons like methane. (...) Read the rest of Hydrocarbon Downpours Could Be Creating New Lakes on Titan (500 words)
Would look twice as sweet! Are you seeing double? No. This isn't an eye test - rather an incredible, dimensional look at NGC 2244 - a star cluster embroiled in a reflection nebula spanning 55 light-years and most commonly called "The Rosette." Step inside and prepare to be blown away… (...) Read the rest of A Rose By Any Other Name… (772 words)
The Spirit rover appears to have some memory and mobility problems. Yes, she's getting old, and it appears she has symptoms of aging similar to humans. On Sunday, during her 1,800th Martian day, or sol, information radioed from Spirit indicated the rover had received its driving commands for the day but had not moved. That can happen for many reasons, including the rover properly sensing that it is not ready to drive. However, other behavior on Sol 1800 was even more unusual: Spirit apparently did not record the day's main activities into the non-volatile memory, the part of its memory that persists even when power is off. It's almost five years to the day when Spirit had memory problems with her "flash drive," but back then, she was just a youngster.
It's Wednesday, so that means its time for another "Where In The Universe" challenge to test your visual knowledge of the cosmos. This is number 40! Woo hoo! See if you can name where in the Universe this image is from, and give yourself extra points if you can name the spacecraft responsible for the image. Make your guess and post a comment. Check back sometime on Thursday to find the answer and see how you did.
UPDATE: The answer has now been posted below. No peeking before you make your guess! (...) Read the rest of Where In The Universe #40 (78 words)
Dwarf Nova QZ Virginis - Annotated - Image Credit: Dr. Joe Brimacombe
For all of you variable star fans, there's a new kid on the block - Dwarf Nova QZ Virginis. It was originally discovered by T. Meshkova on Moscow photographic plates in 1944 and had a magnitude range of 12.9 to as little as 14.5 But what is it? Try a cataclysmic variable star - one that our good friends down under caught just for Universe Today readers! (...) Read the rest of Superoutburst of the Dwarf Nova QZ Virginis (619 words)
A plaque attached to the side of the remains of pad 34. A solemn reminder of a black day in space history.
As we go through our busy, every day lives, we scan the headlines in search of news. We pick up this story and that one, filing it away as part of who we are and what has happened in the world. Once in a great while we might take it back out and look at it again, but all too often we tend to forget as time goes on. Let's change that today… (...) Read the rest of Take Time to Remember Our Heroes… (1,470 words)
The planet HD80606b glows orange from its own heat in this computer-generated image. A massive storm has formed in response to the pulse of heat delivered during the planet's close swing past its star. The blue crescent is reflected light from the star. Image by D. Kasen, J. Langton, and G. Laughlin (UCSC).
As mentioned in a previous article today about global warming, we on Earth worry about our planet's atmosphere rising by a few degrees on average over the next century. But imagine living on a planet where temperatures could rise 700 degrees in just a few hours! A distant planet known as HD8606b, is a gas giant orbiting a star 200 light-years from Earth. It's extremely eccentric orbit around the star takes it from a relatively comfortable distance in an Earth-like habitable zone to the blazing hot regions much closer than Mercury is to our Sun. Infrared sensors aboard NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope measured the planet's temperature as it swooped close to the star, observing a planetary heat wave that rose from 800 to 1,500 degrees Kelvin (980 to 2,240 degrees Fahrenheit) in just six hours. Wow!
And for those readers who like to complain about artist impressions images, the image here is a novel type of "photorealistic" image, created by a new computer program that calculates the radiative transfer processes in astrophysics. (...) Read the rest of Weather Report for Distant Planet: Variable Heat Wave (473 words)
There are some interesting dynamics going on with Centaurus A, an elliptical galaxy about 13 million light-years away. This is a very active and luminous region of space and a great disturbance is going on as another spiral galaxy is trying to get in on the action by merging with Centaurus A. But astronomers now have new insight on what causing all the ruckus: a supermassive black hole at the core of Centaurus A. Jets and lobes emanating from the central black hole have been imaged at submillimeter wavelengths for the first time by using the 12-meter Atacama Pathfinder Experiment (APEX) telescope in Chile. By using a combination of visible and X-ray wavelengths, astronomers were able to produce this striking new image. Help me APEX, you are our only hope!
A new paper published by a leading researcher says many effects of climate change are already irreversible. Susan Solomon, a leader of the International Panel on Climate Change and a scientist with National Oceanic and Atmopheric Association (NOAA) said even if carbon emissions were stopped, temperatures around the globe will remain high until at least the year 3000. And if we continue with our current carbon dioxide emissions for just a few more decades, we could see permanent "dust bowl" conditions. (...) Read the rest of Global Warming May Be Irreversible (426 words)
The folks who run the Hubble Space Telescope have decided to ask for some help in choosing where to next point the world's most famous telescope. People from around the planet can vote to select the next object the Hubble Space Telescope will view. The choices are six objects Hubble has never observed before. You can also enter a drawing to win one of 100 new Hubble pictures of the object that is chosen. The winning image will be released between April 2 and 5, during the IYA's 100 Hours of Astronomy, a global astronomy event geared toward encouraging as many people as possible to experience the night sky. You need to vote by March 1 to swing Hubble toward your favorite target. So get over to the HubbleSite and vote! (...) Read the rest of Help Hubble Makes Its Next Discovery (151 words)
Inaugeration photo. Credit: White House photo by Paul Morse
If you've been oohing over CNN's "The Moment" "photo-synth" image of last week's presidential inauguration, there's another version that might be even better because you don't have to download Microsoft's bulky Silverlight software to see it. And you can thank NASA and the Mars Exploration Rovers for it, too. NASA spinoff technology from the rovers' cameras was used to create a "Gigapan" image from the festivities at the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 20. Photographer David Bergman used the Gigapan camera system to generate one huge image from a combination of 220 images,with an overall size of 1,474 megapixels. This is the same technology used to create the panoramic images of Mars from the rovers.
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