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AndyinPA
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#176

Post by AndyinPA »

https://edition.cnn.com/2022/10/11/worl ... index.html
CNN —
The Double Asteroid Redirection Test successfully changed the trajectory of the asteroid Dimorphos when the NASA spacecraft intentionally slammed into the space rock on September 26, according to the agency.

The DART mission, a full-scale demonstration of deflection technology, was the world’s first conducted on behalf of planetary defense.

Prior to impact, it took Dimorphos 11 hours and 55 minutes to orbit its larger parent asteroid Didymos. Astronomers used ground-based telescopes to measure how Dimorphos’ orbit changed after impact.

Now, it takes Dimorphos 11 hours and 23 minutes to circle Didymos. The DART spacecraft changed its orbit by 32 minutes.

Initially, astronomers expected DART to be a success if it shortened the trajectory by 10 minutes.
:thumbsup:
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#177

Post by chancery »

AndyinPA wrote: Tue Oct 11, 2022 2:46 pm
Now, it takes Dimorphos 11 hours and 23 minutes to circle Didymos. The DART spacecraft changed its orbit by 32 minutes.

Initially, astronomers expected DART to be a success if it shortened the trajectory by 10 minutes.
From the NASA press release:
Before its encounter, NASA had defined a minimum successful orbit period change of Dimorphos as change of 73 seconds or more. This early data show DART surpassed this minimum benchmark by more than 25 times.
 

https://www.nasa.gov/press-release/nasa ... n-in-space

A number of articles do mention a 10 minute goal; I think that was the consensus optimistic estimate rather than the minimum for success.

At about the 36 minute mark of the press conference this afternoon, DART program scientist Tom Statler mentioned the efforts made to predict the range of possible outcomes, and gave an amusing account of his own "you're going to need a bigger boat" kind-of-reaction as he watched the final close-up images before impact.

The video of today's press conference is here:
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#178

Post by AndyinPA »

https://www.washingtonpost.com/science/ ... sa-crater/
Mars has a lot of craters. Now it has two new ones — gouged by rocks that slammed into the planet late last year.

Mars will be fine. This is not a natural disaster. Nor an omen that Earth is newly imperiled by asteroids. The solar system is full of debris. Mars has a feeble atmosphere, and when a meteoroid comes flying in from space, it’s unlikely to burn up before smacking into the surface.

But what has scientists buzzing — to the point that NASA scheduled a news conference Thursday to highlight the discovery, detailed in two papers published in the journal Science — is that the crater-making impacts were documented by two NASA spacecraft, an orbiter and a lander. This was a nifty demonstration of combining scientific resources, one providing an eye on the impact events while the other provided an ear.

The result is an unusual trove of data about the Martian interior, a topic of great interest to planetary scientists who want to understand why this rocky world that was probably warmer and wetter 4 billion years ago became a frigid desert with no obvious sign of life.
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#179

Post by Liz »

the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO) was able to take a picture of the newly formed crater created by the hit when it flew over the impact site less than 24 hours later.
The image is impressive, showing blocks of ice that were spewed up onto the planet's surface around the 492-foot (150-meter) wide and 70-foot (21-meter) deep hole.
The larger of the two struck last December some 2,200 miles (3,500km) from InSight, creating a crater roughly 70 ft (21 metres) deep. The orbiter’s cameras showed debris hurled up to 25 miles (40km) from the impact, as well as white patches of ice around the crater, the most frozen water observed at such low latitudes, Posiolova said.
"This is the warmest spot on Mars, the closest to the equator, we've ever seen water ice,"
Image

Before and After
Image
https://www.theguardian.com/science/202 ... aters-nasa
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#180

Post by RTH10260 »

clickbait - don't loose your sleep
Huge ‘planet killer’ asteroid discovered – and it’s heading our way
With a diameter of 1 to 2km, space rock named 2022 AP7 crosses our orbit but has ‘no chance’ of hitting Earth

Nicola Davis Science correspondent
Tue 1 Nov 2022 19.05 GMT

Astronomers say they have discovered the largest planet killer-sized asteroid in eight years, and that the huge space rock will cross Earth’s orbit.

The asteroid, named 2022 AP7, was reported by researchers looking for space rocks within the orbits of Earth and Venus.

Writing in the Astronomical Journal, lead study author Scott Sheppard and colleagues at the Carnegie Institution for Science in Washington say they have found three “rather large” asteroids, one of which – 2022 AP7 – crosses the Earth’s orbit, making it a potentially hazardous asteroid (PHA).

With a diameter of about 1.1km to 2.3km, the team say 2022 AP7 is the largest PHA discovered since 2014 and probably in the top 5% of the largest ever found.

“Any asteroid over 1km in size is considered a planet killer,” said Sheppard, adding that should such an object strike Earth, the impact would be devastating to life as we know it, with dust and pollutants kicked up into the atmosphere, where they would linger for years.



https://www.theguardian.com/science/202 ... ng-our-way
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#181

Post by AndyinPA »

I guess we don't have enough to worry about.
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#182

Post by Foggy »

Instead of it being a planet killer, we should use it as target practice for an asteroid killer.

Because one of these suckers is going to head directly for us one of these fine days, and it would be nice to have a little practice under our belts, so to speak. Let's make mistakes and learn from them, so there are no mistakes when the future of the planet is at stake.

Y'know, it doesn't help much to break an asteroid into smaller chunks if'n all the chunks hit major cities with Democratic populations. Which they would, you know how they get.
Out from under. :thumbsup:
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#183

Post by northland10 »

Oh no, Planet Killer. If you start hearing the music, it's all over.
101010 :towel:
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#184

Post by Gene Kooper »

Some light (or should that be shadow) humor for Election DAY! When all else fails, humor is helpful.

I came across this link to a Neil Tyson lunar eclipse tweet earlier today and realized that Flat Earthers are as devoid of reality as the MAGA fuckwits.

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#185

Post by AndyinPA »

:rotflmao:
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#186

Post by RTH10260 »

something for the luna(r)tics :biggrin:
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#187

Post by AndyinPA »

:lol:
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#188

Post by Maybenaut »

We went out at 5 am this morning to look at the eclipse. We had to drive awhile to find a spot where we could see it. We parked in a parking lot out in the country and sat there and looked at it for awhile. Then this meteor went streaking just to the left of the moon. It was a red streak, then flamed out a bright green. I'd never seen anything like it. My husband and I looked at each other and said at the same time, "End times, baby!"

It really was spectacularly beautiful though. Especially the meteor.
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#189

Post by Phoenix520 »

Of all the times for us to get blessed rain!! No eclipse for us.
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#190

Post by AndyinPA »

Phoenix520 wrote: Tue Nov 08, 2022 6:34 pm Of all the times for us to get blessed rain!! No eclipse for us.
Well, maybe no end times for you. :biggrin:
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#191

Post by Greatgrey »

What's the Frequency, Kenneth?
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#192

Post by Liz »

When Neutron Stars merge they instantly form a black hole.

Not this time.
But the latest observations revealed the monster star hovering in view for more than a day before it faded out of sight.

“Such a massive neutron star with a long life expectancy is not normally thought to be possible,” said Dr Nuria Jordana-Mitjans, an astronomer at the University of Bath. “It is a mystery why this one was so long-lived.”
a meta-stable hypermassive neutron star
.... They think because it was spinning super fast.

It astounds me how clever we've become.
The unexpected sightings were made using NASA’s orbiting Neil Gehrels Swift Observatory, which detected the initial gamma-ray burst coming from a galaxy about 10.6bn light years away. A robotic observatory, the Liverpool Telescope, situated in the Canary Islands, then automatically swivelled to view the aftermath of the merger. These observations revealed telltale signatures of a highly magnetised, rapidly spinning neutron star.

This suggests that the neutron star itself launched the gamma-ray burst, rather than it occurring after its gravitational collapse. Until now, the exact sequence of events has been hard to figure out.

“We were excited to catch the very early optical light from this short gamma-ray burst – something that is still largely impossible to do without using a robotic telescope,” said Mundell. “Our discovery opens new hope for upcoming sky surveys with telescopes such as the Rubin Observatory LSST, with which we may find signals from hundreds of thousands of such long-lived neutron stars before they collapse to become black holes.”
Read it all Here
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#193

Post by Foggy »

:shock:

The Universe is full of surprises.

Umm ... so that actually happened 10,600,000,000 years ago. It took a while for the evidence to get here. :smoking:
Out from under. :thumbsup:
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#194

Post by RTH10260 »

‘My power’s really low’: Nasa’s Insight Mars rover prepares to sign off from the Red Planet
Robot says it might be sending its last message from Mars as dust chokes out its power supply

Samantha Lock
Tue 20 Dec 2022 02.14 GMT

Nasa’s InSight lander has delivered what could be its final message from Mars, where it has been on a history-making mission to reveal the secrets of the Red Planet’s interior.

In November the space agency warned the lander’s time may becoming to an end as dust continued to thicken and choke out the InSight’s power.

“The spacecraft’s power generation continues to decline as windblown dust on its solar panels thickens,” Nasa wrote in an update on 2 November. “The end is expected to come in the next few weeks.”

A message shared on the Nasa InSight Twitter account on Monday read: “My power’s really low, so this may be the last image I can send. Don’t worry about me though: my time here has been both productive and serene. If I can keep talking to my mission team, I will – but I’ll be signing off here soon. Thanks for staying with me.”




https://www.theguardian.com/science/202 ... red-planet

Since its deployment, Insight has measured over 1,300 seismic events, and more than 50 of them had clear enough signals for the team to derive information about their location on Mars, according to published mission results.

The lander data has also yielded details about Mars’ interior layers, its liquid core, the surprisingly variable remnants beneath the surface of its mostly extinct magnetic field, weather and quake activity.
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#195

Post by RTH10260 »

I think this event has already happened :(
All planets in the solar system visible in night sky at same time on Wednesday
In the northern hemisphere five planets can be seen by the naked eye, and Uranus and Neptune with a telescope or binoculars

Nadeem Badshah
Wed 28 Dec 2022 18.40 GMT

Every planet in the solar system was visible in the night sky simultaneously on Wednesday, which is regarded by experts as a rare astronomical event.

Venus, Mercury, Saturn, Jupiter and Mars could all be seen in that order in the northern hemisphere with the naked eye, starting from the south-western horizon and moving east.

Uranus, located between Mars and Jupiter, and Neptune, which is between Saturn and Jupiter, can be seen with binoculars or a telescope until the end of the year.

All eight planets appeared only 1.5 degrees apart on Wednesday night and were set to reach conjunction – their closest point – on Thursday at 2100 GMT.

The planets can be spotted low in the west, with the clearest view expected to be about 30 minutes after sunset, with Venus disappearing about 40 minutes later, each day until the end of the year.

Gianluca Masi, an astronomer with the Virtual Telescope Project in Italy, told Newsweek: “These nights, we can see all the planets of our solar system at a glance, soon after sunset. It happens from time to time, but it is always a spectacular sight.”

Mercury is the most difficult planet to see without magnification, as it is sitting in a bright part of the sky. However, it can be spotted close to the much brighter Venus.

The rest of the planets line up eastwards, with Jupiter appearing brighter than all of the stars and high in the southern sky.




https://www.theguardian.com/science/202 ... -wednesday
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#196

Post by AndyinPA »

I knew about this, but had to content myself with a beautiful sunset--which means clouds. :(

And it had been sunny most of the day. :roll:
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#197

Post by RTH10260 »

Unfit for readers believing in a 6000 year Earth
Image of star cluster sheds light on early stages of universe
James Webb space telescope brings insight into birth of stars at ‘cosmic noon’ with image of NGC 346 cluster

Harry Taylor
Wed 11 Jan 2023 20.36 GMT

Scientists have been given an unprecedented glimpse into the birth of stars and the early stages of the universe, after a new image was released by the James Webb space telescope.

The image shows a young cluster of stars, known as NGC 346, which is more than 200,000 light years from Earth.

Scientists have taken a particular interest in the cluster, which is in the Small Magellanic Cloud (SMC), because it resembles the conditions of the early universe when star formation was at its peak.

Astronomers hope that studying the region could give more answers as to how the first stars formed during the “cosmic noon”, only 2 or 3 billion years after the big bang.

Dr Olivia Jones, the Science and Technology Facilities Council’s Webb fellow at its UK astronomy technology centre, is lead author on a paper featuring the images.

Jones said: “This is the first time we can detect the full sequence of star formation of both low and high mass stars in another galaxy.

“This means we have far more data to study at high resolution, offering us new information on how the birth of stars shapes their environment and even greater insight into the star formation process.”

The NGC 346 cluster, which is about 3 to 5 million years old, houses protostars, which are clouds of gas and dust in space that are developing into stars. Astronomers study these to try to further understand how stars are formed.



https://www.theguardian.com/science/202 ... -tuniverse
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#198

Post by RTH10260 »

NASA's Webb telescope confirms existence of exoplanet for the 1st time

Devika Rao, Staff writer
Fri, January 13, 2023 at 6:10 PM GMT+1

NASA's James Webb Telescope has confirmed the existence of an exoplanet for the first time. An exoplanet, like Earth, orbits around a star.

The exoplanet, named called LHS 475 b, is similar in size to the Earth and is located 41 light years away, reports NPR. Unlike Earth, the planet orbits its star in just two days and is way hotter than Earth. Scientists have yet to determine the composition of the atmosphere. "There are some terrestrial-type atmospheres that we can rule out," said Jacob Lustig-Yaeger, a researcher at the Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory. "It can't have a thick methane-dominated atmosphere, similar to that of Saturn's moon Titan."

This discovery was made through the help of NASA's Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite. The satellite's data suggested the planet might exist and then Webb's Near-Infrared Spectrograph (NIRSpec) was able to capture it to investigate, NASA writes. The NIRSpec transmits the light from an object to a spectrum where it can be used to determine an object's temperature, mass, and chemical composition.




https://www.yahoo.com/news/nasas-webb-t ... 16410.html
(original: The Week)
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#199

Post by AndyinPA »

Cool!
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#200

Post by noblepa »

I thought that they had discovered several exoplanets. Is this one just the first "earthlike" planet?
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