Topic: Space - on January 15, 2017 at 8:16:00 PM CET
Hubble gazes into a black hole of puzzling lightness
The beautiful spiral galaxy visible in the center of the image is known as RX J1140.1+0307, a galaxy in the Virgo constellation imaged by the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope, and it presents an interesting puzzle. At first glance, this galaxy appears to be a normal spiral galaxy, much like the Milky Way, but first appearances can be deceptive!
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Topic: Space - on January 7, 2017 at 1:52:00 PM CET
Stunning Video Of Earth By NASA Astronaut Shares Beauty Of Our Big Blue Marble
When you’re the country’s astronaut who has clocked the most days in space, such as NASA’s Jeff Williams with his 534 days of space time, you still may not be a household name or a social media star, but when you bring home ultra high-def (UHD) footage of the Earth, the internet loves you.
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Topic: Space - on August 18, 2016 at 6:02:00 PM CEST
This ancient text reveals a Maya astronomer calculated the movements of Venus over a millennium ago
A new analysis of the ancient Mayan text, the Dresden Codex – the oldest book written in the Americas known to historians – suggests an early Maya scientist may have made a major discovery in astronomy more than a thousand years ago. According to a new study, astronomical data written in part of the text called the Venus Table weren't just based on numerology as had been thought, but were a pioneering form of scientific record-keeping that had huge significance for Maya society. "This is the part that I find to be most rewarding, that when we get in here, we're looking at the work of an individual Mayan, and we could call him or her a scientist, an astronomer," says anthropologist Gerardo Aldana from University of California, Santa Barbara. "This person, who's witnessing events at this one city during this very specific period of time, created, through their own creativity, this mathematical innovation."
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Topic: Space - on August 9, 2016 at 5:07:00 PM CEST
The Perseid meteor shower should be great this year
Every year, the Earth moves through the debris from the Swift-Tuttle comet, resulting in the Perseid meteor shower. This year, the Earth is predicted to move through a particularly dense part of the comet's wake, which may mean twice the number of shooting stars during this year's shower.
The best way to see the Perseids is to go outside between midnight and dawn on the morning of Aug. 12. Allow about 45 minutes for your eyes to adjust to the dark. Lie on your back and look straight up. Increased activity may also be seen on Aug. 12-13.
via Here's how to watch: nasa.gov Perseid Meteor Shower 2016: When, Where & How to See It
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Topic: Space - on August 5, 2016 at 5:08:00 PM CEST
Get Ready For A Truly Spectacular Meteor Shower
If you’ve been waiting for a perfect summer evening to watch a meteor shower, then good news. Overnight from August 11 to 12 (that’s Sunday night to Monday morning this upcoming week), one of this year’s most visually impressive meteor showers, the Perseid meteors, will light up the night sky. And this year in particular, scientists say the Perseid peak could display an “outburst” of up to 200 meteors per hour shouting across the U.S. sky.
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Topic: Space - on August 4, 2016 at 5:29:00 PM CEST
China to launch unbreakable quantum spy satellite - and it could one day lead to a megascope the size of Earth that could 'spot a license plate on Jupiter's moons'
Satellite produces entangled photon pairs which form an encryption key These photons will theoretically remain linked over great distances This means that any attempts to listen in will be detected on the other side Scientists say this could one day make for a secure global network
Scientists in China are set to launch the world’s first ‘quantum satellite,’ which could one day make for an ultra-secure global communications network. The 1,300 pound craft contains a crystal that produces pairs of entangled photons, which will be fired to ground stations in China and Austria to form a ‘secret key.’ Entangled photons theoretically maintain their link across any distance, and according to the scientists, any attempts to breach this type of communication would be easily detectable.
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Topic: Space - on August 4, 2016 at 5:24:00 PM CEST
These are the 20 best places to search for alien life, say astronomers
Astronomers have just released a list of the 20 best candidates we have for a 'second Earth', saying that if we want to find life beyond the Solar System, these are our absolute best shots (that we know of). Whittled down from a catalogue of more than 4,000 exoplanets discovered by NASA’s Kepler mission, the ‘top 20’ were singled out as being the most likely to be rocky and habitable. "This is the complete catalogue of all of the Kepler discoveries that are in the habitable zone of their host stars," said one of the team, Stephen Kane from San Francisco State University. "That means we can focus in on the planets in this paper and perform follow-up studies to learn more about them, including if they are indeed habitable."
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Topic: Space - on July 19, 2016 at 4:20:00 PM CEST
The World's Most Powerful Telescope Just Discovered 1,230 New Galaxies
The MeerKAT First Light image of the sky, released today by Minister of Science and Technology, Naledi Pandor, shows unambiguously that MeerKAT is already the best radio telescope of its kind in the Southern Hemisphere. Array Release 1 (AR1) being celebrated today provides 16 of an eventual 64 dishes integrated into a working telescope array. It is the first significant scientific milestone achieved by MeerKAT, the radio telescope under construction in the Karoo that will eventually be integrated into the Square Kilometre Array (SKA). In a small patch of sky covering less than 0.01 percent of the entire celestial sphere, the MeerKAT First Light image shows more than 1300 galaxies in the distant Universe, compared to 70 known in this location prior to MeerKAT. “Based on the results being shown today, we are confident that after all 64 dishes are in place, MeerKAT will be the world’s leading telescope of its kind until the advent of SKA,” according to Professor Justin Jonas, SKA South Africa Chief Technologist.
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Topic: Space - on July 19, 2016 at 4:17:00 PM CEST
Kepler Confirms 100+ New Exoplanets
Astronomers have confirmed another 100 of Kepler's more than 3,000 candidate exoplanets. Phys.org reports: "One of the most interesting set of planets discovered in this study is a system of four potentially rocky planets, between 20 and 50 percent larger than Earth, orbiting a star less than half the size and with less light output than the Sun. Their orbital periods range from five-and-a-half to 24 days, and two of them may experience radiation levels from their star comparable to those on Earth. Despite their tight orbits -- closer than Mercury's orbit around the sun -- the possibility that life could arise on a planet around such a star cannot be ruled out, according to Crossfield." Because the host star as well as many of these other confirmed exoplanets are red dwarf stars, the possibility of life is reduced because the star and its system is likely to have a less rich mix of elements compared to our yellow G-type Sun.
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Topic: Space - on July 19, 2016 at 4:16:00 PM CEST
How Do We Beam Pictures Back From Jupiter? It Takes A Village
Before Juno, the uncrewed spacecraft that NASA successfully inserted into orbit around Jupiter on July 4, there was Cassini, a similar multimillion-dollar amalgam of scaffolding, solar panels and scientific instruments that entered orbit around Saturn in 2004. Cassini’s success helped pave the way for Juno, but in 1992, a congressional budget cut nearly grounded that earlier mission before it even reached the launchpad. Tasked with the suddenly urgent job of making Cassini cheaper to build, engineers at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory took an ax to the bits that made the engineers nervous — the moving parts.
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Topic: Space - on July 13, 2016 at 11:40:00 AM CEST
The Space Station Is Becoming A Spy Satellite For Wildlife
Scientists have a new way to eavesdrop on the planet and its inhabitants. Reuters In 1250, the prior of a Cistercian Abbey reputedly tied a note to a leg of a barn swallow, which read: “Oh swallow, where do you live in winter?” The next spring, he got a response: “In Asia, in the home of Petrus.” This perhaps apocryphal story marks one of the first known instances of someone tagging an animal to track its movements. Thanks to many such endeavors, we now know that every year, barn swallows migrate between their breeding grounds in the northern hemisphere to wintering grounds throughout the tropics and the south. In 1912, one intrepid individual that was ringed in England turned up 7,500 miles away in South Africa.
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Topic: Space - on July 7, 2016 at 3:59:00 PM CEST
Great Britain’s vote to exit the EU sends Europe’s space sector scrambling for answers
Even more surprising than Britain’s June 23 vote to leave the European Union was the fact that so few people, in Britain or elsewhere, had seriously considered the consequences of a pro-Brexit vote. Polls had consistently predicted the decision could land either way. But U.S. and European stock markets had nonetheless risen on the assumption that the stolid British, after flirting with an exit, would elect to remain married to the EU. Starting at dawn June 24, that all collapsed in a collective sky-is-falling dread that Britain would be exiting all European space programs, forcing the remaining nations to react.
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