Science, Space, & Robotics - Page 202

SpaceX is on its way to ferrying humans to the International Space Station, and the private space exploration company has just reached a new milestone.

SpaceX has just reached a new milestone in their quest to be able to ferry humans back and forth from International Space Station to Earth. Just a couple days ago, the Space exploration company live-streamed an in-flight test of Crew Dragon's launch escape system at Launch Complex 39A at NASA's Kennedy Space Center in Florida.

The above video (which I have skipped to 40 seconds before the initial launch) shows the Dragon capsule attached to SpaceX's Falcon 9 rocket. As the timer ticks down and the launch sequence begins, we can see Falcon 9 blasting off from its launch platform. As expected, the Falcon 9 rocket broke apart and exploded right after the Dragon detached and begun free-falling back down to Earth. Parachutes were then deployed on its re-entry before it safely landed in the Atlantic ocean.

Astronomers have located something they have never done before, an asteroid that is orbiting the Sun closer than Venus.

Astronomers at Caltech Zwicky Transient Facility have found this new asteroid, which has now been called 2020 AV2. The asteroid is estimated to be anywhere between 1 - 3 kilometers in diameter, or around 2 miles. 2020 AV2 is a class of asteroid called Ataris, or Interior-Earth Objects (IEOs). These are known objects that are orbiting inside Earth's, and at the moment, astronomers have only located 21 of them. Since 2020 AV2 is orbiting inside of Venus', it's the first 'Vatira' - the 'V' stands for Venus.

So how did the asteroid manage to get there without being captured by Venus' gravitational pull? According to Tom Prince is a Professor of Physics at Caltech said, "An encounter with a planet probably flung the asteroid into Venus's orbit. It's the opposite of what happens when a space mission swings by a planet for a gravity boost. Instead of gaining energy from a planet, it loses it."

At the center of our Milky Way galaxy, we have a supermassive black hole called Sagittarius A*, and astronomers have found some weird objects floating around it.

The new research has been published in the journal Nature and has indicated that astronomers have located some objects that were originally believed to be gasses. The strange part about this though, is that astronomers observed the objects and found that they moved like stars. The objects which have been titled G1 and G2 have been observed getting close to the black hole and stretching into an elongated shape.

Andrea Ghez, UCLA's Lauren B. Leichtman and Arthur E. Levine Professor of Astrophysics and director of the UCLA Galactic Center Group, said, "At the time of closest approach, G2 had a really strange signature. We had seen it before, but it didn't look too peculiar until it got close to the black hole and became elongated, and much of its gas was torn apart. It went from being a pretty innocuous object when it was far from the black hole to one that was really stretched out and distorted at its closest approach and lost its outer shell, and now it's getting more compact again."

Scientists have done the unthinkable; they have combined frog embryo stem cells with robotics and created the first 'living' robot.

Researchers from the University of Vermont (UVM) and Tufts University have used stem cells from frog embryos and combined them with tiny robots to create "xenobots". The robots are technically alive, and they measure in at about a millimeter-wide, can self-heal if sliced in half, can work cooperatively with other live robots, and even swim.

According to Joshua Bongard, a computer scientist and robotics expert at UVM and one of the leads on the research, said, "These are novel living machines. They're neither a traditional robot nor a known species of animal. It's a new class of artifact: a living, programmable organism." So how did scientists and researchers do this? Using a supercomputer, the team at UVM ran an algorithm to find out the best design, then the team at Tufts implemented the design with the stem cells from frog embryos. If you are after more information on this topic, check out this article here.

Astronomers have peered out into the vastness of space and located two more potentially habitable alien planets.

The two new worlds that could be our new homes some day are called 'GJ180 d' and 'GJ229A c' and orbit two red dwarf stars 'GJ229A' and 'GJ180', respectively. Both of the planets are located in the habitable zone of the red dwarf stars and are not total locked. Tidal locking is common for planets found next to red dwarfs, but it isn't good for survivability or an overall habitable planet as it can render the days extremely hot and the nights freezing.

Fabo Feng, of the Carnegie Institution for Science in Washington, D.C, said the planet 'GJ180 d' has a temperature close to Earths, so much so that the planet can be called a super-Earth. 'GJ180 d' is actually larger than Earth as well, its estimated that the exoplanet has 7.5 times the mass of Earth. "GJ180 d is the nearest temperate super-Earth to us that is not tidally locked to its star, which probably boosts its likelihood of being able to host and sustain life." If you are after more information check out this link here.

NASA's Cassini satellite ended its 13-year mission in September 2017, but scientists and researchers are analyzing some of the final data sets sent back from it.

The new data was analyzed, and two new studies have been published in Geophysical Research Letters and JGR: Space Physics detailing some new understanding regarding Saturn's rings. For those that don't know, Cassini's main mission was to observe Saturn, and it did so very well. Throughout the course of its life, it gave scientists numerous vital pieces of information that helped piece together our now present understanding of Saturn.

Cassini was moved to an orbit that brought it closer to Saturn than ever before, and at this length, scientists and researchers were able to obtain images of Saturn's ultraviolet auroras at some never before seen resolution. So what's Saturn's aurora? Saturn's auroras are generated by the interaction between the solar wind from the sun, which shoots out energized particles, and Saturn's rapidly rotating magnetic field. The auroras are found at the planet's poles and are known to flash and pulsate at different speeds.

SpaceX are in preparation for their Crew Dragon launch and before the launch gets underway some crucial tests need to be carried out.

One of those tests are for Crew Dragon's launch escape system. According to the official SpaceX Twitter account, which posted a recent update that described that on January 18th the space exploration company will be performing an in-flight demonstration of Crew Dragon's launch escape system.

The test will verify whether or not the spacecraft has the capabilities to safely bring astronauts back down to Earth in the event of an emergency landing occurring. This will be the last big test for SpaceX's Crew Dragon before it can be checked off as ready-to-go. During one of SpaceX's last tests with Starship, the rocket actually blew its top, check that video out here.

NASA is constantly working on getting humans to our Red Planet neighbor, but there is one big question that needs to be answered first -- where are they going to land and why?

In a new paper published in Geophysical Research Letters, scientists managed to create a map through the analysis of satellite data (MRO & Mars Odyssey orbiter) that shows where martian water is located. This martian water is more accurately called 'water ice', and according to NASA's website, "Water ice will be a key consideration for any potential landing site". This is because if humans can harvest resources on Mars, they will have a steady means of fuel replacement and drinkable water.

Due to the air pressure on Mars being so thin, liquid water can't last on its surface for very long as it evaporates. This is why NASA has identified some key spots across the planet that have "buried treasure". This 'treasure' is, in fact, water ice and its located just under the martian surface. According to Sylvain Piqueux of NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California, "You wouldn't need a backhoe to dig up this ice. You could use a shovel. We're continuing to collect data on buried ice on Mars, zeroing in on the best places for astronauts to land."

Sometimes a little companionship is all you need, especially if you are blasting off to space to be the first prospective rider aboard SpaceX's deep-space rocket.

Japanese billionaire, Yusaku Maezawa is after just that as he has launched a campaign to find a suitable "female partner" to accompany him in his flight around the Moon. Maezawa has started a new website promoting the "girlfriend" campaign, and according to the website "He wants to visit such a special place together with a special someone." There are conditions to applying, they aren't very strict so don't worry.

The website states that applicants have to be; "Single women aged 20 or over, bright personality and always positive, interested in going into space and able to participate in the preparation for it, want to enjoy life to the fullest, be someone who wishes for world peace." Back in September last year, Maezawa put down a large deposit to be the first private customer to ride on SpaceX's Starship once it was completed and ready for flight. Starship won't land on the Moon with passengers. Instead, it will take passengers around the Moon, giving them a perfect look at it.

Jupiter is meant to protect the Earth from space rocks, not slingshot them towards our direction. Or at least that's what astronomers originally thought, the contrary might shape up to be true.

Astronomers originally thought Jupiter's massive size and gravitational pull were saving Earth from experiencing many dangerous space rocks. While that theory might still be relatively true, it might be as full proof as once thought. Kevin Grazier, a former NASA scientist and now planetary physicist, used computer models to simulate the solar system and how space rocks interact with its planets.

What he found in these simulations was, "Our simulations show that Jupiter is just as likely to send comets at Earth as deflect them away, and we've seen that in the real solar system." In the early days of Earth forming, this principle of asteroids crashing into Earth was a good thing, as essential ingredients for life to occur (ice, minerals etc) were redistributed on Earth's surface. Today though, it could end in millions of lives being lost. Remember what happened to the dinosaurs?

A new breakthrough in being able to measure oxygen levels on distant planets has just happened, meaning NASA now has more assistance in locating alien life.

The breakthrough was published in Nature Astronomy and describes a new technique that can be used by NASA's telescopes to measure oxygen levels on distant planets. Oxygen being one of the vital building blocks of life, is what NASA is searching for on distant planets, so any help towards making that location process easier is most-welcomed. The new technique can be used by the James Webb Space Telescope.

Thomas Fauchez, from NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center and lead author of the study, said "Before our work, oxygen at similar levels as on Earth was thought to be undetectable with Webb. This oxygen signal is known since the early 1980s from Earth's atmospheric studies but has never been studied for exoplanet research." While spotting oxygen on distant planets isn't a 100% guarantee that there is extraterrestrial life located there, it does give NASA and scientists some conclusive evidence that a particular planet has a building block of life.

Two galaxies that both have supermassive black holes are merging together and astronomers caught it on camera.

It takes billions of years for galaxies to merge, the process is long but it is a gorgeous one to observe. An team of astronomers used the extremely powerful telescope called Atacama Large Millimetre Array (ALMA) to observe the collision between two galaxies that both have supermassive black holes. Above is the images that were taken with ALMA.

The images don't show the black holes as its extremely difficult to take images of them. But what we can see is all of the light and gas that has failed to escape their ridiculous gravitational pull. That gas that's surrounding the black hole is feeding the black holes, causing them to grow larger and larger as gravity moves both the galaxies closer together to form a new galaxy called NGC 6240.

NASA recently completed the Mars 2020 rover separation test and its first test drive, earning the rover its official martian driver's license.

NASA is planning on sending the newly designed rover to Mars this July, and things are looking up when it comes to running on schedule. Why in July? Well, that's quite simple. Due to the Earth and Mars' elliptical orbits once every 26 months, both planets are in the closest proximity of each other, precisely 35.8 million miles. Choosing to launch in July isn't just a placeholder date, its the most practical time to get the rover there and establish it on Mars' surface to begin testing.

The Mars 2020 rovers' main mission is to seek out signs of ancient microbial life and even prepare the surface of Mars for future terraforming missions. To seek out potential signs of ancient life, NASA scientists have equipped many bells and whistles on the rover, in fact, it will be carrying 10 different measuring instruments, have 23 cameras and microphones are placed all over the rover to allow for scientists to listen to any potential faults. The rover will also have an X-ray spectrometer, radar, solar-powered drone, and more nifty gadgets.

The discrepancy between calculations of the speed of which the universe is expanding has been increased. Scientists can now not fully agree upon what that constant value is.

First a bit of history. The problem we are talking about here is called the Hubble constant, which was first calculated by American astronomer Edwin Hubble. Hubble discovered that every galaxy in the universe is moving away from Earth at a rate proportional to the distance between Earth and that galaxy.

At first glance, one would assume that Earth is at the center of this universe, but instead, astronomers were smart and said that there is a distinct relationship between how far objects are apart from each other, and how fast they are moving away from each other. The problem behind this way of thinking is that scientists and astronomers alike haven't been able to agree on a constant value of what that speed-distance connection is.

Back in April last year, humans achieved something had never done before - taking an image of a supermassive black hole. Now, that black hole has been caught emitting jets that are traveling close to the speed of light.

The black hole that we took a picture of is called Messier 87 (M87), and according to NASA's Chandra X-Ray Observatory, that same black hole has been caught emitting jets of material from its accretion disk. The accretion disk is where gas, dust, and other materials swirl around the black hole, and some of the materials are sucked into the black hole, while some are shot back out into space.

The X-ray data indicated that some of the particles that were moving in the jets were traveling faster than the speed of light. While that might sound impossible, it's only possible because of the phenomenon known as superluminal motion. Brad Snios, a postdoctoral researcher at the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics, said "The jet travels almost as quickly towards us as the light it generates, giving the illusion that the jet's motion is much more rapid than the speed of light".

Over the course of Earth's life many meteors have slammed into its surface, scientists know about the impacts but have struggled to find the craters, until now.

One meteor, in particular, crash-landed into Earth around 790,000 years ago, and the explosion that it created blanketed 10% of the Earth in rock debris. The debris was launched all the way from Indochina to eastern Antarctica and from the Indian Ocean to the western Pacific. Scientists were aware of the impact the meteor created but were unable to find the crater until just recently.

Through the analysis of geochemical and local gravity, scientists were able to pinpoint the impact location to southern Laos on the Bolaven Plateau. The crater was found under a massive field of cooled volcanic lava that spanned a ridiculous 2,000 square miles. According to the recent study, scientists estimated that the crater impact measured in at about 300 feet thick, 8 miles wide and 11 miles long. In the entirety of this article, you will find a geological map of what the scientists have comprised out of evidence.

Astronomers have managed to spot something quite unexpected at the outer rims of our Milky Way galaxy -- new stars forming.

How is this happening? According to Price-Whelan and his colleagues who presented their findings on January 8 at the American Astronomical Society meeting in Honolulu, spectral analysis has shown that these young stars are not of this galaxy and are actually from another. This means that these stars haven't formed from material located in the Milky Way, but have instead come from two close dwarf galaxies called the Magellanic Clouds.

Both of these galaxies are currently on a slow collision course with the Milky Way, and it seems that a stream of gas extending from the galaxies is making its way into the Milky Way and forming new stars. Primary discoverer Adrian Price-Whelan, a research fellow at the Flatiron Institute's Center for Computational Astrophysics in New York City, said "This is a puny cluster of stars-less than a few thousand in total-but it has big implications beyond its local area of the Milky Way". Price-Whelan also named the star cluster - Price-Whelan 1.

CES 2020 - So you might not be a people person, that's ok, but everyone needs a bit of companionship whether that comes in the form of a pet such as a dog, cat, goldfish or even a robot?

Meet PiBo, a helpful service robot that has multiple skills up his robotic sleeves. PiBo can act as your alarm clock, find out the weather for the day based on your location, fill you in on the top news stories, play your favorite music, and take pictures with its 5MP camera. Not only can PiBo do all those things, but it also has voice and facial recognition so just you can bond with PiBo and no one else.

So how tall is this robot? PiBo measures in at just over a foot tall and runs the custom Linux-based Circulus OS on a 1.4Ghz quad-core chip and 1GB of RAM. Unfortunately, there is a downside to PiBo. The battery inside of the robot is only 3,400mAh and only lasts for about 2 hours. That's not the worst of it though, PiBo takes 5 hours to charge... Hopefully, with new editions to PiBo, the Korean company behind it can implement some longer life into it.

Recent research has indicated that Venus could be volcanically active today, which means that it's the only other planet in our solar system besides Earth with active volcanoes.

The research which has been published in Science Advances and led by the Universities Space Research Association (USRA) has found evidence to suggest the second closest planet to the Sun has active volcanoes. Dr. Justin Filiberto, the study's lead author, said, "If Venus is indeed active today, it would make a great place to visit to better understand the interiors of planets".

So how was this evidence found? The European Space Agency's (ESA's) Venus Express orbiter measured the amount of infrared light emitted on Venus' surface. After the data was sent back, scientists were able to determine which new lava flows that were emitting new light versus old ones from data back in the 1990s. Filiberto says, "For example, we could study how planets cool and why the Earth and Venus have active volcanism, but Mars does not. Future missions should be able to see these flows and changes in the surface and provide concrete evidence of its activity."

Astrophysicists around the world are looking to the skies at one star, in particular, Betelgeuse, as it's begun to dim, indicating that it could explode relatively soon.

Neil deGrasse Tyson has taken to his personal Twitter account to let the public know that this isn't something anyone should be worried about. Tyson has littered his Twitter page with awesome facts about Betelgeuse, informing the public with information such as Betelgeuse is the "left armpit of the constellation Orion, is mysteriously dimming, having lost 60% of its brightness across the past six months."

He also has said that "Betelgeuse is so large, if you swapped it with the Sun, it would engulf the orbit of Mars and extend all the way through the asteroid belt. No need to panic, but at 700 light-years, it's the closest star to the Sun that will end its life in a Supernova explosion." Tyson also says that Betelgeuse is expected to explode within the next 100,000 years, and the explosion itself will be visible from Earth even within the daytime.