Science, Space, & Robotics - Page 32

Over the weekend, millions of people around the world looked upward for the annular solar eclipse - a cosmological phenomenon that occurs when the moon lines up perfectly between the Sun and Earth.

In some locations around the world people were able to catch the "ring of fire" phenomenon, an effect that takes place when the moon covers the entire middle section of the Sun, blotting out the majority of the light it emits and only leaving visible a yellow/orange outer ring. While this perspective of the event would truly be incredible, another unique perspective has been captured from 1 million miles away by the Deep Space Climate Observatory (DSCOVR).

This satellite lies 1 million miles from Earth and from its position, offers an interesting perspective of the solar eclipse, perhaps one that not many people have seen before. From the above image, you can see the area of the planet that is currently being covered the shadow of the moon. The region of the planet covered in this black patch is seeing the solar eclipse event take place, and it will move further southward over the course of the day.

Researchers have blasted simulated lunar soil on Earth and fused the soil into what could one day be used as roads and landing pads on the lunar surface.

Lunar soil isn't favorable for exploration on the surface of the moon, both by astronauts and rovers. The lunar soil is comprised of lunar volcanic rock that has been bombarded by the Sun's radiation, resulting in it being a very fine pounder that is electrically charged. This charged powder appears white as the surface of the moon reflects light from the Sun, but its true color is more of a dark gray. Notably, the moon doesn't have any wind, or water systems, which on Earth erode soil, making the edges of the tiny granules less sharp.

The moon's soil is the opposite, with many of its fine dust particles having sharp edges. Since most of the soil is electrically charged, it proves to be "especially sticky," according to Juan-Carlos Ginés-Palomares, an aerospace engineer at Aalen University in Germany. The combination of the aforementioned factors regarding moon dust makes it a real hazard for rovers, astronauts, landings, and general exploration on the surface.

A group of nine researchers that consist of three philosophers of science, two astrobiologists, a data scientist, a mineralogist, and a theoretical physicist have penned a new paper published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences that proposes an addition to the "missing law of nature".

The paper proposes that the definition of "evolution" shouldn't be exclusively thought of as Darwinian or specific to the evolution of life and should be thought of more broadly, or as the paper describes the "Macroscopic" laws of nature. Natural laws that govern the world today include laws related to motion, gravity, electromagnetism, energy, thermodynamics, etc. The team behind the paper proposes evolution should be added to the mix.

The authors coined the term "Law of Increasing Functional Information," which states that a system will evolve if "many different configurations of the system undergo selection for one or more functions." The team pointed to examples such as the evolution of minerals across the timeline of the solar system. At the beginning of the solar system, there were an estimated 20 minerals, but over the course of 4.5 billion years, there have been more than 6,000 identified.

On October 14, 2023, millions of people around the world had the chance to catch the annular solar eclipse of 2023, and for those who happened to miss the event, here are some stunning videos and photographs.

The solar eclipse rolled through eight states across the US before it moved its way down to Mexico, Guatemala, Belize, Honduras, Nicaragua, Costa Rica, Panama, Colombia, and Brazil. As you can probably imagine, millions of people across the aforementioned regions of the world timed their gaze toward the Sun as the moon passed perfectly between Earth and our local star.

The result was captured from numerous locations and immediately thrown up on social media platforms. Depending on the location of the viewer, the images/video captured were completely different, as some people saw the ring of fire effect, while others didn't or only saw it briefly. Some of the videos below showed individuals experiencing the solar eclipse, creating a brief darkness across the region, an effect that would have been surreal to be a part of.

NASA has taken to its blog to share a new graphic revealing how many near-Earth asteroids it has recorded and expects to record as of August this year.

The space agency published the new graphic on its website and explained that a near-Earth asteroid is defined by any comet or asteroid that's 32 feet in diameter that's orbit comes within 30 million miles of Earth. According to NASA's above graphic, the space agency has identified 32,412 near-Earth asteroids (NEOs) of various sizes. Of that total, it has found 853 asteroids bigger than 3,280 feet in diameter, with only 50 estimated left to be found.

Additionally, NASA's graphic states that it has discovered 10,541 NEOs larger than 459 feet, and it still estimates 14,000 left to be found. Furthermore, the space agency gives some additional statistics regarding asteroids that you may find interesting. According to NASA, 100 tons of dust and sand-sized particles bombard Earth every single day, and there are 3 near-Earth asteroids that have passed closer to the Earth than the Moon in the last 30 days.

NASA and SpaceX are expected to send a small spacecraft on its long journey to inspect a metal-rich, yet mysterious asteroid located in the asteroid belt located between Mars and Jupiter.

Researchers believe that the Psyche asteroid could be an ancient core of a planet, or planet-like object, and that visiting it with a spacecraft, collecting data through observations while it orbits the body, will enable researchers to learn more about the evolution of the solar system, and by extension, Earth. The spacecraft is appropriately named after the asteroid itself, Psyche, and has already been placed a top of SpaceX's Falcon Heavy rocket, which is expected to launch sometime on 10:19 a.m. EDT Friday, Oct. 13 (depending on weather conditions).

It was only on October 12 when NASA and SpaceX both took to their official X accounts to announce the launch was called off due to unfavorable weather conditions. If you are worried that the launch will have be scrubbed until a much later date, don't be. NASA replied to one user that asking what the last possible day before a scrub has to occur, "There are additional opportunities identified each day through Oct. 25," wrote the space agency.

NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory has taken to its official X account to announce that Ingenuity will be attempting to break a record that it set on flight 60.

The small rotorcraft, commonly called Ingenuity or the Mars Helicopter, will be attempting to break the groundspeed record that it set in Flight 60. Ingenuity will be attempting the new record on flight 62, which NASA writes is expected to occur to earlier than October 12. At the time of writing, NASA hasn't updated Ingenuity's Flight Log. However, it's still very early in the day.

NASA writes that Flight 62 will have a goal of traveling 879 feet (268 meters) horizontally, a flight time of 119.30 seconds, at a maximum altitude of 59 feet (18 meters), in a north-easterly direction. As for scientific goals, NASA writes Ingenuity will be "imaging science targets", and expanding the "flight envelope". If you are interested in checking out if Ingenuity hits its new record, visit the Flight Log here or NASA's Perseverance X account linked above.

NASA has revealed the contents of the capsule returned to Earth through its OSIRIS-REx mission, which aimed to collect a sample from the asteroid Bennu.

NASA administrator Bill Nelson took to the stage to announce that NASA has successfully returned its first-ever asteroid sample and conducted its first analysis. Nelson explains that results from the first analysis showed the samples contained an abundance of water in the form of hydrated clay minerals - that also contain carbon. More specifically, NASA writes on its blog the sample shows evidence of having "high-carbon content and water," which could indicate the "building blocks of life on Earth."

These samples will be studied for years to come, with researchers attempting to answer the question of how the building blocks arrived on Earth - did an asteroid rich with the necessary ingredients collide with Earth's surface millions of years ago, essentially dropping off the building blocks of life that have eventually evolved into what it is today? Studying samples from Bennu will allow researchers to understand the evolution of the solar system and, by extension, Earth, with NASA researchers even describing Bennu's samples as "unlocking a time capsule that offers us profound insights into the origins of our solar system."

NASA has highlighted an image from Hubble's Classics collection of stunning shots of the cosmos with a new post on the official Hubble X account.

The image is of The Boomerang Nebula and was originally snapped by Hubble's Wide Field Planetary Camera 2 instrument in 1998. However, the nebula was first discovered by astronomers Keith Taylor and Mike Scarrott in 1980, who gave the name "Boomerang Nebula" after they observed it from a ground-based telescope in Australia. Follow-up observations were then conducted by Hubble, revealing more details that weren't seen through ground-based telescopes.

Hubble's high-fidelity images revealed that the Boomerang Nebula should have been called "the Bowtie Nebula", as its shape is clearly that of a bowtie and not a boomerang. Hubble's image revealed faint arcs of ghostly filaments that contain gas that has seemingly been diffused. These long filaments make the shape of the bowtie, and according to NASA, these are created by an extremely powerful wind. The Boomerang Nebula is approximately 5,000 light years away from Earth.

NASA has highlighted a new image snapped by its iconic Hubble Space Telescope, this time concentrating on the barred spiral galaxy known as NGC 5068.

As the space agency explains in its blog post, NGC 5068 is a barred spiral galaxy that contains thousands of dense star-forming regions, with each region varying in age. NASA writes that these regions also contain various quantities of interstellar dust. As for location, NGC 5068 is approximately 20 million light-years from Earth and resides in the constellation Virgo.

An unmissable point of the image is the bright bar located at the top center. This region of space is densely packed with mature stars, and behind them is a black hole pulling all of the stars closer and closer together with its intense gravitational pull. The bright pinkish-red smudges or dots across the image are regions of space that contain ionized hydrogen gas or locations of young star clusters. Another nice find within this time is the existence of 110 Wolf-Rayet stars, which are a type of star that burns its fuel (loses mass) at a very high rate.

With Halloween only a few weeks away, a Minnesota man has broken the world record for growing the heaviest pumpkin - or the jack-o-lantern of all jack-o-lanterns.

The new world record was set on Monday in California when Travis Gienger of Anoka, Minnesota, weighed his behemoth pumpkin that measures 2,749 pounds, breaking the previous world record of 2,702 pounds set by an Italian man in 2021. So, what was his secret to success? Science, of course, or more specifically, horticulture, a field of study that specializes in the cultivation of plants in gardens and greenhouses.

Gienger is a horticulture teacher at Anoka Technical College and has been growing pumpkins since he was a teenager, inspired by his father's aspirations to grow pumpkins. Gienger said that he decided to give his pumpkins extra care this year by watering them up to 12 times in a day, and feeding/fertilizing them more than usual. The accomplishment of now being the world record holder for the world's heaviest pumpkin came with a $30,000 prize check.

Millions of people will be able to witness a rare astronomical event this coming weekend, with the "ring of fire" solar eclipse hitting the skies across multiple parts of the western US states.

Additionally, residents in Central America and South America will be able to view the solar eclipse, which is an astronomical event that occurs when the moon lines up perfectly between the Earth and the Sun, causing the inner area of the Sun to be blotted out. The ring is caused by the moon being too far away from the Sun, which results in the iconic ring of fire that is illustrated above. This border of flame will appear in the skies for approximately 5 minutes.

So, when will this all happen? According to reports, the solar eclipse will begin in the North Pacific and enter the US over Oregon at around 8 am PDT on Saturday. The eclipse will begin to display its ring of fire about an hour after it begins. The solar eclipse will then move from Oregon down across Nevada, Utah, New Mexico, and finally, Texas. Regions of the following states will get brief glimpses of the event; Idaho, California, Arizona, and Colorado.

The world's most powerful space telescope has imaged a star-forming region, the Small Magellanic Cloud, which is within a satellite galaxy of the Milky Way.

The new image was released by NASA and the European Space Agency (ESA), where both agency's explain that Webb's Mid-Infrared Instrument (MIRI) was used to capture the stunning region of space. Officially named NGC 346, astronomers have already scoured over the image and detected 1,001 sources of light, which translates to young stars that are covered in dust, according to a statement from the ESA.

Webb's ability to capture the region of space in both near-infrared and mid-infrared wavelengths of light enables astronomers to gain a deeper understanding of the evolution of stars and protostars, within this region of space and many others like it. The results from these observations lead astronomers and astrophysicists to understand the evolution of galaxies, such as our own Milky Way, and points in time, such as the beginning of the universe.

Just over 250 miles up, the International Space Station (ISS), a multinational floating laboratory, is spilling coolant out into space.

The coolant leak emerged on Monday, October 9, and was traced back to a Russian module attached to the station. Notably, the leak consisted of Toxic ammonia flakes that were observed on the Russian Nauka Multipurpose Laboratory Module (MLM) at around 1 p.m. EDT. These flakes were observed through cameras on the ISS's exterior, and were emanating from one of two radiators on MLM.

Roscosmos confirmed the leak that was observed on MLM, and found its source was Nauka's backup radiator, which was delivered to the space station in 2010. NASA writes in its blog post that astronauts aboard the ISS were "never in any danger". It remains unclear if the leak will require a spacewalk to be fixed. NASA writes that teams on Earth and aboard the ISS will continue to monitor the situation and provide updates when available.

Solar storms can be a real issue, but luckily, Earth hasn't been smacked by an extremely severe one in many years. However, it was in the past, and the impact was tragic.

The most intense solar storm recorded in history was the 1859 Carrington Event that resulted in a global aurora display, telegraph systems being wiped out, fires, and overall chaos. These solar storms are caused by outbursts from the Sun. The charged particles ejected from our local star collide with Earth's magnetic fields and upper atmosphere, creating a geomagnetic storm or solar storm.

While these geomagnetic storms are relatively common on Earth, there is always the potential for a solar storm comparable to the Carrington Event, and that would be catastrophic. Infrastructure such as GPS systems, satellites, telescopes, and electricity grids could be at risk of being knocked offline. Researchers have discovered evidence of a solar storm that is now considered to be more intense than the Carrington Event.

A study that is yet to be published but reported by Science has detailed an argument for something beyond the Kuiper Belt that has since gone unnoticed, or the Kuiper Belt is far larger than researchers have previously measured.

The current understanding of the Kuiper Belt is that it extends from the orbit of Neptune at 30 astronomical units and is 50 astronomical units away from the Sun. One astronomical unit (AU) is the distance between Earth and the Sun. This circumstellar disc in the outer solar system is essentially a cosmic donut that is made up of icy objects that are all orbiting the Sun. Beyond 50 astronomical units, researchers generally believe there are no more objects.

However, according to the new study, researchers looked at the sensors aboard NASA's New Horizons spacecraft, which is currently at a distance of 57 AU - far beyond the Kuiper Belt. These sensors are designed to detect levels of dust, which is used as an indicator for being close to an object. According to the team, New Horizon sensors are reporting an increasing level of dust, suggesting that something is beyond the outer perimeter of the Kuiper Belt.

NASA has shared an image on its social media that briefly captured the attention of millions - "A Bear on Mars?"

The image was originally captured on December 12, 2022, by the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO), which is designed to search for the existence of water on Mars and provide critical support for missions on the Martian surface by acting as a relay station for information. MRO snaps photographs of the Mars landscape from an altitude of 156 miles, and one such image was shared to the University of Arizona's blog on January 25, 2023, that sparked attention.

The "Bear on Mars" is a prime example of the phenomenon called, which is the tendency to see faces or meaning within an image of an object/s that has none. Looking at the image, we can see a V-shaped hill that creates the bear's nose, two impact craters make up the eyes, and a circular fracture pattern creates the head. NASA explains that it's just a "a hill on Mars with a peculiar shape." This human phenomenon is commonly seen when people look up at clouds and notice shapes, people, animals, and more.

The European Space Agency (ESA) has highlighted an image snapped by the Hubble Space Telescope of the two galaxies named NGC 3558 and LEDA 83465.

The space agency explains in a new blog post that LEDA 83465 resides in the upper right of the image and NGC 3558 in the lower left. According to the blog post, these galaxies are approximately 450 million light years away from Earth, and are within a chaotic galaxy cluster called Abell 1185. What is interesting about these two galaxies is their distance, which the ESA writes is just 150,000 light years.

That may sound like a vast distance, but comparatively, the closest galaxy to the Milky Way is Andromeda at a distance of 2.5 million light years. The ESA writes on its official X account, the platform formerly named Twitter, "In galactic terms, they are practically on top of one another." Additionally, the space agency writes that due to the proximity of all the galaxies within the cluster, many are interacting gravitationally, which in some cases results in entire galaxies being consumed by larger ones.

NASA has completed its week of releasing new images snapped by the iconic Hubble Space Telescope with an image of the Type II Seyfert galaxy known as NGC 6951.

Hubble has pointed its old yet still extremely powerful instruments at the spiral galaxy that resides some 78 million light years away from Earth within the Cepheus constellation. NGC 6951 was originally discovered in 1877 by French astronomers Jerome Coggia and American astronomer Lewis Swift in 1878 and has since been a target for developing an understanding of stellar history.

NASA writes in its blog post that NGC 6951 experienced its peak of stellar formation approximately 800 million years ago, which it then sat quietly for about 3000 million years before ramping star production back up.

NASA has taken to its social media channels to announce when it will be showcasing its first asteroid sample to the world.

The same was collected as part of the space agency's OSIRIS-REx mission that recently dropped a capsule back to Earth containing what has been confirmed to be material from the surface of asteroid Bennu. This isn't the first time an asteroid sample has been returned to Earth, but it's a first for NASA.

The capsule landed in the Utah desert on September 24 and has since undergone preliminary examinations, with NASA announcing shortly after cracking open the capsule that it would need some time to transfer the material as there was much more present than initially anticipated.