Science, Space, & Robotics - Page 55

NASA has released a new set of images captured by its Lucy spacecraft while it was conducting its first of three Earth gravity assists.

The space agency has taken to its blog to share the images captured by Lucy while it was between the Earth and the Moon, approximately 160,000 miles from the lunar surface, or about 6.5 hours after it conducted its first of three gravity assists, which is the process of using Earth's gravitational pull to gain momentum to slingshot the spacecraft further. The above image showcases a 800 mile wide patch near the center of the last quarter moon, with each pixel representing approximately 0.8 miles.

According to NASA the image was captured with the Lucy LOng Range Reconnaissance Imager (L'LORRI), and is made up of a combination of ten separate 2 millisecond exposures that have then been sharpened to bring out the most detail possible.

NASA is calling upon the public to send in photos of one of the least understood electrical phenomena that occurs in Earth's upper atmosphere.

Above is an image of what the space agency calls Transient Luminous Events (TLEs), or more commonly referred to as sprites. These mysterious crimson figures occur between 31 and 56 miles in altitude at the higher regions of Earth's upper atmosphere, particularly above thunderstorms and produce large-scale electric discharges, similar to lightning.

Sometimes these bright flashes of light appear as red or orange, and are mistakenly called upper-atmospheric lightning. However, they aren't researchers have found they aren't as hot as true tropospheric lightning, lending to their mysteriousness. NASA has called upon citizens to send in any images of the phenomena so researchers can try and uncover the mystery behind their origin. The project is called "Spritacular".

NASA's InSight lander is designed to learn more about Mars' geological activities by measuring the vitals of the planet and listening to any internal movement. On December 24, 2021, NASA's InSight lander heard something.

NASA has taken to its blog to explain that its InSight lander detected a magnitude 4 Marsquake on December 24, which was later discovered to be caused by a meteor strike that the space agency is saying is one of the biggest on Mars since NASA began monitoring the cosmos. Notably, researchers have penned two new papers published in the journal Science that detail the meteorite hit closer to the equator and excavated large boulder-sized chunks of ice that were buried beneath the martian surface.

The space agency discovered that the December 24 Marsquake was caused by a meteorite impact after checking over before-and-after images snapped by NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO), which has and still is taking pictures of the Red Planet. What researchers found when looking at the images was a large crater with a diameter of 490 feet, leading researchers to believe the meteorite was between 16 to 39 feet wide.

SpaceX has taken to its social media channels to announce the launch of its Falcon 9 rocket, which carried a new batch of Starlink satellites into orbit.

The Falcon 9 rocket launched from California's Vandenberg Space Force Base on Thursday, with the rocket transporting 53 new Starlink satellites into lower Earth orbit. After reaching the designated altitude and releasing the Starlink satellites, the Falcon 9's first stage made a reentry and successfully landed on the SpaceX drone ship called "Of Course I Still Love You", which is located on the Pacific Ocean. There were only eight minutes between the initial launch of the Falcon 9 to its first stage, successfully touching back down on the drone ship.

SpaceX writes on its website that this was the eighth launch and landing for this particular Falcon 9 first-stage booster, which also happened to be used to launch the Sentinel-6 Michael Freilich, NASA's Double Asteroid Redirection Test (DART) mission, and now, six Starlink missions. So far, SpaceX has launched more than 3,500 Starlink satellites into low Earth orbit, enabling for more coverage of its satellite internet service, which it recently announced was now available for moving objects such as RVs. However, there is a big catch with that new service.

Astronomers have recently discovered a very large asteroid that has been classified as "potentially hazardous", and it will be making an approach with Earth quite soon.

NASA has added the asteroid called 2022 RM4 to its Center for Near Earth Object Studies (CNEOS) database, where it states its estimated diameter, speed, and the closest it will come to Earth during its closest approach. According to the database, 2022 RM4 is anywhere between 1,083 feet to 2,428 feet in diameter, which puts it just under the height of the tallest building in the world, Dubai's Burj Khalifa.

The CNEOS database states the very large asteroid will pass Earth at extremely fast speeds, traveling at an estimated 52,500 mph, which is about 68 times the speed of sound. Notably, 2022 RM4 poses no risk to Earth at all as astronomers estimate that it will pass Earth at a safe distance of 1.43 million miles, or about six times the average distance between the Earth and the Moon. So, why is 2022 RM4 classified as "potentially hazardous"?

The European Space Agency (ESA) has released an incredible image taken by the famous Hubble Space Telescope.

The ESA took to its website to share the image along with a video of NGC 1999, a reflection nebula located within the constellation Orion, approximately 1,350 light-years from Earth. NGC 1999 is located near the Orion Nebula, which is Earth's closest region of massive star formation, and according to the European Space Agency, NGC 1999 is actually a relic of recent star formation as it's left behind material from a newborn star.

The eerie glow that is seen throughout the image below comes from the light source located at the center-left of the image. This light source is the newborn star V380 Orionis, and next to it is a large hole, which the ESA describes as an "inky-black keyhole of cosmic proportions". So, what is the black space seen at the center of the image? Astronomers initially believed the keyhole-shaped gap was a Bok globule, which is a dense, cold cloud of gas, molecules, and dust that blocks out any light. However, follow-up observations with ESA's Herschel Space Observatory discovered that it's simply an empty region of space.

The James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) continues to showcase its incredible achievements, and now the highly advanced space telescope has been used to capture a galactic collision occurring in deep space.

NASA and the European Space Agency's (ESA) JWST has captured a new image that has been posted to the ESA's website, where it details IC 1623, two galaxies located approximately 270 million light-years from Earth, within the constellation Cetus. The ESA explains that these two galaxies are currently plunging headfirst into each other in an event called a galactic merger, which causes a massively increased number of newly born stars in what astronomers call "starburst".

The ESA explains on its website that extreme starburst through galactic mergers such as IC 1623 result in large amounts of infrared emissions, which is perfect for Webb's highly advanced trio of infrared instruments. Notably, the ESA states that the merger between the two galaxies may result in a supermassive black hole forming. IC 1623 wasn't just observed by Webb as astronomers pointed the Hubble Space Telescope at the distant galactic duo, showcasing the differences in power between the two famous telescopes.

One of the observatories that are dedicated to looking at and monitoring the activity of the Sun has captured a stunning image.

The image was posted to NASA's Sun-dedicated Twitter account, where the space agency explained that NASA's Solar Dynamics Observatory snapped a photograph that caught the Sun "smiling". The image seen in ultraviolet light showcases dark patches that make up the smiling face NASA is referring to, and, for those that don't know, these dark regions are called coronal holes that formed in the Sun's atmosphere. Large amounts of solar wind are spewed from these coronal holes and shot into space.

Depending on Earth's position, the Sun's solar wind shot out from these holes can impact our planet, causing solar storms in the planet's upper atmosphere. According to SpaceWeather.com, a triple stream of solar wind has already been shot toward Earth, and that first contact with it is expected to happen on October 29, with the chance of auroras occurring on the same day.

SpaceX has announced its bringing its Starlink internet service to any moving object, with the new feature starting in just a few months.

According to an announcement on the official SpaceX Twitter account, Starlink for RVs satellite internet service will soon be able to give internet access to people in moving objects, enabling connectivity while traveling from one location to another. Notably, individuals were already mounting their Starlink dishes to the outside of the RVs, but they weren't originally designed to be used while a vehicle is moving and was more so intended for stationary objects or resting places such as remote cabins or campsites.

So, what's the catch? Well, it costs $599 for a Starlink satellite dish, and if you are interested in using SpaceX's internet it while you are in motion, you will need the Flat High-Performance dish, which costs a staggering $2,500, as well as a $50 shipping and handling fee. Furthermore, the service will cost the standard $135 a month for the "Best Effort" internet connection, and Starlink RV users can expect to be de-prioritized from network resources if they are located in congested areas, with regular Starlink users receiving that prioritization.

A group of astronomers has penned a newly published paper that details a mysterious object which currently doesn't fit into any academic definitions, hence its mysteriousness.

The study published in the scientific journal Nature Astronomy earlier this week details a very unusual neutron star that is believed to be the lightest known neutron star found so far. According to the paper, this particular neutron star has a radius of just 6.2 miles and a mass of 77% of the Sun, which is extremely weird because most neutron stars with a similar radius have a mass of 1.4 times the mass of the Sun.

Astronomers were left scratching their heads at their own observations, with team lead astronomer Victor Doroshenko of the Eberhard Karls University of Tubingen in Germany even going as far as to suggest that it could be a new type of star yet to be fully explored. Notably, neutron stars form after a supergiant star has gone supernova, with its core collapsing in on itself and all of its mass becoming extremely dense. To illustrate just how dense these objects are, researchers estimate that a single teaspoon of a neutron star would weigh about 2.2 trillion pounds.

NASA has shared a Halloween-themed image taken by the famous Hubble Space Telescope, and the photograph showcases a "ghost" out in deep space.

Originally posted to NASA's website in 2020, but re-shared to the space agency's NASA Goddard Twitter account on October 26, is a photograph of the nebula officially known as IC 63. This nebula located 550 light-years from Earth within the constellation Cassiopeia the Queen has been nicknamed the "Ghost Nebula" for its shape and appearance.

NASA explains in its blog post that the brightest stars within nebulae give off large amounts of radiation that eats away at the large clouds of hydrogen gas, which is the raw material used to create stars. This interaction between radiation and hydrogen gas causes an "etching process" that creates gorgeous landscapes such as the one seen below.

Elon Musk founded Neuralink in 2016, and on October 31, the company was poised to make a big "show & tell" reveal.

The last time Neuralink presented a show-and-tell event, it showcased a monkey playing Pong with its mind via an in-development brain chip. The company explained during the presentation that the monkey named Pager was able to move the cursor on a computer screen with neural activity using a 1,024-electrode full-implanted neural recording and data transmission device called the N1 Link.

Since that announcement in April 2021, Neuralink has been somewhat quiet on its development announcements, with reports now indicating that Neuralink co-founder Max Hodak quietly left the company in late April 2022 for an unknown reason despite remaining a "huge cheerleader" for the company.

NASA has locked in its next launch date for its Artemis 1 mission, which will be the liftoff of the Space Launch System (SLS) rocket that'll carry the Orion spacecraft to the Moon.

The Artemis 1 launch has sadly been postponed a couple of times now, the first launch attempt was postponed over a fuel leak which has since been fixed, and the second was postponed due to Hurricane Ian making landfall in Florida. The space agency has locked in a new launch date window that stretches 69-minutes on November 14, with NASA also requested backup launch opportunities for Wednesday, November 16, and Saturday, November 19 - both are two-hour launch windows.

The launch of Artemis 1 marks the first launch of the Artemis Generation, which will be a series of missions that will return astronauts back to the Moon for the first time in 50 years. Artemis 1 mission will essentially be a reconnaissance mission to the Moon and back, a journey that will be more than half a million miles and lay the foundation for future Artemis missions. The launch of Artemis 1 will send the Orion spacecraft on a journey further than any spacecraft has flown before, testing every system that will be used in future Artemis missions to ensure the safety of astronauts once they climb aboard.

The universe is an extremely large place, and within it are hundreds of billions of galaxies that contain an unknown number of planets. Given the large quantity of planets, we can assume some are going to be a little strange when comparing them to Earth.

One of these planets is a world that is called TOI-3757, and according to a recent release on the National Science Foundation's NOIRLab website, this strange world is a gas giant similar to Jupiter. Astronomers observed TOI-3757 using the Kitt Peak National Observatory telescope located in Arizona and found that the planet is located 580 light-years from Earth within the constellation Auriga the Charioteer. Notably, researchers discovered that TOI-3757 is the lowest-density planet ever detected around a red dwarf star.

Astronomers estimate that TOI-3757 has the same average density as a marshmallow, lending to the planet's nickname of "fluffy". Red dwarf stars are the smallest and coolest kind of star in the main star sequence but are known to be extremely active with multiple solar flares that typically strip planets of their atmospheres depending on their proximity. So, what makes TOI-3757 like a marshmallow?

Low-frequency sonar used by naval warships and submarines leads dolphins to a perilous death, according to oceanographers. Since Russia's mass invasion of Ukraine, there has been a noticeable ripple effect from naval movements.

As feared early in the conflict, warship sonar directly interrupts a dolphin's echolocation. Once disoriented, dolphins can no longer navigate, identify prey, and starve. In extreme circumstances, dolphins could accidentally swim into underwater mines.

Here is what Ivan Rusiev, biologist and researcher at the Tuzlivski Iymany National Nature Park, had to say:

A new study has detailed a discovery with the most common type of star in the universe, red dwarf stars, and how the relationship between these stars and the planets orbiting around them may make it much easier for astronomers to identify planets that can support life.

The new study published in the Astrophysical Journal Letters focuses on a planet named GJ 1252b, which orbits a red dwarf star approximately 45 light-years from our Sun. Astronomers honed in on this planet and learned that it doesn't have an atmosphere due to its proximity to its red dwarf star. GJ 1252b orbits its companion star twice every one Earth day, and because it's so close to its host star, it's exposed to large amounts of heat that makes it impossible to maintain a viable atmosphere for life.

An example of a similar situation that is occurring a little closer to home is Mercury and how the Sun is making it extremely difficult for the planet to maintain its atmosphere. Mercury does have an atmosphere, but it's extremely thin, as the Sun is quite literally blasting it away with its radiation. A similar scenario is happening to GJ 1252b, but on a much more extreme level. For instance, GJ 1252b has an estimated surface temperature of 2,242 degrees Fahrenheit, which is hot enough to melt gold, silver, and copper.

Carbon dioxide emissions caused by fossil fuel burning will rise by under 1% in 2022, a fraction of the 2021 results, according to an International Energy Agency (IEA) study.

CO2 emissions are expected to increase by 300 million metric tons in 2022 to a total of 33.8 billion tons. However, it's a noticeable drop from the 2 billion tons added in 2021. The report predicts CO2 emissions from 2022 could have reached 1 billion tons without renewable energy adoption rising.

Here are the largest CO2 emitters in the world: China, United States, European Union, India, Russia, and Japan lead the list - all of those countries account for almost half the global human population. Looking back to 1990, the EU is the sector best at reducing greenhouse gases, dropping 27.3% lower than 1990 metrics.

A highly detailed photograph of an ant's face has seemingly gone viral after many people were shocked at how horrifying ants look close-up.

The above photograph was taken by wildlife photographer Eugenijus Kavaliauskas, which he entered into Nikon's 2022 Photomicrography competition. The image reveals the finest of details of the ant's face, with some people online claiming the face is straight out of a nasty horror film. The image gained a considerable amount of traction on Reddit, with some users asking which species of ant was in the image and how come it has such a demonic look to it.

Users explained that the red eyes seen at the base of the antenna aren't actually the ant's eyes at all, they are the rotating part of the ant's antenna and that the way the photo has been cropped and edited with the vignette, it makes it look like that they're its eyes. The ant's actual eyes are located further back on the head and aren't seen in the image.

NASA has taken to its blog and social channels to showcase Herbig-Haro objects known as HH1 and HH2, located 1,250 light years away from Earth.

Both of these objects reside in the constellation Orion, and according to NASA, the luminous cloud above the bright star in the upper right-hand corner of the image is HH 1, and HH 2 is the cloud in the bottom left-hand corner. These stellar nurseries are the birthplace of new stars and were created by a star system that is located directly in the center of the image. Unfortunately, the star system is shrouded in thick clouds of dust, hence the black center.

Notably, Herbig-Haro objects are simply glowing clumps that are found around newborn stars, and they form when new stars hurl jets of gas outwards at incredibly high speeds. This hurled gas then collides with the surrounding gas and dust, forming the clumps seen in the above image. Additionally, NASA writes that Hubble observations have revealed that some parts of HH 1 are moving at extremely high speeds, with some observations showing that parts of the stellar nursery are traveling at 248 miles per second, or 892,800 miles per hour.

SpaceX has released a video that showcases the two key components of the Starship launch vehicle, the mode of transportation slated to take the first humans to Mars.

Elon Musk's company took to its Twitter account on October 24 to share an awesome video of the Launch and Catch tower nicknamed "Mechazilla" using its "chopstick" arms to lift Ship 24 on top of Booster 7, which occurred on October 20. The two components that makeup Starship, Ship 24 and Booster 7, complete the 394-foot-tall rocket.

Ship 24 measures 164 feet long, and Booster 7, or Super Heavy, comes in at a whopping 230 feet long. Together they create Starship, which SpaceX is currently preparing for its very first orbital test flight, hence the stacking. Elon Musk's company is currently in deep preparation for the first orbital test flight, and if all testing goes well, the company may conduct the first orbital test within the next couple of months.