Stellary Starry Universe

Data from NASA’s STEREO spacecraft have confirmed the stunning reality of monster waves on the sun known as "solar tsunamis."

November 24, 2009: Sometimes you really can believe your eyes. That’s what NASA’s STEREO (Solar Terrestrial Relations Observatory) spacecraft are telling researchers about a controversial phenomenon on the sun known as the “solar tsunami.”

Years ago, when solar physicists first witnessed a towering wave of hot plasma racing along the sun’s surface, they doubted their senses. The scale of the thing was staggering. It rose up higher than Earth itself and rippled out from a central point in a circular pattern millions of kilometers in circumference. Skeptical observers suggested it might be a shadow of some kind—a trick of the eye—but surely not a real wave.

“Now we know,” says Joe Gurman of the Solar Physics Lab at the Goddard Space Flight Center. “Solar tsunamis are real.” [...]

 

Source: Nasa Science – click here for full article

 

 

Long ago, something calamitous happened to Mars, transforming a hospitable world into the apparently lifeless desert we see today. Many scientists believe the Red Planet lost most of its atmosphere, but how? A new NASA mission named MAVEN is specifically designed to answer that question.

Nov. 6, 2009: Once upon a time — roughly four billion years ago — Mars was warm and wet, much like Earth. Liquid water flowed on the Martian surface in long rivers that emptied into shallow seas. A thick atmosphere blanketed the planet and kept it warm.

Living microbes might have even arisen, some scientists believe, starting Mars down the path toward becoming a second life-filled planet next door to our own. [...]

Left: The loss of martian atmosphere could be caused by a complex set of mechanisms working simultaneously. MAVEN is equipped with eight different sensors designed to sort out the confusion.

 

 

Source: Nasa Science – click here for full article

 

 

The MESSENGER spacecraft’s third flyby of the planet Mercury has given scientists an almost complete view of the planet’s surface and revealed some dramatic changes in Mercury’s comet-like tail.

Nov. 3, 2009: The MESSENGER spacecraft’s third flyby of the planet Mercury has given scientists, for the first time, an almost complete view of the planet’s surface and revealed some dramatic changes in Mercury’s comet-like tail.

“The new images remind us that Mercury continues to hold surprises,” says Sean Solomon, principal investigator for the mission and director of the Department of Terrestrial Magnetism at the Carnegie Institution of Washington.

The probe flew by Mercury on Sept. 29th, executing a critical gravity assist maneuver designed to help MESSENGER enter Mercury-orbit in 2011.

 

Source: Nasa Science – click here for full article

 

 

Quasars used as signposts to measure positioning of GPS satellites.

“For GPS to work, the orbital position, or ephemeris, of the satellites has to be known very precisely,” said Chopo Ma of NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Md. “In order to know where the satellites are, you have to know the orientation of the Earth very precisely.”

To get a stable reference point for global positioning, GPS systems have to turn to something that is stable. The earth is moving, the sun is moving, the stars are moving so what’s stable? Well quasars are so remote they do not seem to be moving relative to earth and our solar system. [...]

 

Source: Space.com – click here for full article