The purpose of this blog is the creation of an open, international, independent and free forum, where every UFO-researcher can publish the results of his/her research. The languagues, used for this blog, are Dutch, English and French.You can find the articles of a collegue by selecting his category. Each author stays resposable for the continue of his articles. As blogmaster I have the right to refuse an addition or an article, when it attacks other collegues or UFO-groupes.
Druk op onderstaande knop om te reageren in mijn forum
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Deze blog is opgedragen aan mijn overleden echtgenote Lucienne.
In 2012 verloor ze haar moedige strijd tegen kanker!
In 2011 startte ik deze blog, omdat ik niet mocht stoppen met mijn UFO-onderzoek.
BEDANKT!!!
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UFO'S of UAP'S, ASTRONOMIE, RUIMTEVAART, ARCHEOLOGIE, OUDHEIDKUNDE, SF-SNUFJES EN ANDERE ESOTERISCHE WETENSCHAPPEN - DE ALLERLAATSTE NIEUWTJES
UFO's of UAP'S in België en de rest van de wereld In België had je vooral BUFON of het Belgisch UFO-Netwerk, dat zich met UFO's bezighoudt. BEZOEK DUS ZEKER VOOR ALLE OBJECTIEVE INFORMATIE , enkel nog beschikbaar via Facebook en deze blog.
Verder heb je ook het Belgisch-Ufo-meldpunt en Caelestia, die prachtig, doch ZEER kritisch werk leveren, ja soms zelfs héél sceptisch...
Voor Nederland kan je de mooie site www.ufowijzer.nl bezoeken van Paul Harmans. Een mooie site met veel informatie en artikels.
MUFON of het Mutual UFO Network Inc is een Amerikaanse UFO-vereniging met afdelingen in alle USA-staten en diverse landen.
MUFON's mission is the analytical and scientific investigation of the UFO- Phenomenon for the benefit of humanity...
Je kan ook hun site bekijken onder www.mufon.com.
Ze geven een maandelijks tijdschrift uit, namelijk The MUFON UFO-Journal.
Since 02/01/2020 is Pieter ex-president (=voorzitter) of BUFON, but also ex-National Director MUFON / Flanders and the Netherlands. We work together with the French MUFON Reseau MUFON/EUROP.
ER IS EEN NIEUWE GROEPERING DIE ZICH BUFON NOEMT, MAAR DIE HEBBEN NIETS MET ONZE GROEP TE MAKEN. DEZE COLLEGA'S GEBRUIKEN DE NAAM BUFON VOOR HUN SITE... Ik wens hen veel succes met de verdere uitbouw van hun groep. Zij kunnen de naam BUFON wel geregistreerd hebben, maar het rijke verleden van BUFON kunnen ze niet wegnemen...
24-12-2020
Fluvial Mapping of Mars -8 Trillion Pixel Image 18 Years in the Making
Fluvial Mapping of Mars - 8 Trillion Pixel Image 18 Years in the Making
it took fifteen years of imaging and nearly three years of stitching the pieces together to create the largest image ever made, the 8-trillion-pixel mosaic of Mars’ surface. Now, the first study to utilize the image in its entirety provides unprecedented insight into the ancient river systems that once covered the expansive plains in the planet’s southern hemisphere. These three billion-year-old sedimentary rocks, like those in Earth’s geologic record, could prove valuable targets for future exploration of past climates and tectonics on Mars.(A) A suite of ridges on Mars (at –67.64°E, 43.37°S). To determine whether features are ridges or valleys, the researchers rely on lighting in the impact craters (depressions). Based on the craters, the light is coming from the top of the image. Because the fluvial ridges are casting shadows to the south, they can infer that the feature is sticking up from the surface—a ridge rather than a valley.
Image courtesy J. Dickson.
The work, published this month in Geology, complements existing research into Mars’ hydrologic history by mapping ancient fluvial (river) ridges, which are essentially the inverse of a riverbed. “If you have a river channel, that’s the erosion part of a river. So, by definition, there aren’t any deposits there for you to study,” Jay Dickson, lead author on the paper, explains. “You have rivers eroding rocks, so where did those rocks go? These ridges are the other half of the puzzle.” Using the mosaic, as opposed to more localized imagery, let the researchers solve that puzzle on a global scale.
Mars used to be a wet world, as evidenced by rock records of lakes, rivers, and glaciers. The river ridges were formed between 4 and 3 billion years ago, when large, flat-lying rivers deposited sediments in their channels (rather than only having the water cut away at the surface). Similar systems today can be found in places like southern Utah and Death Valley in the U.S., and the Atacama Desert in Chile. Over time, sediment built up in the channels; once the water dried up, those ridges were all that was left of some rivers.
(B) A similar “analogue” environment on Earth. Fluvial ridges similar to the ones on Mars are in California’s Amargosa river system, although with water still running through the system, it’s the active precursor to the ridges that are remnant on Mars.
Image courtesy J. Dickson.
The ridges are present only in the southern hemisphere, where some of Mars’ oldest and most rugged terrain is, but this pattern is likely a preservation artifact. “These ridges probably used to be all over the entire planet, but subsequent processes have buried them or eroded them away,” Dickson says. “The northern hemisphere is very smooth because it’s been resurfaced, primarily by lava flows.” Additionally, the southern highlands are “some of the flattest surfaces in the solar system,” says Woodward Fischer, who was involved in this work. That exceptional flatness made for good sedimentary deposition, allowing the creation of the records being studied today.
Whether or not a region has fluvial ridges is a basic observation that wasn’t possible until this high-resolution image of the planet’s surface was assembled. Each of the 8 trillion pixels represents 5 to 6 square meters, and coverage is nearly 100 percent, thanks to the “spectacular engineering” of NASA’s context camera that has allowed it to operate continuously for well over a decade. An earlier attempt to map these ridges was published in 2007 by Rebecca Williams, a co-author on the new study, but that work was limited by imagery coverage and quality.
“The first inventory of fluvial ridges using meter-scale images was conducted on data acquired between 1997 and 2006,” Williams says. “These image strips sampled the planet and provided tantalizing snapshots of the surface, but there was lingering uncertainty about missing fluvial ridges in the data gaps.”
The resolution and coverage of Mars’ surface in the mosaic has eliminated much of the team’s uncertainty, filling in gaps and providing context for the features. The mosaic allows researchers to explore questions at global scales, rather than being limited to patchier, localized studies and extrapolating results to the whole hemisphere. Much previous research on Mars hydrology has been limited to craters or single systems, where both the sediment source and destination are known. That’s useful, but more context is better in order to really understand a planet’s environmental history and to be more certain in how an individual feature formed.
In addition to identifying 18 new fluvial ridges, using the mosaic image allowed the team to re-examine features that had previously been identified as fluvial ridges. Upon closer inspection, some weren’t formed by rivers after all, but rather lava flows or glaciers. “If you only see a small part of [a ridge], you might have an idea of how it formed,” Dickson says. “But then you see it in a larger context—like, oh, it’s the flank of a volcano, it’s a lava flow. So now we can more confidently determine which are fluvial ridges, versus ridges formed by other processes.”
Now that we have a global understanding of the distribution of ancient rivers on Mars, future explorations—whether by rover or by astronauts—could use these rock records to investigate what past climates and tectonics were like. “One of the biggest breakthroughs in the last twenty years is the recognition that Mars has a sedimentary record, which means we’re not limited to studying the planet today,” Fischer says. “We can ask questions about its history.” And in doing so, he says, we learn not only about a single planet’s past, but also find “truths about how planets evolved… and why the Earth is habitable.”
As this study is only the first to use the full mosaic, Dickson looks forward to seeing how it gets put to use next. “We expect to see more and more studies, similar in scale to what we’re doing here, by other researchers around the world,” he says. “We hope that this ‘maiden voyage’ scientific study sets an example for the scale of science that can be done with a product this big.”
Contacts and sources:
Kea Giles / by Rebecca Dzombak Geological Society of America
A sky-watcher was taking some evening shots of the moon with a Nikon P900 on December 20, 2020 at 4.52 pm when a large red UFO comes into view from the left side on which the UFO then crosses the moon until it disappears into space.
While crossing the moon the UFO casts its shadow on the lunar surface indicates that it is not something that flies close to the camera, but that it does indeed fly just above the surface of the moon.
The first clip is the close-up, and the second is the original version.
4 Mile Cross Under Ocean Near Macquarie Island, Google Earth Map, UFO Sighting News.
4 Mile Cross Under Ocean Near Macquarie Island, Google Earth Map, UFO Sighting News.
Date of discovery: Dec 23, 2020 Location of sighting: off Macquarie Island
I was using Google Earth Map and I found something really intersting off Macquarie Island. There is a huge cross structure under the ocean there and each line measures the same. It is 4 miles across end to end on both arms. Thats about 7km long! Also not far is another area...a huge 1.5 mile across rectangle opening below a 1 mile bridge on the ocean floor. This opening is for larger UFOs to come down and enter the tunnels to reach the underground base. Yes the base is not on the ocean floor, but more current bases have moved 4-6km below the floor. This way the bases are safe from human detection...however...I did discover the cross and entrance there...so I guess I'm breaking human stereotypes.
Blue UFO Over Bella Vista, Arkansas On Dec 22, 2020, UFO Sighting News.
Blue UFO Over Bella Vista, Arkansas On Dec 22, 2020, UFO Sighting News.
Date of sighting: Dec 22, 2020 Location of sighting: Bella Vista, Arkansas, USA
Source: MUFON
Listen to the surprise in the voices of the man and woman as they watch some glowing purple lights in the sky in Arkansas two days ago. The lights change and it almost look like several round UFOs sit side by side with a line of about six or more. I have to admit the enlarged screenshot I made above really has me baffled. I use to work on B1 bombers on a high security Strategic Air Command Base...but have never ever seen anything like that. This is not made by humans.
US Military Jet Intercepts UFO Over George Town, Kentucky, USA On Dec 21, 2020.
US Military Jet Intercepts UFO Over George Town, Kentucky, USA On Dec 21, 2020.
Date of sighting: Dec 21, 2020 Location of sighting: George Town, Kentucky, USA
This is a great video of a military jet intercepting a UFO over Kentucky this week. The UFO is accelerating and leaving a contrail, however the UFO has no trail and is going the same speed. The UFO obviously did not fear the jet or it would have shot away. When enlarged it does look like thick disk, otherwise known as a tictac. 100% proof the US military intercepts UFOs but can do nothing to stop them.
Scott C. Waring - Taiwan
Eyewitness states:
Looked up to see a plane with vapour trail and under it a white object hover directly underneath it. It was going at exactly the same speed as the plane, maintained the same distance apart from the plane and the same direction for as long as I could see it. There was no noise but the plane was very high.
UFO Seen Over Cemetery Over Netishyn, Ukraine June 10, 2018, UFO Sighting News.
UFO Seen Over Cemetery Over Netishyn, Ukraine June 10, 2018, UFO Sighting News.
Date of sighting: June 10, 2018
Location of sighting: Netishyn, Ukraine
I thought this video was amazing and it demonstrated a lot of what I find in MAJESTIC and Project Blue Book reports. For instance the UFO appears white when far away. The UFO is silent although its clear its moving very fast. The UFO has a glow around it...almost like a fuzzy fog but probably due to the propulsion systems. This is a real UFO, even though its two years old, I have never seen it and needed to post it here for all to view.
Alien craft casts its shadow on the lunar surface while crossing the Moon
Alien craft casts its shadow on the lunar surface while crossing the Moon
Asky-watcher was taking some evening shots of the moon with a Nikon P900 on December 20, 2020 at 4.52 pm when a large red UFO comes into view from the left side on which the UFO then crosses the moon until it disappears into space.
While crossing the moon the UFO casts its shadow on the lunar surface indicates that it is not something that flies close to the camera, but that it does indeed fly just above the surface of the moon.
The first clip is the close-up, and the second is the original version.
Weird blue pulsating spheres caught over Bella vista, Arkansas
Weird blue pulsating spheres caught over Bella vista, Arkansas
3-4 pulsating blue spheres. One sphere, around 50 -100 feet ahead of the “main” spheres. It kept pulsating from one solid to 3-4.
The weird phenomenon in the sky that appeared in Bella Vista, Arkansas on December 22, 2020, raises many questions as witnesses have no idea what it may have been. Mufon.
What was that glowing object in the sky above Lake Elsinore?
What was that glowing object in the sky above Lake Elsinore?
In this screengrab from a video posted to Twitter, an object flies across the skies above Lake Elsinore on Tuesday night, Dec. 22, 2020.(Photo courtesy of Rachel Marry-Karmie)
That bright light in the sky over Lake Elsinore on Tuesday night, Dec. 22, wasn’t an asteroid or a local church trying to replicate the Star of Bethlehem before Christmas.
Nor was it a UFO or Santa’s sleigh.
The glowing object was part of a show from the local skydiving facility.
While many users on social media claimed it was aliens, Santa Claus or even swamp gas, Daniella Martin of Skydive Elsinore said the thrilling stunt was part of a “production show” over the lake after 5:30 p.m.
“We do all kinds of stuff here, sometimes even military stuff,” Martin said. “If you see anything that looks like a shooting star over the south part of the lake, over the airport, that’s us.”
Martin added that the divers jump into the night sky “with pyrotechnics” that look like sparklers.
Martin declined to give more information about the production, or who was behind it.
One Lake Elsinore resident posted on Twitter that she saw the skydivers from her backyard, and that it wasn’t the first time.
“At first I thought it was the start of a meteor shower, but the way it was moving, didn’t look like a meteor,” said Rachel Marry-Karmie, who witnessed the surprise light show from her neighborhood in the Tuscany Hills area.
Another video suggested it was the skydiving team from Red Bull, which has participated in recent nighttime dives — using pyrotechnics — during the winter solstice.
Lake Elsinore city officials said they received no calls. Neither Lake Elsinore police nor the Red Bull skydiving team could be reached for comment, but staff in nearby Wildomar confirmed in a social media post that it was “skydivers doing stunts” from Lake Elsinore’s drop zone for the Skydive Elsinore facility.
Last week, France gave the go-ahead for augmented soldiers, and some fear the super troopers could be the new norm in the recent future.
The French seek to improve “physical, cognitive, perceptive and psychological capacities,” and could allow for location tracking or connectivity with weapons systems and other soldiers. Among the ministry’s research were drugs to keep troops awake for long periods of time and combat stress, and even surgery to improve hearing.
The new species of augmented soldiers, dubbed “homo robocopus” could also have altered DNA to give them enhanced speed and strength as well as robotics.
Michael Clarke, visiting professor in war studies at Kings College London (KCL), told the Sun participating could be “using DNA as a farmer would in a herd of cattle.”
“We’ve reached the point now where we could potentially manipulate people’s DNA to breed into them extra strength, endurance and other things just as we do with animals,” Clarke said. “Just as we’ve done with standard cattle to give them more back, we can do that now very precisely with humans.”
Clarke added that the bio-race is being fueled internationally due to fears of China’s program.
“What they’re all thinking about is what might come up in 30 years’ time, given another 10 years development and experimentation,” Clarke told the paper. “The Chinese in 30 years’ time might have a cohort of people who are 20 years old who’ve got particular characteristics they might have tried to breed into them by manipulating DNA.”
Due to DNA manipulation, future soldiers could also be immune to disease and feelings.
A recent report by the International Society for Military Ethics in Europe obtained by the Sun, reveals a dystopic arena full of bionic men capable of fighting “all the time.”
“Enhanced soldiers would be reduced to bionic men, who run fast, do not need sleep, eat and drink very little, and can fight all the time,” the report states. “A new species is born: Homo robocopus.”
Sir Lawrence Freedman, Professor of war studies at KCL, told the Sun robotics are of more importance: “There are people going back into combat in ways they wouldn’t have been able to before because prosthetics have been improved. You can use Google glasses, there’s lots of things you can now do with a modern soldier that makes them much more effective than they were in the past. If you want people to act just according to orders going in to great danger, the other trend you can see that is pretty active at the moment is drones, autonomous vehicles and so on.”
While France claims it will abide by humanitarian law, French armed forces minister Florence Parly warned, “we have to be clear, not everyone has the same scruples as us and we have to prepare ourselves for such a future,” she said.
Here is some of the tech in progress to create “homo robocopus,” according to the Sun.
Brain microchips — France has been given the all-clear to develop microchips to enhance soldier brain power.
Bionic eyes — Being developed in Hong Kong, this gives users infrared and night vision.
Super hearing — The US’s Tactical Communication and Protective System are smart earbuds which boost soldiers’ hearing to be near superhuman.
Health implant — DARPA, the Pentagon’s research arm, is developing cyborg implants to monitor combat efficiency.
Enhanced limbs — A Devcom report revealed plans to equip US soldiers with enhanced limbs for increased strength.
Exoskeletonlegs — The US Army has tested an exoskeleton which can be attached to soldier’s legs and can increase their productivity by up to 27 times.
Synthetic blood — Respirocyte is a theoretical red blood cell that could help soldiers not get out of breath and stay underwater for hours.
Pain immunity — DARPA’s Persistence in Combat initiative would allow soldiers to have their pain suppressed for 30 days.
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US Astronaut Saw 100s Of UFOs In Germany & Filmed UFO Landing In California, 1957
US Astronaut Saw 100s Of UFOs In Germany & Filmed UFO Landing In California, 1957
Space pioneer Leroy Gordon Cooper, who died in 2004, believed in the existence of aliens who had been traveling from other habitable places to Earth. Not only he believed in extraterrestrials but also claimed that he personally encountered UFOs and other inexplicable phenomena while flying in a fighter jet in Germany in the early 1950s.
Leroy Gordon Cooper Image via Wikipedia
Cooper was one of the seven astronauts of Project Mercury, the first human space program to get a man on the Moon before the Soviet Union. He traveled to space as part of the manned mission Mercury-Atlas 9, which took place in 1963. Then, in 1956, he set a new space endurance record by traveling 3.3 million miles aboard Gemini 5 to prove that astronauts could survive in space on a journey to Moon and back to Earth.
He left NASA in 1970 and spent the rest of his life studying unidentified flying objects. Cooper believed in the UFOs even before he got into the space programs. After his encounter with UFOs in Germany, he became a staunch supporter of the hypotheses of the existence of civilization outside Earth.
Cooper said in an interview that he saw a UFO the first time in his life in the early 1950s, when he was posted at Landstuhl Air Base, West Germany. He said that during that time, Russian MiG-15s often flew over to his base. So, once he was flying at 15,000 meters and saw strange vehicles that flew in formation much higher and faster than their aircraft. He claimed that they were discs shaped with metallic casing.
Gordon claimed to film UFO landing at Edwards Air Force Base in 1957
Then in 1957, when Cooper served as a test pilot at Edwards Air Force Base in California, he saw a flying saucer with a diameter of about 10 meters that hovered nearby and landed on the dried lake.
He said: “I had a camera crew filming the installation when they spotted a saucer. They filmed it as it flew overhead, then hovered, extended three legs as landing gear, and slowly came down to land on a dry lake bed.”
After that, Cooper sent the recordings to Washington and filed a report of the UFO encounter.
“After a while, a high-ranking officer said when the film was developed I was to put it in a pouch and send it to Washington.
He didn’t say anything about me not looking at the film. That’s what I did when it came back from the lab and it was all there just like the camera crew reported.”
The saucer was similar to the one he encountered in 1951.
“Basically the same planform vehicle they were double saucer lenticular. If you’re going to be going in and out of atmospheres like earth or other places might have you certainly need a little more aerodynamic type of vehicle. And the saucer has the capability of going through the air at tremendous rates of speed and handling the bow and trailing wave without making shockwave. So it can be very silent while traveling big rates of speed through the atmosphere.”
Gordon also believed in the crash of an alien spaceship in Roswell, New Mexico, in 1947, and the military found several aliens at the crash site.
“I had a good friend at Roswell, a fellow officer. He had to be careful about what he said. But it sure wasn’t a weather balloon, like the Air Force cover story. He made it clear to me what crashed was a craft of alien origin, and members of the crew were recovered.”
In one of his interviews, Cooper repeatedly argued that aliens who visit our planet on research missions are much more technically advanced than humans. The astronaut believed that the UN should carefully record all reports of UFOs, and was also confident that the governments of different countries were hiding data about extraterrestrial life.
In 2007, NLSI Interim Director David Morrison released a statement where he denied all the claims made by Gordon Cooper about UFOs and alien life. He said: “Sorry, but there is no compelling evidence for space aliens, and certainly not from NASA astronauts.”
Gordon was not the only person who believed in the existence of aliens and UFOs. Edgar Mitchell and Helen Sharman are two renowned astronauts who also believe in alien life outside Earth.
According to Edgar, aliens have contacted people several times, and UFOs had been visiting our planet for a long time.
“It’s been well covered up by all our governments for the last 60 years or so, but slowly it’s leaked out and some of us have been privileged to have been briefed on some of it.”
Helen Sharman, the first British Astronaut
On the other hand, Helen Sharman said: “Aliens exist, there’s no two ways about it.” She began her space career back in 1989, when she passed a difficult selection among other astronauts and confirmed her abilities, getting into one of the first joint projects in the UK and the USSR.
She added that aliens may not be like humans, while it is possible they are here living with humans but invisible to us.
A BRITISH archaeologist claims to have unearthed the childhood home of Jesus Christ beneath a convent in Israel.
Ken Dark, professor of archaeology and history at Reading University, believes he has a strong case after 14 years of fieldwork at the site in Nazareth.
Is this really where Jesus grew up with Mary and Joseph?
Credit: K.R.Dark
Professor Ken Dark believes he has made a good case for the site
Credit: K.R.Dark
Prof. Dark said he believes the identification of ruins beneath the Sisters of Nazareth Convent as the home of Jesus' foster father Joseph have been too quickly dismissed, reports The Times.
The expert claims his research at the location confirms that the convent stands over a 1st century house - which has a strong case for being Jesus' home.
It had been claimed since at least the 380s that the site is where Jesus grew up with Mary and Joseph until such claims were dismissed in the 1930s.
The house was cut into a limestone hillside and incorporates parts of a natural cave, so many features - such as a staircase - still survive.
Prof Dark started his research in 2006 at the site which he describes as "almost forgotten" by historians.
He published an article in 2015 based on his initial findings as he suggested the site was the childhood home of Jesus.
Fresh analysis has now dated the site back to the 1st century which helps to add weight to his claims.
In his book, The Sisters of Nazareth convent: A Roman-period, Byzantine and Crusader site in central Nazareth, he claims the style of house suggests it was owned by Joseph.
Joseph is commonly known as a carpenter, but in the original Greek texts he is described as a tekton.
It is profession which could also be a stonemason or builder, which would match up with the two storey house being hewn into the rock.
Prof Dark also found fragments of pottery at the site which were commonly used by Jewish families of the era.
His fieldwork also suggested there was a cave church was built directly adjacent to the house in the 4th cenutry.
And this is around the time Christianity was adopted as the state religion of the Roman Empire under emperor Constantine.
Further study unearthed a 5th century church built over both the house and the cave church.
It would have been the largest church in Nazareth and was an elaborately decorated cathedral with marble and mosaics.
This matches a 7th century description of the large Byzantine church that was said to have stood on the site of Jesus’s home
The search for historical evidence of Jesus Christ's life is one of the most enduring pursuits in archeologyCredit: Getty Images - Getty
Prof Dark explains the fact the church was even bigger than the nearby Church of the Annunciation shows the cave home's potential significance.
The Church of the Annunciation is where it is said the Archangel Gabriel visited Mary with news that she would give birth to the Son of God.
While he admits there is no concrete proof the house was where Jesus lived, he says there never good evidence for any archeological site to categorically make that claim.
"On the other hand, all the reasons to doubt that it might possibly have been, have gone — this is exciting stuff," he said.
He claims there is "absolutely no reason" why the location of Jesus' home could not have been passed down from the 1st to 4th century.
The expert said based on "oral tradition" this would explain the erection of the church and subsequent cathedral.
The house is built into a natural cave formation
Credit: K.R.Dark
The house is beneath the Sisters of Nazareth Convent
Credit: K.R.Dark
Prof Dark told MailOnline: "This suggests that displaying a house in this way was something really unusual and significant.
"It also begs the question of how did the church builders know these were first-century houses unless some tradition about them remained?
"None of this, of course, proves that the first-century house was that where Jesus was brought up, but it considerably strengthens the case since it was first reported in 2015."
The search for historical evidence of Jesus Christ's life is one of the most enduring pursuits in archeology as there is no definitive proof he ever existed.
"The reality is that we don’t have archaeological records for virtually anyone who lived in Jesus’s time and place," said Professor Bart D. Ehrman, author of Did Jesus Exist? The Historical Argument for Jesus of Nazareth, told History.
For some the Shroud of Turin - which is allegedly the burial cloth of Christ - is one most hotly debated pieces of "evidence" for the existence of Jesus.
Radiocarbon dating suggests the shroud actually dates to the 13th century, but many continue to profess its authenticity as they call for it to be looked at again by scientists.
It comes after a new sketch believed to by Leonardo Da Vinci of the face of Christ was discovered in Italy.
It’s been fairly easy for some to adopt a remote working model during the pandemic, but manufacturing and warehouse workers have had it rougher — some tasks just need people to be physically present in the workplace.
But now, one team is working on a solution for the traditional factory floor that could allow more workers to carry out their labor from home.
The proposed human-in-the-loop assembly system. The robot workspace can be manipulated remotely. Image credits: Columbia Engineering.
Columbia Engineering announced that researchers have won a grant to develop the project titled “FMRG: Adaptable and Scalable Robot Teleoperation for Human-in-the-Loop Assembly.” The project’s raw ingredients include machine perception, human-computer interaction, human-robot interaction, and machine learning.
They have come up with a “physical-scene-understanding algorithm” to convert visual observations via camera shots of a robot workspace into a virtual 3D-scene representation.
Handling 3D models
The system analyzes the robot worksite and can change it into a visual physical scene representation. Each object is represented by a 3D model that mimics its shape, size, and physical attributes. A human operator gets to specify the assembly goal by manipulating these virtual 3D models.
A reinforcement learning algorithm infers a planning policy, given the task goals and the robot configuration. Also, this algorithm can infer its probability of success and use it to determine when to request human assistance — otherwise, it carries out its work automatically.
The project is led by Shuran Song, an assistant professor of computer science at Columbia University. She said the system they envision will allow workers who are not trained roboticists to operate the robots and this pleases her.
“I am excited to see how this research could eventually provide greater job access to workers regardless of their geographical location or physical ability.”
Automation for the future
The team received $3.7m funding from the National Science Foundation (NSF). The NSF stated the award period starts from January 1 to an estimated end date of Dec. 31, 2025. The NSF award abstract reveals the positive impact such an effort could have on business and workers:
“The research will benefit both the manufacturing industry and the workforce by increasing access to manufacturing employment and improving working conditions and safety. By combining human-in-the-loop design with machine learning, this research can broaden the adoption of automation in manufacturing to new tasks. Beyond manufacturing, the research will also lower the entry barrier to using robotic systems for a wide range of real-world applications, such as assistive and service robots.”
The abstract said their team is collaborating with NYDesigns and LaGuardia Community College “to translate research results to industrial partners and develop training programs to educate and prepare the future manufacturing workforce.”
Song is directing the vision-based perception and machine learning algorithm designs for the physical-scene-understanding algorithms. Computer Science Professor Steven Feiner, Columbia University, is looking at the 3D and VR user interface. Matei Ciocarlie, associate professor of mechanical engineering, Columbia University, is building the robot learning and control algorithms. Before joining the faculty, Matei was a scientist at Willow Garage, and scientist at Google. Matei contributed to the development of the open-source Robot Operating System.
A takeaway:News of robots often results in hair-pulling remarks on a tradeoff that can result in lost jobs for humans. Here is a project that, once complete, has the potential to complement human capabilities by using robotics.
Nancy Cohen is a contributing author. Want to get involved like Nancy and send your story to ZME Science? Check out our contact and contribute page.
In the midst of all the crazy things that have happened in our pandemic year, it’s easy to lose track of other developments. But despite the hardship of the lockdowns and the pandemic itself, the world isn’t sitting still. We’ve seen some stunning advancements not related to the pandemic, including some very nifty gadgets. Here are just some of them.
Remember those unsettling robot dog videos trying to go down stairs and open doors? Spot is their leader. The robot by Boston Dynamics has been in development for a few years now, but it’s gone on sale in 2020, for the hefty sum of $74,500 — and this was also the year that Spot was really put to good use.
Spot is agile, robust, and can navigate rugged terrain with unprecedented mobility. Its software is downloadable and upgradeable (available on GitHub) if you’re up for the task, and are willing to pay the price of a luxury car to get the robot itself.
Spot isn’t exactly a companion (though he can also play that part, and he’s a pretty good dancer actually) — he’s more of a utility dog. From patrolling hazardous sites and abandoned buildings to monitoring construction sites and offshore oil rigs, Spot can be sent where it would be too dangerous for humans. Different companies (and even governments) are already putting the robot dog to good use. For instance, Spot is patrolling the parks of Singapore warning people to not stay too close to each other.
A little bit dystopian? Maybe. Useful? Definitely.
2. Drones taking to the oceans
The Geneinno T1 drone. Image credits: Geneinno.
Drones are as cool and useful as ever (and they’re actually becoming more and more present in science and environmental monitoring), but they’re not exactly a new gadget. Well, at least air drones. Underwater drones, however, are pretty new and interesting.
An underwater drone is a submarine in the same sense a ‘regular’ drone is a helicopter. Biologists have been using ROVs (Remotely Operated underwater Vehicles) for a few years to study corals, fish, and explore the subsurface — now, you can get your own version. Several companies are already working in the field, but US-based Geneinno seems to be one of the pioneers in the field, and their ROVs (or underwater drones, which just sounds better) are now available to the public.
3. The Lego Bugatti
Image credits: LEGO
Nowadays, you can build anything and everything from Lego — but few things are as awesome as the company’s Technic branch. You basically build your own, realistic and fancy model cars, from the likes of a Ferrari or a Lamborghini to a Jeep Wrangler or even a race plane.
The cars have accurate real-life functions, such as a gearbox and a steering wheel, connected just like the real thing (there’s even a Lego engine). This is not for the inexperienced builder and not for those without patience, but it can make for a stunning little home gadget. But if you’re looking to build your own Lego fancy car, this is as good as it gets in 2020.
What you see here, just slightly bigger than a coin, is a full-on computer — and it goes for about $25. The Raspberry Pi Foundation is already well-known to those interested in the Internet of Things (IoT) and gadgets, as well as those looking for cheap computing alternatives.
Raspberry Pi’s are small, single-board computers that can function either stand-alone, or as part of other applications (typically involving some form of sensors). The new mini version includes a 64-bit quad-core processor, graphics support, hardware decoder, HDMI ports, USB ports, a PCI interface, camera interfaces, at least a gigabyte of memory, flash storage, clock and battery backup, a wireless option, an ethernet option. If you’d like to start diving into the world of IoT or just getting started with some offbeat computing, this is definitely one of the best places to start — and it won’t break your budget either.
5. Futuristic AI fitness work-from-home mirrors
Image credits: Fuseproject.
Staying fit is never easy, especially in a year like this when we’ve had to deal with the pandemic and all the stress and uncertainty — while mostly staying home. But somehow, one feels that having a futuristic AI mirror assistant could help with that.
The new Forme by Fuseproject is a 43-inch screen with 4k resolution and stowable arms for resistance training. It’s your very own one-on-one personal assistant working out with you in the comfort of your home. You can do various types of resistance training, and the screen helps you see what your virtual trainer is doing and try to do the same thing (you can also see yourself and improve your form). You can opt for pre-recorded workouts or a specialized routine, but the machine’s AI also analyzes your workout schedule and progress and constantly tweaks and adapts for optimum performance.
6. The world’s first graphene headphones
Since its recent discovery, graphene has been touted as a wonder material with myriad applications ranging from renewable energy to spacesuits. While graphene has undoubtedly had an important impact on science, we, the profane consumers, are happy to see it make an impact on something more down to earth: music.
Ora headphones are the world’s first graphene headphones, supported by one of the very inventors of graphene, Nobel Laureate Konstantin Novoselov, and they’re one of the first graphene products to hit the shelves. The quality of the headphones shows in the sound quality, and the design is quite unique.
7. The Robot kitchen
Robots can already do many things, but if they can’t cook a good dinner, how good are they really? Well luckily, that’s no longer a problem — at least if you can spare a six figure sum for the fully automated Moley kitchen. The system features two robotic arms and an array of sensors and cameras that not only cook your meal but also wash everything after they’re done.
For now, the system can produce 30 dishes (all developed by top chefs), but the digital menu will soon be expanded to over 5,000 choices. It’s truly one robot worth sinking your teeth into.
8. A wearable sensor that tells you what’s in your blood
Image credits: Robson Rosa da Silva.
This noninvasive skin-adherent sensor printed on microbial nanocellulose is essentially a 1.5 by 0.5 cm thin sheet that can detect a range of biomarkers, from sodium and potassium to lactic acid and glucose. It can even be used to track the level fo atmospheric pollutants. In addition to medical uses, it could, for instance, be used when working out (to tell you when you should take it easy), or for detecting glucose and warning when you should lay off the cake.
To make things even better, the material is breathable and doesn’t include plastic. The Brazilian researchers who developed it are now looking to see what products would offer the best integration.
9. The Smart Garden 6
Let me guess — you’re still using plastic pots to grow plants in? That’s so 2019. This small, chique automated plant grower by the Finnish Design Shop lets you grow your own herbs and salads with minimum hassle.
Not only does it pump its own water from time to time (you just need to fill the tank), but it also has 18 high-end LED lights which ,according to the producer, “provide the best spectrums and intensity needed to create perfect germination and growth conditions for your greens”
An amateur astronomer discovered a new sungrazer comet during last week’s solar eclipse, NASA reports. The body has been christened C/2020 X3 (SOHO).
Comet C/2020 X3 (SOHO) in the bottom left-hand corner with a composite image of the total eclipse (right). Image credits: ESA/NASA/SOHO.
Sungrazing comets are like their brethren in every way except they pass very close to the Sun, sometimes within a few thousand kilometers of its surface. C/2020 X3 (SOHO) has been discovered by Worachate Boonplod on December 13 (a day before the eclipse) as part of the Sungrazer Project — a citizen science project which allows the public to look for comets in images from the Solar and Heliospheric Observatory, or SOHO.
New old comet
The sungrazer belongs to the Kreutz family of objects, NASA explains, which are the fragments of a larger comet that broke apart around one millennia ago. C/2020 X3 (SOHO) evaporated on approach towards the Sun, but other grazers still orbit around our star, the agency adds.
During its last moments, the comet was traveling at around 450,000 miles per hour, reaching as close as 2.7 million miles from the star’s surface. It was about 50 feet (15 meters) in diameter and disintegrated into dust on approach.
“But wait!”, you might say — “what eclipse?”. Last week saw the last eclipse of 2020, which was visible from a relatively narrow region in the Pacific, southern South America, and Antarctica. People in Chile, Argentina, and communities living in the southern Atlantic and Pacific oceans could see it as a total eclipse.
This is the 3,524th Kreutz sungrazer spotted by SOHO. None have yet been seen to actually hit the star, as they burn away in the lower corona (the Sun’s atmosphere) or pass around 31,000 miles (50,000 kilometers) away from its surface. SOHO works similarly to a solar eclipse, NASA adds, which is why it’s so good at spotting sungrazers. The telescope uses a solid disk to block out light coming in directly from the Sun, letting us analyze its dimmer atmosphere and close-by objects.
Astronomers used radio waves to study conditions in the vicinity of Proxima Centauri, the nearest star to our sun. The results suggest Proxima’s 2 known planets are likely bathed in intense radiation from this star, casting doubt on the planets’ potential for life.
Artist’s concept of huge flares on Proxima Centauri, which unleash ionizing radiation. This radiation could be dangerous for any possible life on planets orbiting close to the star.
This month, even as some astronomers are talking about a possible mystery radio signal from Proxima Centauri – a signal of interest to astronomers who search for intelligent life beyond Earth – other astronomers are talking about space weather in the vicinity of this star, which is the nearest star to our sun. Space weather in Proxima’s vicinity, they are saying, might make life on its planets difficult or even impossible.
What is space weather?
When we hear about weather, we might think of Earth – sun, clouds, rain, wind and so on – or we might think about conditions on other planets or moons that have atmospheres. Space weather isn’t about that. It’s a sort of “weather” that originates in stars, including our own sun, and that permeates the space near a star. Space weather consists of ionizing radiation released during flares on the sun or other stars. The radiation can be deadly for any life forms that may exist on distant planets. That’s especially true, astronomers say, for red dwarf stars, which have more frequent flares than our sun. Red dwarf stars can be very volatile. Proxima Centauri is a red dwarf star.
Astronomers at the University of Sydney in Australia announced the new study on December 10, 2020. These researchers used radio waves to detect and probe the space weather in Proxima’s vicinity. Our sun’s nearest neighbor at only 4.2 light-years away, Proxima is known to have at least two planets orbiting it. One, Proxima Centauri b, is almost the same mass as Earth and the other, Proxima Centauri c, is about seven times more massive. Proxima Centauri b also orbits within its star’s habitable zone, where temperatures might allow liquid water to exist on planet’s surface. Sounds promising, right? But the new findings about flares on stars like Proxima suggest a grim prospect for life on the planets in this system.
The researchers published their peer-reviewed findings in The Astronomical Journal on December 9, 2020.
Hubble Space Telescope image of Proxima Centauri, the closest known star to the sun. Read more about this image.
Image via ESA/ Hubble/ NASA.
These astronomers worked with CSIRO’s Australian Square Kilometre Array Pathfinder (ASKAP) telescope in Western Australia and the Zadko Telescope at the University of Western Australia, as well as other instruments. Tara Murphy of the University of Sydney helped lead the study.
The new observations corroborate previous studies, showing that the planet known as Proxima Centauri b is subject to intense outbursts of ionizing radiation from its star. Proxima Centauri b is close to the star Proxima Centauri, as Andrew Zic, lead author of the study, explained:
But given Proxima Centauri is a cool, small red-dwarf star, it means this habitable zone is very close to the star; much closer in than Mercury is to our sun. What our research shows is that this makes the planets very vulnerable to dangerous ionizing radiation that could effectively sterilize the planets.
Our sun also emits deadly radiation during its occasional coronal mass ejections. Luckily, Earth is relatively far from our star, in contrast to Proxima’s planets; this radiation doesn’t affect us as powerfully. Plus, Earth has an atmosphere and magnetic field that also help to protect us. Zic commented:
Our own sun regularly emits hot clouds of ionized particles during what we call ‘coronal mass ejections.’ But given the sun is much hotter than Proxima Centauri and other red-dwarf stars, our ‘habitable zone’ is far from the sun’s surface, meaning the Earth is a relatively long way from these events.
Further, the Earth has a very powerful planetary magnetic field that shields us from these intense blasts of solar plasma.
Artist’s concept of Proxima Centauri b, which is about 1.3 times the mass of Earth and orbits within the star’s habitable zone where liquid water could exist. The new data support previous studies, showing that the planet is subjected to intense radiation bursts from its star, putting its potential habitability in doubt.
The new study is the first that definitively links optical flares and radio bursts on a star other than the sun. This means that scientists can now use radio waves to study space weather around distant stars, which will provide important clues as to the potential habitability of any rocky planets orbiting them.
The success of these observations is exciting for astronomers. Tara Murphy at the University of Sydney reflected this in her comments:
This is an exciting result from ASKAP. The incredible data quality allowed us to view the stellar flare from Proxima Centauri over its full evolution in amazing detail.
Most importantly, we can see polarized light, which is a signature of these events. It’s a bit like looking at the star with sunglasses on. Once ASKAP is operating in full survey mode we should be able to observe many more events on nearby stars.
The ASKAP observations were also backed up by NASA’s Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite (TESS) and the Zadko Telescope.
Although there could be other explanations, the radio bursts from Proxima Centauri are thought to be connected to coronal mass ejections on the star, just like with our own sun. Zic said:
M-dwarf radio bursts might happen for different reasons than on the sun, where they are usually associated with coronal mass ejections. But it’s highly likely that there are similar events associated with the stellar flares and radio bursts we have seen in this study.
Andrew Zic at The University of Sydney, lead author of the new study.
If Proxima Centauri is any indication, then red dwarf stars, by and large, are not the friendliest places for life. Of course, that also depends on other factors for any given planet, such as just how far it is from the star, how strong its magnetic field is if it has one, etc. Some red dwarfs are probably also more active than others, relatively speaking. As Zic commented:
This is probably bad news on the space weather front. It seems likely that the galaxy’s most common stars – red dwarfs – won’t be great places to find life as we know it.
The presence or lack of magnetic fields around the Proxima Centauri planets, or other red dwarf worlds, might be crucial to their habitability. We just don’t know yet how many of them do have such protective barriers against their stars’ radiation. According to Zac:
This remains an open question. How many exoplanets have magnetic fields like ours? But even if there were magnetic fields, given the stellar proximity of habitable zone planets around M-dwarf stars, this might not be enough to protect them.
On a more positive note, however, as Zic noted, red dwarfs are the most common stars, making up about 70% of the stars in our galaxy. That alone might suggest that at least some of their planets could still be habitable.
The Australian Square Kilometre Array Pathfinder (ASKAP) radio telescope, at CSIRO’s Murchison Radio-astronomy Observatory in Western Australia.
These new results can also be applied not only to the study of Earth’s own biosphere as it exists now and has evolved, but in the future as well.Bruce Gendre at the University of Western Australia noted:
Understanding space weather is critical for understanding how our own planet’s biosphere evolved, but also for what the future is.
Bottom line: Astronomers have used radio waves to study space weather around the nearest star to the sun, Proxima Centauri. The results show that the two known planets are probably subjected to intense radiation from their star, casting doubt on their potential habitability.
New research at the Oregon State University (OSU) discovered a new species and genus of fossil flower from a specimen encased in Burmese amber.
Valviloculus pleristaminis. Image credits Oregon State University.
Christened Valviloculus pleristaminis, the flower is pretty tiny, around 2 mm across for the specimen, a male. However, it boasts some 50 segments arranged in a spiral pattern with vertical pollen-bearing anthers.
Ambered
“This isn’t quite a Christmas flower but it is a beauty, especially considering it was part of a forest that existed 100 million years ago,” said George Poinar Jr., professor emeritus in the OSU College of Science.
“Despite being so small, the detail still remaining is amazing. Our specimen was probably part of a cluster on the plant that contained many similar flowers, some possibly female.”
The fossil consists of an egg-shaped floral cup, the outer layer of petal-like structures (tepals), and anthers made up of two chambers. These anthers hold pollen sacs that are meant to split open “via laterally hinged valves”.
Its name reflects the flower’s structure. ‘Valva’ is a Latin word that is the root of ‘valve’, the authors explain, ‘loculus’ means compartment, ‘plerus’ is ‘many’, while ‘staminis’ refers to its male sex organs. The flower was encased in amber on the bygone supercontinent Pangaea. Although its current location was in western Burma, its original source lies some 4,000 miles across the ocean from Australia to Southeast Asia, Poinar explains.
Valviloculus pleristaminis. Image credits Oregon State University.
The geological structure it formed in is known as the West Burma Block, and eventually broke away from Gondwana around 200 to 500 million years ago. The exact date is unknown, but the current discovery can help.
Valviloculus pleristaminisbelongs to the angiosperm family, a group of vascular plants with stems, roots, and leaves, which fertilize and develop their eggs inside the flower. Angiosperms only evolved and diversified about 100 million years ago, meaning the block couldn’t have wrenched free before then, Poinar explains. This is a much later date than those currently being considered, so it could spur renewed effort — and interest — into dating the event.
The paper “Zygadelphus aetheus gen. et sp. nov., an unusual fossil flower from mid-Cretaceous Myanmar amber” has been published in the Journal of the Botanical Research Institute of Texas.
Despite the global pandemic that has brought much of the world to a grinding halt, space scientists have continued to push the boundaries of our knowledge throughout 2020.
It’s difficult to mention the year 2020 without referencing COVID-19, but as more human beings than ever before were wishing they could take a break from the surface of the planet, space research continued to push our knowledge of the stars. Whilst much of the scientific community was consumed with combating a pandemic, physicists, astronomers, cosmologists, and other researchers were further pushing our understanding of space and the objects which dwell there.
These are some of my personal favourite space-related breakthroughs and research that have come about this year. The list is by no means exhaustive.
In terms of black hole science, 2019 was always going to be a difficult year to top being the year that brought us the first direct image of a supermassive black hole (SMBH). That doesn’t mean that 2020 has been a slow year for black hole developments, however.
One of the most striking and memorable examples of black hole research announced this year was the discovery of a ‘silent’ black hole in our cosmic ‘back yard.’ An international team led by researchers from European Southern Observatory (ESO) including found the black hole in the system HR 6819, located within the Milky Way and just 1,000 light-years from the Earth.
A silent and thus invisible black hole discovered lurking in our ‘solar backyard’ could be an indicator of a much larger population. (ESO/L. Calçada) Background: This wide-field view shows the region of the sky, in the constellation of Telescopium, where HR 6819 can be found. (ESO/Digitized Sky Survey 2. Acknowledgement: Davide De Martin)
The observation marks the closest to Earth a black hole has ever been discovered and Dietrich Baade, Emeritus Astronomer at ESO in Garching believes that it is just ‘the tip of the Iceberg’.
“It’s remarkable because not only is it the first of its kind found, but it’s also so nearby,” said Baade. “Discovering a first only an astronomical stone’s throw away is the biggest surprise one can probably imagine.”
The black hole was described as ‘silent’ by the team because it is not current accreting material — the destructive process that creates powerful x-ray emissions and makes these light-trapping objects observable.
Close-up screen capture image of the LB-1 which, like HR 6819, could also host a silent black hole (Hubble/Public Domain)
“If there is one, there ‘must’ be more,” Baade remarked in May. “If the Earth is not in a privileged position in the Universe — and all available evidence suggests without a doubt it is not — this means that there must be many more silent black holes.”
Baade also remarked that as current cosmological models suggest that the number of stellar-mass black holes is between 100,000,000 to 1,000,000,000 and we have observed nowhere near this many objects, more quiet black holes are “badly needed” to confirm current models. “HR 6819 is the tip of an iceberg, we do not yet know how big the iceberg is.”
Silent black holes weren’t the only examples of this hind of science making noise in 2020, however. Long-missing Intermediate Mass Black Holes were discovered. And just like a proverbial bus, you wait decades for one and then two turn up at once.
2. Intermediate mass black holes found and found again
Missing black holes were the subject of another piece of exciting space science in September 2020, when researchers from the VIRGO/LIGO collaboration discovered the tell-tale signal of an intermediate-mass black hole (IMBH) in gravitational-wave signals. To add to the excitement, the signals originated from the largest black hole merger ever observed.
An artistic interpretation of the binary black hole merger responsible for GW190521. The space-time, figured by a fabric on which a view of the cosmos is printed, is distorted by the GW190521 signal. The turquoise and orange mini-grids represent the dragging effects due to the individually rotating black holes. The estimated spin axes, or self-rotations, of the black holes, are indicated with the corresponding coloured arrows. The background suggests a star cluster, one of the possible environments where GW190521 could have occurred. Credits: Raúl Rubio / Virgo Valencia Group / The Virgo Collaboration.)
The merger — identified as gravitational wave event GW190521 —was detected in gravitational waves and is the first example of a ‘hierarchical merger’ occurring between two black holes of different sizes, one of which was born from a previous merger.
“This doesn’t look much like a chirp, which is what we typically detect,” Virgo member Nelson Christensen, a researcher at the French National Centre for Scientific Research (CNRS) said when announcing the team’s observation. “This is more like something that goes ‘bang,’ and it’s the most massive signal LIGO and Virgo have seen.”
The black hole birthed in the detected merger appears to have a mass of between 100–1000 times that of the Sun — most likely 142 solar masses — putting it in the mass range of an IMBH — a ‘missing link’ between stellar-mass black holes and much larger SMBHs.
Earlier in 2020, another team had used the Hubble Space Telescope X-ray data collected in 2018 to identify what they believed to be an IMBH with a mass 50,000 times that of the Sun named 3XMM J215022.4−055108 (or J2150−0551 for short).
This Hubble Space Telescope image identified the location of an intermediate-mass black hole (IMBH), weighing over 50 000 times the mass of our Sun (NASA, ESA, and D. Lin (University of New Hampshire))
Whether GW190521 or J2150−0551 will go down in history as the first discovered IMBH is currently a little muddy, but what is less questionable is that 2020 will go down as the year in which these ‘missing link’ black holes were first discovered, bringing with them exciting implications for the future investigation of black holes of all sizes.
“Studying the origin and evolution of the intermediate-mass black holes will finally give an answer as to how the supermassive black holes that we find in the centres of massive galaxies came to exist,” said Natalie Webb of the Université de Toulouse in France, part of the team that found J2150−0551. And IMBHs weren’t the only missing element of the Universe that turned up in 2020.
3. Discovering the Universe’s missing mass
In May astronomers, including Professor J. Xavier Prochaska of UC Santa Cruz, announced that they had found the missing half of missing baryonic matter demanded by cosmological models.
“The matter in this study is ‘ordinary’ matter — the material that makes up our bodies, the Earth, and the entirety of the periodic table. We refer to this matter as ‘baryonic’–matter made up of baryons like electron and protons,” Prochaska said when he spoke exclusively to ZME Science earlier this year. “Of particular interest to astronomers is to ascertain the fraction of the material that is tightly bound to galaxies versus the fraction that is out in the open Universe — what we refer to as the intergalactic medium or cosmic web.”
The matter the team discovered isn’t ‘dark matter’ — which accounts for roughly 85–90% of the Universe’s matter content — but rather ‘ordinary’ matter that has been predicted to exist by our models of universal evolution but has remained hidden.
The team made the discovery using mysterious Fast Radio Bursts (FRBs) and the measurement of the redshift of the galaxy from which they originate as a detection method. FRBs can be used as a probe for baryonic matter because as they travel across the Universe, every atom they encounter slows them down by a tiny amount.
This means that they carry with them a trace of these encounters along with them in the spectral splitting as seen above. This allowed the team to infer the presence of clouds of ionised gas that are invisible to ‘ordinary’ astronomy because of how diffuse they are.
4. Asteroid Samples Returned by Hayabusa2
Japan’s Hayabusa2 probe and its continued investigation of the asteroid Ryugu has been the gift that has just kept giving in 2020. Just this month the probe returned to Earth samples collected from an asteroid — which has an orbit that brings it between Earth and Mars — for the first time.
Though probes have landed on asteroids and collected samples before, these samples have been examined in situ. Thus this is the first time researchers have been able to get ‘up close and personal’ with matter from an asteroid.
Artist’s impression of the Hayabusa2 probe achieving touchdown on Ryugu. Image credit: JAXA
Hayabusa2 arrived at Ryugu in late June 2018, making its touch-down on the surface of the asteroid in February of the following year after months careful manoeuvring conducted by the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) and the selection of an optimal region from which to collect samples.
Ahead of the return of samples on December 5th, the probe sent back some stunning images of the asteroid’s surface. These images were more than purely aesthetic, however. Examination of dust grains on the surface of Ryugu gave the team, including Tomokatsu Morota, Nagoya University, Japan, indications of a period of rapid heating by the Sun.
The surface of near-Earth carbonaceous asteroid 162173 Ryugu, as observed by the Hayabusa2 spacecraft just before its landing. This image was produced from images obtained by ONC-W1 at the bottom and ONC-W2 on the side of the spacecraft. The spacecraft’s solar ray paddle casts a shadow on Ryugu’s surface. Image credit: JAXA/U. Tokyo/Kochi U./Rikkyo U./Nagoya U./Chiba Inst. Tech./Meiji U./U. Aizu/AIST
“Our results suggest that Ryugu underwent an orbital excursion near the Sun,” said Morota in May. “This constrains the orbital transition processes of asteroids from the main belt to near-Earth orbit.”
Impressive though this achievement is, its the collection of samples from the asteroid and their subsequent safe return to earth that is the ‘main course’ of the Hayabusa2 mission. “The most important objective of the touchdown is sample collection from Ryugu’s surface,” Morota explained.
Animation created from CAM-H and ONC-W1 data obtained during the 1st touchdown operation (Feb. 21, 2019). Image credit: JAXA/U. Tokyo/Kochi U./Rikkyo U./Nagoya U./Chiba Inst. Tech./Meiji U./U. Aizu/AIST
It is hoped that access to these samples will help answer lingering questions about asteroid composition as well as assisting researchers to confirm Ryugu’s suspected age of 100 million years old — which actually makes it quite young in terms of other asteroids.
Asteroids like Ryugu can act as a ‘snapshot’ of the system’s in which they form at the time of that formation. This is because whereas planets undergo a lot of interaction with other bodies, asteroids remain pretty much untouched.
Whilst researchers will no doubt be elated by the return of the Ryugu samples and the continuing success of the Hayabusa2 mission, 2020 wasn’t all good news for fans of asteroid research.
5. Goodbye to Arecibo
The iconic radio telescope at the Arecibo Observatory in Puerto Rico collapsed at the beginning of December, ahead of its planned demolition. The telescope which will be familiar to moviegoers as the setting of the climactic battle in Pierce Brosnan’s first outing as James Bond, 1995’s Goldeneye, had been in operation up until November, playing a role in the detection of near-Earth asteroids and monitoring if they present a threat to the planet.
An image of the radio telescope before its December 1st collapse (NSF)
The collapse of the radio telescope’s 900-tonne platform which was suspended above the telescope’s 305-metre-wide dish, on December 1st, followed the snapping of one of its main cables in November.
The US National Science Foundation (NSF), which operates the observatory had announced that same month that the telescope would be permanently closed citing ‘safety concerns’ after warnings from engineers that it could collapse at any point.
Following the collapse, the NSF release heart-wrenching footage of the radio telescope collapsing recorded by drones. The footage shows cables snapping at the top of one of the three towers from which the instrument platform was suspended. The platform then plummets downward impacting the side of the dish.
Video shows the radio telescope’s instrument platform fall and collision into the side of the dish (NSF)
The observatory had played a role in several major space-science breakthroughs since its construction in 1963. Most notably, observations made by the instrument formed the basis of Russell A. Hulse and Joseph H. Talyor’s discovery of a new type of pulsar in 1974. The breakthrough would earn the duo the 1993 Nobel Prize in Physics.
Some good could ultimately come out of the collapse of Arecibo. Questions had been asked about the maintenance of the radio telescope for some time and the fact that the cable which snapped in November dated back to the instrument’s construction 57 years ago has not escaped notice and comment.
As a result, various space agencies are being encouraged to make efforts to better maintain large-scale equipment and facilities so that losses like this can be avoided in the future.
This aerial view shows the damage at the Arecibo Observatory after one of the main cables holding the receiver broke in Arecibo, Puerto Rico, on December 1, 2020. – The radio telescope in Puerto Rico, which once starred in a James Bond film, collapsed Tuesday when its 900-ton receiver platform fell 450 feet (140 meters) and smashed onto the radio dish below. (Photo by Ricardo ARDUENGO / AFP) (Photo by RICARDO ARDUENGO/AFP via Getty Images)
For most of us, 2020 is going to be a year that we would rather forget. Whilst very few of us come honestly comment that we have had anything approaching a ‘good year’ space science has plowed ahead, albeit mildly hindered by the global pandemic.
Our knowledge and understanding of space science are better off at the end of 2020 than it was twelve months earlier, and that is at least something positive that has emerged from this painful year.
2020 was historic for NASA. We launched humans to the International Space Station from America again, made progress on our plans to return humans to the Moon and explore Mars, had an unprecedented encounter with an asteroid, and displayed perseverance and resilience in space and on Earth … all, while helping the country deal with a global crisis. Here’s a look back at highlights from those and other things we did this year at NASA.
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Over mijzelf
Ik ben Pieter, en gebruik soms ook wel de schuilnaam Peter2011.
Ik ben een man en woon in Linter (België) en mijn beroep is Ik ben op rust..
Ik ben geboren op 18/10/1950 en ben nu dus 74 jaar jong.
Mijn hobby's zijn: Ufologie en andere esoterische onderwerpen.
Op deze blog vind je onder artikels, werk van mezelf. Mijn dank gaat ook naar André, Ingrid, Oliver, Paul, Vincent, Georges Filer en MUFON voor de bijdragen voor de verschillende categorieën...
Veel leesplezier en geef je mening over deze blog.
