Dit is ons nieuw hondje Kira, een kruising van een waterhond en een Podenko. Ze is sinds 7 februari 2024 bij ons en druk bezig ons hart te veroveren. Het is een lief, aanhankelijk hondje, dat zich op een week snel aan ons heeft aangepast. Ze is heel vinnig en nieuwsgierig, een heel ander hondje dan Noleke.
This is our new dog Kira, a cross between a water dog and a Podenko. She has been with us since February 7, 2024 and is busy winning our hearts. She is a sweet, affectionate dog who quickly adapted to us within a week. She is very quick and curious, a very different dog than Noleke.
DEAR VISITOR,
MY BLOG EXISTS NEARLY 13 YEARS AND 4 MONTH.
ON /30/09/2024 MORE THAN 2.230.520
VISITORS FROM 135 DIFFERENT NATIONS ALREADY FOUND THEIR WAY TO MY BLOG.
THAT IS AN AVERAGE OF 400GUESTS PER DAY.
THANK YOU FOR VISITING MY BLOG AND HOPE YOU ENJOY EACH TIME.
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
Zoeken in blog
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!!!
Een interessant adres?
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...
17-01-2022
Grootste groep broedende vissen ooit ontdekt onder pakijs Antarctica: 60 miljoen actieve nesten
Grootste groep broedende vissen ooit ontdekt onder pakijs Antarctica: 60 miljoen actieve nesten
Vijfhonderd meter onder het pakijs van Antarctica hebben wetenschappers de grootste groep broedende vissen ooit gevonden. Het zou gaan om naar schatting 60 miljoen actieve nesten van een soort ijsvis, goed voor een oppervlakte van zeker 240 vierkante kilometer of iets meer dan de oppervlakte van de stad Antwerpen. Er wordt gesproken over “een ongelofelijke ontdekking”.
De kolonie werd ontdekt in de Weddellzee, een deel van de Zuidelijke Oceaan dat voor het grootste deel uit ijs bestaat en tussen Antarctica en het Zuid-Amerikaanse continent in ligt.
Veel vissen maken nesten en soms verzamelen ze met honderden tegelijk om die te bouwen. In het geval van de ijsvissen werd in het verleden hooguit een handvol nesten samen ontdekt. Tot diepzeebioloog Autun Purser van de Alfred Wegener Institute in het Duitse Bremerhaven en zijn collega's begin vorig jaar op de gigantische kolonie botsten, terwijl ze met een onderzoek bezig waren op de Weddellzee.
Bodem van de zee
De onderzoekers waren de chemische verbanden aan het bestuderen tussen de oppervlaktewaters en de bodem van de zee. Daarvoor werd het leven op de zeebodem in kaart gebracht. Dat gebeurde met een toestel dat achter een ijsbreker aangesleept werd en videobeelden maakte.
Eén van de medewerkers merkte plots dat er overal cirkelvormige nesten van ijsvissen (Neopagetopsis ionah) te zien waren. Die ijsvissen komen alleen in dergelijke wateren voor en zijn aangepast aan de extreme koude daar, onder meer door een soort van antivries in hun bloed. “Toen we een halfuur later nog altijd het ene nest na het andere zagen verschijnen en dat voor de rest van onze vier uur durende tocht ook zo bleek te zijn, wist ik dat we iets ongewoons op het spoor waren”, vertelt Purser aan ‘ScienceNews’.
Drie expedities
De wetenschappers maakten nog drie expedities in de buurt en bleven nest na nest vinden, kilometer na kilometer. Waarom de vissen daar zo massaal verzamelen, is niet duidelijk. Er zou wel veel plankton aanwezig zijn, microscopisch kleine diertjes die de perfecte voeding vormen voor pas uitgekomen vissen. In de buurt was ook een zone met warmer water, wat de vissen kan helpen bij het lokaliseren van de broedgrond.
Zelf zouden de ijsvissen dan weer als voedsel dienen voor zeehonden. Daarvan is geweten dat ze heel wat tijd spenderen in de wateren boven de kolonie, volgens de wetenschappers in ‘Current Biology’.
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LATEST UFO SIGHTINGS AND VIDEOS
LATEST UFO SIGHTINGS AND VIDEOS
Space & Lunas Surface Exploration (UFO Sighting)
Active AirSpace Unidentified Aerial Phenomena and Unidentified Objects in Penang captured through our lens innovation which had won Gold awards in Canada & Malaysia
Smartphone uv infrared telecopy photography by Arav & Annamalai . UV infrared light settings by Istal Zainee Bin Abdul Rahman.
Moon Size Black Sphere UFO Spotted Next To The Sun For The Pass Three Days. January 13-15 2022
This was spotted by Dan who runs the YouTube Channel Smasho Mash where he studies space weather and he captured this on SDO/Solar Dynamics Observatory. In my opinion this object is accumulating the energy that is being given of from our Sun.. What do you guys think?
Thanks to Smasho Mash for allow me the use of his video and to view the full, unedited video:
Ghostly Mist Captured On Home CCTV During The Witching Hour In Modesto, California.
Although this was filmed sometime in July of 2021, This footage was uploaded to Reddit a day ago. Just after 3am the motion detector was set off by this mist.
The witness told me "The dogs where barking all night long and my sister kept looking outside to see what was up but saw nothing." They also added "Went to bed and it happened about 3am and there was no fog that night."
When i ask if anything like this had occurred before, i was told the following "We sees stuff in the house all the time but we never felt like it was dangerous so we do our thing and the ghost does their thing ." Thanks to Ryan Mangini and his sister for allowing me the use of their footage and to view the original:
Saucer Shaped UFO Sighting over Orangeburg, South Carolina on January 6, 2022
witness states:
Went out for a smoke and took pictures of the front yard, as I see frequent UFO activity and like to record proof. I have seen many UFOs that were far off but this was the first time anything has come so close. The craft came from the tree line pulsing multicolored lights. After a few seconds, two orbs came out of it and began to pulse/blink red. It was like they were trying to memos a large aircraft; however, I worked on C-17s in the Air Force and know that this no aircraft. These crafts were moving slow towards the neighbors and disappeared in the trees. I went to the backyard and observed them descend down into the back woods behind the house (swamp land). You can see the red orbs change from vertical to horizontal close to the end of the video.Source: MUFON/ UFO Stalker: Case Number 120202. Sighting over Orangeburg, South Carolina. on January 6, 2022.
Saturn's moon Mimas is covered in 20 mile thick ice, but astronomers now believe there is a 'stealth ocean' buried deep beneath its thick frozen surface.
Mimas, the closest of Saturn's 'large' moons, has a diameter of 246 miles, and is the smallest astronomical body known to still be round in shape due to self-gravitation.
There are no hints of any liquid water, when looking at the moon in images and from observations, according to experts, but simulations by the Southwest Research Institute in Colorado, suggest there is one, deep underneath the blanket of ice.
Measurements taken by the NASA Cassini spacecraft in 2014 hinted there might be some water under the surface, but this hasn't been corroborated until now.
In the new study, the team explored the size and formation predictions for the small moon, to determine that its internal heat would be enough to allow for flowing water.
Saturn's moon Mimas is covered in 20 mile thick ice, but astronomers now believe there is an 'stealth ocean' buried deep beneath its thick frozen cover
THE BASICS: MIMAS
Mimas was discovered in 1789 by English astronomer William Herschel, using his 40-foot reflector telescope.
The Cassini spacecraft made several close approaches and provided detailed images of Mimas.
Less than 123 miles in mean radius, crater-covered Mimas is the smallest and innermost of Saturn's moons.
It isn't big enough to hold a round shape, so it is somewhat ovoid with dimensions of 129 x 122 x 119 miles.
Its low density suggests it consists almost entirely of water ice, which is the only substance ever detected.
SOURCE: NASA
Also known as Saturn I, due to it being the closest to the ringed world, Mimas has a total surface area slightly less than the land area of Spain.
That surface bears none of the fracturing, or evidence of melting that astronomers and planetary scientists would expect to see from a world with a hidden ocean.
'When we look at a body like Mimas, it is a little, cold, dead rock,' Alyssa Rhoden, lead author of this new study told New Scientist.
'If you put Mimas in a gallery with a bunch of other icy moons, you would never look at it and say "oh, that one has an ocean".'
As well as it baring no signs of having an ocean, none of the accepted theoretical models of moon formation suggest it should have an ocean.
However, observations from 2014, taken by Cassini, show the moon wobbling as it spins, suggesting something strange going on under the ice.
At the time researchers suggesting there was water under the icy shell, and so, since then astronomers have been attempting to see whether that is the case, and how it is possible.
Rhoden told New Scientist that researchers set out to prove that Mimas can't have an ocean — because it seemed so unlikely.
The problem is, the scientist explained, that they did find evidence of an ocean, and findings backed up earlier observations from Cassini.
They performed simulations of how the interior is stretched and heated by Saturn's gravity, and what that would do the an icy outer shell.
The heating was enough to support a global ocean of liquid water, as much as 18 miles below a thick crust of ice, deep enough not to crack the surface.
Cassini measurements of Mimas' physical properties are either explained through a non-hydrostatic core, or a global liquid ocean as much as 20 miles below the ice.
A combination of tidal heating, caused by the pull of Saturn, played a bearing on the inner-world ocean developing, as well as its eccentricity and libration.
There are no hints of any liquid water, when looking at the moon in images and from observations, according to experts, but simulations by the Southwest Research Institute in Colorado, suggest there is one, deep underneath the blanket of ice
Measurements taken by the NASA Cassini spacecraft in 2015 hinted there might be some water under the surface, but this hasn't been confirmed until now
'An ocean within Mimas would be surprising, given the lack of comparable geologic activity to that observed on other ocean-bearing moons like Europa and Enceladus, and thus has important implications for the prevalence and identification of ocean worlds,' the researchers wrote in a paper published in the journal Icarus.
'We find that, using the most reasonable assumptions, Mimas would have the suggested ocean and ice shell thicknesses today.'
This would put it under the category of 'stealth world's' — that is icy moons with an unexpected ocean buried beneath its surface.
'There are a lot of icy satellites in our solar system, and if Mimas could be an ocean world, any of them could be ocean worlds,' Rhoden said.
'The more we understand the pathways by which we can form an ocean, the more we're going to learn about the habitats that are available in our solar system.'
WHAT DID CASSINI DISCOVER DURING ITS 20-YEAR MISSION TO SATURN?
Cassini launched from Cape Canaveral, Florida in 1997, then spent seven years in transit followed by 13 years orbiting Saturn.
An artist's impression of the Cassini spacecraft studying Saturn
In 2000 it spent six months studying Jupiter before reaching Saturn in 2004.
In that time, it discovered six more moons around Saturn, three-dimensional structures towering above Saturn's rings, and a giant storm that raged across the planet for nearly a year.
On 13 December 2004 it made its first flyby of Saturn's moons Titan and Dione.
On 24 December it released the European Space Agency-built Huygens probe on Saturn's moon Titan to study its atmosphere and surface composition.
There it discovered eerie hydrocarbon lakes made from ethane and methane.
In 2008, Cassini completed its primary mission to explore the Saturn system and began its mission extension (the Cassini Equinox Mission).
In 2010 it began its second mission (Cassini Solstice Mission) which lasted until it exploded in Saturn's atmosphere.
In December 2011, Cassini obtained the highest resolution images of Saturn's moon Enceladus.
In December of the following year it tracked the transit of Venus to test the feasibility of observing planets outside our solar system.
In March 2013 Cassini made the last flyby of Saturn's moon Rhea and measured its internal structure and gravitational pull.
Cassini didn't just study Saturn - it also captured incredible views of its many moons. In the image above, Saturn's moon Enceladus can be seen drifting before the rings and the tiny moon Pandora. It was captured on Nov. 1, 2009, with the entire scene is backlit by the Sun
In July of that year Cassini captured a black-lit Saturn to examine the rings in fine detail and also captured an image of Earth.
In April of this year it completed its closest flyby of Titan and started its Grande Finale orbit which finished on September 15.
'The mission has changed the way we think of where life may have developed beyond our Earth,' said Andrew Coates, head of the Planetary Science Group at Mullard Space Science Laboratory at University College London.
'As well as Mars, outer planet moons like Enceladus, Europa and even Titan are now top contenders for life elsewhere,' he added. 'We've completely rewritten the textbooks about Saturn.'
According to a new study, Saturn’s moon Mimas may have an ocean buried under several miles of ice.
Mimas was discovered in 1789 by English astronomer Sir William Herschel. The moon is covered with craters, some of which measure 25 miles in diameter (40 kilometers). The massive Herschel crater, however, measures a whopping 88 miles across (142 kilometers) and spreads out almost a third of the moon’s diameter.
Mimas is the closest major moon that orbits Saturn at a distance of just 115,280 miles (185,525 kilometres). It completes a full orbit around the planet in just 22 hours and 37 minutes. It is believed that the moon consists of most water ice with a small amount of rock. The surface temperature is about minus 209 degrees Celsius (minus 344 degrees Fahrenheit).
Mimas
While there is no proof of there being an ocean on Mimas, some researchers do think that there is one hidden far beneath the icy surface based on simulations conducted by Colorado’s Southwest Research Institute. They performed the simulations based on measurements taken by NASA’s Cassini spacecraft in 2014.
The experts claimed that there is enough heat inside of the moon to sustain flowing water. The simulations showed how the inside of the moon could be heated and stretched from the gravity of Saturn. And they found that the heat was enough to support a liquid water ocean measuring as far down as 18 miles (29 kilometers) beneath the icy surface. Since it would be so far down, it wouldn’t be able to crack the surface of the moon.
In an interview with New Scientist, the lead author of the study Alyssa Rhoden explained this in further detail, “When we look at a body like Mimas, it is a little, cold, dead rock.” “If you put Mimas in a gallery with a bunch of other icy moons, you would never look at it and say ‘oh, that one has an ocean’.” But the Cassini data revealed something very interesting about the moon as it was observed wobbling while it spun, which suggested that there could be something odd occurring beneath the thick ice.
In their study, the researchers wrote in part, “An ocean within Mimas would be surprising, given the lack of comparable geologic activity to that observed on other ocean-bearing moons like Europa and Enceladus, and thus has important implications for the prevalence and identification of ocean worlds.” “We find that, using the most reasonable assumptions, Mimas would have the suggested ocean and ice shell thicknesses today.”
If this is correct, it would mean that Mimas is a “stealth world”, meaning that it is an icy moon with an unexpected ocean deep beneath the surface. “There are a lot of icy satellites in our solar system, and if Mimas could be an ocean world, any of them could be ocean worlds,” Rhoden stated.
DE AARDE BEVINDT ZICH TOEVALLIG IN HET HART VAN EEN GIGANTISCHE STERREN BARENDE BUBBEL
DE AARDE BEVINDT ZICH TOEVALLIG IN HET HART VAN EEN GIGANTISCHE STERREN BARENDE BUBBEL
Vivian Lammerse
En nu hebben onderzoekers ontraadseld hoe die bel en de jonge sterren die ons omringen, zijn ontstaan.
Ons zonnestelsel bevindt zich in de zogenoemde ‘Lokale bel’; een 1000 lichtjaar wijde ‘bubbel’, die bestaat uit hete, vrijwel lege ruimte. Opvallend genoeg worden we omringd door duizenden jonge sterren, die zich aan het oppervlak van de gigantische bel hebben vastgeklampt. Een prangende vraag is echter hoe zowel de Lokale bel, als de jonge sterren om ons heen, precies zijn ontstaan. Bovendien bevinden wij ons ook nog eens precies in het hart van de Lokale bel. Hoe dat allemaal zit? Een nieuwe studie schept duidelijkheid.
Lokale bel In het onderzoek zijn astronomen in de evolutionaire geschiedenis van onze galactische achtertuin gedoken. De aarde bevindt zich namelijk in het hart van een gigantische sterren barende bubbel. Maar veel weten we hier echter nog niet van af. Terwijl astronomen al tientallen jaren van het bestaan van de jonge sterren afweten, was de geboorte van de Lokale bel en de impact ervan op het gas eromheen, tot voor kort een raadsel. “Dit is echt een oorsprongsverhaal,” zegt onderzoeker Catherine Zucker. “Voor het eerst kunnen we uitleggen hoe alle nabije stervorming begon.”
Supernova-explosies Over het algemeen wordt aangenomen dat onze Lokale bel – maar ook andere holtes; we zijn niet de enige – het gevolg zijn van supernova-explosies. Reusachtige ontploffingen van massarijke sterren zouden, miljoenen jaren geleden, de hen omringende ruimte nog leger hebben gemaakt dan deze al was. De onderzoekers komen in de nieuwe studie tot de ontdekking dat een reeks supernovae die 14 miljoen jaar geleden plaatsvond, interstellair gas naar buiten duwde. En hierdoor ontstond de grote ‘zeepbel’ om ons heen. “We hebben berekend dat er in de loop van miljoenen jaren ongeveer vijftien supernovae zijn geweest die uiteindelijk de Lokale bel vormden zoals we die vandaag zien,” aldus Zucker.
Groeiend De vreemd gevormde bel slaapt echter niet. Hij groeit langzaam en gestaag, zo merken de astronomen op. “Hij dijt met ongeveer 6,5 kilometer per seconde uit,” vertelt Zucker. “Hij heeft echter het grootste deel van zijn kracht verloren en blijft nu qua snelheid vrijwel stabiel.”
Artistieke impressie van de Lokale bel, met stervorming op het oppervlak. Wetenschappers hebben nu laten zien hoe een reeks gebeurtenissen die 14 miljoen jaar geleden plaatsvond leidde tot het ontstaan van de enorme bel, die verantwoordelijk is voor de vorming van alle jonge sterren binnen 500 lichtjaar afstand van de zon en de aarde. Afbeelding: Leah Hustak
Tegenwoordig zitten er zeven bekende stervormingsgebieden of moleculaire wolken – gebieden in de ruimte waar sterren het levenslicht zien – op het oppervlak van de Lokale bel. Sterker nog, alle jonge sterren en stervormingsgebieden – binnen 500 lichtjaar van de aarde – bevinden zich hier. Dit is overigens geen toeval. De supernova-explosies die namelijk de Lokale bel vormden, creëren tegelijkertijd een oppervlak dat zich uitstekend leent voor stervorming.
Gatenkaas Om het onderzoek wat simpeler uit te leggen; denk eens aan een grote gatenkaas. De gaten in de kaas zijn ontstaan door supernova-explosies. Vervolgens ontstaan er nieuwe sterren in de kaas rond de gaten die door de stervende sterren zijn achtergelaten.
Opvallend genoeg bevindt de aarde zich precies in het hart van de Lokale bel. Overigens moeten we daar niet meer achter zoeken dan simpelweg toeval. “Toen de eerste sterren explodeerden in supernovae, was onze zon nog ver weg van alle actie,” vertelt onderzoeker João Alves. “Ongeveer vijf miljoen jaar geleden kruiste het pad van de zon de bel. En nu zit onze zon – gewoon toevallig – bijna precies in het hart van de Lokale bel.”
Omdat we weten dat superbellen zoals de Lokale bel geen zeldzaamheid zijn, zijn de onderzoekers van plan meer interstellaire bubbels in kaart te brengen. Op die manier willen ze een volledig beeld krijgen van hun locaties en alle vormen en maten waarin ze voorkomen. Door dergelijke superbellen en hun relatie tot elkaar te bestuderen, hopen astronomen uiteindelijk te begrijpen welke rol stervende sterren spelen bij het ‘baren’ van nieuwe sterren. Ook willen onderzoekers zo een beter beeld krijgen van de structuur en evolutie van sterrenstelsels zoals onze eigen Melkweg.
Written by Jennifer Trosper, Project Manager at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory
Mars Perseverance Sol 320 - WATSON Image: NASA's Mars Perseverance rover acquired this image using its onboard SHERLOC WATSON imager. The camera is located on the turret at the end of the rover's robotic arm. The image was acquired on Jan. 13, 2022 (Sol 320).
NASA’s Mars 2020 mission team has been working methodically and thoroughly, making good progress on understanding the best path forward to remove the uninvited pebbles from Perseverance’s bit carousel. Over the previous weekend, and earlier this week, operational sequences were developed and tested to remove these rocky interlopers.
With terrestrial experimentation complete, we have begun executing our mitigation strategy on Mars. On Jan. 12 we did a detailed image survey of the ground below Perseverance. This was done so we would have a good idea what rocks and pebbles already exist down there before some more – from our bit carousel – join them in the not-so-distant future.
With this below-chassis, preliminary imaging, in hand, the team embarked on a maneuver with our robotic arm I never imagined we would perform – ever. Simply put, we are returning the remaining contents of Sample Tube 261 (our latest cored-rock sample) back to its planet of origin. Although this scenario was never designed or planned for prior to launch, it turns out dumping a core from an open tube is a fairly straightforward process (at least during Earth testing). We sent commands up yesterday, and later on today the rover’s robotic arm will simply point the open end of the sample tube toward the surface of Mars and let gravity do the rest.
I imagine your next question is, “Why are you dumping out the contents of the sample tube?” The answer is that, at present, we are not certain how much cored rock continues to reside in Tube 261. And while this rock will never make my holiday card list, the science team really seems to like it. So if our plans go well with our pebble mitigation (see below), we may very well attempt to core “Issole” (the rock from which this sample was taken) again.
Which brings me to next steps in our pebble mitigation strategy: we’re sending up commands to the rover later today, ordering it to do two rotation tests of the bit carousel. These tests (the first, a small rotation; the second, larger) will execute this weekend. Our expectations are that these rotations – and any subsequent pebble movement – will help guide our team, providing them the necessary information on how to proceed. Still, to be thorough, we are also commanding the rover to take a second set of under-chassis images, just in case one or more pebbles happen to pop free.
We expect the data and imagery from these two rotation tests to be sent to Earth by next Tuesday, Jan. 18. From there, we’ll analyze and further refine our plans. If I had to ballpark it, I would estimate we’ll be at our current location another week or so – or even more if we decide to re-sample Issole.
So there you have it. The Perseverance team is exploring every facet of the issue to ensure that we not only get rid of this rocky debris but also prevent a similar reoccurrence during future sampling. Essentially, we are leaving no rock unturned in the pursuit of these four pebbles.
The levitating rover concept is a wild new idea to explore airless worlds.
An illustration of a hovering-rover concept. (Image credit: MIT)
Air is invisible but mighty: birds harness it to fly, planes on Earth and distant machines like NASA's Ingenuity helicopter on Mars work with it to soar above the surface. Now, researchers are working on a new craft that could lift off the ground with no air at all.
Researchers at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) want to engineer a new kind of hovering spacecraft that can operate without air. Instead of relying on air like birds and planes, it will levitate using the electric charge available from interplanetary surfaces.
The team is currently working on a test version of the craft: a small, disc-shaped test vehicle about the size of a human palm and weighing about as much as a chicken egg. Interestingly enough, the developing design for this airless hovering spacecraft looks remarkably like a sci-fi inspired "flying saucer."
Celestial bodies like the moon and asteroids do not have atmospheres that could support the flight of more traditional flying craft. (The moon has a very thin, barely-there layer of gases that technically make up an atmosphere called an exosphere.) But engineers are using this lack of a gaseous shroud to their advantage. It turns out that, because of this lack of atmosphere, asteroids and the moon receive direct exposure from the sun and surrounding plasma that allows their surfaces to build up an electric field.
Because of this electric field, dirt particles on these bodies can be charged "much the way static electricity can cause a person’s hair to stand on end," MIT representatives wrote in a Dec. 21 statement.
Asteroid Itokawa. Japan's Hayabusa mission reached this space rock in September 2005. (Image credit: JAXA)
The team at MIT sought to figure out if a small disk-shaped craft that was fitted with miniature thrusters could produce enough repulsive electrostatic force to hover over a charged surface. Their work was supported, in part, by NASA.
Their initial feasibility model was successful once they figured out that amplifying the surface's charge would give their rover enough repelling boost to successfully levitate. The supplemental boost is provided by thrusters that enrich the charge of an atmosphere-less object's surface.
They then created a test vehicle. According to the statement from MIT, the researchers were able to successfully show that the boost from their design concept should be strong enough to levitate a 2-lb (0.9 kilograms) vehicle on either the moon or a large asteroid.
The moon's natural surface charge is strong enough to levitate lunar dust more than 3 feet (1 meter) above the ground, according to the statement. The new design concept would allow bigger rovers to levitate, because the boosters can theoretically generate a large-enough repulsive force between the spacecraft and the ground.
"Engineers at NASA and elsewhere have recently proposed harnessing this natural surface charge to levitate a glider with wings made of Mylar, a material that naturally holds the same charge as surfaces on airless bodies… But such a design would likely be limited to small asteroids, as larger planetary bodies would have a stronger, counteracting gravitational pull," wrote MIT officials.
"The MIT team's levitating rover could potentially get around this size limitation," they added.
Japan's Hayabusa2 spacecraft captured this view of the asteroid Ryugu from approximately 4 miles (6 kilometers) away on July 20, 2018, at 3 a.m. EDT (0700 GMT). (Image credit: JAXA)
With more trials, the team hopes their project could have applications on interplanetary missions. In the statement, MIT officials cited exploratory endeavors like Japan's Hayabusa2 mission, which reached the diamond-shaped asteroid Ryugu in 2018 and deployed a small lander and three rovers to study it up-close
"Similarly, we think a future mission could send out small hovering rovers to explore the surface of the moon and other asteroids," Oliver Jia-Richards, the study's lead author and graduate student in MIT’s Department of Aeronautics and Astronautics, said in the statement.
Fo llow Doris Elin Urrutia on Twitter @salazar_elin. Follow uson Twitter @Spacedotcom and on Facebook.
Huge black object becomes visible during solar flare
Huge black object becomes visible during solar flare
On 2022-01-11 and 2022-01-12 the Stereo EUVI A304 satellite captured a massive solar flare, then, on 2022-1-14 and 2022-1-15, the SDO AIA 94 satellite captured a huge black object that becomes visible during another solar flare.
UFOs have often been photographed next to the sun, but in this case it is not clear whether the black object is just a speck on the camera lens or an extraterrestrial craft.
UFO ATTEMPTS TO MAKE CONTACT | The Proof is Out There
UFO ATTEMPTS TO MAKE CONTACT | The Proof is Out There
In June 2019, an eyewitness spotted strange orbs watching him at Lake Superior. Watch as experts examine the footage and reveal the truth, in this clip from Season 2, “Apocalyptic Lights & Baby Sharkman.”
SPACEX MARS CITY: LAUNCH SCHEDULE, KEY BUILD DATES, AND HOW TO GET THERE
SPACEX MARS CITY: LAUNCH SCHEDULE, KEY BUILD DATES, AND HOW TO GET THERE
Musk plans to build a self-sustaining city on Mars.
READY TO LIVE on Mars? It could become an option soon, if Elon Musk succeeds in his goals.
The SpaceX CEO has a long-standing vision of establishing a city on the Red Planet. It would be self-sustaining, would be home to 1 million people, and would transform humanity into a multi-planet species. It is perhaps Musk’s most ambitious goal, one that could keep him occupied for the next three decades.
“It's about believing in the future and thinking that the future would be better than the past,” Musk said at the International Astronautical Conference 2017 in Adelaide, Australia. “I can't think of anything more exciting than going out there and being among the stars.”
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Here is what you need to know about Musk’s mission.
WHAT IS THE MARS CITY?
Musk plans to build a full-size city on the surface of Mars. This would be a city open to regular people, not just scientists and researchers.
People interested in moving to Mars could pay for their flight with a loan. Once there, people would be able to pay off the loan by working in anything from iron foundries to pizzerias. Musk declared at a 2016 conference that there would be labor shortages for a long time.
This city would be free to govern itself on its own terms, as indicated by the Starlink internet service terms and conditions released in October 2020. This appears to stand in contradiction to the 1967 Outer Space Treaty, which states that the launch origin country is responsible for subsequent space activities. David Anderman, who served as SpaceX’s general counsel when the terms were released, suggested to Inversein 2021 that the two documents may be set on a collision course.
Mars: ready for a city?Shutterstock
Musk estimated in 2019 that it would take around one million tons of cargo to build a self-sustaining city on Mars. Assuming it costs $100,000 per ton to send cargo to Mars with the upcoming Starship, that would put a Mars city’s price at around $100 billion. At the high end, Musk estimates it could cost around $10 trillion.
WHY DOES ELON MUSK WANT TO BUILD A CITY ON MARS?
Musk’s stated aim is to transform humanity into a multi-planet species.
Over the years, he has listed reasons as to why humanity would want to expand into the universe. One theme he regularly lists is that a life-ending event on Earth could spell the end of humanity — but humanity could live on if it’s able to set up base on a new planet like Mars.
“Earth is ~4.5B years old, but life is still not multiplanetary and it is extremely uncertain how much time is left to become so,” Musk wrote on Twitter in November 2021. Beyond very worst-case scenario climate change, a surprise meteor strike could also wipe out humanity.
SpaceX concept art of a Starship taking off from Mars.SpaceX
Another reason, as he suggested in September 2018, is because it’s a reason to keep on living:
“There’s so many things that make people sad or depressed about the future, but I think becoming a space-faring civilization is one of those things that makes you excited about the future.”
Musk isn’t the first person to call for humanity to colonize another planet — professor Stephen Hawking said in 2017 that humans would need to expand out within 100 years if they hoped to survive. However, astrophysicist Martin Rees said in response to Hawking and Musk that the idea was a “dangerous delusion [...] dealing with climate change on Earth is a doddle compared to making Mars habitable.”
WHEN DID MUSK FIRST GET THE IDEA FOR A MARS CITY?
It’s hard to say when he first got this idea — Ashlee Vance’s 2015 biography claims that “by the middle of his teenage years” he’d come to see “man’s fate in the universe” as his “personal obligation.” He was inspired by science fiction novels like Douglas Adams’ Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy.
The book also cites Terency Beney, who went to school with Musk. Beney claims that Musk was already thinking about colonizing other planets in his early years.
In 2001, Musk attended a meeting of the non-profit Mars Society group. During the event, Musk learned about the group’s plans to send mice into space to inspire people. Musk started considering the prospect of sending them to Mars instead, an idea that eventually led to him founding SpaceX.
In 2007, before SpaceX had even launched its first rocket to orbit, Musk told Wired that in 30 years there would be a base on the Moon and Mars.
The idea took on new form in 2016, when he gave a speech at the International Astronautical Congress about his idea to make humanity into a multi-planet species.
HOW WILL ELON MUSK BUILD A CITY ON MARS?
Central to the plan is the Starship. This fully-reusable rocket, currently under development in Texas, will enable SpaceX to send humans and cargo to Mars. The ship will be capable of launching over 100 tons or 100 people into space at a time.
Its use of liquid oxygen and methane as fuel, rather than the rocket propellant used in the Falcon 9, means explorers can fly to Mars, refuel using resources found on the planet, and fly back to Earth. The astronauts could even venture out further into space, building a planet-hopping network of refueling stations along the way.
DOES JEFF BEZOS AGREE WITH ELON MUSK’S MARS CITY IDEA?
Not everybody in the space industry agrees with Musk’s vision. Jeff Bezos, founder of rival firm Blue Origin, prefers to build giant orbiting cities near Earth to expand humanity.
In May 2019, Bezos cited research from physicist Gerard K. O’Neill. He asked a key question: is a planetary surface the best place for humans to expand into the solar system? O’Neill decided the answer was no for three key reasons:
The planetary surfaces aren’t that big. Humans would maybe, at best, double the amount of available land surface.
They’re a long way away. A round trip to Mars would take years — the Earth and Mars align once every 22 months, and the trip itself would take a few months depending on the rocket.
There won’t be any real-time communications with Earth because of the distance. It takes around 20 minutes to send a signal to Mars, much slower than the tens of milliseconds it takes to communicate over the internet.
Instead, Bezos prefers to build O’Neill-style colonies in Earth’s orbit. This, he claims, could support up to one trillion humans.
“Makes no sense. In order to grow the colony, you’d have to transport vast amounts of mass from planets/moons/asteroids. Would be like trying to build the USA in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean!”
WHAT IS THE DESIGN FOR THE MARS CITY?
During Musk’s 2017 International Astronautical Congress presentation, he revealed images of how the city may look:
SpaceX's Mars city design.SpaceX
The city would begin initially with a series of bases, gradually expanding out over time.
SpaceX's concept art for how a Mars city with a Starship may look.SpaceX
HOW MUCH WILL IT COST TO TAKE A SPACESHIP TO THE MARS CITY?
Musk claimed in 2019 that a return ticket could cost around $500,000 initially, dropping to $100,000 over time. Musk’s goal in 2016 was to reach a ticket price of around the median price of a house in the United States. That would suggest people could sell their house to move to Mars.
Another option, Musk suggested, would be a personal loan. Visitors would pay off the loan by getting a job to help fill the city’s labor shortages. It’s an idea that arguably bears resemblance to 19th-century American company towns, where employees lived in a city owned by their employer. Especially in the early days, Mars may not have many choices for local employment — and you’ll need to pay off that loan for your flight.
Guenter Lang, an economics professor at Kühne Logistics University in Germany, drew this plan into question in a May 2019 interview with Inverse. After all, if you’re rich enough to go, why would you give up that luxury?
WHEN WILL SPACEX BUILD A CITY ON MARS?
In 2017, Musk outlined an “aspirational” plan to send two cargo ships to Mars as early as 2022. It would then send four ships at the next closest approach — two crewed ships and two cargo ships — in 2024.
Mars and Earth are at their closest around once every 26 months. The distance between the two at this time reduces to around 33.9 million miles.
In March 2019, Musk wrote on Twitter that “it’s possible to make a self-sustaining city on Mars by 2050, if we start in 5 years & take 10 orbital synchronizations.” With 26 months between synchronizations, that would mean it would take around 22 years at a minimum to build the city.
Musk has set himself the deadline of a self-sustaining Mars city with 1 million people by 2050. Musk would turn 79 years old that year.
As SpaceX has yet to even host its first orbital flight with the Starship, it seems unlikely that it will send the first cargo ships this year.
WILL ELON MUSK TERRAFORM MARS?
Probably not in his lifetime, but he does have some ideas.
At SpaceX’s headquarters, next to the lobby, the company has two images that show a before and after of a terraformed Mars:
The current surface temperature on Mars is an average of minus 63 degrees Celsius, or minus 82 degrees Fahrenheit. Musk’s idea is to heat up the planet’s poles to release stores of frozen carbon dioxide. This would use a series of continuous, low fallout nuclear fusion explosions to act as artificial suns.
The idea would be to use the carbon dioxide stores to create a more hospitable atmosphere. Humans could then walk around the planet using just a breathing apparatus.
That’s the theory, at least. In practice, Bruce Jakosky and Christopher S. Edwards published a paper in the journal Nature Astronomyback in 2018 that drew that plan into question. It argued there is “not enough CO2 remaining on Mars to provide significant greenhouse warming were the gas to be emplaced into the atmosphere.”
The paper found that vaporizing Mars’ carbon-rich sedimentary rocks would release enough gas for around 12 millibars of atmospheric pressure. By comparison, Earth’s atmosphere is around 1,000 millibars at sea level.
Jakosky and Edwards publicly discussed with Musk as to whether there was enough carbon dioxide lurking beneath the surface. The three seemed to agree, however, that the technology to terraform Mars is some ways away yet.
In January of 1996, a number of people in Varginha, Brazil, claimed to have witnessed a UFO and encountered one or more extraterrestrials. As the story spread, there were reports the Brazilian military had captured two ETs and the news was picked up by the mainstream media, including The Wall Street Journal in the U.S. While the incident and the eyewitness account by three female witnesses inspired a local disc-shaped water reservoir and tourist sites catering to the story, the military and the Brazilian government have never confirmed the UFO nor the aliens. That may change after this week when a man came forward claiming he was a soldier in 1996, participated in the capture of the aliens and was in very close proximity to one of them.
A sign a city loves its ETs and UFOs
UFO researcher and reporter Edison Bonaventura interviewed Saulo José Machado and posted the video (watch it here in Portuguese) on his Enigmas e Mistérios (Riddles and Mysteries) YouTube channel. Portal Vigilia reviewed the video in Portuguese and Google provided the English translation of this interesting account by Machado – who claims he was a low-ranking junior soldier in January 1996 when his life was changed forever by a trip with other soldiers from his base in Belo Horizonte in southeastern Brazil to Varginha for an undisclosed operation. Make that an unusual operation too – the first thing they noticed was that they were carrying rifles with no ammunition in them. While sweeping the area where they were dropped off, he claims two other soldiers came out of the woods carrying a strange being.
“The first thing that caught my attention was the very large head. The head is completely disproportionate to the body. And a very big red eye. And then, in those 10 or so seconds that I had to observe it, I noticed that it was quite oily. Dark, a reddish more iron-colored, but very oily, and a weird smell that reminded me of acetone.” (Google translation)
In the video, Machado holds up his drawing of the creature and claims he was within five feet of it. His description of it sounds similar to the accounts of the three women, who estimated it to be five feet tall with a large head, large red eyes, thin body, V-shaped feet and brown skin. The mother of two of the girls went to the area and smelled a strong ammonia-like odor. There were reports of a second creature being found by soldiers two days later (Machado claims he was there a day or so after January 20th when the women saw it) as well as other accounts of a UFO crashing and being retrieved by soldiers, who ordered people in the area to say nothing. Some people claimed the two ‘aliens’ were taken to a medical clinic before being removed by the military. A detailed account of the numerous reports was made in on the 20th anniversary in 2016 by South of Minas (read it here).
Varginha without aliens and UFOs
Edison Bonaventura seems to consider Saulo José Machado to be a credible military witness to what would, if real, be Brazil’s Roswell incident. The local police response was that the young women saw “a citizen known as Mudinho, who probably has some mental disability and whose physical characteristics matched the description (…) make it likely that the hypothesis that this citizen, probably being dirty, due to the heavy rains and seen crouching by a wall, was mistaken by the three terrified girls as a space creature.” They say the military and emergency vehicles were actually there to be repaired, and the military claimed that the two ‘creatures’ were most likely an expectant local couple who were dwarfs.
A military witness to UFOs and a ‘shadow person’ at a U.S. Air Force nuclear base came forward this week. Are more military witnesses to UFOs and ETs revealing their stories now that the stigma and the consequences are diminishing? Will this encourage the Brazilian authorities to open the files on the Varginha UFO Incident?
Any references to “top secret bases” instantly provokes imagery and thoughts of Nevada’s most famous place: Area 51. Utah has the Dugway Proving Ground. It’s a place that, for years, has been tied to rumors concerning UFOs and dead aliens. The U.K. has Porton Down, a highly protected base that also has UFO links attached to it. But, what about the bases that we’re not sure about? Do they really exist? That’s what today’s theme is all about. Let’s begin with the Dulce Base, an underground facility said to be buried deep below the town of Dulce, New Mexico. Back in the 1970s, Paul Bennewitz – who died in 2003, in Albuquerque, New Mexico – had his own company that stood adjacent to Kirtland Air Force Base, New Mexico. Its name was Thunder Scientific. On occasion, Bennewitz had seen – late at night and in the early hours of the morning – strange, unidentified objects flying over Kirtland Air Force Base and the nearby, huge Manzano Mountains. They could have been early drone-like craft. But, for Bennewitz they were alien craft. In ingenious fashion – but from the perspective of Bennewitz, in terrible fashion – a plot was initiated to, in essence, give Bennewitz exactly what he wanted to hear.
(Nick Redfern)
At the grave of Paul Bennewitz
So, with that in mind, well-placed government agents, intelligence operatives, and experts in the fields of counterintelligence and disinformation, all fed Bennewitz fictitious tales of dangerous ETs, of thousands of people abducted and mind-controlled in slave-like fashion by the aliens, of terrible experiments undertaken on people held below the Dulce base, and of a looming confrontation between the human race and the deadly creatures from another galaxy. In other words, the Dulce Base probably does not really exist. On the other hand, UFOs, cattle mutilations, and black helicopters have all played “roles” in the story. Even the FBI took note of what was going on at Dulce. Moving on: how about what we might call a “little brother” to Area 51? Time and again, you’ll hear that whistleblower Bob Lazar briefly worked on retrieved UFOs at Area 51. We know Area 51 exists. We’re not sure about S-4 though. As for S-4, according to Lazar it was a massive facility; however, one would not know that if one were to fly over it. In fact, you would scarcely know if you were on the ground, either. Lazar explained that S-4 was actually built within the surrounding mountains, which had been carefully and massively hollowed out. It was within these reinforced, hollow areas that all of the work on the alien craft was undertaken. Nothing could be seen from the sky. Practically nothing could be seen on the ground. And, the whole facility was hidden in the mountains. We still don’t have the proof , though, that S-4 is the real deal.
Area 51 site map, as depicted in declassified CIA documents released via its CREST program
How about a room that’s all blue? Well, that’s not quite correct. But, we are talking of something that is said to be called the Blue Room. So the story goes, it’s an underground building – possibly deep below Wright-Patterson Air Force Base. And what’s said to be stored in the Blue Room? Nothing less than the remains of dead aliens retrieved from crashed UFOs. One person who heard of the Blue Room was the late Senator Barry Goldwater. He had a fascination for the UFO issue, and, throughout his life and career, made more than a few notable comments and observations on the subject. The bulk of them revolved around his attempts to determine the truth about longstanding rumors that something of a UFO nature (and something of deep significance, too) was secretly held at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base, Dayton, Ohio. On March 28, 1975, Goldwater wrote the following, highly thought-provoking, words to a UFO researcher named Shlomo Arnon: “The subject of UFOs is one that has interested me for some long time. About ten or twelve years ago I made an effort to find out what was in the building at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base where the information is stored that has been collected by the Air Force, and I was understandably denied this request. It is still classified above Top Secret.”
(Nick Redfern)
Looks like they had all been partying hard the night before
Could there be a secret base on the far side of the Moon? That’s right: I’m going to tell you the intriguing story of Project Horizon. It fell under the auspices of the U.S. Army, and had its origins in the latter part of the 1950s. The plan was to take the first steps towards constructing an installation on the surface of the Moon by the mid-1960s. The goal was for the base to be armed with nuclear weapons and which could be used to decimate the Soviet Union if the United States was hit by a sneak attack and the infrastructure of the nation was significantly destroyed. After much preliminary discussion, it was in late March 1959 that the ambitious program was finally put into place. Overseeing many of the plans to create the secret base was Lieutenant General Arthur G. Trudeau. At the time, Trudeau was the Army’s Chief of Research and Development. Now-declassified files on Project Horizon demonstrate that Trudeau and his team estimated it would cost approximately $6 Billion to design, build and fully equip a base on the Moon.
In a document titled “Project Horizon: A U.S. Army Study for the Establishment of a Lunar Military Post,” Trudeau wrote the following words: “There is a requirement for a manned military outpost on the Moon. The lunar outpost is required to develop and protect potential United States interests on the Moon; to develop techniques in Moon-based surveillance of the Earth and space, in communications relay, and in operations on the surface of the Moon, for further exploration into space and for military operations on the Moon if required; and to support scientific investigations on the Moon.” Although Project Horizon was scuttled, there are rumors suggesting that, yes, there are bases on the far side of our Moon. I say: show me the hard evidence and then I’ll be satisfied.
On January 7, 1948, 25-year-old Captain Thomas F. Mantell, a Kentucky Air National Guard pilot, died in the crash of his P-51 Mustang fighter plane near Franklin, Kentucky, United States, after being sent in pursuit of an unidentified flying object (UFO). The event was among the most publicized early UFO incidents.
Later investigation by the United States Air Force's Project Blue Book indicated that Mantell may have died chasing a Skyhook balloon, which in 1948 was a top-secret project that he would not have known about.
Mantell pursued the object in a steep climb and disregarded suggestions to level his altitude. At high altitude he blacked out from a lack of oxygen; his plane went into a downward spiral and crashed.
While many will write this mystery off as having been solved, WartimeStories cannot come to that conclusion. he therefore will leave it to you, the listener, to decide for yourself what to believe after hearing the individual eyewitness accounts, those of various military personnel, regarding the strange unidentified flying objects they saw on January 7, 1948, from no less than three military bases in Kentucky and Ohio.
Rather than being out on its own, the Earth is at the centre of a giant, 1,000-light-year-wide bubble, created by at least 15 supernova explosions, a new study has found.
There are thousands of young stars at the edge of this bubble, according to astrophysicists from the Space Telescope Science Institute in Baltimore, Maryland.
Working with experts from Harvard and Smithsonian, the team reconstructed the evolutionary history of the galactic neighbourhood over 14 million years.
In the 1970s astronomers discovered Earth was in a cosmic void, after realising no stars had formed in 14 million years, with all stars inside this 'bubble' emerging either before it formed, or passing through on their orbit of the galactic centre.
The new study found that multiple supernova explosions 14 million years ago blasted materials needed for star formation to the edge of a huge area of space, creating a 'superbubble' that is surrounded by a frenzy of star bursts, but with none inside.
The team likened the discovery to a Milky Way that resembles a 'hole-y Swiss cheese', where the holes in the cheese are blasted out by supernova, allowing new starts to form in the cheese, around the holes.
'This is really an origin story; for the first time we can explain how all nearby star formation began,' said astronomer and co-author Catherine Zucker.
Earth is at the centre of 'Swiss cheese' bubble, study find
The new study found that multiple supernova explosions 14 million years ago blasted materials needed for star formation to the edge of a huge area of space, creating a 'superbubble' that is surrounded by a frenzy of star bursts, but with none inside
Artist's illustration of the Local Bubble with star formation occurring on the bubble's surface. Scientists have now shown how a chain of events beginning 14 million years ago with a set of powerful supernovae led to the creation of the vast bubble, responsible for the formation of all young stars within 500 light years of the sun and Earth
WHAT WERE THE STUDY'S KEY FINDINGS?
Astronomers have known for decades that the sun lies inside the Local Bubble.
This is a cavity of low-density, high-temperature plasma surrounded by a shell of cold, neutral gas and dust.
The new study discovered the precise shape and extent of the shell, when it formed and its relationship to nearby star formation.
They found that nearly all of the star-forming complexes in the solar vicinity lie on the surface of the Local Bubble and that their young stars show outward expansion mainly perpendicular to the bubble's surface.
Tracebacks of these young stars' motions support a picture in which the origin of the Local Bubble was a burst of stellar birth and then death near the bubble’s centre approximately 14 million years ago.
The expansion of the Local Bubble created by the supernovae swept up the interstellar medium into an extended shell that has now fragmented and collapsed into the most prominent nearby molecular clouds.
At the centre of this new study is a 3D spacetime animation, using data from the Gaia observatory.
The animation revealed all young stars and star forming regions within 500 light years of Earth in all directions.
'We've calculated that about 15 supernovae have gone off over millions of years to form the Local Bubble that we see today,' says Zucker who is now NASA Hubble Fellow at the Space Telescope Science Institute.
The oddly-shaped bubble is not dormant and continues to slowly grow, the astronomers discovered, saying it is 'coasting along at about four miles per second.'
'It has lost most of its oomph though and has pretty much plateaued in terms of speed,' added Zucker.
The expansion speed, as well as past and present trajectories of young stars forming on the surface, were gathered using the Gaia observatory.
'This is an incredible detective story, driven by both data and theory,' says Harvard professor and Center for Astrophysics astronomer Alyssa Goodman.
Goodman is a study co-author and founder of glue, data visualization software that enabled the discovery.
'We can piece together the history of star formation around us using a wide variety of independent clues.
These include 'supernova models, stellar motions and exquisite new 3D maps of the material surrounding the Local Bubble.'
Using a trove of new data and data science techniques, the spacetime animation shows how a series of supernovae that first went off 14 million years ago, pushed interstellar gas outwards, creating a bubble-like structure with a surface that's ripe for star formation.
'When the first supernovae that created the Local Bubble went off, our Sun was far away from the action' says co-author João Alves, a professor at the University of Vienna.
'But about five million years ago, the Sun's path through the galaxy took it right into the bubble, and now the sun sits — just by luck — almost right in the bubble's centre.'
Today, as humans peer out into space from near the sun, they have a front row seat to the process of star formation occurring all around on the bubble's surface, the team explained.
Astronomers first theorised that superbubbles were pervasive in the Milky Way nearly 50 years ago, after spotting a void, where no new stars were being formed.
Using a trove of new data and data science techniques, the spacetime animation shows how a series of supernovae that first went off 14 million years ago, pushed interstellar gas outwards, creating a bubble-like structure with a surface that's ripe for star formation
Charting out bubbles, and their relationship to each other, will ultimately allow astronomers to understand the role played by dying stars in giving birth to new ones, and in the structure and evolution of galaxies like the Milky Way
'Now, we have proof — and what are the chances that we are right smack in the middle of one of these things?' asks Goodman. Statistically, it is very unlikely that the Sun would be centred in a giant bubble if such bubbles were rare in our Milky Way Galaxy, she explained, suggesting they are common.
Next, the team, including co-author and Harvard doctoral student Michael Foley, plans to map out more interstellar bubbles to get a full 3D view of their locations, shapes and sizes.
Charting out bubbles, and their relationship to each other, will ultimately allow astronomers to understand the role played by dying stars in giving birth to new ones, and in the structure and evolution of galaxies like the Milky Way.
Zucker wonders, 'Where do these bubbles touch? How do they interact with each other? How do superbubbles drive the birth of stars like our sun in the Milky Way?'
The findings have been published in the journal Nature.
WHAT IS THE EUROPEAN SPACE AGENCY'S GAIA PROBE AND WHAT IS DESIGNED TO DO?
Gaia is an ambitious mission to chart a three-dimensional map of our galaxy, the Milky Way, and in the process reveal its composition, formation and evolution.
Gaia has been circling the sun nearly a million miles beyond Earth's orbit since its launch by the European Space Agency (ESA) in December 2013.
On its journey, the probe has been discreetly snapping pictures of the Milky Way, identifying stars from smaller galaxies long ago swallowed up by our own.
Tens of thousands of previously undetected objects are expected to be discovered by Gaia, including asteroids that may one day threaten Earth, planets circling nearby stars, and exploding supernovas.
Artist's impression of Gaia mapping the stars of the Milky Way. Gaia maps the position of the Milky Way's stars in a couple of ways. It pinpoints the location of the stars but the probe can also plot their movement, by scanning each star about 70 times
Astrophysicists also hope to learn more about the distribution of dark matter, the invisible substance thought to hold the observable universe together.
They also plan to test Albert Einstein's general theory of relativity by watching how light is deflected by the sun and its planets.
The satellite's billion-pixel camera, the largest ever in space, is so powerful it would be able to gauge the diameter of a human hair at a distance of 621 miles (1,000 km).
This means nearby stars have been located with unprecedented accuracy.
Gaia maps the position of the Milky Way's stars in a couple of ways.
Gaia’s all-sky view of our Milky Way Galaxy and neighbouring galaxies, based on measurements of nearly 1.7 billion stars. The map shows the total brightness and colour of stars observed by the ESA satellite in each portion of the sky between July 2014 and May 2016. Brighter regions indicate denser concentrations of especially bright stars, while darker regions correspond to patches of the sky where fewer bright stars are observed. The colour representation is obtained by combining the total amount of light with the amount of blue and red light recorded by Gaia in each patch of the sky.
It pinpoints the location of the stars but the probe can also plot their movement, by scanning each star about 70 times.
This is what allows scientists to calculate the distance between Earth and each star, which is a crucial measure.
In September 2016, ESA released the first batch of data collected by Gaia, which included information on the brightness and position of over a billion stars.
In April 2018, this was expanded to high-precision measurements of almost 1.7 billion stars.
Earth Is Surrounded by a 1000 Light Year Wide Bubble Carved Out by Supernovas
Earth Is Surrounded by a 1000 Light Year Wide Bubble Carved Out by Supernovas
The cosmic void is surrounded by multiple star-forming regions created by the explosions. Earth is slap bang in the middle of a 1,000 light-year-wide bubble with a dense surface birthing thousands of baby stars.
Researchers have long wondered what created this "superbubble." Now, a new study suggests that at least 15 powerful star explosions inflated this cosmic bubble.
Astronomers in the 1970s first discovered the gigantic void, known as the Local Bubble, after realizing that no stars had formed inside the blob for around 14 million years. The only stars inside the bubble either existed before the bubble emerged or formed outside the void and are now passing through; the sun is one such trespasser.
This setup had suggested that several supernovas were responsible for this void. Those stellar explosions, the researchers said, would have blasted the materials needed to make new stars, such as hydrogen gas, to the edge of a huge area in space, leaving behind the Local Bubble that's surrounded by a frenzy of star births.
In a new study, published online Jan. 12 in the journal Nature, researchers accurately mapped the star-forming regions surrounding the Local Bubble and, in doing so, calculated how fast the superbubble is expanding.
This allowed the team to work out exactly how many supernovas were needed to carve out the gigantic cosmic void and better understand how star-forming regions are created across the Milky Way.
Do aliens exist? Interview with Harvard Professor Avi Loeb
Do aliens exist? Interview with Harvard Professor Avi Loeb
Are we really alone in the universe? This question is not only on the minds of science fiction authors, but also of scientists. Avi Loeb, Frank B. Baird Jr. Professor of Science at Harvard University, presented his theory of extraterrestrial intelligence at the Ada Lovelace Festival 2021 in conversation with ada co-founder Miriam Meckel.
NASA’s Webb Telescope Reaches Major Milestone as Mirror Unfolds
NASA’s Webb Telescope Reaches Major Milestone as Mirror Unfolds
This artist’s conception of the James Webb Space Telescope in space shows all its major elements fully deployed. The telescope was folded to fit into its launch vehicle, and then was slowly unfolded over the course of two weeks after launch. Credits: NASA GSFC/CIL/Adriana Manrique Gutierrez
NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope team fully deployed its 21-foot, gold-coated primary mirror, successfully completing the final stage of all major spacecraft deployments to prepare for science operations.
A joint effort with the European Space Agency (ESA) and Canadian Space Agency, the Webb mission will explore every phase of cosmic history – from within our solar system to the most distant observable galaxies in the early universe.
“Today, NASA achieved another engineering milestone decades in the making. While the journey is not complete, I join the Webb team in breathing a little easier and imagining the future breakthroughs bound to inspire the world,” said NASA Administrator Bill Nelson. “The James Webb Space Telescope is an unprecedented mission that is on the precipice of seeing the light from the first galaxies and discovering the mysteries of our universe. Each feat already achieved and future accomplishment is a testament to the thousands of innovators who poured their life’s passion into this mission.”
The two wings of Webb’s primary mirror had been folded to fit inside the nose cone of an Arianespace Ariane 5 rocket prior to launch. After more than a week of other critical spacecraft deployments, the Webb team began remotely unfolding the hexagonal segments of the primary mirror, the largest ever launched into space. This was a multi-day process, with the first side deployed Jan. 7 and the second Jan. 8.
Mission Operations Center ground control at the Space Telescope Science Institute in Baltimore began deploying the second side panel of the mirror at 8:53 a.m. EST. Once it extended and latched into position at 1:17 p.m. EST, the team declared all major deployments successfully completed.
The world’s largest and most complex space science telescope will now begin moving its 18 primary mirror segments to align the telescope optics. The ground team will command 126 actuators on the backsides of the segments to flex each mirror – an alignment that will take months to complete. Then the team will calibrate the science instruments prior to delivering Webb’s first images this summer.
“I am so proud of the team – spanning continents and decades – that delivered this first-of-its kind achievement,” said Thomas Zurbuchen, associate administrator for the Science Mission Directorate in NASA Headquarters in Washington. “Webb’s successful deployment exemplifies the best of what NASA has to offer: the willingness to attempt bold and challenging things in the name of discoveries still unknown.”
Soon, Webb will also undergo a third mid-course correction burn – one of three planned to place the telescope precisely in orbit around the second Lagrange point, commonly known as L2, nearly 1 million miles from Earth. This is Webb’s final orbital position, where its sunshield will protect it from light from the Sun, Earth, and Moon that could interfere with observations of infrared light. Webb is designed to peer back over 13.5 billion years to capture infrared light from celestial objects, with much higher resolution than ever before, and to study our own solar system as well as distant worlds.
“The successful completion of all of the Webb Space Telescope’s deployments is historic,” said Gregory L. Robinson, Webb program director at NASA Headquarters. “This is the first time a NASA-led mission has ever attempted to complete a complex sequence to unfold an observatory in space – a remarkable feat for our team, NASA, and the world.”
NASA’s Science Mission Directorate oversees the mission. NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland, manages the project for the agency and oversees the Space Telescope Science Institute, Northrop Grumman, and other mission partners. In addition to Goddard, several NASA centers contributed to the project, including Johnson Space Center in Houston, the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Alabama, Ames Research Center in Silicon Valley, and others.
For more information about the Webb mission, visit:
NEW MILITARY TECH LETS ONE PERSON FLY SWARM OF 130 DRONES
NEW MILITARY TECH LETS ONE PERSON FLY SWARM OF 130 DRONES
THE OPERATOR WOULD USE VR AND VOICE COMMANDS TO CONTROL THE SWARM.
RAYTHEON/FUTURISM
Swarm Hive Mind
In a horrifying example of the escalating warfare capabilities, the Pentagon has helped develop technology that allows a single person to control 130 drones for military operations.
Behind the project is defense contractor company Raytheon, which is working with the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA). The team successfully tested their grim new technology in an indoor and outdoor urban setting, according to a press release from the company.
Dubbed “OFFensive Swarm-Enabled Tactics” (OFFSET), the swarm was made up of 130 physical drones as well as 30 simulated drones, whatever that means. Raytheon claims that the software and hardware used in the swarm allows an operator to command a swarm with “minimal training.”
“Controlling a drone swarm changes the way an operator or group of operators think about the drones,” Shane Clark, the principal investigator of OFFSET at Raytheon. “Takeaways from this exercise help inform us of the inflection points between utility and manageability.”
VR Command Post
The operator controlling the swarm won’t be doing so at a desk with a joystick. Instead, they’ll use a virtual reality interface that allows them to look through each drone individually. This creates an “interactive virtual view of the environment,” the release said.
“You can look behind the building to access a view of drone locations for example and use the virtual reality environment to test and see if your mission is viable,” Clark explained.
The team also created a speech interface that allows operators to give voice commands to the swarm. Clark added that this will allow the operator “to act quickly while maintaining situational awareness.”
So yeah, a swarm of drones flying into warfare is a compelling — if bleak — image on its own. Knowing that a single person is controlling them using VR and voice commands, though, is downright mind-blowing.
It’s hardly surprising that 1997 was the year in which the Roswell “UFO” affair reached its pinnacle. It was, after all, the 50th anniversary of the mysterious event. Just about everyone who was anyone in Ufology was commenting on, or writing about, the case. And, unsurprisingly, mostly from the perspective of promoting and championing the alien angle. That was not the case for exactly everyone, however. In 1997 – three years after the U.S. Air Force championed its 1994 “Mogul Balloon Report” on Roswell was published – the Air Force made a surprising acknowledgement that the reported sightings of strange bodies at Roswell did have a basis in fact. Not only that: so compelled by then was the Air Force to address the bodies issue that it authorized the release of yet another report on Roswell. The last word, lo and behold, was not the last word. The last word was not even anywhere in sight. Entitled The Roswell Report: Case Closed, it did very little – if anything at all – to dampen the notoriety surrounding the case, however. In fact, the question of why the Air Force had concluded there was a pressing need on its part to explain the reports of unusual bodies found in New Mexico (when it could quite easily have summarily dismissed them as hoaxes or modern-day folklore), only heightened the interest in what did or did not occur in early July 1947.
The Air Force report focused practically all of its 231 pages on the alleged recovery of the strange bodies and asserted that: “‘Aliens’ observed in the New Mexico desert were probably anthropomorphic test dummies that were carried aloft by U.S. Air Force high altitude balloons for scientific research. The ‘unusual’ military activities in the New Mexico desert were high altitude research balloon launch and recovery operations. The reports of military units that always seemed to arrive shortly after the crash of a flying saucer to retrieve the saucer and ‘crew,’ were actually accurate descriptions of Air Force personnel engaged in anthropomorphic dummy recovery operations.”
(Nick Redfern)
Aliens, human guinea-pigs, or dummies?
There is no doubt (it is, actually, a matter of historical record) that the Air Force conducted a wide array of tests using crash test dummies in New Mexico and that at least some of these tests did occur in the vicinity of both the White Sands Proving Ground and the town of Roswell. But were those same tests responsible – either in part or in whole – for the stories concerning highly unusual-looking bodies recovered by the military during the summer of 1947? At the time of its release, the conclusions of the Air Force’s latest (final…?) report provoked a furor of controversy. While there is absolutely no doubt that tests utilizing anthropomorphic dummies were widespread in New Mexico, the Air Force’s report largely and very carefully glosses over the fact that these particular tests did not even commence until the early 1950s.
(Nick Redfern)
Driving by the White Sands Missile Range, New Mexico
This was an issue not lost on the mainstream media during the Air Force’s press conference at the Pentagon, which accompanied the release of the report in July 1997. A reporter asked, “How do you square the UFO enthusiasts saying that they’re talking about 1947, and you’re talking about dummies used in the 50’s, almost a decade later?”” Air Force spokesman, Colonel John Haynes replied, slightly and noticeably awkwardly: “Well, I’m afraid that’s a problem that we have with time compression. I don’t know what they saw in ‘47, but I’m quite sure it probably was Project Mogul. But I think if you find that people talk about things over a period of time, they begin to lose exactly when the date was.”
It should be said that the Air Force still stands by its Mogul balloon and crash-test dummy scenario. And, it’s unlikely that those two scenarios will go away. Unlike so many people in Ufology, however, I don’t think that the Air Force of today knows what happened way back in 1947. And that also goes for the Air Force of 1997, when the 50th anniversary of the near-legendary affair came around. My tentative view is that someone knows what happened back in 1947 on the Foster Ranch, and someone knows where the old files are still kept. Or, rather a select group knows the truth. But, the numbers of people who are “in the know” are small. Indeed, small enough to make sure that the truth doesn’t leak out. And, finally, both Ufologists and the Air Force have one thing in common: they have both been denied the real story of Roswell.
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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.
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