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!!!
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 Ontdek de Fascinerende Wereld van UFO's en UAP's: Jouw Bron voor Onthullende Informatie!
Ben jij ook gefascineerd door het onbekende? Wil je meer weten over UFO's en UAP's, niet alleen in België, maar over de hele wereld? Dan ben je op de juiste plek!
België: Het Kloppend Hart van UFO-onderzoek
In België is BUFON (Belgisch UFO-Netwerk) dé autoriteit op het gebied van UFO-onderzoek. Voor betrouwbare en objectieve informatie over deze intrigerende fenomenen, bezoek je zeker onze Facebook-pagina en deze blog. Maar dat is nog niet alles! Ontdek ook het Belgisch UFO-meldpunt en Caelestia, twee organisaties die diepgaand onderzoek verrichten, al zijn ze soms kritisch of sceptisch.
Nederland: Een Schat aan Informatie
Voor onze Nederlandse buren is er de schitterende website www.ufowijzer.nl, beheerd door Paul Harmans. Deze site biedt een schat aan informatie en artikelen die je niet wilt missen!
Internationaal: MUFON - De Wereldwijde Autoriteit
Neem ook een kijkje bij MUFON (Mutual UFO Network Inc.), een gerenommeerde Amerikaanse UFO-vereniging met afdelingen in de VS en wereldwijd. MUFON is toegewijd aan de wetenschappelijke en analytische studie van het UFO-fenomeen, en hun maandelijkse tijdschrift, The MUFON UFO-Journal, is een must-read voor elke UFO-enthousiasteling. Bezoek hun website op www.mufon.com voor meer informatie.
Samenwerking en Toekomstvisie
Sinds 1 februari 2020 is Pieter niet alleen ex-president van BUFON, maar ook de voormalige nationale directeur van MUFON in Vlaanderen en Nederland. Dit creëert een sterke samenwerking met de Franse MUFON Reseau MUFON/EUROP, wat ons in staat stelt om nog meer waardevolle inzichten te delen.
Let op: Nepprofielen en Nieuwe Groeperingen
Pas op voor een nieuwe groepering die zich ook BUFON noemt, maar geen enkele connectie heeft met onze gevestigde organisatie. Hoewel zij de naam geregistreerd hebben, kunnen ze het rijke verleden en de expertise van onze groep niet evenaren. We wensen hen veel succes, maar we blijven de autoriteit in UFO-onderzoek!
Blijf Op De Hoogte!
Wil jij de laatste nieuwtjes over UFO's, ruimtevaart, archeologie, en meer? Volg ons dan en duik samen met ons in de fascinerende wereld van het onbekende! Sluit je aan bij de gemeenschap van nieuwsgierige geesten die net als jij verlangen naar antwoorden en avonturen in de sterren!
Heb je vragen of wil je meer weten? Aarzel dan niet om contact met ons op te nemen! Samen ontrafelen we het mysterie van de lucht en daarbuiten.
18-01-2022
These Newly-Discovered Planets are Doomed
These Newly-Discovered Planets are Doomed
Astronomers have spied three more exoplanets. But the discovery might not last long. Each planet is in a separate solar system, and each orbits perilously close to its star. Even worse, all of the stars are dying.
The results?
Three doomed planets.
TESS (Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite) and other planet-hunting endeavours have found thousands of exoplanets in the last few years and decades. The exoplanets vary widely, from Earth-like planets in their stars’ quiet habitable zones to planets so hot that vaporized iron falls as rain.
But these three exoplanets have something in common. They have very short-period orbits—some of the shortest ever found—around sub-giant or giant stars. For planets like these, the writing is on the wall: they’ll spiral inward towards their stars, which will eventually engulf them.
A team of researchers presented these grim findings in a new paper titled “TESS Giants Transiting Giants II: The hottest Jupiters orbiting evolved stars.” The Astronomical Journal accepted the paper, and it’s up on the pre-press site arxiv.org. Samuel Grunblatt is the lead author. He’s a postdoctoral fellow at the American Museum of Natural History and the Flatiron Institute.
The discovery might sound macabre: three doomed planets that’ll spiral inwards toward their end, with stars that are also inching towards death as they leave the main sequence. But that would be misrepresenting the discovery. Instead, think of it as planetary archaeology.
“These discoveries are crucial to understanding a new frontier in exoplanet studies: how planetary systems evolve over time,” Grunblatt said in a press release. “These observations offer new windows into planets nearing the end of their lives before their host stars swallow them up.”
The three planets are TOI-2337b, TOI-4329b, and TOI-2669b. TOI stands for Tess Object of Interest, and the number is the star. The “b” denotes the planet closest to the star in each system.
This figure shows what TESS data can look like after it’s processed. Each panel was processed differently, but each one shows the same overall result. In this study, a nearby star contaminated the stellar flux data from TOI-4329, so the researchers used data processed in three different ways to strengthen their results. TESS gathered the data over 2.9 days of observations. Image Credit: Grunblatt et al 2022.
All of the planets are gas giants, similar to Jupiter in our Solar System. Astronomers found them during a survey looking for new planets orbiting evolved host stars. The worlds range from 0.4 to 1.8 Jupiter masses and 0.8 to 1.8 Jupiter radii. The stars range from about 1.2 to 1.5 solar masses and about 2.3 to 4.1 solar radii.
The planets have a wide range of densities, which indicates that each of the solar systems underwent a chaotic period of planet-to-planet interactions. Astronomers think that the history of those interactions contributed to the density variations through unpredictable heating rates and timescales.
The James Webb Space Telescope may be able to tease out some of the details in at least one of these systems. When it examines the TOI-4329 system, the presence or lack of water vapour and CO2 in the planet’s atmosphere could restrain the location where the planet formed. It could also provide insight into the types of planetary interactions that put the planet into its current orbit.
The spectrographs onboard the James Webb Space Telescope provide scientists with the data needed to analyze the materials that make up stars, nebulae, galaxies, and planets’ atmospheres. Image Credit: ESA
In planet-star configurations like these, astronomers expect the planets to inflate as they inch closer to the stars and as the stars expand. The stars will eventually engulf the planets as their orbits spiral inwards. So far, TESS hasn’t detected any evidence of a decaying orbit. But TESS found these planets during its Prime Mission. It’ll gather more data during its Extended Missions, and that data will form a longer baseline of observations. That more extended baseline may indicate that the planets are already in their death spirals.
Planetary inflation is becoming an important metric in understanding exoplanets. Why do some planets as massive as Jupiter have much greater radii? Gas giants experience radiative cooling from their inner depths, inhibiting inflation over long timescales, beginning shortly after formation. Proximity to a star might delay that cooling and promote inflation.
But there’s also growing evidence that proximity to a star can actively cause inflation through stellar flux. In a previous paper by lead author Greenblatt in 2017, the authors wrote, “Stellar flux flowing to the planets’ deep convective interiors could therefore explain their current size, an indication that planet ‘inflation’ is directly tied to stellar irradiation rather than delayed atmospheric cooling after the planets’ formation.”
Scientists think that gas giants like Jupiter have a deep radiative zone that transfers heat to a convective zone. Over time, the release of heat keeps the planet from inflating. But as a gas giant comes closer to its star, stellar flux can add heat to the planet, causing inflation. Image Credit: NASA / JPL-Caltech / SwRI
But planetary inflation is a complicated issue. In the same 2017 paper, the authors write that “Planets may be inflated by methods that are more strongly dependent on other factors such as atmospheric metallicity than incident flux.”
Though there’s no indication of orbital decay in the planets yet, there is evidence of inflation for at least one planet. TOI-2337b has the shortest orbital period of any world ever found around a red giant star, but it shows no sign of inflation. The TOI-2669b system is the most evolved system of the three, yet the planet doesn’t show any signs of inflation either. TOI-4329b, however, does show signs of inflation.
TOI-2669b is a brighter target than the other two in this study. That makes it a good target for spectroscopy with the James Webb Telescope. That data, along with tighter constraints on the planet’s eccentricity, “… could place new constraints on planet inflation and migration mechanisms and timescales.”
The three planets in this study are just the beginning. TESS should find many more of them. “We expect to find tens to hundreds of these evolved transiting planet systems with TESS, providing new details on how planets interact with each other, inflate, and migrate around stars, including those like our Sun,” said Nick Saunders, a graduate student at UH IfA and co-author of the study.
TESS had some help in this work. While it found the planets with the transit method, those findings only reveal candidate exoplanets. Confirmation as exoplanets requires ground-based follow-up observations. The Keck Observatory provided those via its High-Resolution Echelle Spectrometer (HIRES) instrument. Data from HIRES fleshed out the discoveries.
The Sun sets on Mauna Kea as the twin Kecks prepare for observing. Credit: Laurie Hatch/ W. M. Keck Observatory
“The Keck observations of these planetary systems are critical to understanding their origins, helping reveal the fate of solar systems like our own,” said UH IfA Astronomer Daniel Huber, who co-authored the study. Studies like this one might also be tiny steps towards answering humanity’s most significant question: Are we alon
All of this might sound academic to a casual reader. But our own Sun will one day leave the main sequence and begin to expand into a red subgiant and will likely engulf Earth. It’s doubtful that humanity will survive until then since it won’t happen for billions of years. Extinctions are the norm here on Earth, but maybe humanity will somehow beat the cosmic odds.
In the meantime, at least we’re learning more about nature and the Universe we’re a part of.
Alien Underground-Phil Schneider True Story. New Documentary by Darcy Weir
Alien Underground-Phil Schneider True Story. New Documentary by Darcy Weir
Alien Underground-Phil Schneider True Story. New Documentary by Darcy Weir
THE UNDERGROUND – A HIDDEN REALITY AND THE TRUE STORY OF PHIL SCHNEIDER BY DARCY WEIR New and Improved Documentary about the mysterious life of Phil Schneider and the claims he made about underground bases built by the government to house Alien technology and secrets.
Phil Schneider died in 1996. Previous to his death he had been on tour across the United States speaking out about various subjects including his involvement with building a secret underground base in Dulce, New Mexico for the military. During this time, he was said to have had an encounter with a violent E.T race in the late 1970′s which would change his whole life immediately after. This documentary explores some of the information Phil Schneider spoke about to the public in the 1990′s by examining each claim in detail with expert opinions from Richard Dolan, Richard Sauder, and Cynthia Drayer (Phil’s Ex-Wife). In this documentary you will find never before published photos of Phil’s Autopsy, documents about the Philadelphia Experiment from Oscar Schneider’s files (Phil’s father) and a very well explained background about Underground Bases. — Darcy Weir
Now this is one of the best detailed structures I have ever found on Mars. According to the photo ruler at the bottom of the photo, the structure measures 25km and could be up to 45km across! Now I thought that was amazing and it really blew my mind, but then I thought about it and decided to look around the photo more and found that there were dozens of blurred out areas...almost 10% of the entire photo! Some of those areas had blurred structures slightly visible (about 20-30% transparent) and then I realized...NASA had fooled me into thinking there were less structures on Mars. But this photo proves that theory wrong. There are hundreds of structures in this photo alone! I feel like a fool to not have known earlier. I guess the regular photos I looked through were too highly edited, but these elevation photos, were much less edited. Anyways, in the video I not only show people what I found, but teach others how to find such things. The video is in HD so the detail is great.
100% proof aliens inhabited Mars on a global scale!
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- Gemiddelde waardering: 0/5 - (0 Stemmen) Categorie:Ruins, strange artifacts on other planets, moons, ed ( Fr, EN, NL )
Black Object Shoots Past Plane 9-24-2018, Video, UFO Sighting News.
Black Object Shoots Past Plane 9-24-2018, Video, UFO Sighting News.
Date of sighting: 9-24-2018, but reported yesterday to MUFON Location of sighitng: London, UK Source: MUFON
Note that on the close up of the UFO above there are no wings, not propellers, nothing to indicate its anything but a UFO. UFOs often scout out the most high tech devices they can in order to scan them and learn about our current technological levels of humanity. Here we see a perfect oval UFO shoot past the passenger jet as if it were standing still. Also note, most UFOs are cloaked from radar, and our radar tech is the same today as it was back in the 1970, so that tech is basically stunted (stagnate) and easy to hide from. What we see here in this 2018 video is 100% proof that UFOs investigate passengers jets, jeopardizing the crew and passengers by coming incredibly close to the plane before shooting away.
Scott C. Waring - Taiwan
Eyewitness states:
We were out on our balcony at our Airbnb in London, UK. We were directly under a flight landing path, and my girlfriend took this video. After examining it later, we noticed at the 25 second mark, something flew by this plane. It went from tail to nose. Left hand side of the video. If you slow it down you’ll see something fly from the bottom left, up toward top left of the screen. Pretty amazing because the plane was right there beside it in the video, and can give you a great scale of the size comparison.
Harvard Professor Explores Does extraterrestrial intelligence exist? UFO Sighting News.
Harvard Professor Explores Does extraterrestrial intelligence exist? UFO Sighting News.
Date of interview: Dec 11, 2021 Location of interview:University of Harvard, USA
Professor Avi Loeb is interviewed about the existence of intelligent alien life in the universe. The answers are enlightening. He says that humanity is trying to comprehend beyond itself to better understand the possibility of intelligent life out there, but its hindered by the fact that most humans can't see beyond themselves, but mostly focus on the self. The big picture is ignored, but he is optimistic that humanity will continue to evolve and science will one day unlock all doors including finding intelligent life in the universe. As a Harvard professor it may be bit difficult to come out and just say, yes, aliens exist, but in his long winded and well explained interview...he did state it already. He doesn't want to jeopardize his position at an ivy league university. So yes, he believes there is life more intelligent than humans, but they are so intelligent and beyond us that we cannot comprehend such creatures even exist. Very exciting really. I totally agree 100%.
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- Gemiddelde waardering: 0/5 - (0 Stemmen) Categorie:ALIEN LIFE, UFO- CRASHES, ABDUCTIONS, MEN IN BLACK, ed ( FR. , NL; E )
Light Over Home At Tupelo, Mississippi 1-17-2022, UFO Sighting News.
Light Over Home At Tupelo, Mississippi 1-17-2022,UFO Sighting News.
Date of sighting: January 17, 2022 Location of sighing:Tupelo, Mississippi, USA Source: MUFON
Now one of the complaints from inexperienced viewers I often get is that those are planet lights. The first comment on this video stated, "Come on...anything that flashes like that is...a plane. But his impatiences and inexperience shows. You see I can quote hundreds of UFO reports that state the UFO had "flashing lights"...such incidences can be found in Project Blue Book, MJ12 files, US Pentagon documents and much more. So...flashing lights doesn't mean its always a plane. It just means the lights can easily cause a human to BELIEVE it's only a plane. Aliens are masters at deception...since they have mostly gotten away with hiding from us for so long. This video below...it's a UFO. Welcome to the truth, the truth will set you free, but first it will hurt like hell.
Scott C. Waring - Taiwan
Eyewitness states:
Moved slowly through the air with a low humming noise and had a pulsing reddish orange light and the shape of a sphere.
George Knapp is an author, speaker, and the chief investigative reporter at KLAS TV in Las Vegas, NV. Jeremy Corbell is a contemporary artist and documentary filmmaker.
Men in Black Really Exist – A Strange US Air Force Memo Suggests
Men in Black Really Exist – A Strange US Air Force Memo Suggests
UFO seekers have had to deal with the enigmatic Men in Black throughout the years.
According to John Keel, Men in Black are persons who act as military commanders with the intent of suppressing the UFO mystery inquiry, reducing the credibility of those participating in such investigations, and instilling terror in witnesses.
A previous US Air Force report corroborates this, stating that the branch and the Blue Book Project were aware of these black guys and had recorded multiple occasions in which they intimidated UFO witnesses and seized photographic evidence.
What our fans have to say:
“I’ve seen the guys in black and they absolutely exist, but not in the context of UFOs. You will encounter these folks if you are one of the unlucky ones working on a SAP. I’m not sure why they dress in all black and have such a commanding presence, but they do… they don’t only deal with UFOs, they deal with black projects in general. It all sounds a little over-the-top and somewhat comical to me, but these men are dead serious, and I’m quite sure they have carte blanche to do whatever they want.”
“They’re also in Canada… their attitudes are out of this planet… simply ignore them like a nightmare… did I or didn’t…(?)”
Take a look at the video below and let us know what you think.
A Fleet Of UFOs Flew Low Over A Highway In Illinois
A Fleet Of UFOs Flew Low Over A Highway In Illinois
A mysterious group of several glowing spheres silently and slowly flew along a busy road in Illinois near Lake Michigan before the glow of the balls began to fade and eventually disappeared into the night sky.
This video (see below) was filmed on November 26, 2021 at approximately 6 p.m. According to an eyewitness, the objects moved completely silently and, changing formation, moved towards Lake Michigan.
Initially, a “triangle” of three shining spheres was seen in the sky, and then it broke up and more spheres appeared moving in the dark sky.
Earlier, UFOs were repeatedly spotted in the Lake Michigan area, which is why American ufologists have a theory that the deep cold waters of the lake may hide an alien base.
As for this video, initially skeptics began to say that Elon Musk’s satellites got on the video, and then a version appeared that the shining spheres were actually helicopters with searchlights.
TR-3B
In turn, political scientist Thomas Wawrusko suggested that the video could have captured the flight of the secret US aircraft TR-3B.
The TR-3B is an as yet unconfirmed “black project” by the US Air Force, allegedly created by the advanced weapons laboratory DARPA.
A massive icefish breeding colony, covering almost 100 square miles, has been discovered in Antarctica's Weddell Sea, with about 60 million active nests.
It is the world's largest breeding colony of fish, representing a biomass of more than 135 million pounds, and covers an area roughly the size of Birmingham.
Until now it was not known that such a thing existed.
Each of the nests include about 1,700 eggs, with a number of fish carcasses found within, or near the site - as it is thought to be a feeding ground for seals.
Also known as notothenioids, these fish play an important role in the wider food web, say experts from the Alfred Wegener Institute in Bremerhaven, Germany.
The discovery will play an important role in the conservation of Antarctica and surrounding oceans, the researchers claim, adding that they plan to return to the area later this year to survey more of the ocean floor for signs of nests.
A massive icefish breeding colony, covering almost 100 square miles, has been discovered in Antarctica's Weddell Sea, with about 60 million active nests
Each of the nests include about 1,700 eggs, with a number of fish carcasses found within, or near the site - as it is thought to be a feeding ground for seals
WHAT ARE ICEFISH (NOTOTHENIIDAE)?
Nototheniidae, the notothens or cod icefishes, live in the Southern Ocean.
They are a family of ray-finned fish first described in 1861, with the name meaning 'coming from the south'.
They are found around the Antarctic and have elongated bodies.
They typically have two dorsal fins and grow to up to 85 inches.
Researchers from Germany discovered more than 60 million icefish nests in the Southern Ocean near Antarctica.
The team used an underwater camera 'sledge' called Ocean Floor Observation and Bathymetry System (OFOBS) in the southern Weddell Sea, Antarctica.
The researchers were surveying the Filchner ice shelf, a vast slab that has floated off the land onto the sea, as well as the surrounding seafloor, which included an upwelling of water that was 3.6 F warmer than the surrounding area.
While they were able to examine the change in water temperature, finding the massive fish colony and breeding ground was 'rather unexpected'.
Their bodily fluids contain antifreeze proteins that enable them to survive the very cold temperatures of the Southern Ocean.
As a result, blood is less thick and sticky - increasing supply of oxygen to organs.
Lead author Dr Autun Purser said data revealed this area is a prime feeding ground for seals, with 'a great many spending their time in close proximity to the nests'.
'We know this from historical tracking data and fresh tracking data from our cruise. The nests are exactly where the warmer water is upwelling.
'These facts may be coincidence, and more work is needed, but the recorded seal data show seals do indeed dive to the depths of the fish nests, so may well be dining on these fish.'
'A few dozen nests ha$
ve been observed elsewhere in the Antarctic - but this find is orders of magnitude larger,' added Dr Purser.
The researchers used an underwater camera 'sledge', OFOBS, which is a large, towed device, weighing one ton and towed behind the icebreaker RV Polarstern.
'We tow this at a height of about 5ft to 8ft above the seafloor, recording videos and acoustic bathymetry data,' explained Dr Purser.
Live images were transmitted from 1,755ft to 1,377ft down to monitors aboard the research ship, and the longer the mission lasted, the more excitement grew.
The discovery will play an important role in the conservation of Antarctica and surrounding oceans, the researchers claim, adding that they plan to return to the area later this year to survey more of the ocean floor for signs of nests
The team used an underwater camera 'sledge' called Ocean Floor Observation and Bathymetry System (OFOBS) in the southern Weddell Sea, Antarctica
'Oasis of life' is discovered beneath Antarctica's Ekström Ice Shelf
Deep beneath the Antarctic ice shelves, the environment is about as harsh as it gets.
Extremely cold, perpetually dark and with food sources almost non-existent, it is not exactly conducive to life, even if Earth is home to some remarkably hardy and resolute creatures that exist in all corners of the world.
But surprisingly scientists have discovered 77 species living there, including evidence that this 'oasis of life' dates back some 6,000 years.
Among them were sabre-shaped moss animals and unusual worms, researchers in Germany found.
Using hot water, the team from the Alfred Wegener Institute (AWI) drilled two holes through nearly 656ft (200 metres) of the Ekström Ice Shelf near Neumayer Station III in the South Eastern Weddell Sea in 2018.
Nest followed nest, the team said. Precise evaluations identified an average one breeding site per 33 square foot - with up to two per 10 square feet.
Mapping suggested it extended across a region roughly equivalent to an island the size of Malta - about 92 square miles.
Dr Purser said: 'The idea such a huge breeding area of icefish in the Weddell Sea was previously undiscovered is totally fascinating.'
The Polarstern icebreaker has been exploring it for four decades. Only individual Neopagetopsis ionah fish or small clusters of nests had ever been detected.
Dr Purser said: 'We did not know to expect any sort of fish nest ecosystem.' That part, he adds, came as a 'total surprise.'
Dr Purser said: 'After the spectacular discovery of the many fish nests, we thought about a strategy on board to find out how large the breeding area was - there was literally no end in sight.
'The nests are three quarters of a metre in diameter - so they are much larger than the structures and creatures, some of which are only centimetres in size, that we normally detect with the OFOBS system.
'So, we were able to increase the height above ground to about three metres and the towing speed to a maximum of three knots, thus multiplying the area investigated.
'We covered an area of [490,000 sq ft] and counted an incredible 16,160 fish nests on the photo and video footage.'
The round fish nests could be clearly identified - about six inches deep and two-and-a-half feet in diameter.
They stood out from the otherwise muddy seabed due to a circular central area of small stones. Several types were distinguished.
Some were 'active' with between 1,500 and 2,500 eggs and guarded in three-quarters of cases by an adult icefish of the species Neopagetopsis ionah.
Others contained only eggs. There were also unused nests, in the vicinity of which either only a fish without eggs could be seen, or a dead fish.
The researchers used OFOBS's longer-range but lower-resolution side scan sonars - which recorded over 100,000 nests - to work out distribution and density.
They were a popular destination for seals in search of food. Transmitters attached to the marine mammals showed 90 per cent of diving activities occurred there.
Nest followed nest, the team said. Precise evaluations identified an average one breeding site per 33 square foot - with up to two per 10 square feet
It's likely to be the most spatially extensive contiguous fish breeding colony discovered worldwide to date.
Bettina Stark-Watzinger, German Federal Research Minister, congratulated the researchers on their discovery, saying it makes an important contribution towards protecting the Antarctic environment.
The researchers have now deployed two camera systems to monitor the icefish nests until a research vessel returns.
The hope is that photographs taken multiple times a day will yield new insights on the workings of this newly discovered ecosystem.
Purser says he has plans to return in April 2022 for surveys of the seafloor in areas of the northeast Weddell Sea.
The findings have been published in the journal Current Biology.
ALL YOU NEED TO KNOW ABOUT WEDDELL SEALS
Scientific name: Leptonychotes weddellii
Description: Weddell seals are large animals. Both adult males and females are about 3 metres long and weigh around 400–500kg. The head is small relative to body size and the colour is usually dappled grey and black on the back with a mostly white under-belly.
Distribution and abundance:Weddell seals have a circumpolar distribution and are coastal, staying around the fast ice and venturing only 9-12 miles (15–20km) into the Southern Ocean to feed. Weddell seals haul-out onto the fast-ice to rest and moult, and for females to pup.
Weddell seals are incredibly placid sedentary animals. They can be approached without much apparent stress to the animal. When they haul-out they remain close to their access hole on top of the ice. Underwater they remain relatively close to their breeding colonies, usually within 50–100km though occasional migrations of several hundred kilometres do occur, especially by juveniles.
Weddell seals are the most southerly ranging mammal to permanently inhabit the continent. Sightings of the seals have been made in New Zealand and Australia, though they are very rare here.
Threats: The under-ice environment is relatively safe from air breathing predators such as killer whales and leopard seals.
Special adaptations: Because Weddell seals breath air and live under the fast-ice, they must breath through cracks and holes in the ice cover. There are many cracks in the ice during the warmer summer months.
During winter these openings freeze over and Weddell seals use their canine and incisor teeth to rasp open the new ice and so maintain holes through which to breathe.
Conservation status:least concern
Breeding: Weddell seals haul-out onto the stable fast-ice to rest and moult, and for females to pup, returning to the same area each year. Females of 6 years and over give birth in October to 1 pup per year. Pups weigh 25–30kg at birth and mothers care for them for 6 weeks by which time they have grown to 110–140kg. Pups learn to swim and haul-out of the water from 1 week old.
During the breeding season males defend underwater territories from other males for access to breathing holes and females. Both male and female seals vocalise, males may do so to maintain established territories. The only observation of mating (Cline et al, 1971) reported that it took place under water for 5 minutes or more. The male maintained rhythmic body undulations at a rate of 160 per minute.
Diet and feeding:Weddell seals are carnivores. Their food varies with time and location but mid-water (pelagic) and bottom dwelling (benthic) fish, squid, octopus and prawns are common. One seal was repeatedly observed to capture a fish weighing more than 40kg. Weddell seals are very capable divers, remaining under water for up to 45 minutes and reaching depths as great as 720m in search of prey. Lengthy shallow dives are probably exploration dives for new ice holes and food sources.
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.”
Beste bezoeker, Heb je zelf al ooit een vreemde waarneming gedaan, laat dit dan even weten via email aan Frederick Delaere opwww.ufomeldpunt.be. Deze onderzoekers behandelen jouw melding in volledige anonimiteit en met alle respect voor jouw privacy. Ze zijn kritisch, objectief maar open minded aangelegd en zullen jou steeds een verklaring geven voor jouw waarneming! DUS AARZEL NIET, ALS JE EEN ANTWOORD OP JOUW VRAGEN WENST, CONTACTEER FREDERICK. BIJ VOORBAAT DANK...
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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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