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...
28-09-2022
NASA’s Mars rover makes ‘fantastic’ find in search for past life
NASA’s Mars rover makes ‘fantastic’ find in search for past life
Perseverance has collected four rock samples from an ancient river delta where organisms might have thrived.
Perseverance used its robotic arm to collect rock cores from an outcrop called Skinner Ridge, which is part of an ancient river delta on Mars.
Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/ASU/MSSS
Since July, NASA’s Perseverance rover has drilled and collected four slim cores of sedimentary rock, formed in what was once a lake on Mars. They are the first of this type of rock to be gathered on another world — and scientists are excited because at least two of the cores probably contain organic compounds.
On Earth, organics, which are carbon-containing molecules, are often associated with living things, although they can be formed without the involvement of organisms.
Adding to the buzz over the rock samples, Perseverance collected them from an ancient delta in Mars’s Jezero Crater, where a river once deposited layers of sediment — and possibly other matter. River deltas on Earth often teem with living organisms. If life ever existed in Jezero, these cores are probably NASA’s best chance of finding it.
Having the cores is “fantastic”, if scientists ever hope to answer that question, says Tanja Bosak, a geobiologist at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in Cambridge.
In the coming years, NASA and the European Space Agency plan to send other spacecraft to Jezero to pick up the cores that Perseverance has collected and bring them back to Earth, where scientists will analyse them with advanced laboratory techniques. The samples, which are expected to arrive no earlier than 2033, will be the first ever returned from Mars.
“To undertake the challenge and the expense of a Mars sample-return mission, we need a great suite of rocks to bring back,” Laurie Leshin, director of the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California, said at a press briefing on 15 September. “We are off to a great start.”
Sedimentary search
Perseverance landed in the 45-kilometre-wide Jezero Crater in February 2021. Its main goal is to look for signs of past life, and its prime destination is the 3.5-billion-year-old river delta, where sediments long ago turned into rock.
Perseverance travelled to the edge of Jezero Crater’s ancient river delta (from right) early this year. Once there, it collected rock cores from sites near Hogwallow Flats. Then it rolled back to an area called Enchanted Lake, where it currently sits.
Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/University of Arizona/USGS
Perseverance spent more than a year making its way to the delta to do its main studies. After landing farther away from the delta than scientists had hoped, it drove around Jezero’s floor, where it surprisingly found ‘igneous’ rocks formed directly from molten magma, or from volcanic activity. Scientists expected the crater floor, once the bottom of a lake, to contain sedimentary rock.
It wasn’t until April 2022, when Perseverance finally arrived at the delta, that scientists found what they had been looking for. In the past few months, the rover has collected two pairs of cores from different types of sedimentary rock that make up the edge of the delta.
One pair comes from a rock outcrop known as Skinner Ridge, which is made of fine-grained sandstone similar to a type of rock seen in many places on Earth. Viewed up close in Perseverance’s sampling tubes, the Skinner Ridge cores appear light-coloured and studded with round grains of dark material. These darker grains were probably carried by the ancient river that once flowed into Jezero from regions that lie perhaps hundreds of kilometres away. So, studying the grains might tell scientists about the history of far-flung areas of Mars.
The other recently collected pair of cores comes from a spot called Wildcat Ridge, which lies just 20 metres from Skinner Ridge. These samples are lighter in colour, and are more homogeneous. They seem to be a mudstone — even more fine-grained than the Skinner Ridge cores. The finer the grains in a rock, the more likely it is to contain evidence of past life. On Earth, small grains tend to settle out in low-energy environments such as the bottom of a pond, where they can preserve decaying organisms or other signs of life that settle there.
The rover examined sedimentary rock at Skinner Ridge (left) and Wildcat Ridge (right) by grinding circular patches. The Skinner Ridge rock contained dark grains, while the Wildcat Ridge patch was lighter in colour and had finer grains.
Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/MSSS
Wildcat Ridge is also where scientists spotted the organic molecules. Next to the sites from which Perseverance drilled its two cores, the rover ground a 5-centimetre-wide circle into the rock to expose its interior texture. The rover then stretched out its robotic arm and inspected the mineralogy of the rock.
It turned out to be richer in organics than any spot studied by Perseverance so far, said Sunanda Sharma, a planetary scientist at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory. And the organics seem to be most concentrated in spots that are also rich in sulfate minerals, which can harbour signs of life. This suggests that organics and sulfate minerals were concentrated as the lake that once filled Jezero was evaporating, Sharma said.
Rolling on
Perseverance has already moved on to another area, known as Enchanted Lake, that it had previously explored. There it will work to collect another pair of samples of fine-grained rock, as well as some of the material lying around on the Martian surface.
Sometime before the end of the year, it will probably place six or more core samples on the ground, where they will serve as a first collection of rocks that could be picked up in the future. Perseverance will keep the rest of its tubes on board — some filled and some empty — and continue exploring Jezero. Ultimately, it will roll up on top of the delta and then continue out of the crater, onto the ancient terrain beyond.
Perseverance’s sidekick, the miniature helicopter Ingenuity, has lasted much longer than its designers ever thought it would. It recently made its 31st flight, having been designed for only five. Ingenuity has been flying along with the rover, helping it to scout paths forwards.
Driekwart van alle uitgestorven landdieren woonde op een eiland. De overgrote meerderheid viel ten prooi aan een ‘invasive alien species’. Via een spelletje geurcluedo met een kleine Kroatische hagedis ontdekte ik waarom eilanddieren zo gevoelig zijn voor aliens.
Daar zat ik dan. In een half afgewerkte hotelkamer op het Kroatische eiland Vis, de vensters afgeschermd met lakens, starend naar een karsthagedis (Latijnse naam: Podarcis melisellensis) die door het spiegelglas geen weet van mij had. Elke beweging noteerde ik. Elke keer ik zijn gevorkte tong zag piepen, turfde ik. Ik zat middenin een gedragsobservatie van een hagedis die ik een dag eerder ving op de rotsen van Mali Barjak, het naburige eiland met een diameter van nog geen 100 m. Die karsthagedis was er één van de meer dan tweehonderd die mijn collega’s en ik te pakken kregen op verschillende Kroatische locaties. In totaal deed ik zo’n vijfhonderdvijftig observaties op die hagedissen. “Waarom zou een mens zich daar in vredesnaam mee bezighouden?” hoor ik je denken. Wel, omdat die kleine eilandhagedis mij kon vertellen waarom zijn achterneef op het Kroatische vasteland wel kon vluchten van de bloeddorstige kleine Indische mangoeste en hij niet.
Een prooidier zonder reukzin heeft een aanzienlijke handicap
De kleine Indische mangoeste is een “invasive alien species” of – in het Nederlands – invasieve exoot. Exoten zijn organismen die afgereisd zijn naar een plaats waar ze oorspronkelijk niet thuis horen. In sommige gevallen brengt die exoot schade toe aan zijn nieuwe omgeving. Dan noemen we de exoot invasief. Onze kleine Indische mangoeste werd met opzet vanuit Azië geëxporteerd naar onder andere Hawaï, Fiji, Japan, Mauritius, en Kroatië. Dit om giftige slangen en rattenplagen te bestrijden. Waar niemand rekening mee had gehouden was dat de mangoeste een alleseter is. Hij lust dus ook wel eens een hagedis, en een vogeltje, ook wel een muisje of een kikker. Eenmaal aangekomen in een nieuwe regio verricht het dier vaak een bloedbad. En omdat de mangoeste nu ook op eigen houtje verder reist, is het niet meer dan logisch dat de kleine Indische mangoeste benoemd is tot één van de gevaarlijkste invasieve exoten op onze planeet.
De kleine Indische mangoeste werd met opzet geïntroduceerd op enkele eilanden en het vasteland van Kroatië.
Credit: J.N. Stuart.
Specifiek op eilanden zaaien invasieve exoten zoals de mangoeste dood en verderf. We zien dit veel minder op het vasteland. Moesten we weten waarin eilanddieren verschillen van hun continentale verwanten zouden we beter begrijpen waarom net zij zo kwetsbaar zijn. Die kennis zou ons toelaten eilanddieren beter te beschermen. Dus ging ik op zoek naar waar het fout loopt bij eilanddieren. Ik focuste op de eerste, meest belangrijke stap in het ontwijken van gevaar: gevaarherkenning. En dat, via één van de oudste zintuigen in het dierenrijk: de reukzin. Een roofdier ruiken geeft drie voordelen t.o.v. eentje zien, horen, en al zeker voelen:
Veel prooidieren ruiken roofdieren al voordat deze te dichtbij komen en ontsnappen onmogelijk is.
Een roofdier is vaak meester in camouflage. Dan is geur het enige wat zijn aanwezigheid verraadt.
Geur blijft gewoonlijk ook een tijdje hangen. Zo kunnen prooien risicovolle plaatsen waar veel passage is door roofdieren identificeren en ontwijken.
Een prooidier zonder reukzin heeft dus een aanzienlijke handicap. Dit is de reden waarom heel diverse dieren hun reukzin gebruiken om roofdieren te ontwijken. Dit gaat van vogels over zoogdieren tot vissen, insecten, en … hagedissen. Maar specifiek hagedissen hebben enkele handige eigenschappen die het gemakkelijk maken om reukzin bij eilanddieren te onderzoeken. Zij kunnen namelijk ruiken via hun tong. Deze merkwaardigheid maakt het voor mij mogelijk om de aandacht die een hagedis voor een bepaalde geur heeft op een gestandaardiseerde manier te achterhalen. Ik tel simpelweg het aantal keren dat de hagedis zijn tong uitsteekt. Als ik daarbovenop ook nog tekenen van angst noteer, weet ik exact wat mijn hagedis van de mangoestegeur vindt. Het is het ideale biologische model voor mijn onderzoek.
Eilandhagedissen zien zich mogelijk genoodzaakt om te besparen op hersenweefsel ten koste van hun reukvermogen
Dus zat ik daar op een Kroatisch eiland, ettelijke uren geurcluedo te spelen met karsthagedissen. Het doel van het spel: vind de moordenaar enkel op basis van zijn geur. Naast mangoestegeur bood ik hagedissen ook gember, een geurloos doekje, en geuren van lokale roofdieren (slangen) waarmee ze wel vertrouwd waren aan. Wat bleek: Eilandhagedissen staken hun tong niet eens uit naar de doekjes en stenen gemarkeerd met mangoeste- en zelfs slangengeur, laat staan dat ze er schrik van hadden. De vastelandshagedissen hadden er nochtans alle moordenaars uit gehaald! Het lijkt er dus op dat eilandhagedissen hun vermogen om roofdieren te ruiken verloren zijn; en daarmee ook één van hun belangrijkste verdedigingsmechanismen.
Een karsthagedis in een observatie-arena achterhaalt welke geur er aan een steen hangt.
Maar waarom gebeurt dit specifiek op eilanden? Via hersenscans achterhaalde ik wat er schort aan het reukvermogen van de eilandhagedissen. En wat blijkt? De hersendelen die instaan voor het verwerken van geurmoleculen zijn veel kleiner in eilandhagedissen vergeleken met vastelandshagedissen. Het is momenteel moeilijk te zeggen hoe dat komt, maar er is wel een hypothese die dit zou kunnen verklaren. De hersenen verbruiken veel energie en eilanden staan bekend voor hun barre omstandigheden. Eilandhagedissen zien zich mogelijk genoodzaakt om te besparen op hersenweefsel ten koste van hun reukvermogen. Hierbij staan ze sterk achter op hagedissen van het vasteland die met hun superieure geurzin beter gewapend zijn tegen invasieve exoten.
Ook al vallen veel karsthagedissen ten prooi aan mangoestes, toch zien we vandaag nog geen grote gevolgen voor het voortbestaan van die soort op Kroatische eilanden. Ik heb dan ook goede hoop voor mijn geschubde vrienden die ik weer uitzette op hun vangstlocatie. Hun grote aantal is waarschijnlijk hetgeen in hun voordeel speelt. Minder courante dieren ondervinden echter ook die barre eilandomstandigheden. Het is dan ook hoogstwaarschijnlijk dat die eilandcondities ook hen beïnvloeden en beperken in hun vermogen om invasieve exoten te ontwijken. Voor die zeldzamere dieren kan de introductie van een invasieve soort dat extra duwtje richting uitroeiing zijn.
We kunnen dus besluiten dat in een geglobaliseerde wereld waar dagelijks miljoenen dieren worden verhuisd via het wegverkeer, de scheep- of luchtvaart, we specifiek moeten inzetten op het voorkomen van de introductie van invasieve exoten op eilanden. Zo kan mijn Mali barjakaanse hagedis met een gerust hartje verder zonnen op zijn rots te midden van de Adriatische zee.
Ahead of the release of a much-anticipated U.S. intelligence report on aerial phenomena, former Canadian defence minister Harjit Sajjan received a briefing on UFOs.
“I expect I am not alone in noting the recent increase in comment regarding Unidentified Flying Objects in the media internationally, particularly in the U.S.,” Sajjan’s then-chief of staff wrote in a May 19, 2021 email to senior defence officials. “I believe it is prudent to request a full briefing for Minister Sajjan from the Canadian perspective on this issue.”
A lieutenant-colonel co-ordinated the effort. An accompanying five-page slide presentation included an overview of cases and procedures, which currently link the Canadian Armed Forces (CAF) with air traffic controllers, federal aviation authorities and a civilian researcher in Manitoba. CTVNews.ca acquired the slides and related emails through an access to information request.
It took six weeks of emails before a Department of National Defence spokesperson confirmed the briefing occurred in mid-2021, although they would not provide an exact date. A subsequent access to information request revealed the briefing took place on May 27, 2021.
Sajjan, a former CAF lieutenant-colonel himself, was replaced as defence minister by Anita Anand in an Oct. 2021 cabinet shuffle and now serves as Minister of International Development.
“No, we have no records of subsequent briefs based on currently-available information,” the National Defence spokesperson said. “Minister Anand has not received a brief at this juncture.”
'VITAL INTELLIGENCE SIGHTINGS'
The briefing slides say approximately 1,000 UFO sightings are reported in Canada each year.
Emails and five-page slide deck below show how Sajjan received a briefing on “unidentified aerial phenomena” in May 2021. CTVNews.ca has redacted email addresses and phone numbers for privacy. Click here to see the document full screen.
The most recent case referenced was from May 9, 2021, when the pilot of a Delta Air Lines flight over Saskatchewan asked air traffic controllers “about traffic well above them and moving right to left.” According to a publicly-available report from Transport Canada, the “controller advised that there was no known traffic in the area. The pilot replied that they couldn't figure out what it was either.”
Transport Canada, the federal department that maintains the database, warns such “reports contain preliminary, unconfirmed data which can be subject to change.”
That data is mostly supplied by Nav Canada, a private company that owns and operates Canadian civil air navigation infrastructure such as airport control towers. When Nav Canada personnel receive UFO reports, the Canadian Armed Forces (CAF) are also usually alerted.
“NAV Canada is the responsible agency for managing UAP-related reporting,” the slides prepared for the then-defence minister read. “CAF does not typically investigate sightings of unexplained phenomena outside the context of investigating potential threats or distress.”
A Nav Canada spokesperson said the company doesn’t investigate UFO reports, adding that their role is to forward information to federal authorities. They point to a Nav Canada guide to Canadian aviation procedures, which puts “unidentified flying objects” at the front of a list of “vital intelligence sightings” requiring reports. Other examples include “surface warships identified as being non-Canadian or non-American.”
A spokesperson from Transport Canada told CTVNews.ca that UFO reports “have no potential for regulatory enforcement and often fall outside the department’s mandate.”
“Reports of unidentified objects can rarely be followed up on as they are as the title implies, unidentified,” the spokesperson said in an email.
The U.S. government has funded UFO research programs almost continuously since 2007. The public got a rare peek at those efforts on June 25, 2021, when the U.S. intelligence community released an unclassified report on recent military sightings, which included UAP that “appeared to remain stationary in winds aloft, move against the wind, maneuver abruptly, or move at considerable speed, without discernable means of propulsion.”
From drones to weather phenomena to top-secret technology, many potential explanations are floated for odd observations like these, and officials say they should not be interpreted as proof extraterrestrials are visiting earth. But finding answers requires investigation, and compared to government-funded programs in the U.S., little appears to be happening in Canada.
“As our closest ally and NORAD partner continues to investigate the national security implications of UAP, it would be prudent for Canada to take a similar approach,” the former Conservative cabinet member said in a statement to CTVNews.ca. “Rather than ridicule and silence, it would be wise to take this issue seriously, with the objective of identifying the origins and intent of these UAP.”
'CANADA'S PRE-EMINENT UFOLOGIST'
Declassified records held by Library and Archives Canada reveal military UFO procedures and sightings dating back to the early 1950s. By the 1960s, responsibility was transferred to the Royal Canadian Mounted Police and scientists at the National Research Council of Canada, which ended their involvement in 1995.
According to the briefing slides obtained by CTVNews.ca, it wasn’t long before a civilian researcher described as “Canada’s pre-eminent ufologist” started receiving UFO reports directly from the military and Transport Canada.
Chris Rutkowski is a Winnipeg-based science writer and University of Manitoba communications professional who has led efforts to document more than 23,000 sightings since 1989 through the annual Canadian UFO Survey. Rutkowski told CTVNews.ca he was asked to provide material for the minister’s briefing as a “civilian advisor,” and that he last received official UFO data in early 2021.
“I have been called both a sceptic and a believer, which probably demonstrates that my position is appropriate,” Rutkowski said in an email. “We are long past the era of UFOs being a subject of ridicule. Well-trained observers have reported sightings of UFOs and UAP and there seems to be a renewed interest by both scientists and the military establishment in taking a closer look at this persistent phenomenon.”
Rutkowski, whose 10th UFO book is scheduled to be released this spring, would like to see a panel or committee formed to gather and examine Canadian cases. Findlay also thinks it’s time for Canada to be more active and open about UFOs.
“We believe the government should adopt a streamlined, whole-of-government approach to standardize the collection of reports across numerous departments and contractors, such as NAV Canada,” Findlay told CTVNews.ca in a rare statement on the subject from a Canadian politician. “Efforts should be undertaken to investigate and make those findings public in a responsible manner.”
UFO procedures remain unchanged in Canada, the Department of National Defence spokesperson told CTVNews.ca. When asked if information on the subject has been provided to Prime Minister Justin Trudeau or his office, their response was, “not directly, no.”
CTV News was first made aware of Sajjan’s UFO briefing by an anonymous source, who shared documents acquired through Canadian freedom of information laws. CTV News verified those documents by filing a new access to information request with the Department of National Defence.
Edited by CTVNews.ca's Rachel Aiello and Brooklyn Neustaeter
RELATED IMAGES
A donut-shaped UFO was spotted in Rimouski, Que. on Oct. 23, 2017 and photographed by witnesses.
(Source: 2017 Canadian UFO Survey)
Correction
A Department of National Defence spokesperson previously told CTVNews.ca that the briefing occurred in "early June 2021." A subsequent access to information request revealed that the briefing actually took place earlier, on May 27, 2021. This story has been updated accordingly.
BEWIJS VOOR BUITENAARDS LEVEN KAN ZOMAAR AL EENS IN DE BUIK VAN DIT MARSWAGENTJE ZITTEN
BEWIJS VOOR BUITENAARDS LEVEN KAN ZOMAAR AL EENS IN DE BUIK VAN DIT MARSWAGENTJE ZITTEN
Vivian Lammerse
Marsrover Perseverance heeft onlangs een monster verzameld dat organisch materiaal bevat, wat erop kan wijzen dat Mars in een ver verleden bewoonbaar was.
Ondertussen speurt NASA’s Perseverance-rover al enige tijd op Mars naar tekenen van oud, microbieel leven. In zijn zoektocht verzamelt het Marswagentje verschillende monsters. En die blijken beter dan het missieteam had durven hopen, zo laten ze weten. In de buik van Perseverance zit momenteel namelijk een monster opgeborgen dat organisch materiaal bevat. En dit monster zou zomaar eens het antwoord kunnen geven op de vraag of Mars ooit leven herbergde.
Wildcat Ridge Perseverance trof het organisch materiaal aan in een Mars-steen die de naam Wildcat Ridge heeft gekregen. De rots is waarschijnlijk miljarden jaren geleden gevormd toen modder en fijn zand zich vestigden in een verdampend zoutwatermeer. Eind juli schraapte de rover een gedeelte van het oppervlak van Wildcat Ridge weg en analyseerde het met behulp van zijn SHERLOC-instrument. SHERLOC – een afkorting voor Scanning Habitable Environments with Raman & Luminescence for Organics & Chemicals – gebruikt een ultraviolette laser om mineralen in gesteente te identificeren. Uit de analyse blijkt dat het monster een klasse organische moleculen bevat die verbonden zijn met sulfaten. En dat is interessant. Sulfaatmineralen kunnen namelijk belangrijke informatie opleveren over de waterige omgevingen waarin ze zijn gevormd.
Meer over organische moleculen Organische moleculen bestaan voornamelijk uit koolstof en bevatten gewoonlijk waterstof- en zuurstofatomen. Ze kunnen ook andere elementen bevatten, zoals stikstof, fosfor en zwavel. De vondst van dergelijke organische moleculen zijn van belang, omdat sommige van deze verbindingen de bouwstenen van leven zijn. De aanwezigheid van deze specifieke moleculen wordt beschouwd als een potentiële biosignatuur – een stof of structuur die een bewijs zou kunnen zijn van voormalig leven. Toch houden wetenschappers een slag om de arm. Sommige organische moleculen kunnen namelijk ook door middel van chemische processen, zonder de aanwezigheid van leven, ontstaan.
Het is niet de eerste keer dat er op Mars organisch materiaal wordt gevonden. Zowel Perseverance als de Curiosity-rover hebben dit al eerder aangetroffen. Toch is de huidige ontdekking een stuk spannender.
Spannender “In een ver verleden werd het zand, de modder en de zouten die nu het Wildcat Ridge-monster vormen, afgezet onder omstandigheden waarin leven mogelijk had kunnen gedijen,” legt onderzoeker Ken Farley uit. “Het feit dat er dus organische stof is gevonden in zo’n sedimentair gesteente, is heel interessant.” Toch moeten we nog even geduld hebben voordat we weten of het monster inderdaad bewijs van buitenaards leven herbergt. “Hoe geavanceerd de instrumenten aan boord van Perseverance ook zijn, verdere conclusies over wat er in het Wildcat Ridge-monster zit, kunnen we pas trekken als het monster op aarde aan een grondige inspectie is onderworpen,” aldus Farley.
Bodem en delta Marsrover Perseverance landde op 18 februari 2021 in de Jezero-krater waar de rover op sporen van (voormalig) leven jaagt. Dat Perseverance hier zoekt, is niet voor niets. Wetenschappers vermoeden namelijk dat het miljarden jaren geleden een met water gevuld kratermeer was. Tijdens Perseverance’ eerste wetenschappelijke campagne onderzocht de rover de bodem van de krater, waar hij zelfs stollingsgesteente aantrof, dat zich diep onder de grond vormt uit magma of tijdens vulkanische activiteit aan het oppervlak. Momenteel bestudeert Perseverance de delta; een oude, waaiervormige structuur die zo’n 3,5 miljoen jaar geleden werd gevormd bij de samenvloeiing van een Mars-rivier en een meer. Hier analyseert hij nu sedimentaire gesteenten. “De delta, met zijn diverse sedimentaire gesteenten, contrasteert prachtig met de stollingsgesteenten die al eerder op de kraterbodem zijn gevonden,” zegt Farley. “Het levert ons een gevarieerde reeks monsters op, die samen meer inzicht zullen verschaffen in de geologische geschiedenis nadat de krater werd gevormd.”
Twaalf monsters Wetenschappers keken erg uit naar het moment waarop Perseverance de delta aan een nadere inspectie zou onderwerpen. Zo vermoedden ze dat de kans reëel is dat hier bewijs van oud microbieel leven te vinden zou zijn. Het Wildcat Ridge-monster laat nu zien dat die kans inderdaad bestaat. Het monster is dan ook een belangrijke aanvulling op de toch al indrukwekkende collectie van Perseverance. Ondertussen heeft de rover al vier monsters in de oude rivierdelta verzameld. Ook heeft de rover al eerder rotsmonsters en één atmosferisch monster verzameld. Dit brengt het totaal aantal wetenschappelijk veelbelovende monsters op twaalf.
Uiteindelijk hopen de onderzoekers alle meegebrachte monsterbuisjes – maar liefst 42 in totaal – te vullen met interessante monsters van Mars. Door deze vervolgens naar de aarde terug te sturen, hopen wetenschappers een aantal prangende wetenschappelijke vragen te beantwoorden – waaronder natuurlijk die ene hoofdvraag: heeft er ooit leven op Mars bestaan? “Over slechts enkele jaren zullen de monsters op aarde arriveren, zodat wetenschappers ze tot in de kleinste details kunnen bestuderen,” zegt onderzoeker Laurie Leshin. “Dit is werkelijk fantastisch. We zullen zoveel leren.”
Meer weten… …over de toekomstige Mars Sample Return-missie, waarin de door Perseverance verzamelde Marsmonsters op aarde zullen worden afgeleverd? Lees dan ook dit eerder verschenen artikel op Scientias.nl!
Researchers have mounted 3D printers onto drones with the aim of creating swarms of robots that could 3D print entire buildings.
The aerial vehicles were specially designed to be able to deposit a cement-like material with enough precision to build tall structures. Groups of them together could do the job even faster.
The idea is that 3D printed shelters could be greener than standard construction methods, and drones could be useful in reaching difficult to access areas.
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Hubble Unveils an Astronomical Explosion
Hubble Unveils an Astronomical Explosion
A shroud of thick gas and dust surrounds a bright young star in this image from the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope. Hubble’s Wide Field Camera 3 inspected a young stellar object, over 9,000 light-years away in the constellation Taurus, to help astronomers understand the earliest stages in the lives of massive stars. This object – which is known to astronomers as IRAS 05506+2414 – may be an example of an explosive event caused by the disruption of a massive young star system.
The swirling discs of material surrounding a young star are usually funneled into twin outflows of gas and dust from the star. In the case of IRAS 05506+2414, however, a fan-like spray of material traveling at velocities of up to 217 miles per second (350 km per second) is spreading outwards from the center of this image.
Astronomers turned to Hubble’s Wide Field Camera 3 to measure the distance to IRAS 05506+2414. While it is possible to measure the velocity of material speeding outward from the star, astronomers cannot tell how far from Earth the star actually is from a single observation. To determine the star’s distance, they measured how far the outflow travels between successive images. From there they could infer the distance to IRAS 05506+2414. Knowing its distance allows astronomers to determine how bright the star is and how much energy it is emitting, and therefore estimate its mass – all vital information in determining the origin of this bright young star’s unusual outflow.
This Wireless Camera Taps Into Sound Waves to Reveal Deep-Sea Secrets
This Wireless Camera Taps Into Sound Waves to Reveal Deep-Sea Secrets
MIT scientists want to map the entire ocean so we can understand how climate change is forcing it to evolve.
Monisha Ravisetti
This battery-free, underwater device can harness sound waves to capture images of our ocean's deepest, darkest secrets.
Adam Glanzman
MIT scientists presented their prototype of a fascinating underwater camera on Monday. Rather than rely on battery power, this device gets juice from sound waves traveling through the ocean for its deep-sea image escapades. It even works in the darkest of environments.
Then it has the ability to wirelessly transmit all that photo data goodness back through the water to be reconstructed on a computer.
This means that if the model can be scaled up, it could spring humanity a few steps forward on the journey to achieving a massive goal: mapping every corner of Earth's oceans.
Though our beautiful planet's surface consists of a whopping 70% water (reminder, this doesn't account for depth) the research team estimates we've only ever observed less than 5% of the sea. And one reason, they say, for such lack of knowledge is viable underwater cameras are really hard to build due to battery restrictions.
Simply, a workable imager within the sea can't travel too far out from a ship without running out of power. It's also expensive to make a super long-lasting battery, and not time efficient to have to restart an expedition every time the camera at hand must be retrieved and recharged. Thus, the newly proposed sound wave-energized camera holds potential to be a game changer for deep-sea explorers.
According to an outline of the invention, published in the journal Nature Communications, the device can run for weeks on end before someone has to pick it up, allowing it to venture far out into the sea in just one go. It's also about 100,000 times more energy-efficient than other undersea cameras, the team said.
"One of the most exciting applications of this camera, for me personally, is in the context of climate monitoring," Fadel Adib, associate professor in MIT's department of electrical engineering and computer science, said in a statement. "We are building climate models, but we are missing data from over 95 percent of the ocean. This technology could help us build more accurate climate models and better understand how climate change impacts the underwater world."
As proof of principle, the research crew tested their mechanism to create color images of plastic bottles floating in a New Hampshire pond. They also captured images of an African starfish in such high resolution that you can see the tiny tubercles along its arms. Overall, it appears to be a solid pathway toward solving the underwater battery conundrum.
But perhaps even more exciting than the long-term implications of the team's camera is the absolutely remarkable way it works.
Turning sound waves into views
Basically, the team explained, this sound wave-powered camera takes advantage of noise that's already present under the sea. Passing ships, marine life, tides and other such things create sound. But what is sound, exactly?
Sound isn't an intangible force of some sort. Rather, it's the product of waves traveling through a medium and vibrating that medium on a super (super) minute scale. The medium could be air, water -- anything with atoms, really. When air vibrations hit our eardrums, for example, our brain translates the signal into what we consider sound. That's also why stuff sounds warped to us when we're underwater. Nothing is truly "warped," per se. Soundwaves just vibrate water molecules differently.
OK, so the important bit about this mechanism, for the team's new camera, are those vibrations.
The small device is encased in a special material that produces an electric signal every time it's hit by sound waves vibrating through the water. Those vibrations, in essence, vibrate it as well. Then, the vibrations are converted from mechanical energy into electrical energy, and there you have it -- a steadily powered underwater camera.
Further, to keep hardware light -- so the camera doesn't eat away at its power – the team used off-the-shelf imaging sensors and cheap flash instruments that can only capture images in grayscale. From there, they used sort of an old-fashioned way of obtaining a full-color image.
"When we were kids in art class, we were taught that we could make all colors using three basic colors. The same rules follow for color images we see on our computers. We just need red, green and blue -- these three channels -- to construct color images," Waleed Akbar, MIT researcher and co-author of the study, said in a statement.
First, the camera captures the image with a specifically tailored red LED light filter, then again with a blue filter and again with a green one. Put together, you get the full pic. Finally, all the image data is encoded in computer language, aka ones and zeros, and here's the kicker.
It's sent to a receiver back as soundwaves.
The camera receiver basically transmits its own sound waves to the camera, then the camera can either reflect the waves back or absorb them fully. Altogether, this creates a sort of binary code to tell the receiver what the image data really is.
"This whole process, since it just requires a single switch to convert the device from a nonreflective state to a reflective state, consumes five orders of magnitude less power than typical underwater communications systems," MIT researcher Sayed Saad Afzal said in a statement.
As of now, however, the camera only possesses a maximum transmission range of 40 meters from the receiver. But the team said it wants to increase both that range and the device's memory capacity going forward.
Eventually, they said, it could potentially capture real-time photos and perhaps even stream underwater secrets right to a computer.
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Mysterious Cases of Living Fossils, Suspended Animation, and Hibernation
Mysterious Cases of Living Fossils, Suspended Animation, and Hibernation
We all know that fossils, by their very nature, are dead. Of course, nothing can survive the conditions of pressure, depth and time required to petrify wood, see saplings mature into massive trees, transmogrify vegetation into coal or metamorphose mud into solid rock. Still, living creatures seemingly from remotest antiquity keep turning up encased in stone from far beneath Earth's surface, embedded inside solid tree trunks and in other situations defying both reason and the gospel of the Great God Science.
Living Fossils Story #1: Ancient Wormhole Mine
One such case occurred April 22, 1881, when miner Joe Molino was working deep in the Wide West Mine outside Ruby Hill, Nevada. When he wedged loose a protruding hunk of stone from the tunnel wall it landed on his foot. Enraged, he grabbed a sledgehammer and smashed it to bits. Molino was stunned to see his hammer blow had exposed a baseball-sized cavity in the rock. It was half full of motionless white worms.
As a crowd of quizzical miners gathered to view the unusual artifacts the worms began to move. Within an hour they were crawling around on the floor of the tunnel.
Mine operators sent the worms (whose species apparently was never determined) and their solid stone sarcophagus to the U.S. Bureau of Mines. Several weeks later the bureau sent the mine operators a letter declaring they must have been mistaken. Since it clearly is impossible for creatures to have survived under the circumstances described, as far as the bureau was concerned there was no way the incident could have happened.
In 1892 an ore nugget found in an Arizona mine was found to contain a dead beetle from which emerged a live beetle: is that a living fossil or what?
Yet more scientific mystery was brewing in the American West when, sometime in 1892, a large beetle was found encased in a chunk of iron ore in the Longfellow Mine outside Clifton, Arizona. The ore nugget and its dead inhabitant were turned over to El Paso geologist Z. T. White, who placed the insect in a specimen case. Several days later he was shocked to see the creature move. Watching through a magnifying glass White saw a small beetle emerge from the body of the larger, dead one. He placed the small beetle in a jar where it lived for several months. When it died, he presented it, the larger beetle and the lump of ore to the Smithsonian Institution , where they may remain to this day.
Living Fossils Story #3: A Load of Bullfrog
Since the vast majority of fossils are buried, it is predictable that mines are the main source of mysterious zoological artifacts. In 1873, miners at the Black Diamond Coal Mine outside San Francisco found a large frog encased in limestone.
This common (but venerable) bullfrog was apparently blind, and able to slowly move just one leg. After several hours on the surface, it died. The frog and its entombing stone were given to the San Francisco Academy of Sciences, where its survival of what would seem an impossible stretch of time continues to defy understanding.
Yet not all living fossils are found in stone or ore.
Once in 1893 in Ontario, Canada a live toad emerged from deep inside a tree trunk!
In October 1893 workmen at the Brown and Hall Sawmill in Ontario, Canada were using a circular saw to cut a large tree trunk into planks when the blade sliced through a cavity containing (and almost cut in two) a live toad imprisoned squarely in the middle of the tree trunk. The tree was about 200 years old, and the spherical, perfectly smooth hole in which the amphibian was entombed was about 60 feet (18 meters) above the ground. The toad tumbled from its wooden prison and hopped away, seemingly none the worse for its long confinement.
Another report of a live toad in a hole comes from England. In 1829 huge granite blocks that had formed a submerged footing under the docks of Liverpool's George's Basin were being cut into small chunks to be made into steps. During one of the cuts, the stone saw revealed a little hole in the middle of a block, and a toad within it.
Workers gently enlarged the hole to free its occupant, and the amphibian made several futile attempts to get to its feet. Several hours later, after trying one last time to assume its normal crouching position, the toad sank to the pavement and died. Several scientists who later examined the small corpse confessed they were at a loss to explain how the animal could have been found alive under such airless, foodless and waterless conditions. One of these learned men took the dead animal home with him, and it was never seen again. It was not the first or last impossible fossil yielded by Britain.
Living Fossils Story #5: Newt News
In 1818 professional geologist Dr. E.D. Clark, who taught at Caius College in Cambridge, Scotland, was present at the digging of a pit on a friend's property when the workmen hit a layer of animated fossils. As one of the workers was breaking up a large chunk of chalk stone into smaller pieces so they could be removed from the hole he found three newts embedded in the rock. Clarke placed them in the bright sunlight and was stupefied when they began to move. Two of them died later in the day, and for years he exhibited them to his students during his lectures on prehistory. He placed the third newt in a nearby brook, and it "skipped and twisted about as though it had never been torpid," and escaped, he later said. Clarke was never able to identify the species to which the newts belonged.
Upon Clarke's retirement he donated the preserved newts to the university's biology department, where, for decades, other professors displayed them during lectures. During the chaos of the 1940 Nazi bombing blitz these pickled specimens turned up missing. Unless they were blown to atoms by a Luftwaffe bomb, they may remain somewhere within Cambridge University, forgotten and still unexplained.
This is a fossil of a flying dinosaur, a Pterodactylus antiquus, and a close cousin of this species was apparently still alive in France in the 1850s according to newspaper reports at the time.
The most incredible find of a living fossil is that reported by the Illustrated London Times of February 9, 1856. The incident occurred in France during the construction of a railway tunnel between the towns of Nancy and St. Dizier. According to the article, workers were breaking up a huge boulder when a goose-sized monster staggered from a freshly exposed cavity and screeched hoarsely before falling dead. It had a long beak, sharp teeth, four legs joined by membranes, and feet with long hooked talons. Its flesh was oily and glossy black.
The mysterious carcass was taken to a paleontologist who instantly recognized the animal as a Pterodactylus anas, a denizen of the Jurassic Period , which ended 135 million years ago. There is no record of whether the body was preserved and still exists.
Possibilities
Certain animals' ability to live long stretches without sustenance is possible via hibernation to escape the lean, hostile conditions of winter. Because their metabolisms are conditioned to arouse them upon the advent of the warmth and renewed food supplies of springtime, they are seldom in suspended animation for more than four or five months. What might happen if spring never arrived? What if their hibernation dens were to be buried by glaciers and/or metamorphose into rock?
Southern Methodist University professor of biology Dr. John Ubelaker, Ph.D. points out that many organisms possess the ability to lower their metabolisms, and that this function is often triggered by environmental conditions. This permits survival through difficult times.
"This is a common phenomenon among many free-living nematodes that have the ability to form a resting stage--dauer larvae--in order to survive a stressful situation," he says. "In these nematodes the ability to control water and water loss is critical, and several metabolic-biochemical processes operate."
Nematodes that have come to life are perhaps the most incredible living fossils. A colorized electron micrograph of a soybean cyst nematode and egg.
In his 1863 book History of the Supernatural noted British author and scientist William Hewitt recounted a midsummer incident he had personally witnessed several years earlier in which workmen in Nottinghamshire, England were digging a ditch and unearthed what he called "a regular stratum of frogs." The creatures were not only alive, but so animated they all hopped away.
He described the layer of mud that had held the frogs as "stiff as butter," and based on the time of year and his examination of the ground where they were buried, he estimated they had been there at least six months. As he asked his readers, "If these frogs could live six months in this nearly solid casing of viscous mud, why not six or any number of years?"
Ubelaker expands upon this premise:
"An interesting fact of life is that an organism's structure and composition can remain virtually the same even though it continuously takes in nutrients and produces wastes. Often defined as a dynamic equilibrium, life allows concentrations of the mixture of the materials in an organism to remain constant even though individual molecules are constantly shifting back and forth, increasing or decreasing in a short time scale," he says."Remember that an organism at equilibrium is dead. A common classroom comparison is often made with a river and the steady state condition of organisms--the river maintains the same level and shape even though water is constantly flowing through it. Rivers rise and change course, drop to low levels depending on the available water, but at any one point it (and its concentration of materials) remains quite constant. In organisms the structure, proteins, nucleic acid, lipids stay relatively constant even though no one molecule remains in any pool for long."
The erratic and odd sides of the natural world remind us of how much we still have to learn about Mother Earth and the processes that govern her and her multitude of children. There are doubtless many more living relics of the primordial past awaiting exhumation. When they do come to light, they should be studied meticulously in order to ascertain how they survived such extremes of time, temperature and deprivation. The possibility of harmlessly subjecting human beings to suspended animation could solve problems of surviving extended space travel, awaiting the return of loved ones from the stars, outlasting terminal illnesses until cures are discovered, or simply staying alive long enough to meet one's great-great-great-grandchildren. Before we can even start on such grand aspirations, however, we must admit this potentially priceless process exists.
Top image: Frog brooch of amber and bronze on a rock, representative of living fossils.
A radar on Zhurong can penetrate the surface to a depth of 100 metres.
Credit: Xinhua/Shutterstock
China’s Zhurong rover has peered deep under the surface of Mars, finding evidence of two major floods that probably shaped the region the robot has been exploring since it landed in May 2021.
An analysis published in Nature today1 is the first result from Zhurong’s radar imager, which can probe up to 100 metres below the surface. “It is a very interesting paper, and I was particularly impressed by how deep they can see with this radar,” says Svein-Erik Hamran, a planetary scientist at the University of Oslo, who analysed the only previous data from ground-penetrating radar used on the planet, collected by NASA’s Perseverance rover.
The history of Zhurong’s landing site — on Utopia Planitia, vast plains in Mars’s northern hemisphere — has puzzled scientists. Some have theorized that water or ice was once a feature of the landscape. Observations from space have identified sedimentary deposits that suggest the region was once an ancient ocean or submerged by huge floods, and geological features, such as pitted cones, resemble structures formed by water or ice. In May, researchers analysed infrared images of the landing site taken by China’s Mars orbiter, Tianwen-1, and found hydrated minerals that could have formed when groundwater rose through the rock or ice melted.
But the region could have also been covered in lava, concealing some of these hydrological processes in the subsurface. Eruptions from the volcano Elysium Mons to the east of the landing site, or other volcanic activity, could have covered the region in magma, as has been observed in other parts of the Utopia basin. By studying the radar data, researchers hope to understand what happened, and whether water or ice could still be lurking below the rocks. “We want to know what is going on beneath the surface,” says study co-author Liu Yang, a planetary scientist at the National Space Science Center in Beijing.
Below the surface
Zhurong is China’s first rover on the red planet, and it has been exploring the southern part of Utopia Planitia. The rover’s ground-penetrating radar transmits high-frequency radio waves that can penetrate the surface to a depth of between 3 and 10 metres, and low-frequency waves that can reach up to 100 metres underground but offer poorer resolution. The study authors analysed low-frequency data taken between 25 May and 6 September over more than 1,100 metres of terrain as Zhurong travelled south of its landing site. Radar signals reflect off materials under the surface, revealing the size of their grains and their ability to hold an electric charge. Stronger signals typically indicate larger objects.
The radar did not find any evidence of liquid water down to 80 metres, but it did detect two horizontal layers with interesting patterns. In a layer between 10 and 30 metres deep, the team reports, the reflection signals strengthened with increasing depth. The researchers say this is probably due to larger boulders resting at the base of the layer, and smaller rocks settling on top. An older, thicker layer between 30 and 80 metres down showed a similar pattern.
The older layer is probably the result of rapid flooding that carried sediments to the region more than three billion years ago, when there was a lot of water activity on Mars, says co-author Chen Ling, a seismologist at the Institute of Geology and Geophysics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, in Beijing.
The upper layer could have been created by another flood some 1.6 billion years ago, when there was lots of glacial activity. Chen says it is unlikely that the upper layer contains intact lava flows, because it has a smaller ability to hold an electric charge than would be expected for intact volcanic rocks. Furthermore, the researchers didn’t see any sudden changes in layering, which would be expected when lava flows meet sedimentary material.
The Jezero crater is a paleolake on Mars. Its outlet canyon, carved by overflow flooding, can be seen in the upper right side of the crater.
(Credit: NASA/Tim Goudge)
Volcanic or sedimentary?
But, Chen says, it is possible that a thin coat of lava once covered the upper layer and it has gradually been broken down into smaller pieces. Radar data alone cannot definitively reveal whether material is sedimentary or volcanic, says Xu Yi, a planetary scientist at Macau University of Science and Technology.
Radar data are good at indicating the layering and geometry of subsurface material, but not so good at pinpointing its composition, including whether the material is ice or rock, says Hamran. Often, researchers rely on other clues, such as rocks peering out from the surface, to build a picture of past events, he says. The authors say they can’t rule out the possibility that the region contains buried saline ice.
More radar results are expected from the mission, including data taken during Zhurong’s continued traverse of Mars, results from the high-frequency radar measurements already made, and Tianwen-1’s orbital radar observations, which penetrate deep into the planet. They could help to clarify details of the terrain. “This is only the first step,” say Ling.
doi: https://doi.org/10.1038/d41586-022-03056-1
References
Li, C. et al.Nature https://doi.org/10.1038/s41586-022-05147-5 (2022).
Many ancient texts and Internet stories claim that humanity is the result of genetic mutation done to prehistoric humans by intelligent beings from outer space. Sitchin, who posed a great impact on the ancient astronaut theories, believed that an advanced race of intelligent beings arrived on Earth 450,000 years ago during the Age of Neanderthals, and through genetic engineering, they created modern-day human beings. Moreover, another theory that might support Sitchin’s claims is the mystery of Rh-negative blood which links humans to otherworldly origins.
“If mankind evolved from the same African ancestor then everyone’s blood would be compatible, but it is not. Where did the Rh- negatives come from? Why does the body of an Rh-negative mother carrying an Rh-positive child try to reject her own offspring? Humanity isn’t one race, but a hybrid species,” –Species with Amnesia: Our Forgottenby Robert Sepehr.
Species with Amnesia: Our Forgotten History
The population with the highest concentration of Rh-negative blood type is located between the border of Spain and France in the Pyrenees mountain range. The people that occupy this isolated region are known as the Basque, and they have long confounded anthropologists and historians. The language spoken by the portion of the territory is not related to any other in that part of the world. Up to 35% of Basque people have an Rh-negative blood type that is least likely to mutate or interact with other blood types.
There are 8 most common blood types (A+, A-, B+, B-, O+, O-, AB+, AB-); a classification derived from proteins found on the surface of cells which are basically designed to wage war against bacteria and viruses in the human body. Around 85% of humans in the world are Rh-positive and have no issues receiving blood from positive or negative donors.
Whether Rh-negative blood is just a mutation or not is something that has caused debate among researchers. If it was a mutation, then why are the people who possess Rh-negative blood known for having extra vertebrae? This, just as the blood type, is explained scientifically as being a mutation. However, according to modern DNA sequencing, it is demonstrated that humanity is not just one single race that descended from the same ancestor in Africa, but a hybridized species, with a far more enigmatic truth behind it all.
The fact is if the mother is Rh-negative, her immune system treats Rh-positive fetal cells as if they were a foreign substance. The mother’s body makes antibodies against the fetal blood cells. These antibodies may cross back through the placenta into the developing baby. They destroy the baby’s circulating red blood cells. It suggests somewhere in our lineage that the Rh negatives and the Rh positives are perceived as being profoundly different.
Rh-negative is very rare. It was not spread across the world until colonization started in the 15th century. Rh-negative didn’t exist in the Americas, Southern Africa and Asia. It was only in Europe. According to scientists, modern humans arose in Africa at least 250,000 to 300,000 years ago. They are all Rh-positive. They do not have any Rh-negative, so from where did it evolve?
Robert Sepehr tells in his book “Species with Amnesia: Our Forbidden History” more about the enigmatic blood type Rh-negative. The author suggests that highly advanced civilizations had been on Earth before us, just to be destroyed by some great global catastrophe as mysteriously, history tells us.
Could the Rh-negative blood type offer evidence of a vastly different pre-human evolution than what we are led to believe in our history books? Might it offer indisputable proof of extraterrestrial intervention in the remote past? But if so, is the experimentation with intelligent hominid over, or is it still taking place?
Ancient Origins writes:“Indeed, it is amidst the Basque of France and Spain that we find an odd prevalence of one human blood type known as Rh-negative. The use of Rh here denotes “Rhesus,” as the origins of the blood type were labeled after a common factor shared between humans and the Rhesus monkey; today, the Rh blood group system is one of thirty of the existing current blood group systems recognized by science, of which close to eighty-five percent of humans have. 8 The most common manifestation of the Rhesus blood factor in humans is known as Rh-positive blood. By studying the common factors present between blood types of, for instance, humans and the Rhesus monkey, it becomes clear in terms of the genetic information present here that at some point in our ancient past, humans must have shared a common ancestor with this species of Old World monkeys.”
Sepehr argues that “highly advanced civilizations have been here before us, just to be destroyed by some great global catastrophe. But for each race that has died out, another has taken its place, with a selected few holding on to the memories and sacred knowledge of the past race. In our vanity, we think we have discovered some of the great truths of science and technology, but we are in fact only just beginning to rediscover the profound wisdom of past civilizations. In many ways, we are like an awakening Species with Amnesia, yearning to reclaim our forgotten past.”
Many believe that Rh-negative blood would be the legacy that the Anunnaki left on Earth among other things.
LAUREL, Md. — For the first time in history, a spacecraft from Earth has crashed into an asteroid to test a way to save our planet from extinction.
The spacecraft, NASA's Double Asteroid Rendezvous Test (DART) probe, slammed into a small asteroid 7 million miles (11 million kilometers) from Earth tonight (Sept. 26) in what the U.S. space agency has billed as the world's first planetary defense test. The goal: to change the orbit of the space rock — called Dimorphos — around its larger asteroid parent Didymos enough to prove humanity could deflect a dangerous asteroid if one was headed for Earth.
"As far as we can tell, our first planetary defense test was a success," said Elena Adams, DART's mission systems engineer here at the Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory (JHUAPL), after the successful crash. "I think Earthlings should sleep better. Definitely, I will."
That's something the dinosaurs couldn't do 65 million years ago, when the massive Chicxulub asteroid slammed into the Yucatan Peninsula and led to their extinction.
"The dinosaurs didn't have a space program to help them, but we do," Katherine Calvin, NASA's chief scientist and senior climate advisor, said before the crash. "So DART represents important progress in understanding potential hazards in the future and how to protect our planet from potential impacts."
The golf cart-sized DART spacecraft slammed into Dimorphos at 7:14 p.m. EDT (2314 GMT) while flying at a whopping 14,000 mph (22,500 kph). The spacecraft wasn't large as probes go, but NASA hoped that its 1,320 pounds (600 kilograms) would be enough to move the 534-foot-wide (163 meters) Dimorphos a bit faster in its orbit around its parent.
"The spacecraft is very small," said planetary scientist Nancy Chabot, DART coordination lead at JHUAPL, which oversees the mission for NASA, before the impact. "Sometimes, we describe it as running a golf cart into the Great Pyramid."
Despite the on-target crash, there was a mix of calm and anticipation at DART's mission control center at JHUAPL as the spacecraft sped towards its destruction. Nothing went wrong during the crash, so engineers didn't have to try one of the 21 different contingency plans they had in their hip pocket.
Much of DART's last four hours were automated, with the spacecraft's navigation system locking on to Dimorphos in the final hour of its approach. DART's main camera beamed a photo to Earth every second until the feed went black as the spacecraft crashed into the asteroid.
"It's nerve-wracking," Andy Cheng, chief scientist for planetary defense at JHUAPL, said of the final days before the crash. He came up with the DART mission's concept in 2011. The $313 million DART mission launched on Nov. 23, 2021.
As DART closed in on Dimorphos, the asteroid transformed from a mysterious bright dot into a detailed landscape of boulders, crags and shadowed terrain. Then, right on time, the live feed from DART went black and flight controllers inside DART's mission operations center jumped for joy and traded hugs and high fives in a triumphant celebration. DART hit its asteroid bull's-eye.
Did humanity's first planetary defense test succeed?
Other spacecraft also watched the crash.
NASA's new James Webb Space Telescope, the Hubble Space Telescope and the Lucy spacecraft on its own asteroid mission all tracked the crash from their respective vantage points across the solar system. On Earth, a vast network of ground-based telescopes were trained on the event and will be following the binary Didymos-Dimorphos system over time to see how much faster Dimorphos is now moving in its orbit.
"Our requirements are for 73 seconds but we actually think we're going to change by about 10 minutes," Statler said.
It will take time to know if the DART impact was successful as a planetary defense test.
More than three dozen telescopes around the world, including at least one on every continent, will be tracking the Didymos-Dimorphos asteroid system over the next six months to understand exactly how effective the test was. The first radar observations of the impact could come as early as Tuesday (Sept. 27), said Cristina Thomas, a planetary scientist with Northern Arizona University who leads the DART observations working group.
"We're going to be observing Didymos until it's no longer observable," Thomas said. DART mission scientists added that they should know definitively how much DART moved Dimorphos in the next two months.
The observation campaign has brought in volunteer student and university groups around the world, each hoping to add their observations to the DART effort.
I was looking over a recent Gigapan photo taken by the mars rover when I noticed a sculpture in a hillside, then below it, I noticed a human-like figure gripping a shield or staff. The figure clearly looks like it a real living and breathing person, but they died there in that place, in that position and were fossilized somehow. Maybe its a shield from the side and they were holding it up to shield them from something coming. Now understand that we humans have two strands of DNA the intertwine...if aliens had say...6 or more strands of DNA intertwined, the skin, bones would have 600% resistance from breaking down in the environment after death compared to our own. Hey please check out the HD video I made below and hear my explanation more deeply.
In this recent email report, a glowing sphere is seen in the sky which changes its color and its shape from sphere to diamond in a blink of an eye. The object is huge, much to big to be a star or planet and the flashes seem to be its only form of communication to those watching. If you can decipher the color pattern, you will also decipher a message they were sending to those watching. I would guess such a message would be short and to the point, like...we come in peace, or...greetings universal friends.
Scott C. Waring - Taiwan
Eyewitness states:
At 0600 I went outside in my backyard to bring the dogs out to go to the bathroom. While walking them around the yard I noticed an odd looking light to the east. I was at [gps location redacted] and it wasn’t exactly 266 degrees West. It took awhile for my eyes to focus on the source to make it out, but it appeared triangular with flashing lights. It was hovering. I took a quick video in case it disappeared while I went inside to get my wife and kids to witness the event. All 3 said the object was abnormal. I have worked for the airlines as a mechanic for over 20 years and was also in the Air Force for 4 years so can say this was unconventional to anything I have witnessed. After about 15 minutes we all went inside as it was getting close to dawn. I decided to go down and quick get my telescope to see if I could get a closer look at it. By the time I got back outside the object was gone. The video I took from my camera seemed distorted, like it was interfered with and blurry. You could see it much better in person.
The DART Mission, Will This Save All Life On Earth?
The DART Mission, Will This Save All Life On Earth?
This could be history in the making and joining me tonight will be my space science guy Dan from smAshomAsh so come and be apart of this event with us. Hope to see you here, stay blessed and safe...
Eridu: The Sumerian Garden of Eden and the Oldest City in the World?
Eridu: The Sumerian Garden of Eden and the Oldest City in the World?
Today, Eridu is often considered to be one of the oldest permanent settlements in Mesopotamia, and perhaps even in the world. The ancient Sumerians also believed that Eridu was the first city in the world and they documented that belief in the Sumerian King List and the Eridu Genesis . At least 18 layers of settlement are found at the site, could the ancient Sumerian belief be possible?
Archaeological evidence shows that the earliest structures date to the 6th millennium BC. The city reached its zenith during the 4th millennium BC and continued to be inhabited until around the 7th century BC. By then, however, the city had lost its importance.
Some of the baked bricks used in the construction of the Sumerian ziggurat at Eridu, southwest of Nasiriyah, Iraq, are stamped with the name of King Ur-Nammu (2123-2106 BC).
Eridu (known today as Tell Abu Shahrain) is located about 20 km (12.5 miles) to the southwest of the famous city of Ur. As its modern name indicates, the archaeological site is a tell, which is a huge mound formed over the millennia as a result of new settlements being built over the ruins of the previous ones. The tell rises to a height to 7 meters (23 feet), and is formed by 18 levels of occupation, according to the archaeological excavations. The bulk of this has been dated to the Ubaid and Uruk periods, which lasted from the 6th to 4th millennia BC.
The ancient Sumerians themselves made mention of Eridu’s antiquity. In the Sumerian King List , for example, it is written that “After the kingship descended from heaven, the kingship was in Eridug.” In addition, in the creation myth known as the Eridu Genesis , it is said to have been one of the five cities that existed before the Deluge, the others being Bad-Tibira, Larak, Sippar, and Suruppak.
The God of Eridu Temple
The patron god of Eridu was Enki (known also in Akkadian as Ea), the god of water. According to Sumerian mythology, the settlement was founded by Enki, and it was from this city that civilization was spread to other parts of the land. Although Enki was initially a local god, he rose in importance as the city grew in influence, resulting in him being incorporated into the pantheon of other cities as well. In Eridu, Enki’s temple is known as E-Abzu (Abzu may be translated as ‘Deep Ocean’, and refers to the underground spring from which all life is believed to have begun).
Rough map of the Eridu mound showing the main ziggurat, temple, and a few buildings.
Archaeological excavations of the E-Abzu have revealed that the temple began as a small room containing what has been referred to by scholars as a ‘cult niche’ and an ‘offering table’. Over the millennia, however, the inhabitants built new temples over the ruins of the old ones, each bigger than the last. The E-Abzu eventually became a large ziggurat, an apt reflection of Enki’s status as a major deity. It has been proposed that the E-Abzu may have been the largest of the ancient Mesopotamian ziggurats.
Economic Activities
Although the E-Abzu is the focal point of the site’s archaeology, there are either elements of interest. More recent excavations, for instance, have revealed that during the Ubaid period, the city was a pottery production center. This is evident in the pottery works, which had large scatterings of pottery fragments and kiln waste. Additionally, remains of fishing nets, weights, and even models of reed boats have been found at the site, suggesting that fishing was a major economic activity carried out by the inhabitants.
There are nine lines of cuneiform inscriptions on this fired clay brick; stamp of the king Amar-Sin (Amar-Suen, previously misread as Bur-Sin), king of Ur. 2100-2000 BC. From Eridu (modern-day Tell Abu Shahrain), southern Mesopotamia, Iraq. It is currently housed in the British Museum in London.
(Osama Shukir Muhammed Amin FRCP(Glasg)/ CC BY SA 4.0 )
Eridu was the dominant city in southern Mesopotamia during the Ubaid period, but it was eventually superseded by Uruk. Nevertheless, it continued to be revered as the first city, and it retained its religious significance thanks to the E-Abzu.
It has been suggested that ecological changes, i.e. the recession of the gulf coast and the increasingly unreliable water table, were responsible for the decline of Eridu around the end of the 3rd millennium BC. The city continued to be inhabited up until around the 7th century BC, although by then it had become a mere shadow of its former glory.
In 2016, Eridu was inscribed as a UNESCO World Heritage Site, as part of the ‘Ahwar of Southern Iraq: Refuge of Biodiversity and the Relict Landscape of the Mesopotamian Cities’.
Top image: Re-creation of the port at Eridu. Source: Public Domain
For a long time, UFOs have been known to be Aerial phenomena that moves only in one medium, but then the report of objects diving into the water and coming out hit the media. Now, many experts including the Pentagon consider UFOs as “transmedium objects.” For example, an object could be considered “transmedium” if it could fly through Earth’s atmosphere in addition to another environment, such as space or underwater. There are more than dozens of incidents reported by the Navy personnel that justify the UFO maneuvers underwater with enormous speed. Those who have served years in the Naval force experienced something whose origins are still not understood.
1966, USS Tiru (SS-416) Encounters UFO
In 1966, a mysterious series of events occurred with the US Navy submarine USS Tiru SS-416. The submarine left Pearl Harbor in Hawaii and was bound for Seattle, Washington, where it was scheduled to stay in the repair dock for several days, after which it was supposed to take part in torpedo exercises. On the way to Seattle, one of the crew members reported something strange in the sky at a distance of about 2 miles, and he asked other sailors to check it, but at that moment, the boat’s radar station also recorded anomalous contact. One of the eyewitnesses, a crew member named Jim Speiser recounted what had happened: (Source)
“The lookout refused to tell the OOD (officer of the deck) what it was that he had seen and instead insisted that the starboard lookout and the OOD both look at that area. The three men looked through their binoculars toward the area reported and were astounded to see a metal craft larger than a football field tumble from the clouds into the ocean. It actually tumbled end over end and when it hit the water and sank beneath the ocean huge geysers of water rose into the air.
When the port lookout was sure that the others had seen it he then told the OOD that he had seen it tumble from the ocean up into the clouds. The OOD and the starboard lookout were speechless. Within a few minutes, however, they all became excited when it again rose from the water and tumbled up into the cloud layer. At about the same time a crew member below queried the bridge about a radar contact at the same range and bearing. Sonar also reported strange echos.
The OOD called for the Captain to come to the bridge at that time. At about the same time the object emerged from the clouds and fell down into the ocean. All five men witnessed this. The QMC (Quartermaster Clerk) took pictures as it rose up into the clouds and then back down into the ocean once again.
The five men watched for quite a while longer but nothing else happened. Soon the sub had moved out of visual range and the Captain told all witnesses that they were never to discuss what they had seen with anyone under any circumstances. He stated that the incident was classified information.
The Captain then went below and sent a radio msg. There was no doubt as to what we had seen. It was a metal craft with machinery on and around the outside of it. It appeared to have windows or lenses placed around its perimeter. It made no noise that we could hear. It did not disturb the sub’s electrical systems nor did it affect the gyro compass. It looked very much like a round flying “ship” as in sea going ship. It had the shape and form of a saucer with a bowl inverted in the saucer and it was huge. I will never forget it as long as I live.”
1991, USS Kirk FF108 UFO Encounter
Another similar incident took place in 1991 off the west coast of South America. The witness stated that at that time, he was a Chief of Operations and Intelligence serving aboard the Knox-class escort destroyer USS Kirk FF1087 and that they were part of a drug interdiction force consisting of the USS Kirk and three other Navy ships. Their main task was to patrol using a network of radars to track and then intercept drug planes flying out of Colombia, Panama and Guatemala, as well as to seize any smuggling ships that they could find. (Source)
USS Kirk (FF-1087). Image credit: Wikimedia Commons
The witness said that his primary position was at the CIC Combat Information Center, which he and 22 other specialists maintained 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, rotating in two shifts of 11 people.
At 2 a.m. on December 16, he was on duty at CIC. The night was calm and nothing unusual happened. He said he used the break to go up to the bridge. At this time, the entire ship was in a status called “darkened ship,” when all external lights were turned off, as well as on the bridge, that is, everything around was dimly lit only by instrument panels. His friend was on deck duty that night, and they chatted when they had some free time. And suddenly, everything around was lit up in red color:
“All of a sudden and out of nowhere, like a huge flash from a camera, emanating from the starboard bow sea level upward was a huge flash of red glowing light, which lit up our entire ship. It only lit up our ship, not the surrounding ocean, just our ship. It happened so fast, that the OOD, the navigator and I were speechless for about 5 seconds, at which time I looked at the OOD and asked him if he just saw that light. He stated yes in a sullen voice.
I then asked the navigator and he replied yes. I then took the navigator’s sound powered headset, and asked the forward and aft look outs, if they had just seen the same red flash, to which the forward look out stated, “YES! WHAT THE HELL WAS THAT?”
After lookout said yes as well. I then immediately contacted CIC, and asked the CIC officer if we had any aircraft or surface ships in our vicinity, to which he replied clear as a whistle. I asked if we had any submarine activity in the area, to which he replied, no. At this point I looked at the OOD and asked him if we should wake up the captain or as we would call him, The Old Man. The OOD sat there stunned for a minute, as did I and everyone else.
What had just happened did not make any sense. The flash emanated from the sea, directly off of our starboard bow (like it was touching our bow), and ascended upwardly so rapidly, creating the effect of the bright red flash. The other weird aspect of this event was that only our ship was lit up within the red flash, not the surrounding sea, but our vessel only. The OOD elected not to wake the captain, and the entire incident was logged in our ship’s log as an unexplained phenomenon.
Up until this event, I did not believe in UFOss or USOss. I have no doubt that our ship, steaming along at 12 knots, came right up on a submerged unidentifiable aircraft. I don’t think the aircraft or USO had any idea we were sailing up to them. I think whatever it was, took off in a very unplanned and fast manner, and wanted to quickly identify us, thus the flash.”
In the end, after much deliberation, they decided not to wake the captain up, but simply to register it in the ship’s log as an “unexplained phenomenon.”
Another Navy submarine encountered something strange happened in October 1989. On October 24, USS Memphis was on a mission to secure a shuttle launch site in Florida, patrolling about 150 miles from the coast, when something very large was detected by sonar and began approaching them quickly. At that point, almost all the instruments on the submarine failed: (Source)
“The ship was malfunctioning, our tanks were blowing out of control, we were losing navigation ability and the communications area was totally lost. We went to all stop and tried to access what was happening. The controls in the reactor area started to malfunction. This presented a serious danger to our safety, so the captain ordered us to shut down the reactor, surface and go to diesel motors. When the ship surfaced I went to my watch station. The ship was still experiencing electronic difficulties but the mechanical devices such as diesel engines, cook stoves, and turbines were fine.
This huge vessel was over a half mile across. The UFO made a half circle around our ship then passed across the stern causing our electronics systems to go crazy. We had permanent damage in communications and the sonar room. As the craft flew over the stern, I could see the rain stop under its red glow. The water seemed to rise almost a foot as the UFO passed over silently. When the UFO finished its swing across the stern it paused – the sky got brighter red and it simply moved off at tremendous speed inside 15 seconds. When the UFO left, our boat returned to normal with the exception of the radio and sonar. We did a quick system check and the captain ordered us to return to reactor power and get underway. The captain took two petty officers, the executive officer, and myself into the wardroom. He told us to not spread any rumors until we had a chance to talk to Commander Submarine Fleet – Atlantic.
We reached port in about 7 hours where I was taken into “protective custody.” Two enlisted men and myself agreed we had witnessed a real UFO. I was the one who shot it with a laser range finder, so I was the only one that had its exact sizes. I shot that vessel as it hovered and I got solid readings, not spotty like I would on debris. We were in holding for about three hours when an officer from the Air Force arrived and gave us a line of bull about an exploding weather satellite. The Navy then transferred virtually everyone on the crew to new assignments. This included the captain, the executive officer and the entire crew. They were split up which almost never happens unless one of them gets a promotion or a new command, neither of which happened.”
Nimitz-class aircraft carrier UFO Encounter
More recently, there has been a report from E-4 Petty Officer John Baughman, who in 2010 served aboard the Nimitz-class aircraft carrier USS Carl Vinson. At the time, the ship was off the coast of Haiti, delivering humanitarian aid to a region that had just experienced a catastrophic earthquake. He had a break that day, and he sat on the deck of the SAM launcher and was just looking at the water as usual. He liked to watch the underwater world. (Source)
He said: “I was staring into the water from above when a large, flat, white ’Tic Tac’ object, approximately twenty feet in length, suddenly appeared in my view below me, moving right and darted into the depths as fast as it appeared. I couldn’t really comprehend what I saw. It was definitely a solid object, but when it descended, its forward end rapidly collapsed in on itself and disappeared.”
Baughman could not believe what he saw. He told his supervisor about the strange object he had seen underwater. But others were indifferent and ended the talk by saying “everyone sees weird shit in the ocean.”
He doubted about his sighting as he believed that it could be anything from an albino whale, shark, or some ship wreckage to an optical illusion. He said: “But it cast its own shadow and that’s how I was able to perceive it as a solid object.”
Capt. Kent D. Whalen and John Baughman, 2011
However, Baughman remained silent for all those years until the 2004 Nimitz event got public in 2017. This encouraged him to reveal his encounter with an underwater UFO. “It’s hard to come to grips with something like this, and I still feel somewhat insecure about it because it doesn’t make sense. But at the same time, more data points, even as basic as my story, could help solve the mystery of whether they’re foreign adversaries playing mind games, non-human entities, or the myriad of other possibilities,” he explained.
Being afraid of the response he could have received on his story, he had been keeping silence for many years. Likewise, there are other military personnel who do not reveal their incidents due to many reasons.
USS Omaha (LCS 12)
Some interesting UFO sightings have been reported by many in the US Navy, and footage has even been released showing UFOs entering water. Among the proposed evidence for this is a video filmed off the coast of San Diego in July 2019 by the crew of the USS Omaha. In a video posted by UFO researcher and investigative director Jeremy Corbell, a spherical object is seen flying over the ship and then descending into the water as one of the crew exclaims, “Wow, it splashed!”
The video caused a lot of buzz on the Internet, but it became even more interesting when Corbell said that a Navy submarine was sent to search for the object, however, it did not find anything. Interestingly, there was information that at about the same time, American submarines spotted other mysterious anomalous objects underwater in that area, which seemed to defy the laws of physics. The Navy has confirmed that the footage was genuine, but they cannot explain it.
More specifically, Luis Elizondo, a former director of the Pentagon’s Advanced Aerospace Threat Identification Program, said:
“Imagine a technology that can do 6-700 g-forces, which can fly at 13,000 miles per hour, which can evade radar and which can fly through air and water and eventually. in the space. And oh, by the way, has no obvious signs of propulsion, no wings, no control surfaces and yet can still defy the natural effects of Earth’s gravity. This is precisely what we are seeing.” (Source)
One of the undated accounts was a Soviet nuclear submarine’s encounter with the formation of six alien spacecraft in the south of the Pacific ocean. At the depth of 260 meters, the six disc-like objects were moving towards the submarine at the speed of 426 km per hour. The crew could not escape their pursuit, and the commander ordered the crew to rise to the surface. The crew saw through the periscope that the objects came out of the water and took off at absurdly fast speed.
According to former nuclear submarine commander Yury Beketov, many mysterious events also took place in the Bermuda Triangle region. The devices failed for no apparent reason. He believed that the UFOs were behind it.
“[In Translation]We have repeatedly observed that devices record the movement of material objects at an unimaginable speed. We measured some speeds – it is about 230 knots (400 km per hour). Such speed is difficult to create on the surface, only in the air. But there is gigantic resistance in the water. As if the laws of physics do not apply to these objects. There is only one conclusion: the creatures who created such material objects significantly surpass us in development” Beketov said.
Another Navy intelligence Captain Igor Barclay said that the Unidentified submerged objects were seen in the places where the Russian Navy and NATO fleet are concentrated. He said: “These are the Bahamas and Bermuda, Puerto Rico. Especially often UFOs are seen in the deepest region of the Atlantic – in the south of the Bermuda Triangle and in the Caribbean.” (Source)
NASA Announces The Discovery of a Potentially Habitable ‘Sister Solar System’
NASA Announces The Discovery of a Potentially Habitable ‘Sister Solar System’
NASA recently announced the discovery of seven Earth-sized planets around the habitable or ‘temperate zone’ of a star 39 light-years away, in one of the most significant exoplanet discoveries to date.
According to research, at least the inner six planets appear to have Earth-like masses, are made of rock, and have surface temperatures ranging from 0 to 100°C (32 to 212°F). NASA refers to it as a “sister solar system” to our own, and claims that some of the planets might potentially support liquid water and even extraterrestrial life.
NASA made the announcement in a live press conference after triggering much speculation over their big “discovery beyond our Solar System”.
The new exoplanets were discovered circling TRAPPIST-1, an ultracool dwarf star 39 light-years distant from our Sun in the Aquarius constellation.
Using Earth-based telescopes, astronomers led by Michal Gillon of the University of Liège in Belgium discovered three exoplanets around the star. However, it wasn’t until the researchers examined it more extensively using NASA’s Spitzer satellite telescope that they identified four extra planets in the system.
Based on these findings, initial estimations imply that at least five of the planets have masses similar to Earth, and further Hubble Space Telescope metrics indicate that they are most likely rocky in composition.
At least three appear to be in their star’s temperate zone, which implies their surface temperatures are most likely to be between 0 and 100°C (32 and 212°F), making liquid water and possibly even extraterrestrial life a possibility.
Before we get too enthusiastic, the researchers emphasize that much more research and analysis have to be done, particularly on the seventh, outermost planet, which has only been detected orbiting the star once.
As a result, we still don’t know how long it takes the seventh planet to orbit TRAPPIST-1 or how it interacts with the inner planets. And because the entire system is so far away, we can’t be certain whether it contains water or is a good environment for life.
According to the researchers, not only are at least three of the planets potentially home to liquid seas, but the entire system appears to have a lot in common with our own. The authors write in Nature, “The TRAPPIST-1 system is a tiny analogue of the inner Solar System.”
Below is a comparison of the inner Solar System to the TRAPPIST-1 system:
oA/Amanda Smith
Despite the similarities, there are also significant differences between our systems. TRAPPIST-1 is only slightly larger than Jupiter, and its planets orbit only slightly farther apart than Jupiter’s moons.
The entire system is also quite compact, with the closest planet requiring only 1.5 days to round its star. The sixth planet takes 13 days. That is, if you were standing on the surface of one of these planets, the neighboring planets in the sky would appear larger than our Moon does to us at times.
Imagine something like this:
NASA/JPL-Caltech
As a result, it’s suggested that the planets may all affect each other, and that they may even be tidally locked, with one face always directed towards their star, similar to how Jupiter’s moons always have one side locked towards the giant planet.
That tidal locking could also do some strange things to the temperature gradients on the planet, which NASA says makes it possible that liquid water could exist on any of them under the right conditions.
Perhaps more interesting than this discovery is what it suggests for the potential of other Earth-like planets in our galaxy.
“In the past few years, evidence has been mounting that Earth-sized planets are abundant in the Galaxy, but Gillon and collaborators’ findings indicate that these planets are even more common than previously thought,” Ignas A. G. Snellen, an astronomer from the Leiden University in the Netherlands who wasn’t involved in the research, writes in an accompanying opinion piece in Nature.
“From geometric arguments, we expect that for every transiting planet found, there should be a multitude of similar planets (20 to 100 times more) that, seen from Earth, never pass in front of their host star.
Of course, the authors could have been lucky, but finding seven transiting Earth-sized planets in such a small sample suggests that the Solar System with its four (sub-)Earth-sized planets might be nothing out of the ordinary.”
For the time being, we can only speculate about what these seven fantastic Earth-like worlds would be like. But the best part about all of this is that in the not-so-distant future, we might actually be able to know more.
With the NASA James Webb Space Telescope launched last year, researchers will have a better understanding of the composition and atmosphere of this sister solar system.
When the European Space Agency’s Extremely Large Telescope gets functional in 2024, it should be able to detect water on distant worlds from right here on Earth.
If you want the wonder of this discovery put into perspective, here’s Sean Carey, the manager of NASA’s Spitzer Science Centre, to fill you with awe about the galaxy we live in:
Former NASA Employee Saw UFOs during Apollo 15 Mission
Former NASA Employee Saw UFOs during Apollo 15 Mission
Apollo 15 UFO
Note: I was able to contact the gentleman who made this report. I asked him several questions about his account that I needed cleared up for my own curiosity, and the veracity of the report itself. One question concerned his employment dates, which he very quickly cleared up. Secondly, I asked him about what mission was being broadcast as he watched the UFOs on the TV screen. I had thought it must be Apollo 15, and he verified this for me also.
I would also like to thank Eileen Nesbitt for her invaluable assistance in gathering information on this very important report.) (B J)
When I first started working for NASA, its initials, not the name, National Aeronautics and Space Administration, was how it was referred to. NASA is with whom I began employment in 1958 as a security guard on Wayside in Houston, Texas. They hadn't even started building Manned Spacecraft Center at Webster yet, which would later be called MSC at Clear Lake.
In 1961, I transferred to the Fire Department at the fledgling MSC and started training as a Fire and Safety Technician. The contractor responsible for Fire and Safety was Houston Fire and Safety. They held the contract for five years, losing out to Wackenhut Corporation out of Coral Gables Florida in 1966 because Wackenhut incorporated all phases of fire, safety and security under one blanket contract. Some say that George Wackenhut had first, Kennedy's, then Johnson's ear, but I haven't seen proof of it.
Everybody who hired in as a Fire Fighter was cross-trained in almost every aspect of maintenance operations. I attended numerous schools on fire alarm systems, pump repair, electrical and mechanical maintenance, physical plant operations, and last and certainly not the least, fire, safety and security. We were told that we had to pass a very rigid security clearance investigation, and that our job would be forfeit if we did no pass. I passed with flying colors and kept my job. There were several who did not pass, and we were never told why they had been laid off.
When I started, there were approximately three hundred eighty men who were attached to the fire department there at MSC. I saw a lot of men come and go during my twenty-six years of employment, but I never saw anyone who was willing to speak out about the rigid security. Even in later years, I kept in touch with several of my closest friends, when conversations turned to anything we were told not to talk about, there was always someone there to remind us that we had been told not to discuss it, even after we were no longer there.
I saw things, and heard statements from Astronauts that I didn't discuss, even with my wife or family. It was like a gigantic trust handed us and we honored it. To this day, I don't talk about everything I heard when I was around the Astronauts, at least not in detail.
There were several incidents that occurred during my tenure as an employee and to several of the Fire Fighters that got all of us thinking about how our government wasn't telling all they knew. For instance, in Building #1 on Johnson Space center, which was Building #2 when I first started work there, most of the north center of the second floor was the "crypto" room. We didn't know what went on in the room, but we did know that we weren't allowed in the room under normal circumstances. However, when an alarm came in at the Fire Station, we responded to the floor of the building that showed up on the enunciator panel at the station, One time, around 1964, we responded to Bldg.#2 to find that the alarm originated from the "crypto" room.
However, the doors were open and we just walked in to check the minor panel located there.
The whole east wall was covered with photos of UFOs. As we finished up, the officer of that room came back in and found us there. He actually pulled his sidearm and pointed it at us before demanding to know why we had entered that room.
He eventually accepted our explanation, but it took Everette D. Shafer*, head of NASA Security to vouch for us before the man would shut off his threats towards us. Everette Shafer reminded him, that had the armed officer been there in the room with the door locked, the incident could have been avoided. No, that was one very unhappy officer. I think he was Air Force, but I could be wrong; he was a Captain, I do remember that. When I came back from the Cape in 1968, we had another incident in the very same room, and the same officer was there also.
Apollo 15 Landing Site
Hadley Rille/Apennine Mountains-26.13222° N latitude, 3.63386° E. longitude
The Apollo 15 landing site was located at 26° 4´ 54¨ north latitude by 3° 39´ 30¨ east longitude at the foot of the Apennine mountain range. The Apennines rise up to more than 15,000 feet (4572 m) along the southeastern edge of Mare Imbrium (Sea of Rains).
The Apennine escarpment--highest on the Moon--had been selected to allow the astronauts to drive from the LM to the Apennine front during two of the EVAs.
This time, he had Mr. Shafer to give the okay for us to enter the room, with him as our armed escort. But this time the walls on all four sides were photo-to-photo of UFOs and other very strange looking aircraft. We did our job, got out of there, but Mr. Shafer and the officer both told us to not speak to anyone of what we saw or observed in that room, ever! During Man Rated Tests, the fire department was trained to be rescuers should anything happen. Or job was to stand-by in readiness during many long hours of boring, repetitious, and meaningless exercises. Most times it was not the Astronauts themselves who performed the exercises, rather it was trained test subjects who did. We all became acquainted with them.
Buildings #7, #32, and #33 on Manned Spacecraft Center, were the test sites for Vacuum Chamber related tests. In Building #32, was housed the largest vacuum chamber in the free world. In Building #33, was the ultra-high vacuum test chamber, and Building #7 housed three test chambers. Building #7 is also where the Astronauts Space suits were manufactured.
Throughout the sixties, we performed numerous duties, some at MSC, while others were at Area 2000 at Ellington AFB in Genoa, Texas. Area 2000 was where the Lunar Landing Training Vehicle was tested and flown by test pilots and Astronauts. I was Crew Chief of the Contract Fire Department personnel at Area 2000 for close to a year, working all three shifts due to loss of personnel or whatever, but eventually being promoted up the ladder to Training Officer.
Not anything really special happened while I was Training Officer, but I did get to go places that was off limits to other personnel. It was one of my jobs to draw the pre-fire attack plans for every building on Site, to accomplish that job, I had the need to enter all buildings and accurately record everything of interest towards fire, safety, and security onto drawings. That is why I remember so much detail concerning the buildings, their locations, the interior layouts, and where all exits and equipment relating to Fire, Safety and Security were located.
Another part of everyone's job was the Safety patrols during any mission. From the first day on the job, before we were trained to become good little NASA Fire Fighters, we were told that we would perform various duties during our employment, that we would be constantly training, ensuring that we all would have the latest knowledge to do our job with the highest of proficiency.
Part of the training regimen was to know, and I do mean know, every building so intimately that we could draw a set of plans for them in our sleep. We ate, slept, and dreamed of building plans; construction materials inside and out, how many panels and manufacturer name of all alarm systems; how to repair or reset those systems; what was in the buildings that could be dangerous to us during emergencies.etc. but mostly the interior layout, hallways, exits, room locations.
With that small introduction, I will now attempt to give you the details of the safety patrols for Integrated Mission Control Center, commonly known as Building #30 on Johnson Space Center.
Building #30 is not just one building, rather it is two separate buildings, each having distinct functions. There is the Administrative side that houses support personnel, and the Mission Operations Control Rooms, otherwise known as the MOCR. By the way, at the time I was there, the Admin side of Building #30 was the building that housed the office of James Oberg.
There are two MOCR's located in IMCC, one on the second floor and one on the third floor. The building is like a big square, windowless structure sitting right next to the Southwestern Bell building. You can't miss it, because it is the only building that looks like it. Three stories inside, it looks more like a five- storied structure from the outside. As you have most likely ascertained by now, there are some very high ceilings inside the MOCR's.
Although we were never told we couldn't go into the MOCR's during missions, all of the safety inspectors assumed that we weren't welcome, that maybe we would be a distraction. However, we were allowed in every section surrounding the MOCR's.
On the second and third floors, there was the outside section, and the center section with a hallway completely around the inside of the building that separated the outside section from the inside. The outside section of the building housed the air handlers, workshops, soft and hardware support offices, and tool rooms, while the inside portion was dedicated to the MOCR and it's support.
In the MOCR itself, was a huge screen that stretched across the entire wall. It was the mission map, which kept the technicians apprised where the vehicle was at any given moment during its orbits above the earth. On one end was the big television screen, which received its picture from a large bank of cameras directly behind the screen.
Those cameras generated a lot of heat, and part of our duty during inspections was to make sure that there weren't any ignitable materials in that area. It was kept dark for some reason, but the cameras gave off enough light so a person didn't stumble around in there. It was also very cold most of the time, especially during missions.
At the back of the MOCR is a series of glass windows. These windows are set into the wall that makes up the barrier that separates the viewing room from the MOCR. The viewing room has two doors for entry. Entry is accomplished by getting off the elevator, taking a right down the hall, and the first door is the first entryway. About twenty-five feet further down the hall is the second door. Situated between them is a small door about three to four feet high. This door lets a maintenance technician into the area under the viewing room.
On each side of the room, to the front are located phone booths, one on each side of the window. There are about eight rows of seats with a set of slight stairs that separate them into two sections. The seats are similar to any seat you may see in a movie house, but way more comfortable.
Mounted on the wall above the big windows are two large screen colored TV's with several high mounted speakers so the viewer can listen in to the conversations between the Astronauts and the ground crews.
At the back of the room, right at the top of the center stairs, is a minor alarm panel. It was this minor alarm panel that safety had to monitor during all missions. The room was relatively quiet, cool and very comfortable. It was here I always chose to take a pipe break. My partner was also a pipe smoker, so we shared stories, listened to the quiet banter between the ground crew and the vehicle, and actually didn't pay much attention to what was going on in the MOCR.
Nothing out of the way ever occurred in the Missions, but during one particular Mission, something so unique happened that I would always remember it. Jim Baker and I had been doing the regular routine safety inspection during a Manned Mission to the Moon.
We entered the viewing room at the end of our patrol, and as was our wont, sat at the back of the room to enjoy a pipe. We both smoked a pipe, and the viewing room allowed smokers. We had been there for no longer than fifteen minutes, it may have been longer, but I doubt it, when the stage left door opened and in walked several, at least five of the upper echelon administrators of Johnson Space Center.
Uh, it actually wasn't called Johnson Space Center at that time; rather the name was Manned Spacecraft Center. Anyway, I do know that one of the people was definitely Chrome Dome, as we were irreverently known to call Dr. Gilruth. At that time I had hair and found it funny to refer to one of the finest minds our country had by the moniker, "Chrome Dome."
Just prior to their entering the viewing room, Jim and I noticed that the Technicians in the MOCR had gotten up and left the room. Now, that isn't unusual during a normal EVA, but the Astronauts were in Hadley's Rille. They couldn't be seen because they were over the edge, down in the Rille itself. The Lunar Rover was about thirty, maybe forty or more yards from the edge, and had the left front camera on the spot where the Astronauts had disappeared. You could hear the Astronauts voices talking, but as in most of the dialogs, we weren't paying close attention to what they were saying. We did notice the technicians getting up and leaving the MOCR. Jim is the one who actually said something about it.
"Looks as if everyone got a bee in their bonnet at the same time, don't it?" "Most probably their piss and lunch break," I offered. It was right after I made that statement, that Dr. Gilruth entered, and several others came in with him. They didn't look back, just went to the center of the viewing room and were talking excitedly among themselves and pointing towards the big screen to the right of the main screen in the MOCR.
Jim and I then paid close attention to what was on the screen. There was an object above the spot where the Astronauts were supposed to be in Hadley's Rille, just hovering. I am totally positive as to it being an object; it was round, it had a shiny side with a shadow side, with the shadow side matching the shadows on the moon, and though all the video shots coming from the moon looked black and white, they could actually have been in color. The harsh lighting was probably responsible for the illusion of black and white.
Anyway, The object started a slow move from screen left to screen right. The camera on the left front of the Rover followed the object as it moved screen right. Soon it was apparent that it actually wasn't moving screen right, but was circling the Rover.
The Rover has two mounted cameras on it. One camera was mounted on the left front and one on the right rear. As the object came into view of the right rear, that camera picked up the object and continued tracking it as it circled, very slowly around the Rover. It finally came to the point where the right rear camera could no longer follow it, so the left front camera picked up the image again and followed it to where it was once more above where the Astronauts were in Hadley's Rille.
I uttered something that brought us to the attention of Dr. Gilruth and the others. "What the crap is that? What caused me to utter that phrase was, the object took off straight up and went out of sight in less than a second. It may have been longer, but seemed like it was gone in the blink of an eye, but I was still aware that it had actually gone straight up.
One of the men there, I still think it was Everette Shafer, turned and asked us what we were doing in the room, and we told them that we were there to inspect the fire alarm panel at the rear of the room and to take our smoke break. And to ask a question of our own. "What in hell was that about?"
Can you believe they actually told us it was a drop of oil on the lens of the camera on the moon? Truth! Now, I am not stupid, though I have done a few stupid things in my life, like getting married the first time, but I know a pile of schlock when I hear it! It wasn't a drop of oil, no way!
I opened my mouth and said, "There's no way it was on the lens on the camera on the moon."
"The temperature would freeze the drop solid."
To Which the man holding my clearance in his hand, reading my name replied, "I mean it was a drop of oil on the camera lens at the back of that screen." To which he pointed. Okay, it was a good place to shut up and get out of the viewing room, but.. Once more I said something because as I have previously stated, I'm not stupid!
"There's no way that drop of oil is on any one of those lenses at the back of the screen, because of the temperature."
"The heat is high enough back there to set the drop of oil on fire."
Who ever it was holding my badge in his hand, says, "If you want to keep your job, you'll get out of here and keep your mouth shut about what occurred here."
Not about what I saw, not about why I was in there, just get out and keep my mouth shut about what had occured. I pulled away from him, turned to Jim and said lets go.
When we exited the room, to our surprise, there was Dick Nieber and Loring E. Williams of security on the doors. They were as surprised at seeing us come out of the room as we were at seeing them standing guard there. Further, they told us that Andrado and two others were on the rear doors to keep unauthorized people out of there.
Then they told us their story: They were pulled away from vehicular patrol and told to go immediately to IMCC and the second floor MOCR viewing room and stand guard until further notice. They were told that absolutely nobody other than Dr. Gilruth and the people who were with him were to be allowed into the room. It's no wonder our being there disturbed Dr. Gilruth and the others; we weren't supposed to be there.
When Nieber asked us what had happened in there, we told them we couldn't discuss it. They thought that the Astronauts had been killed. That was what had been circulating between them while they were guarding the doors to the viewing room. Wrong! That same evening, I sat at the typewriter and wrote out everything, time, date, place, and mission, plus all the names I could remember of who were there with all the facts concerning the incident, and asked Jim Baker to read it and sign it. He read it and signed it on condition that I would give him a copy of the report. I went to the copier, and made six complete copies of the report and gave Jim one of them.
Incidentally, when we arrived back at the fire station, Sgt. Thomas Walsh asked us to come to the dispatcher's office to speak to him. He closed the door and told us that he'd received a call from Shafer, that no matter what we had seen or heard in the viewing room, we were not supposed to discuss it with anyone at all, ever, because it had to do with National Security. "National Security over a drop of oil on a camera lens?" I think not!
Jim Baker died in 1983 of a sudden heart attack. He was forty- six and one of my best friends and we got together regularly at his home, in his gun shop to discuss different people and things. The last time I saw him alive, I asked him if he still had his report hidden away and he told me he had actually burned his copy, but had given a copy to another friend from West Virginia who wanted it.
I retired in 1979, and moved to Austin Texas. I was security dispatcher for the LBJ Presidential Library there in Austin when I got a call from Jim's daughter, Amey, telling me that her father had passed away early that morning.
Jim's last words to me, there in his little gun shop was, "You sure raised hell over that drop of oil, but you were right, they were full of shit and you knew it."
Addendum: 03-13-05
I looked it up recently and it was Apollo 15. For some reason, I have lost my original notes written up on NASA Fire Department's old IBM Selectric. However, I must reiterate that it wasn't a film, it was real-time and we observed the incident as it happened on the big screen in the MOCR on the second floor at Building 30, aka, Mission Operations Control Center.
We had stopped in the viewing room to check the minor fire panel at the rear of the room and then sat down to smoke our pipes. We had been in there about fifteen minutes when in walked Dr. Gilruth and about five other men. They didn't even know we were in the room until the object took off straight up, this being after it had circled the Lunar Rover.
As I stated, it was the Flight where the Astronauts had landed close to Hadley's Rille, and when the incident happened, they were out of sight over the edge, in the Rille. To the best of my knowledge, that is what was being told by the news media. However, when we returned to the Fire Station, nobody had seen the object, and Sgt. Thomas Walsh had taken us into the Dispatchers office and told us that he had received a call from Everette Shafer, NASA Security, telling him to apprise us of the oaths we had signed concerning National Security and the penalties attached to breaking the law.
*:Spelling may be Sheaffer, or Sheafer
In addition to this very recent information about the astronauts sighting one or more UFOs while in Hadley's Rille, the following is a conversation discovered from NASA's Apollo 15 flight journal with the crew in respect to an interview with news media. 270:22:31 Henize: Hey, 15, we're getting a beautiful picture coming through.
270:22:37 Scott: Roger. Go ahead with your questions.
270:22:46 Henize: Roger. We'll - we'll admire the beautiful picture for - for a few minutes here.
270:22:56 Henize: Deke just passed out from the shock, incidentally.
[The crew appear in a row, facing the camera. Dave is camera-left, Al in the centre and Jim to camera-right. Dave has a noticeable beard after 12 days in space.]
270:23:15 Henize: Okay, fellas. I have a preliminary statement to make here. The questions you will be asked in this news conference have been submitted by newsmen here at the Manned Spacecraft Center who've been covering the flight. Some of the questions they raised have been answered in your communications with - with Mission Control, but the public-at-large has not necessarily heard them. The questions are being read to you exactly as submitted by the newsmen, and in an order of priority specified by them.
270:23:46 Henize: Question number 1. This last week, we have shared scores of exciting moments with you. Which single moment would you most like to live again, and is there any moment which you would never like to repeat?
270:24:03 Scott: Well, I guess we all probably have a different idea of which would be the single most exciting moment of the flight, and maybe we'll just run through it one at a time. I guess the most impressive moment I can remember is standing up on Hadley mountain - Hadley Delta, and looking back at the plain and seeing the LM and the rille and Mount Hadley, and the whole big picture in one - one swoop. And I think we've got some pictures for you from up there, and I believe the TV was running at the same time, and I think that was probably the most impressive sight that I've ever seen. Al?
This information puts a whole new light on the following photos acquired over the years.
David Scott made his third space flight as spacecraft commander of Apollo 15, July 26 - August 7, 1971. His companions on the flight were Alfred M. Worden (command module pilot) and James B. Irwin (lunar module pilot). Apollo 15 was the fourth manned lunar landing mission and the first to visit and explore the moon's "Hadley Rille" and Apennine Mountains which are located on the southeast edge of the Mare Imbrium (Sea of Rains).
NASA will on Monday attempt a feat humanity has never before accomplished: deliberately smacking a spacecraft into an asteroid to slightly deflect its orbit, in a key test of our ability to stop cosmic objects from devastating life on Earth.
The Double Asteroid Redirection Test (DART) spaceship launched from California last November and is fast approaching its target, which it will strike at roughly 14,000 miles (22,500 kilometers) per hour.
"It's the final cosmic collision countdown," tweeted mission control at Johns Hopkins Applied Physics Laboratory in Maryland.
To be sure, neither the asteroid moonlet Dimorphos, nor the big brother it orbits, called Didymos, pose any threat as the pair loop the Sun, passing about seven million miles from Earth at nearest approach.
But NASA has deemed the experiment important to carry out before an actual need is discovered.
If all goes to plan, impact between the car-sized spacecraft, and the 530-foot (160 meters, or two Statues of Liberty) asteroid should take place at 7:14 pm Eastern Time (2314 GMT), viewable on a NASA livestream.
By striking Dimorphos head on, NASA hopes to push it into a smaller orbit, shaving ten minutes off the time it takes to encircle Didymos, which is currently 11 hours and 55 minutes—a change that will be detected by ground telescopes in the days or weeks to come.
The proof-of-concept experiment will make a reality of what has before only been attempted in science fiction—notably in films such as "Armageddon" and "Don't Look Up."
Technically challenging
As the craft propels itself through space, flying autonomously for the mission's final phase, its camera system will start to beam down the very first pictures of Dimorphos.
Minutes later, a toaster-sized satellite called LICIACube, which already separated from DART a few weeks ago, will make a close pass of the site to capture images of the collision and the ejecta—the pulverized rock thrown off by impact.
LICIACube's pictures will be sent back in the next weeks and months.
Also watching the event: an array of telescopes, both on Earth and in space—including the recently operational James Webb—which might be able to see a brightening cloud of dust.
Finally, a full picture of what the system looks like will be revealed when a European Space Agency mission four years down the line called Hera arrives to survey Dimorphos' surface and measure its mass, which scientists can currently only guess at.
Being prepared
Very few of the billions of asteroids and comets in our solar system are considered potentially hazardous to our planet, and none are expected in the next hundred years or so.
But "I guarantee to you that if you wait long enough, there will be an object," said NASA's Thomas Zurbuchen.
We know that from the geological record—for example, the six-mile wide Chicxulub asteroid struck Earth 66 million years ago, plunging the world into a long winter that led to the mass extinction of the dinosaurs along with 75 percent of all species.
An asteroid the size of Dimorphos, by contrast, would only cause a regional impact, such as devastating a city, albeit with greater force than any nuclear bomb in history.
How much momentum DART imparts on Dimorphos will depend on whether the asteroid is solid rock, or more like a "rubbish pile" of boulders bound by mutual gravity—a situation that's not yet known.
The shape of the asteroid is also not known, but NASA engineers are confident DART's SmartNav guidance system will hit its target.
If it misses, NASA will have another shot in two years' time, with the spaceship containing just enough fuel for another pass.
But if it succeeds, the mission will mark the first step towards a world capable of defending itself from a future existential threat.
Graphic on NASA's DART mission to crash a small spacecraft into a mini-asteroid to change its trajectory as a test for any potentially dangerous asteroids in the future.
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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.
