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...
14-10-2022
JWST detects carbon dioxide in atmosphere of exoplanet for first time
JWST detects carbon dioxide in atmosphere of exoplanet for first time
The detection marks a new level of detail previously unmatched by other observatories.
WASP-39 b is a hot Saturnlike exoplanet caught in an extremely close orbit to its host star.
NASA, ESA, CSA, and J. Olmsted (STScI)
The James Webb Space Telescope wowed the world with its first science images release on July 12, which included data on the chemical composition of an exoplanet’s atmosphere. But that was just a glimpse at what JWST has to offer.
Now JWST has taken its first peer-reviewed spectrum of an extrasolar planet atmosphere. This time, scientists looked at WASP-39 b, a Saturn-like world orbiting extremely close to its parent star, with each orbit only taking 4.1 days. The data, which has been accepted for publication in Nature and presented in a preprint on arXiv.org, revealed the clearest evidence ever collected for carbon dioxide (CO2) in an exoplanet’s atmosphere.
The bump of CO2 was not surprising, but was still an exciting confirmation of older, less detailed data taken of WASP-39 b.
Illustration:NASA, ESA, CSA, and L. Hustak (STScI); Science: The JWST Transiting Exoplanet Community Early Release Science Team
Due to its prevalence in our own solar system, CO2 may not be the most groundbreaking of molecules to find. But it does have important implications for planetary formation theories and understanding the atmospheres of both giant and rocky exoplanets.
Why WASP-39 b?
These observations were taken as a part of JWST’s Early Science Release Program, which wraps up at the end of the observatory’s first five months of science observations. This meant that the scientists needed to select a target that would be visible during that time.
Not only that, since JWST would still be stretching its legs, researchers wanted a planet that would be big and easy for the telescope to scrutinize. And, of course, they wanted a world with a little mystery as well.
Size? Check.
WASP-39 b is just about the same mass as Saturn and about 1.3 times Jupiter’s diameter.
Difficulty? Check.
WASP-39 is a Sun-like star just 700 light-years distant. And this exoplanet orbits extremely close to its host star, about one-eighth the Sun-Mercury distance, completing one orbit roughly every 4 Earth-days.
Mystery? Check
Previous observations from the Spitzer telescope indicated that CO2 could be present in the atmosphere of WASP-39 b, but the data could have just as easily been evidence of another molecule.
Unprecedented detail
The previous Spitzer observations may have hinted at the presence of a relatively heavy element, which mostly closely resembled CO2, but coauthor and University of Chicago professor of Astronomy and Astrophysics, Jacob Bean, wouldn’t have been surprised if those results were wrong.
“It was quite surprising that the Spitzer points held up as well as they did,” Bean told Astronomy. “I would have just been like, 'Of course they're not right.’" He adds they easily could have been statistically off from what JWST detected.
The Spitzer observations (grey circles and “IRAC1” and “IRAC2” sensitivity curves) of CO2 has been matched with the one taken by JWST (in color).
Ahrer, E.-M. et al.
To Bean, JWST instead has validated some of those older Spitzer measurements. “The previous data are holding up really well, and now we're just extending that with James Webb.”
In the spectrum of WASP-39 b, JWST was able to measure the subtle differences in individual colors across the 3- to 5.5-micron range, something no other observatory has done before. And JWST isn’t even done with this exoplanet yet. Three more observations are planned, which, when combined, will essentially give the full chemical inventory of WASP-39 b.
Scientists will then be able to use that information as a kind of fossil record, helping them piece together the formation history of the planet.
The great migration
Prior to the discovery of exoplanets, researchers believed that the gas giants in our solar system formed entirely in their respective orbits. But when observations showed that many giant exoplanets were winding up in wildly different orbits, such as extremely close to their host stars, that theory had to be modified. Now, most researchers think that Jupiter and Saturn migrated throughout the solar system during their formation, sweeping in closer to the Sun before backtracking closer to their original birth places.
The movements of the giant planets in our solar system as explained by the Grand Tack theory.
Astronomy:Roen Kelly
This migration left fingerprints all over the planets' atmospheres, as the two worlds picked up heavy-element-laden planetesimals — small, solid bodies present in the protoplanetary disks around young stars — that are only located closer to the Sun. Some of these bodies dissolved into the atmosphere of our gas giants, enriching them with heavy elements.
If WASP-39 b has a similar composition as Saturn, then that would suggest it also experienced such a migration before settling in its current orbit. “[Previously,] we haven’t had a lot of success because our instruments have not had the sensitivity, the wavelength coverage, the accuracy to really tell us this information,” says Bean. “And so, we’ve been kind of stumbling around in the dark about this.”
But JWST is finally ripping open the metaphorical blinds. While more data still needs to be analyzed, the new data seems to point to WASP-39 b being comparable to Saturn, according to Bean.
Migration isn’t the only explanation for how WASP-39 b’s atmosphere may have been seeded with a heavy element like CO2, however. It’s possible that, while it was still young, the world was assailed by comets and asteroids — an upbringing that is also comparable to Saturn.
More to come
Besides having implications for WASP-39 b’s origins, the JWST teases yet another mystery, too — another type of molecule whose presence can’t be as easily explained as the CO2.
Knowing the temperature, pressure, and elemental abundances of a planet’s atmosphere, scientists can usually compute a good estimate of the world's expected chemistry. But the unidentified spectral feature is beyond what the model suggested, indicating that some other atmospheric phenomena is creating the mystery molecule.
“It’s a subtle spectral feature,” says Bean, which is why the team is taking its time to analyze all the data before they share their findings. But ultimately, “we wouldn’t have put it in the paper if we didn’t have a lot of confidence in it.”
JWST isn’t only focused on the mysteries of WASP-39 b, either. Or even just giant planets, for that matter.
Now that JWST has proven its capability, researchers will be using the observatory to peer at more Earth-like worlds. Although the level of detail attainable for a rocky planet will be significantly less than that for a giant planet, the confidence built by observing planets like WASP-39 b will influence how much trust is given to the telescope and its instruments when looking at rocky worlds.
“I think most people, given a choice [between WASP-39 b and Trappist-1 c] they'd probably pick Trappist-1 c,” says Bean, referencing a rocky, Venus-like world located some 40 light-years away. But “It’s all tied together for me," he says. "We have to understand [WASP-39 b] at the same time we have to understand [Trappist-1 c], because the unifying factor is planets with atmospheres, our observational techniques, and how we go about interpreting that.”
Fascinerende close-upfoto van mier gaat over de tongen: “Om nachtmerries van te krijgen”
Een fascinerend, intrigerend en tegelijkertijd doodeng close-upbeeld van een mier gaat over de tongen op het internet. De foto werd genomen door ene Dr. Eugenijus Kavaliauskas uit Tauragė, Litouwen. Hij maakte het kiekje voor de Nikon Small World 2022-fotowedstrijd, die fotografen en wetenschappers van over heel de wereld uitnodigt om beelden in te sturen van alle coole dingen die zichtbaar zijn onder een microscoop. De Litouwer besloot een mier van naderbij te bestuderen en vast te leggen. Bedankt voor de nachtmerries, dokter.
De reacties op Reddit onder de opmerkelijke close-upfoto liegen er niet om: “Het lijkt wel een draak”, “Om nachtmerries van te krijgen”, “Ren voor je leven”, klinkt het. Sommigen zien er een ork van ‘Lord of The Rings’ in, anderen roepen prompt ‘Dracarys!’ - het handige commando dat de Targaryens van ‘Game of Thrones’ gebruiken als ze willen dat hun draken vuur spuwen.
Deze mier lijkt dan ook een echte draak zo fel ingezoomd. Een monster met een glimmende doch craquelerende zwarte huid, en met felle oranjerode, vlammende ogen, grote briesende neusgaten en demonisch oplichtende stekels.
Ogen
Gelukkig is de foto enigszins misleidend. Want die vlammende ogen zijn helemaal geen ogen en het geheel is geen mierensmoel. Toch niet volledig. Het zijn wij die een gezicht zien ín een mierengezicht, waarbij de oranjerode ‘ogen’ eigenlijk onderdeel zijn van de antennes die op de kop van de mier zitten. De echte ogen van de mier zijn niet in beeld.
Vergelijk de foto maar eens met deze andere - het moet gezegd; nog steeds angstaanjagende - beelden van mieren, deze keer genomen door de Amerikaanse fotograaf Josh Coogler. Daar zijn de echte ogen van de mieren steeds wel in beeld. Ze blijven zelfs zo dus wel écht draakachtige tronies hebben, die kleine zwarte kruipertjes.
Verschillen
Voor Coogler is een doodgewone mier die hij ergens ziet telkens weer een nieuwe kans om in de wondere wereld van macrofotografie te duiken en iedereen te tonen hoeveel complexer deze wezens zijn dan ze lijken, zo legde hij onlangs uit bij ‘My Modern Met’, nadat zijn foto’s viraal waren gegaan.
Terwijl hij zich oorspronkelijk op de diertjes begon te focussen, louter en alleen omdat ze zo makkelijk te vinden zijn, is het hun rijke visuele variatie die hem maar blijft teruggrijpen naar hen. “Wat mij het meest heeft verrast, is hoe verschillend ze zijn van elkaar”, aldus Coogler. “Hoe een werker - meer behendig en lenig qua uitzicht - er anders uitziet dan een soldaat - met hun grote, sterke hoofden. En hoe een rode vuurmier er weer anders uitziet dan een houtmier. Ze zijn allemaal uniek en ze hebben veel meer te bieden dan de meeste mensen zouden denken. Het is leuk om ze te kunnen fotograferen en ze op deze manier te tonen aan iedereen.”
De foto van de Litouwse Dr. Eugenijus Kavaliauskas was één van de meer dan 1.300 inzendingen uit 72 landen die binnenkwamen voor de 48ste editie van Nikon Small World 2022. Hoewel er meer lijkt te worden gesproken over de foto van de mier, is het beeld niet de ultieme winnaar van de fotowedstrijd. Dat werd een mooie microscopische foto van een pootje van een Madagaskardaggekko.
Mieren zijn zeer belangrijke ecologische spelers. De nuttige diertjes ruimen massaal afval en andere insecten op. Ze zijn vooral bekend om hun spectaculaire kracht: de kleine krachtpatsers kunnen tot wel vijftig keer hun eigen lichaamsgewicht optillen. Helemaal niet zo gek dat ze er van dichtbij bekeken uitzien als een echte badass, toch?
Eerie footage captured by European Space Agency's Mars Express probe shows the Martian moon Deimos eclipsing Jupiter.
The new clip, captured by the European Space Agency's Mars Express satellite, comprises 80 individual images that were stitched together.
In the foreground is the irregular-shaped Martian moon Deimos, with its rocky and cratered surface.
In the background is Jupiter and its four largest moons, known as the 'Galilean moons' – Europa, Ganymede, Io and Callisto.
Jupiter is the large bright white circle near the centre, while its moons appear as small white specks of light.
A second, shorter clip, meanwhile, shows Phobos, the other Martian moon, blocking its sibling Deimos.
Mars Express probe shows Martian moon Deimos eclipsing Jupiter
The Martian moon Deimos (left) notable for its rocky and cratered surface, can be seen here about to pass Jupiter, which appears as a large white spot. Jupiter's moons appear as mere specks of light
THE GALILEAN MOONS
The Galilean moons are the four largest moons of Jupiter:
- Ganymede (3,273 miles in diameter)
- Callisto(2,995 miles in diameter)
- Io (2,263 miles in diameter)
- Europa(1,939 miles in diameter)
Mars Express is still going strong nearly 20 years after its launch from Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan in June 2003.
'The new images demonstrate that Mars Express continues to shine a light on Mars, the immediate surroundings of the Red Planet, and beyond,' said the European Space Agency (ESA).
The first clip is made up of a series of 80 images taken on February 14, 2022. It first shows Deimos passing in front of Europa, the smallest of the four Galilean moons, known for its icy surface and thin oxygen atmosphere.
The largest moon in the Solar System, Ganymede, is then obscured from view, as is Jupiter, Io and then lastly Callisto.
In the clip, Deimos appears to move up and down in the animation due to the small swaying movements of Mars Express while it rotates to place its camera into position.
Deimos is the smaller and outermost of the two natural satellites of Mars, the other being Phobos.
Here, the Martian moon obscures Callisto. Jupiter and the other three Galilean moons are visible to the left
Artist's impression of the the European Space Agency's Mars Express satellite, which launched from Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan in June 2003
The two Martian moons experience strong tidal forces from the planet, causing their orbits to fluctuate constantly.
Phobos orbits extremely close to Mars at an average of 3,700 miles and is moving towards the planet, while Deimos is 12,470 miles away on average and moves away from it.
ESA's second new clip, meanwhile, comprises 19 images captured on March 30, 2022 by Mars Express.
In this second video, Deimos is blocked by its larger sibling, Phobos, which measures about 14 miles along its longest axis. Deimos is a dwarf in comparison – only 3.7 miles.
Enhanced colour image of Phobos, the larger of the two Martian moons. It measures 14 miles along its longest axis
At only 3.7 miles in diameter, Deimos (pictured in this enhanced colour image) is a dwarf in comparison to its Martian sibling
At the time the images were taken, Phobos was 7,618 miles away from the camera, while Deimos was 17,340 miles away.
'From this perspective it is difficult to see the size difference between the Martian moons,' ESA said.
Much is still unknown about the formation and composition of Mars' two moons, although the upcoming MMX mission, led by the Japanese space agency, aims to remedy this.
Set to launch next year, the mission will orbit Phobos and Deimos before landing on Phobos and collecting a sample from the larger moon to return to Earth.
WHAT IS THE EUROPEAN SPACE AGENCY'S MARS EXPRESS SATELLITE?
Mars Express, so called because of the rapid and streamlined development time, represents the European Space Agency's (ESA's) first visit to another planet in the solar system.
The spacecraft, launched in 2003, borrowed technology from ESA's Rosetta mission and the Mars 96 mission.
Since beginning science operations in 2004, the durable orbiter has given scientists an entirely new view of Earth's intriguing neighbour.
It is now helping to answer fundamental questions about the geology, atmosphere, surface environment, history of water and potential for life on Mars.
Mars Express, so called because of the rapid and streamlined development time, represents the European Space Agency's (ESA's) first visit to another planet in the solar system
(artist's impression)
The spacecraft’s high-resolution camera has sent back thousands of dramatic 3D views of the Martian surface.
One instrument has discovered hydrated minerals that form only in the presence of liquid water, providing confirmation that Mars was once much wetter than it is today.
The first radar sounder ever to orbit another planet has detected subsurface layers of water ice.
Another instrument has detected enough water ice in the polar caps to create a global ocean 36 ft (11m) deep, and revealed vast plains of permafrost around the South Pole.
Mars Express found the highest clouds ever seen above any planetary surface at 62 miles (100km).
The mission found indications of the possible presence of methane, which on Earth is attributed to active volcanism and biochemical processes.
Its highly elliptical orbit has enabled the spacecraft to look beyond Mars, in order to survey its two tiny moons, particularly the innermost satellite Phobos, which has been studied in unprecedented detail.
During its lifetime it has acted as a communication relay between Earth and various NASA spacecraft, including the Phoenix lander and several rovers on the surface.
Mars Express Watched Deimos Pass in Front of Jupiter and its Moons
Mars Express Watched Deimos Pass in Front of Jupiter and its Moons
That’s no moon … wait … yes, it is, and more!
ESA’s Mars Express has captured an unusual and rare occultation, all from its vantage point in orbit of Mars. The spacecraft’s orbit brought it to the right place where it could witness the moment Mars’ small moon Deimos passed in front of Jupiter and its four largest moons. Scientists say that celestial alignments like these enable a more precise determination of the Martian moons’ orbits.
If you’ve seen Jupiter and its moons through binoculars or a small telescope, you might be envious of Mars Express’ view, especially when Deimos passes through the field of view.
ESA said this sequence is made up of a series of 80 images taken by the High Resolution Stereo Camera onboard Mars Express on February 14, 2022. In the foreground, the images show the irregular shaped Deimos, with its rocky and cratered surface, and in the background Jupiter and the four Galilean satellites are visible. Jupiter is the large bright white spot and the moons appear as small white specks of light.
The distance between Mars Express and Jupiter is about 745 million km (463 million miles). In order for distant Jupiter and the moons to show up in this video, the images have contrast enhanced. Otherwise, because of the difference in brightness compared to the nearby Deimos, the distant objects would not have been visible.
Phobos and Deimos, as seen by Mars Express. Credit: ESA.
The workhorse Mars Express has been in orbit of the Red Planet since 2003 and Mars’ two moons, Deimos and Phobos, have been studied frequently by the spacecraft. Mars Express data has helped scientists understand more about the moons’ composition, especially Phobos’ mysterious grooved terrain, and learn more about the moons’ puzzling origin. This includes tracking their orbits.
Scientists say the moons experience strong tidal forces from Mars, causing their orbits to fluctuate constantly. Phobos orbits extremely close to Mars at just 6,000 km (3,700 miles), and is moving towards the planet, while Deimos moves away from it. It is difficult to measure their orbits from Earth due to the brightness of Mars in comparison to these small bodies.
About a month and half after imaging the alignment with Jupiter, Mars Express captured another occultation, when Deimos was blocked by its larger sibling, Phobos. The images were taken on March 30, 2022 when Phobos was 12 km away from the camera. From this perspective it is difficult to see the size difference between the martian moons, as Deimos is further from the camera at a distance of 28 km.
Deimos has a diameter of 12 km (7.5 miles) and Phobos has a diameter 22 km (14 miles).
Dark Ring UFO Over Seaford England, Shoots Away When Filmed, 9-24-2022, UFO Sighting News.
Dark Ring UFO Over Seaford England, Shoots Away When Filmed, 9-24-2022, UFO Sighting News.
Date of sighting: 9-24-2022
Location of sighting: Seaford, England
Just when you thought it was safe to go to the beach, this happens. An eyewitness caught sight of a dark ring UFO moving low over the water so he began to record it. The UFO then begins to move away, as if it could sense that it was being recorded. It quickly moved up and into the clouds to hide within. Absolute proof that aliens exist over England. Ring UFOs are not new, but have been seen for thousands of years.
The Bible story of Ezekiel's wheel features a vision of four wheels that illustrates the spiritual, divine essence of God and His omnipresence in our reality. This story is predominately found in the first chapter of the book of Ezekiel, as part of his inaugural vision. God approaches Ezekiel as the divine warrior, riding in his battle chariot. The chariot is drawn by four living creatures, each having four faces (those of a man, a lion, an ox, and an eagle) and four wings. Beside each "living creature" is a "wheel within a wheel", with "tall and awesome" rims full of eyes all around. God appoints Ezekiel as a prophet and as a "watchman" in Israel: "Son of man, I am sending you to the Israelites."
Scott C. Waring - Taiwan
Eyewitness states:
I was at the beach looking out to the wind Array on a nice day at Seaford. I saw what I thought was tourists or workers in a helicopter going low in and out of the wind turbines which I though both dangerous and stupid. They saw the shape was odd not a helicopter more like a balloon, but it was moving oddly so I decided to film it on my phone in case it crashed. I could not hold my phone still enough, so I walked the wall to steady it and filmed it for just over a minute and eventually it went up high into the clouds. But I thought I would develop the film or zoom in and then I saw it is more like a disc moving side to side then further out to sea the wind array gives good perspective although it was a long way out. Other people at the beach saw me filming but did not seem that interested probably because they have bad eyes most people in Seaford are over 70. But there could well be more footage out there...
Amazing UFO filmed over United States Kansas City, MO yesterday!
Amazing UFO filmed over United States Kansas City, MO yesterday!
This really interesting UFO footage was filmed yesterday at 7:30 pm. The exact location is currently undisclosed.
Update: Location of the sighting is Kansas City, Missouri.
Witness report:
Saw this on security but wasn’t fast enough to see in person. I have absolutely no idea what it is but have never seen anything similar on cam. Ideas welcome. This is straight from the camera, saved and uploaded in its entirety. The camera naturally records in approx 2 minute blocks. I do live near a place B-2s fly but I never heard a sound and that would be flying extremely low per usual what I see and hear. I only see them 1-2 times a year though. They sometimes make a huge boom when they break the sound barrier.
After the DART spacecraft ploughed into the asteroid Dimorphos, the Hubble Space Telescope captured images of the ejected plume of dust and debris that streamed for thousands of kilometres behind the space rock.
Credit: NASA/European Space Agency/Space Telescope Science Institute/Hubble
Humans have for the first time proved that they can change the path of a massive rock hurtling through space. NASA has announced that the spacecraft it slammed into an asteroid on 26 September succeeded in altering the space rock’s orbit around another asteroid — with better-than-expected results.
Agency officials had estimated that the Double Asteroid Redirection Test (DART) spacecraft would ‘nudge’ the asteroid Dimorphos closer to its partner, Didymos, and cut the time it takes to orbit around that rock by 10–15 minutes. At a press conference on 11 October, researchers confirmed that DART in fact cut the orbital time by around 32 minutes.
Neither asteroid was a threat to Earth, but the agency tested the manoeuvre to prove that humanity could, in principle, deflect a worrisome space rock heading for the planet.
“This is a watershed moment for planetary defence, and a watershed moment for humanity,” said NASA administrator Bill Nelson.
Tracking the aftermath
Determining whether the mission succeeded relied on more than a half dozen telescopes around the world. Ground-based optical telescopes can’t resolve Didymos and Dimorphos, which are millions of kilometres from Earth and only a few hundred metres across, so are seen as a single point in the night sky. But the telescopes can measure dips in brightness as Dimorphos cycles in front of and behind Didymos. Observers tracked these movements and compared them with pre-collision orbital times to quantify DART’s impact.
Independently, a pair of radar facilities — Goldstone Observatory in Fort Irwin, California, and Green Bank Observatory in West Virginia — turned their dishes towards the asteroid pair. Unlike optical telescopes, radar observations can discern the two asteroids as distinct objects, allowing astronomers to view their respective positions and estimate Dimorphos’s orbital period around Didymos.
Both sets of observations agreed that DART’s impact knocked Dimorphos tens of metres closer to its companion and cut its orbital period to around 11 hours and 23 minutes.
Although the 32-minute reduction is larger than expected, it still falls within the range of possibilities that scientists modelled. Researchers think the manouevre succeeded as well as it did because Dimorphos is more a loose collection of rocks than a solid chunk that would be harder to deflect. Another reason for the dramatic change in the orbital period is that when DART hit, a lot of debris shot out from the asteroid, creating a tail thousands of kilometres long; the recoil from it probably accentuated the potency of DART’s impact, researchers said at the press conference.
“We have a lot of work ahead of us in order to really understand what happened,” said Tom Statler, a DART programme scientist at NASA’s headquarters in Washington DC.
Saving Earth
Scientists will continue to observe the asteroid pair in the months to come, hoping to understand more about the shape of Dimorphos’s new orbit and whether DART’s impact introduced a ‘wobble’ to the asteroid. With the help of images from LICIACube — the Italian Space Agency’s probe that trailed DART and then flew by to capture the impact — scientists hope to learn more about the properties of the ejected debris.
But the mission’s final post-mortem won’t be complete for the better part of a decade. Launching in its wake, the European Space Agency’s Hera mission — currently slated for lift-off in October 2024 — should arrive at Dimorphos in late 2026, to observe the aftermath of DART’s impact.
For now, the results indicate that the US$330-million DART mission was a success. But defending Earth from future impacts requires a few things, researchers say: knowing the locations and properties of any dangerous space rocks, and having enough time to act. DART launched in November last year and took about ten months to hit its target.
If a threatening asteroid really were headed towards Earth, said Nancy Chabot, a planetary scientist and the DART coordination lead at Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory in Laurel, Maryland, a mission would need to launch years in advance to deflect it safely. “Warning is really key here,” she said, adding that even space rocks larger than the 160-metre-wide Dimorphos might be dealt with, given enough planning and time.
Future Moon dwellings could end up looking a bit like our terrestrial camping sites: Lunar residents may carry an inflatable structure with them and blow it up when they get there. These have a major advantage as you can fit a massive living structure inside a much smaller rocket.
And now, some architects are taking this idea pretty seriously.
Humans could live in inflatable houses buried under the lunar soil and supported by food from inflatable greenhouses, according to a recent concept study funded by the European Space Agency (ESA) and drawn up by Pneumocell, an Austria-based company specializing in inflatable architecture.
It isn’t Pneumocell’s first blow-up space idea. The company has previously designed an inflatable Mars habitat and a partially inflatable spacecraft. But they were just that — concepts. “It’s very difficult in a small country like Austria to get funding for such an idea,” says Thomas Herzig, an architect at Pneumocell.
Rather than halt their out-of-this-world idea, Herzig and his colleagues acquired an ESA grant last year. Even so, ambitious off-Earth habitat designs like theirs have a long way to go before they can see the light of the (lunar) day.
LUNAR LIVING WON’T BE EASY
Any off-Earth habitat has one key goal: to keep its crew alive outside of the atmosphere we evolved to survive in.
There are many formidable dangers that await us on the Moon. California’s earthquakes and wildfires have nothing on the micrometeoroids, constant radiation, and apocalyptic temperature swings (from 250 degrees Fahrenheit in the two-week-long day to 200 degrees below 0 in the two-week-long night) that plague the lunar surface.
But as they say in real estate, it’s all about location. The specific areas that people settle in could minimize some of these threats.
For example, humans could live underground, where the lunar regolith would protect them from the worst of the elements. Moon migrants could also land in polar regions, where we could tap water from the ground.
Rather than fortnight-long nights and days, the poles get more constant sunlight (convenient for solar power).
Pnuemocell looked into digs for both regions, pinpointing polar craters to plop its habitat on: Hinshelwood near the north pole and Shackleton near the south pole. The architects plan to build within the crater walls, carving out a network of tunnels to fill with inflatable modules and tubes.
Unfortunately, that setup comes with a major obstacle. This environment is air-free and has no running water to erode and blunt rocks, so pieces of lunar regolith could stick out like shards of glass. It’s a very real hazard for inflatable structures.
“That inflatable portion would have to be designed to where it would have some sort of barrier layer that is resistant to being penetrated by those sharp particles,” says James Nabity, an engineer at the University of Colorado Boulder who isn’t involved with Pneumocell.
To protect against such a fate, the designers envision a skin composed of two layers separated by a gap.
“The biggest threat is not the collapse of the structure,” says Herzig. While you may think falling debris is the main risk in a collapse, possible asphyxiation is most concerning.
Bedrooms would surround donut-shaped greenhouses, the largest rooms in the habitat. Tunnels would link these greenhouses and branch off into utilities and laboratories.
Mirrors positioned above the crater would reflect sunlight — always available thanks to the habitat’s strategic polar placement — down into soil and crops below.
THIS PLAN IS PRETTY MUCH UNPRECEDENTED.
“Having plants is a great idea,” Nabity says. Certainly, greenhouses can help feed a crew living more than 200,000 miles from Earth’s farms. But flora can do more than that: Designers have evidence to believe that it can boost crew members’ moods.
Those plants would grow in air that has been modified to prevent balloon-popping, with reduced air pressure and increased oxygen content. The greenhouse would also be humidified to lower the fire risk.
But this plan is pretty much unprecedented: “I’m not aware of any experiments with growing plants in that level of atmosphere,” says Nabity. While scientists have recently grown plants in samples of real lunar soil, they’re still far from nailing down the real thing.
It isn’t just the horticulture aspect that remains highly hypothetical. Pneumocell hasn’t yet decided which material will make up its inflatable structures.
One candidate is mylar, which spacecraft have used for decades to trap and reflect heat. Mylar balloons are pretty easy to come by (they’re a staple at children’s birthday parties), but nobody has ever tried to use it for a giant inflatable structure before.
A second option: thermoplastic polyurethane, a low-cost, flexible material that’s used in life rafts and phone cases — but so far hasn’t gone into space. It’s unclear whether it will remain elastic when it encounters the moon’s chilling temperatures.
All things considered, Pneumocell’s idea will need a good deal of prototyping and testing on the ground before it can blast off to space.
BLOWING UP IN SPACE
While Pneumocell’s concept might seem particularly zany, inflatable space habitats aren’t a new idea. As early as the 1960s, Goodyear (yes, the tire company) proposed a space station constructed from a giant air-filled rubber ring.
Decades later, in the late 1990s, NASA engineers plottedTransHab, an inflatable module that they imagined could one day house astronauts on the International Space Station (ISS) or even on a spacecraft bound for Mars.
TransHab never left the drawing board, but it inspired the current generation of space architects. “A lot of people have picked it up in the last 10 years,” says Georgi Petrov, an architect at the firm Skidmore, Owings & Merrill (SOM).
One of TransHab’s imitators did in fact make it to the ISS. In 2016, astronauts tethered a little experimental module called BEAM to the station’s side and inflated it — all in orbit. Eventually, NASA hopes to use inflatable modules like BEAM to build out the planned Gateway station that might one day orbit the Moon.
On the other side of the Atlantic, the European Space Agency was interested, too. The agency partnered with SOM — the same architecture firm behind New York’s One World Trade Center, Hong Kong’s HKCEC, and several modern airport terminals — to envision such a village.
At the Venice Biennale art exhibition in 2021, SOM showed off its vision for cone-shaped lunar homes. Its homes would be inflatable, and they might even expand to house more crew members. Like Pneumocell, it would set up camp on the lunar south pole.
INFLATABLES AREN’T THE ONLY CREATIVE WAY TO GET AROUND A ROCKET’S CARGO SPACE LIMITATIONS.
In contrast to Pneumocell’s subterranean balloon-dwellers, these would touch down on the lunar surface. SOM’s homes may be far more vulnerable to radiation and micrometeoroids, but the firm says a protective shell for each structure could combat those problems.
In SOM’s design, each cone would house a crew of four. The concept takes advantage of the Moon’s relatively low gravity (about 17 percent of ours on Earth) by stacking its rooms — inhabitants would move between them via ladders. SOM imagines combining dozens of these habitats into a “lunar village.”
Inflatables aren’t the only creative way to get around a rocket’s cargo space limitations.
Rather than packing up prefab habitats, future Moon-folk might bring over 3D printers — and build their residences after they arrive by printing parts from lunar regolith.
To pursue this idea, NASA tapped construction startup AI SpaceFactory to design a 3D-printable lunar habitat. Its curved concept, called Lunar Infrastructure Asset (LINA), would rise in the form of a bulbous three-pointed star — its roof printed from a mixture of lunar soil and Earth-made synthetic polymers.
Nobody has taken a 3D printer to the Moon yet, so reshaping moondust remains up to future missions. But engineers on Earth can try their hand with artificial materials meant to mimic lunar regolith. They have already 3D-printed Moon-like bricks, along with gears and screws.
Last year, researchers in Germany printed parts from fake lunar regolith in a zero-gravity environment — suggesting that lunar folk might be able to print parts in lunar orbit.
OUR NEXT MOONSHOT
So far, no plans exist to launch any of these lunar habitats. “We’re an architecture and engineering firm,” says Petrov, who was involved with SOM’s lunar village project. “We don’t have the means to build spaceships.”
What’s more, humans might not even return to the Moon as soon as we had hoped. As of this writing, Artemis 1— the next uncrewed celestial stepping-stone to Earth’s celestial companion — currently sits delayed on the pad in Florida. Any lunar architecture plans will likely have to wait for the 2030s, if not later.
The team at Pneumocell is currently seeking out more funding so it can build a small-scale prototype on Earth. Only after this crucial step can it do the much more expensive work of sending it to space.
“I THINK IT’S IMPORTANT THAT YOU HAVE DERIVED PRODUCTS THAT HAVE A USE HERE ON EARTH AND NOT JUST FOR SPACE.”
In the meantime, the Pneumocell architects think their work can benefit our terrestrial habitats. Herzig points out that materials like thermoplastic polyurethane are easier to recycle than most building components. Worldwide, constructionand demolition gobble up more raw materials than any other industry. And in the United States, it contributes around 40 percent of all solid waste.
“I think it’s important that you have derived products that have a use here on Earth and not just for space,” he says.
Projects like Pneumocell’s mark a significant shift in our vision for extraterrestrial living: Around a decade ago, space architects didn’t know if they were drafting up homes for the Moon or Mars, according to Petrov.
“Long term, I think Mars is still a much more interesting and viable destination,” he says. “But we need to go to the Moon first.”
Hubble Spots Ultra-Speedy Jet Blasting From Star Crash
Hubble Spots Ultra-Speedy Jet Blasting From Star Crash
Astronomers using NASA's Hubble Space Telescope have made a unique measurement that indicates a jet, plowing through space at speeds greater than 99.97% the speed of light, was propelled by the titanic collision between two neutron stars.
The explosive event, named GW170817, was observed in August 2017. The blast released the energy comparable to that of a supernova explosion. It was the first combined detection of gravitational waves and gamma radiation from a binary neutron star merger.
Two neutron stars, the surviving cores of massive stars that exploded, collided sending a ripple through the fabric of time and space in a phenomenon called gravitational waves. In the aftermath, a blowtorch jet of radiation was ejected at nearly the speed of light, slamming into material surrounding the obliterated pair. Astronomers used Hubble to measure the motion of a blob of material the jet slammed into. Credits: NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center; Lead Producer: Paul Morris
This was a major watershed in the ongoing investigation of these extraordinary collisions. The aftermath of this merger was collectively seen by 70 observatories around the globe and in space, across a broad swath of the electromagnetic spectrum in addition to the gravitational wave detection. This heralded a significant breakthrough for the emerging field of Time Domain and Multi-Messenger Astrophysics, the use of multiple "messengers" like light and gravitational waves to study the universe as it changes over time.
Scientists quickly aimed Hubble at the site of the explosion just two days later. The neutron stars collapsed into a black hole whose powerful gravity began pulling material toward it. That material formed a rapidly-spinning disk that generated jets moving outward from its poles. The roaring jet smashed into and swept up material in the expanding shell of explosion debris. This included a blob of material through which a jet emerged.
While the event took place in 2017, it has taken several years for scientists to come up with a way to analyze the Hubble data and data from other telescopes to paint this full picture.
The Hubble observation was combined with observations from multiple National Science Foundation radio telescopes working together for very long baseline interferometry (VLBI). The radio data were taken 75 days and 230 days after the explosion.
"I'm amazed that Hubble could give us such a precise measurement, which rivals the precision achieved by powerful radio VLBI telescopes spread across the globe," said Kunal P. Mooley of Caltech in Pasadena, California, lead author of a paper being published in the October 13 journal of Nature magazine.
The authors used Hubble data together with data from ESA's (the European Space Agency) Gaia satellite, in addition to VLBI, to achieve extreme precision. "It took months of careful analysis of the data to make this measurement," said Jay Anderson of the Space Telescope Science Institute in Baltimore, Maryland.
This is an artist's impression of two neutron stars colliding. The smashup between two dense stellar remnants unleashes the energy of 1,000 standard stellar nova explosions. In the aftermath of the collision a blowtorch jet of radiation is ejected at nearly the speed of light. The jet is directed along a narrow beam confined by powerful magnetic fields. The roaring jet plowed into and swept up material in the surrounding interstellar medium.
Credits: Artwork: Elizabeth Wheatley (STScI)
By combining the different observations, they were able to pinpoint the explosion site. The Hubble measurement showed the jet was moving at an apparent velocity of seven times the speed of light. The radio observations show the jet later had decelerated to an apparent speed of four times faster than the speed of light.
In reality, nothing can exceed the speed of light, so this "superluminal" motion is an illusion. Because the jet is approaching Earth at nearly the speed of light, the light it emits at a later time has a shorter distance to go. In essence the jet is chasing its own light. In actuality more time has passed between the jet's emission of the light than the observer thinks. This causes the object's velocity to be overestimated – in this case seemingly exceeding the speed of light.
"Our result indicates that the jet was moving at least at 99.97% the speed of light when it was launched," said Wenbin Lu of the University of California, Berkeley.
The Hubble measurements, combined with the VLBI measurements, announced in 2018, greatly strengthen the long-presumed connection between neutron star mergers and short-duration gamma-ray bursts. That connection requires a fast-moving jet to emerge, which has now been measured in GW170817.
At present there is a discrepancy between Hubble constant values as estimated for the early universe and nearby universe – one of the biggest mysteries in astrophysics today. The differing values are based on extremely precise measurements of Type Ia supernovae by Hubble and other observatories, and Cosmic Microwave Background measurements by ESA's Planck satellite. More views of relativistic jets could add information for astronomers trying to solve the puzzle.
The Hubble Space Telescope is a project of international cooperation between NASA and ESA. NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland, manages the telescope. The Space Telescope Science Institute (STScI) in Baltimore, Maryland, conducts Hubble science operations. STScI is operated for NASA by the Association of Universities for Research in Astronomy, in Washington, D.C.
Image. Mrs. Hannah McRoberts, Campbell River, BC, 1981
IN BRIEF
The Facts:
The People’s Republic of China announced last year that there has been an increase of mysterious and unexplained aircraft in Chinese airspace.
They, like several other countries have established official programs to study the phenomenon.
Evidence does suggest, however, that governments have been studying the phenomenon for decades.
Reflect On:
UFOs have been studied and observed for years. Why is the U.S. and other governments claiming that they will only now start to study it?
What should we make of the data that's been collected over the past several decades when it's not even being acknowledged?
Can we trust an "official" explanation about the phenomenon from such sources?
Some proponents of the theory that UFOs are secret military craft from foreign nations fail to realize that dozens of governments are dealing with the “UFO” issue, and have been for decades.
The South China Morning Post (SCMP) reported in June 2021 that Chinese analysts “have been overwhelmed in recent years by rapidly mounting sighting reports from a wide range of military and civilian sources” by what the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) are calling “unidentified air conditions.”
Once again, as we’ve been seeing the United States, the mainstream perspective of the phenomenon and the nature in which it’s being reported has taken the tone of ‘a problem.’
“The frequent occurrence of unidentified air conditions in recent years … brings severe challenges to air defence security of our country,”
Chen Li of the PLA’s Air Force Early Warning Academy, in a 2019 report cited by SCMP.
What if looking at the phenomenon through the lens of it being some sort of threat is in fact the problem? This is not to assume their nature and purpose, but it’s simply putting more focus on our reaction to the phenomenon, which is important. Are we the aggressors? Multiple cases and encounters suggest that may be the case.
Is the protocol to shoot first and ask questions after?
That being said, nobody can deny that there are air safety issue concerns here. But the vast majority of UFO encounters with human aircraft, be it civilian or military, perform evasive maneuvers to avoid our own aircraft. This is what’s been reported for decades, and that is made clear by going through the literature that describes military and civilian encounters with UFOs.
“At a time when cross- domain trans medium threats to United States national security are expanding exponentially, the Committee is disappointed with the slow pace of DoD-led efforts to establish the office to address those threats and to replace the former Unidentified Aerial Phenomena Task Force as required in Section 1683 of the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2022.”
Transmedium objects are those that are capable of flying at tremendous speeds both in the air and through the water. Many UFOs are observed doing this.
The United States Navy recently expressed that releasing their classified videos they have in their possession of UFOs would be a threat to national security.
This topic has been shrouded in secrecy since the 1940’s, should we expect much to change? If we look at other topics and/or actions that have been justified under the guise of ‘national security’, it doesn’t paint a really trustworthy picture. Mass surveillance is a great example. It was once considered a conspiracy theory until NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden provided proof of just how vast and global it really is, and what kind of intrusive surveillance technology is being used.
All of this was justified under the claim that it (mass surveillance) was necessary to protect citizens.
History is chock full of example where our ‘safety’ and ‘national security’ has been used as a mask to cover our eyes to very immoral and unethical actions that governments partake in. Whether it be arming and assisting the very same terrorist organizations they claim to be fighting themselves, or something else. Why do we imprison people, like Julian Assange, for exposing war crimes?
It’s not for national security. It’s to maintain a monopoly of power, wealth, and as NSA whistleblower William Binney said, “total population control.”
So, if we have governments and political systems that seem to incentivize immoral and unethical behaviour, one that thrives off of secrecy, perception manipulation and the retention of power, as well as a history of disseminating propaganda, then why should we expect anything different when it comes to the topic of UFOs?
A few UFO researchers have warned against the threat perspective. Renowned UFO researcher, scientist, mathematician, and astrophysicist Dr. Jacques Vallée made an appearance on the Joe Rogan show in late 2020 stating just that.
Thousands of contact stories, which are closely associated with UFOs, share stories that are benevolent in nature. That being said, there are some what appear to be malevolent stories as well.
The fact remains, the phenomenon has been documented for thousands of years throughout art, the introduction of the printing press and more. An “invasion” type of scenario doesn’t seem to probable given the fact that it probably would have happened by now.
This topic is so vast and leaves no aspect of humanity untouched. What we are likely to receive from governments is a watered down sanitized version of it, not a holistic, open and transparent revelation that shares all that is represented of this phenomenon and its nature. But that’s just my opinion.
Researchers have transplanted a human brain organoid (bright green) into the brain of a newborn rat pup, creating a hybrid brain in which the neurons interface.
Credit: Stanford University
Miniature human-brain-like structures transplanted into rats can send signals and respond to environmental cues picked up by the rats’ whiskers, according to a study1. This demonstration that neurons grown from human stem cells can interface with nerve cells in live rodents could lead to a way to test therapies for human brain disorders.
Scientists would like to use brain organoids — tiny brain-like structures grown from human stem cells — to study neurodegenerative and neuropsychiatric disorders that humans develop. But the organoids mimic human brains only so far. They don’t develop blood vessels and so can’t receive nutrients, meaning that they don’t thrive for long. And they don’t get the stimulation they need to grow fully: in a human infant’s brain, neurons’ growth and how they develop connections with other neurons are based in part on input from the senses.
To give brain organoids this stimulation and support, neuroscientist Sergiu Pasca at Stanford University in California and his colleagues grew the structures from human stem cells and then injected them into the brains of newborn rat pups, with the expectation that the human cells would grow along with the rats’ own cells. The team placed the organoids in a brain region called the somatosensory cortex, which receives signals from the rats’ whiskers and other sensory organs and then passes them along to other brain regions that interpret the signals.
Human brain cells mature much more slowly than rat cells, so the researchers had to wait for more than six months for the organoids to become fully integrated into the rat brains. But when they examined the animals’ brains at the end of that time, they saw that the integration had been so successful that it was almost like adding “another transistor to a circuit”, Pasca said at a 10 October press conference.
Paola Arlotta, a molecular biologist at Harvard University in Cambridge, Massachusetts, is excited about the results. “It’s an important step in allowing organoids to tell us more complex properties of the brain,” she says, although she thinks that the transplantation procedure is probably still too expensive and complex to become a standard research tool. The next step, Arlotta adds, will be to work out how individual human neurons — not just fully developed organoids — are integrated into the rat brain.
Behaviour trigger
In their report, published in Nature on 12 October1, the researchers describe how they genetically engineered the neurons in the organoids to fire when stimulated with light from a fibre-optic cable embedded in the rats’ brains. The team trained the rats to lick a spout to receive water while the light was switched on. Afterwards, when the researchers shone the light on the hybrid brains, the rats were prompted to lick the spout, meaning that the human cells had become integrated well enough to help drive the animals’ behaviour. Furthermore, when the researchers prodded the rats’ whiskers, they found that the human cells in the sensory cortex fired in response, suggesting that the cells were able to pick up sensory information.
Human neurons created from stem cells and transplanted into a rat brain (right) grow more fully than those cultivated in a dish (left).
Credit: Stanford University
To demonstrate the promise of their work for studying brain disorders, Pasca and his colleagues also created brain organoids from the stem cells of three people with a genetic condition called Timothy syndrome, which can cause symptoms similar to some seen in autism. The tiny structures looked the same as any other brain organoids grown in a dish, but when the researchers transplanted them into rats, they did not grow as large as others and their neurons didn’t fire in the same way.
Rusty Gage, a neuroscientist at the Salk Institute for Biological Studies in La Jolla, California, is glad to see these results. In 2018, he and a team of researchers found that transplanted human brain organoids could be integrated into the brains of adult mice2. Mice don’t live as long as rats, and Pasca and his colleagues hoped that because newborn rat pups’ brains are more plastic than those of adult animals, they would be better able to receive the new cells.
“We’ve got challenges out there for us,” Gage says. “But I do believe the transplantation procedure will be a valuable tool.”
Some of the challenges are ethical. People are concerned that creating rodent–human hybrids could harm the animals, or create animals with human-like brains. Last year, a panel organized by the US National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine released a report concluding that human brain organoids are still too primitive to become conscious, attain human-like intelligence or acquire other abilities that might require legal regulation. Pasca says that his team’s organoid transplants didn’t cause problems such as seizures or memory deficits in the rats, and didn’t seem to change the animals’ behaviour significantly.
But Arlotta, a member of the National Academies panel, says that problems could arise as science advances. “We can’t just discuss it once and let it be,” she says. She adds that concerns about human organoids need to be weighed against the needs of people with neurological and psychiatric disorders. Brain organoids and human–animal hybrid brains could reveal the mechanisms underlying these illnesses, and allow researchers to test therapies for conditions such as schizophrenia and bipolar disorder. “I think we have a responsibility as a society to do everything we can,” Arlotta says.
A color view of the Jovian moon Europa captured by NASA's Galileo spacecraft in the late 1990s.
(Image credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/SETI Institute)
Salty water lakes throughout the crust of Jupiter's icy moon Europa might burst from the surface as plumes of vapor or flows of slushy ice "lava", new research suggests.
NASA's Europa Clipper will explore the moon in the early 2030s and should be able to detect these subsurface lakes, if they indeed exist. Their presence would mean that the global ocean scientists think exists below the surface of the Jovian moon isn't the only liquid water lurking under Europa's icy shell. Scientists are keen to investigate Europa and its liquid water because this moon of Jupiter appears tantalizingly capable of hosting life.
The Europa Clipper spacecraft, set to launch in 2024, will fly past Europa around 50 times using sophisticated instruments to collect data about the moon. But before the mission gets underway, scientists are working to better model the water on Europa to more accurately focus the spacecraft's investigation.
One piece of new research in that vein offers new theories about the material that erupts from the surface of Europa as plumes or as "cryolava," the icy equivalent of the molten lava in volcanic activity seen on Earth. The work uses a new computer model and suggests that these eruptions may originate from subsurface reservoirs of salty water or "lakes" in the crust of Europa, rather than from its global liquid ocean.
"We demonstrated that plumes or cryolava flows could mean there are shallow liquid reservoirs below, which Europa Clipper would be able to detect," Elodie Lesage, lead author of the research and a Europa scientist at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) in California, said in astatement. "Our results give new insights into how deep the water might be that's driving surface activity, including plumes. And the water should be shallow enough that it can be detected by multiple Europa Clipper instruments."
The team's models suggest that the mission should detect reservoirs of water relatively close to the surface of Europa, in the upper 2.5 to 5 miles (4 to 8 kilometers) of the crust.
This is the region where the ice is at its coldest and most brittle. Pockets of water held here would freeze and expand, thus breaking the surrounding ice and triggering an eruption. This phenomenon is similar to how carbonated drinks can swell and burst when placed in a freezer.
An illustration of icy plumes of material erupting from the surface of Jupiter's moon Europa with the gas giant planet in the background. (Image credit: NASA/ESA/K. Retherford/SWRI)
The researchers also determined that the reservoirs most likely to erupt in this way are wide and flat, like a pancake.
However, the situation is different deeper inside Europa, according to the team. Reservoirs below around 5 miles (8 kilometers) under Europa's crust would also expand and push on surrounding ice. But because this ice is warmer, it is less brittle and thus soft enough to absorb the increased pressure rather than bursting. Instead of being analogous to an exploding soda can, this is more like a balloon of water that stretches as the liquid it contains freezes and expands.
These findings should help the Europa Clipper's radar instrument, called Radar for Europa Assessment and Sounding: Ocean to Near-surface (REASON), hunt for pockets of water when the spacecraft arrives at Europa in 2030.
"The new work shows that water bodies in the shallow subsurface could be unstable if stresses exceed the strength of the ice and could be associated with plumes rising above the surface," Don Blankenship, leader of the REASON team and a geophysicist at the University of Texas Institute for Geophysics in Texas who wasn't involved in the research, said in the same statement. "That means REASON could be able to see water bodies in the same places that you see plumes."
Astronomers Discover A Water Reservoir Floating In Space That Is Equivalent To 140 Trillion Times All The Water In The Earth's Ocean
Astronomers Discover A Water Reservoir Floating In Space That Is Equivalent To 140 Trillion Times All The Water In The Earth's Ocean
by Mirza Newton
There is a reserve of water the size of 140 trillion oceans lurking in a faraway supermassive black hole, the universe's largest deposit of water and 4,000 times the amount found in the Milky Way.
This amount of water was discovered by two teams of astronomers 12 billion light-years away, where it appears as vapor dispersed across hundreds of light-years.
The reservoir was discovered in a quasar's gaseous area, which is a brilliant compact region in the heart of a galaxy powered by a black hole. This finding demonstrates that water may be present throughout the cosmos, even at the start.
While this is not surprising to experts, water has never been discovered this far out before. The light from the quasar (specifically, the APM 08279+5255 quasar in the constellation Lynx) took 12 billion years to reach Earth, implying that this mass of water existed when the universe was just 1.6 billion years old.
One group used the Z-Spec instrument at the Caltech Submillimeter Observatory in Hawaii, while the other used the Plateau de Bure Interferometer in the French Alps.
These sensors detect millimeter and submillimeter wavelengths, allowing the detection of trace gases (or vast reservoirs of water vapor) in the early cosmos.
The discovery of many spectral fingerprints of water in the quasar provided researchers with the data they needed to calculate the vast magnitude of the reservoir.
[NASA][THIS IS AN UPDATED VERSION OF THE OLD ARTICLE]
Human brain cells grown in a lab learn to play Pong: Incredible footage shows mini-brains mastering the classic video game after just five MINUTES of training
Human brain cells grown in a lab learn to play Pong: Incredible footage shows mini-brains mastering the classic video game after just five MINUTES of training
Pong is a classic table tennis-themed video game, first released in 1972
Researchers took human brain cells and grew 800,000 neurons in a dish
They demonstrated that the brains cells could master Pong in just five minutes
In the future, the researchers hope the findings could pave the way for treatments for neurodegenerative conditions like dementia
It's the classic table tennis-themed video game that tasks players with moving a paddle vertically across a screen to hit a ball.
And now even human brain cells grown in a lab have mastered Pong.
Researchers from Melbourne-based start-up, Cortical Labs, have shown for the first time that 800,000 brain cells can perform goal-directed tasks – in this case, Pong.
The findings suggest that even brain cells in a petri dish can exhibit inherent intelligence, modifying their behaviour over time.
'This new capacity to teach cell cultures to perform a task in which they exhibit sentience – by controlling the paddle to return the ball via sensing – opens up new discovery possibilities which will have far-reaching consequences for technology, health, and society,' said Dr Adeel Razi, an author of the study.
'We know our brains have the evolutionary advantage of being tuned over hundreds of millions of years for survival.
'Now, it seems we have in our grasp where we can harness this incredibly powerful and cheap biological intelligence.'
Researchers from Melbourne-based start-up, Cortical Labs, have shown for the first time that 800,000 brain cells living in a dish can perform goal-directed tasks – in this case, Pong
How will the results be used?
The team will now try to see what happens when DishBrain is affected by medicines and alcohol.
'We're trying to create a dose response curve with ethanol – basically get them 'drunk' and see if they play the game more poorly, just as when people drink,' said Dr Kagan.
In the future, the researchers hope the findings could pave the way for treatments for neurodegenerative conditions.
'DishBrain offers a simpler approach to test how the brain works and gain insights into debilitating conditions such as epilepsy and dementia,' says Dr Hon Weng Chong, Chief Executive Officer of Cortical Labs.
Scientists have previously been able to grow brain cells in the lab and read their activity.
However, until now, it's not been possible to stimulate the cells in a structured and meaningful way.
Dr Brett Kagan, who led the study, explained: 'In the past, models of the brain have been developed according to how computer scientists think the brain might work.
'That is usually based on our current understanding of information technology, such as silicon computing.
'But in truth we don't really understand how the brain works.'
In the new study, the team took mouse cells from embryonic brains as well as some human brain cells, and grew 800,000 neurons in a dish, in what they're calling 'DishBrain'.
The neurons were connected to a computer in such a way where they received feedback on whether their paddle was hitting the ball.
Electrodes on the left or right of one array were fired to tell DishBrain which side the ball was on, while distance from the paddle was indicated by the frequency of signals.
Using electric probes that recorded 'spikes', the researchers monitored the neuron's activity and responses to this feedback.
In the new study, the team took mouse cells from embryonic brains as well as some human brain cells, and grew 800,000 neurons in a dish, in what they're calling 'DishBrain'
(pictured)
Pong is a classic table tennis-themed video game that tasks players with moving a paddle vertically across a screen to hit a ball
What is Pong?
Pong was officially released on November 29, 1972.
The two-dimensional table tennis simulator, the first release by Atari, is credited with being one of the progenitors of the video games industry, which is now worth a phenomenal $65billion a year.
The simple two-dimensional simulation of ping pong, consists merely of two paddles which moved up and down to pass a moving spot between each player.
Yet its addictive gameplay captured the imagination of thousands of players around the world, building Atari's status as a video games giant.
Spikes became stronger the more a neuron moved its paddle and hit the ball.
And when neurons missed the ball, their playstyle was critiqued by a software programme.
This shows that neurons can adapt their activity to a changing environment in a goal-oriented way, in real time.
Professor Karl Friston, a theoretical neuroscientist at UCL, and co-author of the study, said: 'Remarkably, the cultures learned how to make their world more predictable by acting upon it.
'This is remarkable because you cannot teach this kind of self-organisation; simply because — unlike a pet — these mini brains have no sense of reward and punishment.'
Pong wasn't the only game the team tested.
'You know when the Google Chrome browser crashes and you get that dinosaur that you can make jump over obstacles (Project Bolan),' said Dr Kagan.
'We've done that and we've seen some nice preliminary results, but we still have more work to do building new environments for custom purposes.'
The team will now try to see what happens when DishBrain is affected by medicines and alcohol.
'We're trying to create a dose response curve with ethanol – basically get them "drunk" and see if they play the game more poorly, just as when people drink,' said Dr Kagan.
In the future, the researchers hope the findings could pave the way for treatments for neurodegenerative conditions.
'DishBrain offers a simpler approach to test how the brain works and gain insights into debilitating conditions such as epilepsy and dementia,' said Dr Hon Weng Chong, Chief Executive Officer of Cortical Labs.
WHAT IS A NEURON AND HOW DOES IT WORK?
A neuron, also known as nerve cell, is an electrically excitable cell that takes up, processes and transmits information through electrical and chemical signals. It is one of the basic elements of the nervous system.
In order that a human being can react to his environment, neurons transport stimuli.
The stimulation, for example the burning of the finger at a candle flame, is transported by the ascending neurons to the central nervous system and in return, the descending neurons stimulate the arm in order to remove the finger from the candle.
A typical neuron is divided into three parts: the cell body, the dendrites and the axon. The cell body, the centre of the neuron, extends its processes called the axon and the dendrites to other cells.Dendrites typically branch profusely, getting thinner with each branching. The axon is thin but can reach enormous distances.
To make a comparable scale, the diameter of a neuron is about the tenth size of the diameter of a human hair.
All neurons are electrically excitable. The electrical impulse mostly arrives on the dendrites, gets processed into the cell body to then move along the axon.
On its all length an axon functions merely as an electric cable, simply transmitting the signal.
Once the electrical reaches the end of the axon, at the synapses, things get a little more complex.
The key to neural function is the synaptic signalling process, which is partly electrical and partly chemical.
Once the electrical signal reaches the synapse, a special molecule called neurotransmitter is released by the neuron.
This neurotransmitter will then stimulate the second neuron, triggering a new wave of electrical impulse, repeating the mechanism described above.
Menselijke hersencellen gekweekt in labo leren videogame Pong spelen in 5 minuten
Wetenschappers hebben het videospelletje Pong uit de jaren 70 in amper vijf minuten tijd leren spelen aan menselijke hersencellen gekweekt in een laboratorium. Volgens de onderzoekers kan hun “minibrein” voelen en reageren op de omgeving. Op termijn is de hoop dat de technologie kan worden ingezet om behandelingen te testen voor ziektes als Alzheimer.
Brett Kagan van het bedrijf Cortical Labs beweert dat hij met zijn team onderzoekers uit het Australische Melbourne voor het eerst een “gevoelig” brein op een schaaltje in een labo heeft gekweekt. Andere experten vinden die omschrijving te ver gaan, al noemen ze het onderzoek wel “opwindend”. “We konden geen betere term vinden om dit te beschrijven”, zegt Kagan. “Het is in staat om informatie van een externe bron op te nemen, die te verwerken en er vervolgens in real time op te reageren.” Neurowetenschapper Dean Burnett, die verbonden is aan de Cardiff Psychology School, geeft toch de voorkeur aan de term “denkend systeem”. “Er wordt informatie doorgegeven en duidelijk gebruikt, waardoor veranderingen ontstaan, dus over de stimulus die zij ontvangen wordt op een elementaire manier ‘nagedacht’”, zegt Burnett.
Het creëren van een minibrein is op zich niet nieuw. Het eerste werd al in 2013 gekweekt, toen om microcefalie te bestuderen, de genetische aandoening waarbij de schedelomvang te klein is en ook de hersenen zich niet volledig kunnen ontwikkelen. Sindsdien worden minibreinen vaker gebruikt in hersenonderzoek.
De primeur van dit onderzoek bestaat erin dat de hersenen werden verbonden met een externe omgevingsfactor, in dit geval een videogame, en dat er interactie was. Eerst werden menselijke hersencellen gekweekt uit stamcellen en enkele ook uit embryo’s van muizen. In totaal bestond het minibrein uit zo’n 800.000 cellen. Via elektroden werden de hersencellen verbonden met Pong, een van de allereerste videospellen, daterend uit de jaren 70.
Wat is Pong?
Het spel is gebaseerd op pingpong. De twee spelers staan elk achteraan hun eigen helft van het speelveld en hebben elk een bat, dat enkel horizontaal kan bewegen en dat tegen een balletje kan kaatsen. Aan de boven- en onderkant van het speelveld zijn er twee muren, die het balletje wegkaatsen telkens als dat de muur raakt. De bedoeling is om het balletje achter het bat van de tegenstander te krijgen en zo te scoren.
Bij de proef met het minibrein gaven de elektroden aan aan welke kant het balletje was en hoe ver het verwijderd was van de batjes. Als reactie daarop produceerden de cellen hun eigen elektrische activiteit. Naarmate het spel vorderde, gebruikten ze minder energie. Maar wanneer er ‘gescoord’ werd en het spel dus opnieuw begon met het balletje op een willekeurig punt, verbruikten ze meer energie om zich aan te passen aan de nieuwe spelsituatie.
In vijf minuten tijd leerde het minibrein Pong spelen. De bal werd vaak gemist, maar het succespercentage lag ver boven wat nog toeval is, ook al - zo benadrukken de onderzoekers - heeft het minibrein geen bewustzijn en weet het niet dat het Pong aan het spelen is zoals een menselijke speler dat zou beseffen.
Kagan hoopt dat deze technologie uiteindelijk zal kunnen worden gebruikt om behandelingen voor neurodegeneratieve ziekten zoals Alzheimer te testen. Kagan wil verder gaan dan alleen maar kijken of de hersenen in een schaaltje al dan niet activiteit vertonen. “Het doel van hersencellen is om informatie in real time te verwerken”, zegt hij. “Het aanboren van hun ware functie ontsluit zo veel meer onderzoeksgebieden die uitgebreid kunnen worden onderzocht.” Kagan is nu van plan om te testen welke invloed alcohol heeft op de capaciteit van het minibrein om Pong te spelen. Hij wil nagaan of de hersencellen reageren zoals een menselijk brein, wat van het systeem een efficiënte stand-in voor experimenten zou maken.
De studie is na peer-review gepubliceerd in het tijdschrift ‘Neuron’.
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Phew, NASA’s CAPSTONE is no Longer Tumbling in Space
Phew, NASA’s CAPSTONE is no Longer Tumbling in Space
Engineers with the trouble-plagued CAPSTONE mission to the Moon have made progress in stabilizing the spacecraft. A month ago, the microwave-oven-sized CAPSTONE (Cislunar Autonomous Positioning System Technology Operations and Navigation Experiment) began tumbling and lost its orientation in space. But now, after weeks of painstaking and patient troubleshooting, team members successfully executed an operation to stop the spacecraft’s spin. NASA says this clears a major hurdle in returning the spacecraft to normal operations.
Animation of the CAPSTONE mission in orbit of the Moon. Credits: NASA/Daniel Rutter
The mission for small satellite is to conduct tests to make sure the unique lunar orbit for NASA’s future Lunar Gateway is actually stable. It launched on June 28, 2022 from New Zealand on Rocket Lab’s Electron rocket. In early July, after conducting a course correction burn, the spacecraft lost contact with the Deep Space Network; however, communications were reestablished after about 24 hours.
But on September 8th, at the end of another course correction maneuver, the spacecraft’s attitude started to deviate. CAPSTONE’s reaction wheels were unable to counter the spacecraft’s oscillations, and the vehicle entered into an uncontrolled spin. With its antenna no longer pointed at Earth, communications were lost again.
Even though engineers were soon able to re-establish a weak communications link, data indicated the spacecraft’s solar arrays weren’t producing enough energy to charge the batteries, which was causing the spacecraft to reset frequently from lack of power. Most worrying was that without energy to run the onboard heaters, the thrusters needed to stop the tumble could freeze. But the mission team was able to put CAPSTONE into safe mode, which allowed the solar panels to focus on supplying power to heat the spacecraft. Then the team could focus attempting to solve the tumbling problem. They were able to determine the problem arose from a thruster valve that was partially stuck open.
CAPSTONE mission timeline. Credit: Advanced Space and Terran Orbital.
In reviewing the telemetry data, one encouraging bit of data was that CAPSTONE was on course for eventually reaching its desired orbital trajectory. The unusual lunar orbit, called a near rectilinear halo orbit (NRHO), is an elongated polar orbit that brings a spacecraft within 1600 km (1,000 miles) of one lunar pole on its near pass and 70,000 km (43,500 miles) from the other pole every seven days. Since the orbit uses a balance point in the gravities of Earth and the Moon, it is theorized that spacecraft in this type of orbit require less propulsion capability for spacecraft flying to and from the Moon’s surface than other circular orbits and requires minimal energy to maintain. This is CAPSTONE’s goal, to determine how stable and energy-saving this orbit actually is.
Last week Friday, on October 7, recovery commands were executed and the initial telemetry from CAPSTONE points to a successful maneuver, indicating the spacecraft has stopped its spin and regained full 3-axis attitude control. This means CAPSTONE’s position is controlled and its solar arrays are pointing towards the Sun and the communications antenna is pointing towards Earth.
The team is now monitoring the spacecraft status and making any needed adjustments to procedures in order to account for and mitigate the effects of the partially open thruster valve. The mission team also will work to design possible fixes for this valve-related issue in order to reduce risk for future maneuvers. CAPSTONE remains on track to insert into its targeted near rectilinear halo orbit at the Moon on Nov. 13.
SpinLaunch Completes its 10th Test, Hurling Payloads for NASA and Other Companies Into the air
SpinLaunch Completes its 10th Test, Hurling Payloads for NASA and Other Companies Into the air
There has been no shortage of exciting developments in the commercial space industry (aka. NewSpace) in recent years. These include the ability to retrieve and reuse rockets (in part or whole), new configurations that reduce expendability, and new engines. But beyond making rocket launches more cost-effective, several cutting-edge ideas have been brought forward to make space more accessible. These include SpinLaunch‘s concept for an electric kinetic launch system (aka. a space catapult) that can propel payloads of up to 200 kg (440 lbs) to space.
On September 27th, 2022, SpinLaunch announced the results of its tenth successful flight test of its Suborbital Mass Accelerator (SMA) at Spaceport America, New Mexico. This time, SpinLaunch sent four partner payloads to space with its Suborbital Accelerator Flight Test Vehicle, which provided valuable data about the launch environment and payload integration process. This latest successful test has placed the company and its launch system one step closer to providing low-cost and sustainable launch services for satellites and other small payloads.
Based in Long Beach, California, SpinLaunch was founded in 2014 by Jonathan Yaney, an aerospace enthusiast and self-described “serial entrepreneur” with a long history of co-founding startups. Before founding SpinLaunch, Yaney spent 15 years establishing companies involved in consulting, IT, construction, and aerospace. By 2014, he began working on a new launch technology that would enable a low-cost and sustainable means of sending constellations of satellites to Low Earth Orbit (LEO).
Another Successful Launch
The company’s 12-meter (39.37 ft) Suborbital Mass Accelerator (SMA), located at Spaceport America in New Mexico, operates on a pretty straightforward principle. The accelerator spins payloads up to 10,000 g and then releases them from its launch tube towards space. Once the launch vehicle reaches orbit, its protective outer casing (similar to a rocket fairing) breaks away, releasing the second stage. This vehicle then ignites its single engine and carries payloads to the desired orbit, where they are released.
This method does away with the need for propellant burns to achieve escape velocity, making it far more environmentally friendly since it does not leave excess carbon emissions in our atmosphere. This latest flight is the tenth test conducted by the company in the eleven months since the SMA became operational in late 2021. Whereas the previous flights, which took place in October 2021 and May 2022, consisted of launch tests that saw test vehicles launched to higher and higher altitudes.
Flight Test 10 was the first flight to include cargo and was witnessed by more than 150 partners, government officials, and commercial space industry advocates. The test saw the Flight Test Vehicle (FTV) deploy all six of its payloads successfully (which were also recovered) and provided critical flight data. Moreover, it demonstrated that standard satellite components used by commercial partners are inherently compatible with the SMA launch system. Said Founder & CEO Yaney in a recent interview with BusinessWire:
“Flight Test 10 represents a key inflection point for SpinLaunch, as we’ve opened the Suborbital Accelerator system externally for our customers, strategic partners, and research groups. The data and insights collected from flight tests will be invaluable for both SpinLaunch, as we further the development of the Orbital Launch system, and for our customers who are looking to us to provide them with low-cost, high-cadence, sustainable access to space.”
As part of the pre-flight qualification process, SpinLaunch accelerated payloads up to 10,000 g using its 12-meter (39.37 ft) Lab Accelerator at its Long Beach headquarters. After clearing the qualification test, the payloads were inspected and integrated into the FTV in preparation for Flight Test 10 at the SMA at Spaceport America.
Launch Partners
The six payloads carried by the FTV included two instrumentation payloads that collected data on the flight, plus four partner payloads contributed by NASA, Airbus U.S. Space & Defense, Cornell Engineering, and Outpost. Each was responsible for testing systems vital to the SMA and FTV and gauged the system’s ability to safely launch satellites and other payloads to suborbital altitude and beyond. NASA contributed a Data Acquisition Unit (DAQ) for its payload designed to evaluate the kinetic launch method for future commercial launch opportunities.
This payload was included as part of a NASA Space Act Agreement signed by SpinLaunch to develop, integrate, and fly a sensor suite to space. The DAQ gathered launch environment data using two accelerometers, a gyroscope, a magnetometer, and sensors for pressure, temperature, and humidity. Airbus U.S. Space & Defense provided their satellite sun sensor, a device typically used by spacecraft for attitude control and positioning. As a global leader in satellite systems, Airbus’ payload was intended to see if the extreme loads generated by the launch would impact the sensor signal.
To test this, a team of engineers monitored the sensor’s output signal during the high-g centrifuge test, the pre-flight test, and Flight Test 10. They then compared the output signal during all three phases to the pre-flight data and were pleased with the result. According to their findings, the sensor’s output signal was unaffected during the pre-flight, flight, or recovery phases. This success was a major step in certifying subsystems (like sensors or onboard laboratories) that are more delicate than other flight components for use on SpinLaunch’s orbital launch system.
“Our Airbus U.S. engineering team is excited to work with SpinLaunch in support of this significant advancement of a new accelerated launch concept,” said Airbus U.S. CTO Armen Askijian. “We look forward to continued collaboration and future success.”
The next payload was contributed by the Space Systems Design Studio (SSDS), which is part of the Sibley School of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering at Cornell University. The SSDS is responsible for designing next-generation satellites substantially smaller than CubeSats (called ChipSats) that will provide distributed in-situ measurements of Earth’s upper atmosphere and other planets. As part of Test Flight 10, the SSDS contributed some of their ChipSats, which were released during the flight to test the SpinLaunch-designed payload deployment system.
The payload deployment system is vital to SpinLaunch’s services, which are likely to include satellites of every shape and form. Future tests with SSDS may include high-altitude ChipSat deployments to verify their ability to reenter the atmosphere and follow a trajectory that will cause them to burn up. Said Hunter Adams, a lecturer in Cornell Engineering’s school of electrical and computer engineering:
“Centimeter-scale spacecraft will be a critical tool in future planetary science missions. Deployed en masse from orbit, ChipSats will descend through the atmosphere and down to the surface of this planet and others, gathering spatially distributed datasets as they fall. To plan these missions, we must understand the chaotic trajectories that low-mass and high-surface-area objects take from the top of the atmosphere to the surface of the planet. By conducting experiments with SpinLaunch’s Suborbital Accelerator, we can gather critical information for planning future planetary science missions involving ChipSats. It is absolutely a game-changer for centimeter-scale spacecraft research.”
The fourth payload was contributed by Outpost, a Los Angeles-based aerospace company developing reusable satellites capable of returning to Earth. Their payload consisted of an onboard computer for testing and qualifying the launch system, which validated both and proved that the flight computer is compatible with SpinLaunch’s launch environment. This represents a big step towards broader verification and testing of the kinetic launch system, and Outpost and SpinLaunch plan to continue collaborating in this respect. Said Michael Vergalla, co-founder and CTO at Outpost:
“Outpost and SpinLaunch share the same mission of providing customers with low-cost, rapid launch – which means rethinking the way we access space. Testing our hardware with SpinLaunch’s mass accelerator gives us optionality and provides valuable engineering data for developing our hardware to be compatible with their launch system and unlock the upside of low-cost and high-cadence launch.”
SpinLaunch’s vacuum-sealed centrifuge will accelerate a rocket to more than 8,000 km/h (5,000 mph). Credit: SpinLaunch
The success of this latest test has effectively demonstrated SpinLaunch’s capability to launch satellites and small payloads to suborbital altitude. It also means the company is on track for sending satellites to orbit and delivering payloads for other missions by 2026. It is also another step on the path toward SpinLaunch realizing its next-generation launcher, the Orbital Mass Accelerator (OMA). As the name suggests, this system will be larger, more powerful, and will be able to send heavier payloads to Low Earth Orbit (LEO), greatly expanding the types of mission profiles the company can provide.
Equally interesting is the wider implications this latest successful test will have for commercial space. The kinetic launch method is part of a growing constellation of services that are changing how we think about going to space. In terms of rockets, most commercial providers offer at least partially-reusable vehicles, single-stage-to-orbit (SSTO) vehicles, and air-launch vehicles. Beyond rockets, space agencies and entrepreneurs are pushing the boundaries of orbital balloons, electric rails, mass drivers, and spaceplanes.
The net effect of these low-cost and sustainable launch systems will likely be tremendous, enabling everything from megaconstellations (that don’t cause space debris) to the creation of private space stations and habitats and the commercialization of LEO. Who knows? Such diverse methods for sending payloads to orbit could even pave the way towards some of the most ambitious methods for sending payloads and people to space – like Slingatrons, Sky Hooks, and Space Elevators!
Two Tic-Tac Crashed In Antarctica, Google Earth Map, Video, UFO Sighting News.
Two Tic-Tac Crashed In Antarctica, Google Earth Map, Video, UFO Sighting News.
Date of sighting: Oct 13, 2022 Location of sighting: Antarctica Google location: -62.663753, -61.099363
Hey check this out. I was using Google Earth map and came across these two pink tic-tac shaped crashed UFOs. The objects are in an area that has no signs of humans anywhere. There are no trails, roads, docks, cars, ships, buildings of any kind. These objects are alone and seem to be two crash landed UFOs. The objects measure 7.5 by 4 meters across and clearly could hold several human size occupants each. Check out my video below I just made and tell me your thoughts.
3 UFO lights in formation over Scottsdale, Arizona 2-Oct-2022
3 UFO lights in formation over Scottsdale, Arizona 2-Oct-2022
These 3 huge lights were seen and recorded in the sky above Scottsdale, a desert city in Arizona east of state capital Phoenix. Filmed on 2nd October 2022.
Witness report:
At or about 6:30 pm on October 2, 2002, I was on a 2 nd story rooftop facing south. I began to see 3 lights traveling from the southeast to north over phoenix. The lights travelled as far north to Scottsdale and became stationary. The lights were a bright white and pulsating. After a minute the 3 lights were aligned in a straight line, then the 3rd light at the bottom took off the south. The second light about another minute later moved south then moved back toward the northwest . The Top light of the three remained stationary . I recorded about 3 minutes of video and took a two photos.
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Over mijzelf
Ik ben Pieter, en gebruik soms ook wel de schuilnaam Peter2011.
Ik ben een man en woon in Linter (België) en mijn beroep is Ik ben op rust..
Ik ben geboren op 18/10/1950 en ben nu dus 74 jaar jong.
Mijn hobby's zijn: Ufologie en andere esoterische onderwerpen.
Op deze blog vind je onder artikels, werk van mezelf. Mijn dank gaat ook naar André, Ingrid, Oliver, Paul, Vincent, Georges Filer en MUFON voor de bijdragen voor de verschillende categorieën...
Veel leesplezier en geef je mening over deze blog.
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