Marsverkenner vindt nieuw gas op rode planeet

De Europees-Russische Marsverkenner Trace Gas Orbiter (TGO) heeft een nieuw gas ontdekt op de rode planeet. Dat meldt het Belgisch Instituut voor Ruimte-Aëronomie (BIRA), parallel met een publicatie in het het vakblad Science Advances. De Marsverkenner leverde ook nieuwe informatie over de manier waarop onze buurplaneet haar water verliest.

Bron: Belga

De Trace Gas Orbiter, waarop ook het Belgische NOMAD-instrument staat, maakt deel uit van de eerste ExoMars-missie van het Europese Ruimtevaartagentschap ESA en het Russische Ruimtevaartagentschap Roscosmos. Doel van dat programma is om te weten komen of er ooit leven geweest is op Mars. 

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  Vlaamse leidt astronautes op (en was in 2008 zelf kandidaat): "Sportieve vrouw met lang cv? Dan maak je goede kans" 

De Marsverkenner verzamelt sinds het voorjaar van 2018 atmosferische gegevens. Naast de zoektocht naar methaan is de detectie van nieuwe gassen een van de hoofdobjectieven van de missie. Het recentste onderzoek heeft nu geleid tot de ontdekking van een nieuw gas in de atmosfeer van Mars: waterstofchloride.

Vulkanische activiteit

Waterstofchloridegas (HCl) bestaat uit een waterstof- en een chlooratoom. Marswetenschappers waren altijd al op zoek naar gassen op basis van chloor of zwavel, omdat ze mogelijke indicatoren zijn van vulkanische activiteit. Maar de aard van de waarnemingen - het feit dat waterstofchloride op hetzelfde moment op zeer afgelegen plaatsen werd waargenomen en het ontbreken van andere gassen die men bij vulkanische activiteit zou verwachten - wijst op een andere bron. Met name op een heel nieuwe en niet eerder onderzochte interactie tussen het oppervlak en de atmosfeer van Mars, aangedreven door de stofseizoenen op de planeet.

In een proces dat veel gelijkenis vertoont met dat op Aarde belanden zouten in de vorm van natriumchloride (NaCl) - overblijfselen van de oceanen die verdampt zijn en gevangen zitten in het stoffige oppervlak van Mars - door de winden in de atmosfeer. Zonlicht verwarmt de atmosfeer waardoor het stof, samen met de waterdamp (H2O) die vrijkomt uit de ijskappen, opstijgt. Het zoute stof reageert met het water in de atmosfeer waarbij chloor vrijkomt, dat op zijn beurt weer reageert met waterstofmoleculen en waterstofchloride vormt. Door verdere reacties zou het chloor- of zoutzuurrijke stof kunnen terugkeren naar het oppervlak, misschien in de vorm van perchloraten, een zoutsoort die bestaat uit zuurstof en chloor.

Water blijkt een cruciaal element te zijn in deze chemie: er is waterdamp nodig om chloor vrij te maken en er is een bijproduct van water - waterstof - nodig om waterstofchloride te vormen. Maar ook het stof speelt een heel belangrijke rol: er wordt meer waterstofchloride waargenomen wanneer de stofactiviteit toeneemt, een proces dat verband houdt met de seizoensgebonden opwarming van het zuidelijk halfrond.

Vloeibaar water

Ooit zou vloeibaar water over het oppervlak van Mars hebben gestroomd, zoals blijkt uit de talrijke voorbeelden van oude opgedroogde valleien en rivierbeddingen. Vandaag de dag zit het meestal opgesloten in de ijskappen of onder het oppervlak. Mars lekt ook vandaag nog water in de vorm van waterstof en zuurstof die uit de atmosfeer ontsnappen.

Inzicht in het samenspel van potentiële waterhoudende reservoirs en hun gedrag over de seizoenen heen en op lange termijn is essentieel om de evolutie van het klimaat van Mars te begrijpen. Dat kan door het bestuderen van waterdamp en ‘halfzwaar’ water (waarbij één waterstofatoom is vervangen door een deuteriumatoom, een vorm van waterstof met een extra neutron). De deuterium-over-waterstof-verhouding (D/H) vertelt iets over de geschiedenis van het water op Mars, en hoe het waterverlies in de loop der tijd is geëvolueerd.

De nieuwe metingen onthullen dramatische variabiliteit in D/H met de hoogte en het seizoen naarmate het water opstijgt van zijn oorspronkelijke locatie. De gegevens laten zien dat zodra het water volledig is verdampt, het een hoge verrijking in halfzwaar water vertoont met een D/H-verhouding die zes keer zo hoog is als die op Aarde, wat bevestigt dat in de loop van de tijd grote hoeveelheden water verloren zijn gegaan.

Waterverlies 

Tussen april 2018 en april 2019 lieten de ExoMars-gegevens ook drie gevallen van versneld waterverlies in de atmosfeer zien: de globale stofstorm van 2018, een korte maar intense regionale storm in januari 2019 en het vrijkomen van water uit de zuidelijke poolijskap tijdens de zomermaanden, gekoppeld aan seizoenswisselingen. Van bijzonder belang is een pluim van opstijgende waterdamp tijdens de zuidelijke zomer, die op seizoens- en jaarbasis water in de bovenste atmosfeer zou kunnen injecteren, aldus het BIRA.

LEES OOK:

• Chinese Marsverkenner succesvol in een baan rond de planeet geraakt

GERELATEERDE VIDEO'S, uitgekozen en gepost door peter2011

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10-02-2021 om 21:58 geschreven door peter  

10-02-2021 om 20:41 geschreven door peter  

{  http://worldufophotosandnews.org/ }

10-02-2021 om 18:48 geschreven door peter  

In Search for Extraterrestrial Life: Super-Earth Atmospheres Probed at Sandia's Z Machine

The huge forces generated by the Z machine at Sandia National Laboratories are being used to replicate the gravitational pressures on so-called “super-Earths” to determine which might maintain atmospheres that could support life.

“Z has provided our collaboration a unique tool that no other technique can match, for us to explore the extreme conditions of super-Earths’ interiors,” he said. “The machine’s unprecedented high-quality data have been critical for advancing our knowledge of super-Earths.”

The Magnificent Seven

Further analysis of the state of gaseous and dense materials on specific super-Earths produced a list of seven planets possibly worthy of further study: 55 Cancri e; Kepler 10b, 36b, 80e, and 93b; CoRoT-7b; and HD-219134b.

Sandia manager Christopher Seagle, who with Fei initially proposed these experiments, said, “These planets, which we found most likely to support life, were selected for further study because they have similar ratios to Earth in their iron, silicates and volatile gasses, in addition to interior temperatures conducive to maintaining magnetic fields for protection against solar wind.”

The focus on supersized, rather than small, planets came about because large gravitational pressures mean atmospheres are more likely to survive over the long haul, said Townsend.

For example, he said, “Because Mars was smaller, it had a weaker gravitational field to begin with. Then as its core quickly cooled, it lost its magnetic field and its atmosphere was subsequently stripped away.”

Z in action

For these experiments, the Z machine, with operating conditions of up to 26 million amps and hundreds of thousands of volts, creates magnetic pulses of enormous power that accelerate credit card-sized pieces of copper and aluminum called flyer-plates. These were propelled much faster than a rifle bullet into samples of bridgmanite, the Earth’s most common mineral. The near-instantaneous pressure of the forceful interaction created longitudinal and transverse sound waves in the material that reveal whether the material remains solid or changes to a liquid or gas, said Sandia researcher and paper author Chad McCoy. With these new results, researchers were supplied with solid data on which to anchor otherwise theoretical planetary models.

The technical paper concludes that the high-precision density data and unprecedently high melting temperatures achieved at the Z machine “provide benchmarks for theoretical calculations under extreme conditions.”

Concluded Fei, “Our collaboration with Sandia scientists has led to results that will encourage more academic exploration of exoplanets, whose discovery has captured the public imagination.”

“This work identifies interesting exoplanet candidates to explore further,” said Seagle. “Z shock compression plus Fei’s unusual capability to synthesize large-diameter bridgmanite lead to an opportunity to obtain data relevant to exoplanets that would not be possible anywhere else.”

The work was supported by the National Science Foundation, the Z Fundamental Science Program and a Carnegie Venture grant.

Contacts and sources:

• Neal Singer
  Sandia National Laboratories

{ https://beforeitsnews.com/ }

10-02-2021 om 18:36 geschreven door peter  

An Upwelling of Hot Rock Beneath the Atlantic Is Heating the World’s Oceans

“An upsurge of hot rock from deep beneath the Atlantic Ocean may be driving the continents on either side apart,” writes Maria Temming in Science News.

Not surprisingly in today’s politically correct world, Temming’s article does not mention ocean warming. Instead, the title of the piece enthuses that “An upwelling of rock beneath the Atlantic may drive continents apart.” Notice that the title does not mention the hot rock.

Same with the subtitle: “The Mid-Atlantic Ridge may play a more active role in plate tectonics than thought.” No mention of hot rocks there, either.

But I think the hot rocks are the most important takeaway from her article.

The image of the Mid-Atlantic Ridge included with Temming’s article (above) might make it difficult for you to delineate just exactly where the Mid-Atlantic Ridge is located. But as luck would have it, I found a different image (below) showing the Mid-Atlantic Ridge, the Mid-Pacific Rise, and other oceanic ridges. I think the vast amount of red emanating from those ridges makes it perfectly clear where the heat is coming from.

Anyway, back to Temming’s article.

New seismic data from the Atlantic Ocean floor show that hot rock is welling up beneath the Mid-Atlantic Ridge from more than 600 kilometers deep in Earth’s mantle, says Temming. (She loves calling it ‘hot rock,’ but in reality it’s red-hot fiery basalt, the ocean’s version of red-hot lava.)

Matthew Agius, a seismologist at Roma Tre University in Rome, and his colleagues used 39 seismometers on the seafloor along the ridge between South America and Africa to monitor earthquakes around the world for about a year. The tremors contained clues about the location and movement of material far below the seafloor.

In those signals, Agius’ team saw hints of material from Earth’s lower mantle welling up toward the Mid-Atlantic Ridge. “This was completely unexpected,” Agius says, and it could be a powerful force for pushing apart the tectonic plates on either side of the rift.” (I don’t understand why it would be “unexpected.”)

So what to make of this?

I certainly agree that the deep-mantle material surging up at the centers of these rifts must play a major role in seafloor spreading.

But I also maintain, as I have been saying for years, that those hot rocks are heating the world’s oceans. And not just a little bit of heat, mind you, but far more than you might believe. If those ‘hot rocks’ are like other such fiery basalt, their temperatures could easily measure up to 2,150°F (1,177°C) hot.

More than ten times the boiling point!

• Read the Whole Article
• The post An Upwelling of Hot Rock Beneath the Atlantic Is Heating the World’s Oceans appeared first on LewRockwell.

Source: 

• http://freedombunker.com/2021/02/09/an-upwelling-of-hot-rock-beneath-the-atlantic-is-heating-the-worlds-oceans/

{ https://beforeitsnews.com/ }

10-02-2021 om 14:45 geschreven door peter  

Plane Investigates UFO Over West Palm beach, Florida, 2-9-2021, UFO Sighting News.

Date of sighting: Feb 9, 2021

Location of sighting: West Palm Beach, Florida, USA

Source: MUFON 

 

Now here is something you don't see everyday. In Florida a man and woman were driving down West Palm Beach when they noticed a white cone in the sky with a shiny object moving around it. The small object is a single engine plane that happened to be in the area and got curious about this huge white cone in the sky. The white cone begins to fade and the shiny object which has wings and a light at each wingtip, seems to be investigating the white cone. But the white cone quickly fades more and more as if it were a UFO cloaking to hide itself. This is a common practice of UFOs that believe they are going unnoticed, but when they realize they were wrong and that someone was watching them on the ground, they cloak which looks like the object becoming transparent more and more until its totally gone. Absolute proof UFOs can cloak...right in front of our own eyes and totally get away with it. 

Scott C. Waring 

Eyewitness states: 

{ https://www.ufosightingsdaily.com/ }

10-02-2021 om 14:30 geschreven door peter  

Two Cloud Disks Over Facatativá, Colombia 1 Year Apart, UFO Sighting News.

Date of 1st sighting: January 22, 2020
Date of 2nd sighting: February 4, 2021

Location of sighting: 24km from Facatativa, Colombia

 

These three video clips show a UFO inside a cloud formation. Its well known among UFO researchers that UFOs not only make clouds, but do it to hide from humans. Here we have two sightings and the first one back in 2020 lasted for four full hours over the city of Facatativa, Colombia. The amazing thing is...the eyewitness was standing just ten meters from the same location he stood the year before, seeing a similar event looking in the same direction. The fact that aliens may be using our measure of time, our human calendar is intriguing to me. Proof that they do is the mere fact that the sightings are 355 days apart, just 10 days short of a full perfect year. That means some UFO sighting events in history may occur again...one month, one year, ten years even from the actual first event! Wow, important news. Also 100% proof a large alien base is nearby the city of Facatatativa about 6km below the jungle floor. 

Scott C. Waring - Taiwan

{ https://www.ufosightingsdaily.com/ }

10-02-2021 om 14:23 geschreven door peter  

On February 6, 2021 construction workers leaving after lunch at 13 o'clock from the cabins to the construction site, on the island behind the stadium in Yalla, Kaliningrad, Russia noticed an object hovering in the sky. 

The object that looks like an oddly shaped cloud moves slowly until it disappears into a cloud formation. 

It appears, after further analysis of the object that it is a UFO disguised as cloud. The dark cylindrical UFO can be seen partially sticking out on top of the cloud. 

It is a known fact that some UFOs, which are likely scouting probes, are hiding by creating a cloud around them and while the reason is unknown, it is assumed that these probes cloak themselves in order to observe a particular area without being seen.

  

RELATED VIDEOS, selected and posted by peter2011

{ http://ufosightingshotspot.blogspot.com/ }

10-02-2021 om 14:10 geschreven door peter  

Astonishing 1961 Abduction Case (Helen Wheels)

The Richard Dolan Show w/Peter Robbins.

Everyone knows about the 1961 UFO encounter of Betty and Barney Hill. But three months prior to that, another (mostly unknown) event took place involving two young people on Long Island, Peter Robbins and his sister Helen. While Peter went on years later to become a well-known UFO researcher, Helen became a famous Punk Rock star. Here, in a well-illustrated video interview, Peter describes what happened to Helen, and how it affected both of their lives in a powerful way.

{ https://www.latest-ufo-sightings.net/ }

10-02-2021 om 13:52 geschreven door peter  

When both aliens and humans are looking for each other, the chances are we'll make contact.

 by Paula Ferreira

 

Dr. Eamonn Kerins, an astrophysicist from the University of Manchester, has an idea for the Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence (SETI). It consists of a strategy called Mutual Detectability based on coordination game, a strategy in which both players make the same decision.

Imagine you’re at a concert and your phone battery is dead, but you need to find a friend. How do you do it?

Here’s an approach: both of can you employ the same strategy and find each other in the middle of the crowd. In this situation, both parties win a payoff for having the same desire and the same decisions. This is what Mutual Detectability is about. If two civilizations have enough knowledge of each other, it is likely they will try to communicate and reach each other. This type of strategy rationalization is the basis of game theory, and Kerins believes applying game theory to SETI could be a fruitful strategy.

Opposites don’t always atract

One obstacle for the civilizations looking for other civilizations has to do with technological advancement. When one civilization is more powerful than the other, the less powerful will feel less comfortable in making contact — for obvious reasons. Any civilization looking for others would have an incentive to listen, but not send out signals, so our galaxy might be full of listeners not able to find each other.

However, even if two civilizations are trying to find each other, they might not be able to if they use very different technologies. This could be avoided, says Kerins, if the more advanced civilization would use less-advanced signals. But you’d still need to actually be able to find them. This leads to the SETI paradox, if intelligent beings are looking for intelligent beings but not trying to reach out, then SETI is in vain.

Where to look?

Kerins points to the importance of the region of the Earth Transit Zone(ETZ). The idea is simple: not all planets in the universe can see us. If an alien civilization can observe us when our planet passes in front of the Sun and reduces its luminosity, they will be able to detect us. This is called the transit method, used by astronomers to detect exoplanets.

ETZ is the optimal area in which other beings could detect us in the galaxy using the transit method. Success in mutual detectability could mean detecting planets in the habitable zone and that are in the ETZ region. Similarly, we should focus on detecting potentially habitable planets that could be able to see us.

The transit method.

Credit: NASA Ames.

Good news is, there’s at least one planet that fits the bill.

K2-155 d is a Super-Earth in the habitable zone that happens to be in ETZ. The planet orbits an M dwarf star, the smallest type of star we know of, but it orbits it close enough to potentially have habitable temperatures. This type of star also makes the transit method easier to succeed, because a relatively small star has a clearer response to the transit. In other words, we see it blinking more clearly. That would be one starting to point SETI telescopes at.

But we already know many exoplanets. Only the Kepler mission discovered 2,662 planets in nearly 10 years of service. If we continue the search for planets and match the criteria stated by Dr. Kerins, our chances of communication would increase and the loneliness of Earth could end.

• The theory was published in The Astronomical Journal.

{ https://www.zmescience.com/ }

09-02-2021 om 23:56 geschreven door peter  

A new documentary currently running about the contents of a journal alleged to have been kept by Major Jesse Marcel, the first military witness to see the object that crashed in Roswell, New Mexico, in 1947, has the famous incident back in the news, especially since Marcel told his family what he saw was “not made by human hands” and that he was pressured by the US government to retract his original statement and deny he ever saw evidence of a UFO. However, a few sites have also picked up on another old story by another alleged witness – this one a military nurse who claimed shortly before her death that she had been the only person to communicate telepathically with the only alien to survive the Roswell crash. If you’ve never heard this tale and wonder if it’s true, here’s the strange account of Matilda O’Donnell MacElroy, Senior Master Sergeant Women’s Army Air Force Medical Corp, about her conversation with Airl the alien.

Matilda O’Donnell McElroy, Senior Master Sergeant Women’s Army Air Force Medical Corp

“Many men have been killed to extinguish the possibility of revealing the knowledge I have helped to withhold from society, until now. Only a small handful of people on Earth have seen and heard what I have had the burden of keeping secret for sixty years. All those years I thought that I had been entrusted with a great deal of confidence by the “powers that be” in our government, although I have often felt that power is greatly misguided, to “protect” Mankind from the certain knowledge that, not only do intelligent extraterrestrial life forms exist, but that they have and continue to aggressively monitor and invade the lives of everyone on Earth every day.”

Matilda O’Donnell MacElroy wrote the letter in 2007 to author Lawrence R. Spencer, who had contacted MacElroy eight years prior for his boom, “The Oz Factors.” That interview gave her the trust to share with him at age 83 the story that she didn’t want to take to the grave (she revealed she was planning euthanasia in a few months). She claims she was the driver of a vehicle occupied by a “Mr. Cavitt,” a Counter Intelligence Officer sent to the crash site, and was instructed to help in any way in her capacity as a trained flight nurse. MacElroy claimed she saw a craft, dead aliens and one conscious and uninjured. When she attended to the alien, she claims to have received mental images, which she interpreted as the alien communicating telepathically. Revealing this to Mr. Cavitt, she was “assigned permanently to serve as a “companion” of the alien at all times”, conducting interviews and making a complete report. For doing this, she was promoted to Senior Master Sergeant and given a pay raise. MacElroy says she found out the alien’s name was Airl and appeared to be a female.

“Our communication did not consist of “spoken language”, in the conventional sense. Indeed, the “body” of the alien had no “mouth” through which to speak. Our communication was by telepathy. At first, I could not understand Airl very clearly. I could perceive images, emotions and impressions, but it was difficult for me to express these verbally. Once Airl learned the English language, she was able to focus her thoughts more precisely using symbols and meanings of words I could understand. Learning the English language was done as a favor to me. It was more for my own benefit than hers.“

MacElroy told Spencer in the letter that Airl was an officer, pilot and engineer serving in The Domain Expeditionary Force, and had been stationed at a base in the asteroid belt. She ended by instructing him to reveal the contents of the letter and her accompanying notes to as many people as possible as soon as possible so that “people understand the devastating consequences to our spiritual and physical survival if we fail to take effective action to undo the long-standing and pervasive effects of alien intervention on Earth.” Spencer did as he was told and “Alien Interview “ was published in 2008. The book was filled with alleged transcripts and notes on all of her conversations with Airl before the alien died or departed from the doll-sized body MacElroy had interviewed.

What can we make of all of this? Howandwhys.com, the site which recently brought the story back into the news, says it ”sounds a bit like a sci-fiction movie.” Many comments on the website selling the book believe it to be true, but one negative commenter pointed out that Spencer never actually met MacElroy in person, destroyed the letter and transcripts, and wants the reader to believe MacElroy decided to trust him after a 20 minute phone conversation nearly a decade before. Most interestingly, the commenter claims that the rank of “senior master sergeant” didn’t exist in 1947 and the Army Air Force went out of existence in that year.

Is this another piece to add to the still growing pile of “evidence” supporting the Roswell incident being an alien UFO crash and subsequent government coverup, or should it be added to the still growing pile of fictional accounts? This story definitely needs a documentary investigation.

(Special thanks to Phantoms & Monsters for the link to the story in How & Whys.)

RELATED VIDEOS, selected and posted by peter2011

{ https://mysteriousuniverse.org/ }

09-02-2021 om 23:25 geschreven door peter  

Doing radio just recently, I was amazed how many people listening didn’t know much at all about the Betty and Barney Hill “alien abduction” of September 1961 – an event that, this year, will reach its 60th. Maybe, some people aren’t overly excited by older cases, but are far more enthused by what’s going on right now. Certainly, it’s good to keep in touch with what’s afoot now, but, as I see it, it’s always good to understand the earlier years of the UFO subject, too. So, for those who – just a few nights ago – admitted they didn’t know a great deal about the Hill affair, here’s how it goes. Old-timers might find some interesting things too! Now, let’s get to it. Although the 1950s-era abduction account of Antonio Villas Boas was reported quite widely in UFO-themed books, magazines, and newsletters in the 1950s and 1960s, it was the sexual nature of the claims that led many researchers of the UFO phenomenon to ignore, or completely write-off, the cases as fanciful tales born out of fantasy and not a lot else. In other words, those same researchers were repressed. That situation changed post-September 19, 1961.

That’s when a New Hampshire husband and wife, the aforementioned Barney and Betty Hill, were driving to their New Hampshire home (with their dog, Delsey), after taking a welcome vacation in Montreal, Canada. One might argue they needed another vacation after experiencing what was lurking and looming on the horizon. As the pair headed home, and at around 10.30 p.m., as they drove south of Lancaster, New Hampshire, they were puzzled by the sight of a strange light in the night sky above. Viewing the lighted object through binoculars convinced the Hills that what they were seeing was not an aircraft – of either a commercial or military kind. As they continued their drive through the mountains, Barney and Betty developed an uneasy sense that whoever was flying the craft was watching them; playing a game with them, toying with them, and practically goading them into following the maneuvers of the device.

Matters came to a sudden hair-raising head head when the object approached their car and dropped to a height of around ninety feet, causing Barney to bring the car to a sudden stop, in the middle of the road, on the darkened, mountain pass. Pancake-like was how Barney later described the unearthly-looking vehicle, after stepping out of the car and staring into the dark skies. As Barney focused on the craft with the binoculars, he couldn’t fail to see close to a dozen beings – wearing caps – milling around and peering down at the frightened pair. When the machine began to close in on the Hill’s car, Barney shouted to Betty that the things inside were going to kidnap them. They jumped back into the car at sped off at high speed. Craft and crew did not follow – or so it seemed at the time.

The traumatic encounter was far from over: it didn’t take long at all before Betty and Barney realized that there was something very wrong about their journey – around two hours of time was “missing” from it. Gone. Obliterated from their memories. Finally, after nightmares, restless nights of tossing and turning, and picking up on fragmented memories suggesting there was far more to the incident than they consciously remembered, the pair received help from a psychiatrist and neurologist in Boston, Massachusetts, Dr. Benjamin Simon – who began a series of hypnotic sessions with the Hills in January 1964.

What surfaced out of those sessions, while Barney and Betty were rendered into altered states by the doctor was, to put it bluntly, astounding: if the results of the hypnosis were not the product of fantasy or suggestion, both of the Hills had been taken on board what was nothing less than an alien spacecraft, and subjected to a number of medical procedures that clearly left Betty and Barney in states of lasting turmoil. The then-modern era of alien abductions was born.

RELATED VIDEOS, selected and posted by peter2011

{ https://mysteriousuniverse.org/ }

09-02-2021 om 23:10 geschreven door peter  

The United Arab Emirates' Mars probe just entered orbit around the red planet, the first in a Mars-mission bonanza

Morgan McFall-Johnsen

A rendering of the Hope orbiter, provided by the Mohammed Bin Rashid Space Centre.

• The United Arab Emirates' first interplanetary mission, a spacecraft called Hope, reached Mars on Tuesday.

• The orbiter is set to map Mars' climate across an entire Martian year.

• It's the first of three Mars missions expected to reach the planet in the next two weeks.
  

The United Arab Emirates has flown a spacecraft into orbit around Mars, marking a first for the Arab world and a major accomplishment for the country's young space program.

The Hope probe â€" "Al-Amal" in Arabic â€" launched from Tanegashima Island in Japan on July 20, then journeyed seven months to the next planet over.

With Mars in its sights, the SUV-sized spacecraft fired all six of its Delta V thrusters for about 27 minutes on Tuesday, burning through half of its fuel to slow its speed by more than 2,100 mph.

In the days leading up to this braking manoeuvre, Emirati officials estimated a 50-50 chance of success, according to Agence France-Presse. If the manoeuvre had failed, the probe could have crashed into Mars or careened past it into deep space.

Instead, the spacecraft fell into an oval-shaped orbit around Mars on Tuesday morning. A signal confirming its success reached mission controllers on Earth at 11:14 a.m. ET.

Hope is the UAE Space Agency's first major mission. It aims to orbit the red planet for a full Martian year (about two Earth years) and create a comprehensive map of the planet's climate.

"It's the very first holistic weather satellite of Mars," Sarah Al Amiri, the mission's science lead, told Space.com.

The probe's unique orbit will allow it to monitor any given region of Mars for hours at a time, watching in infrared, ultraviolet, and visible light as clouds drift by and enormous dust storms roil through the red desert.

The UAE aims for Hope to map weather across the entire planet, through all times of day, over the full Martian year. If successful, this will be humanity's first such picture of the Martian climate.

"It is the time factor that has largely been missing from our knowledge and understanding of the weather system of Mars," Al Amiri said. "During every single time slot of the day, we want to know what happens across an entire day, because weather as we know it is a very dynamic system. We also want to understand what happens in different seasons on Mars. And that requires us to collect data across an entire year."

That data could help scientists better understand Mars' changing seasons and learn how the planet lost the thick atmosphere that protected it 4 billion years ago. Back then, the Martian surface may have been warm enough for liquid water, and scientists think the planet could have supported microbial life.

The UAE is now the fifth country to reach Mars. China is set to follow as the sixth Mars-faring nation on Wednesday, when its Tianwen-1 spacecraft is slated to insert itself into orbit around the planet. (Stay tuned for the Tianwen-1 rover landing in May.)

NASA's new Mars rover, Perseverance, is set to touch down on the planet's surface next week. In terms of visitors from Earth, this is the busiest month in Martian history.

Hope can monitor Martian weather up close and from afar

Sheikh Khalifa bin Zayed Al Nahyan, president of the UAE, announced in 2014 that the country would be going to Mars. The decree came with a deadline â€" 2021 â€" to commemorate the nation's 50th anniversary.

The Mohammed bin Rashid Space Centre was tasked with developing and building the Mars-bound spacecraft. Engineers there equipped the orbiter with three scientific instruments to study Martian weather in infrared light, capture high-resolution photos, and measure atmosphere loss in ultraviolet.

The probe's irregular, or "elliptical," orbit will allow it to capture a unique picture of Martian weather and climate over time.

"When you're very close to Mars, you're moving as fast as Mars is turning on its axis, and therefore, you observe one side of Mars during multiple times of the day. And as you get farther away and you get slower, we observe several time zones on Mars in several locations," Al Amiri told Space.com. "We keep on doing this over the course of an entire 10-day window, and by 10 days, we've fully mapped everywhere on Mars during every time of the day."

As Hope circles Mars, completing an orbit once every 55 hours, the satellite will look for links between weather events in the lower atmosphere and the amount of hydrogen and oxygen bleeding into space from the planet's upper atmosphere. This could offer clues about the process that caused the planet to lose most of its atmosphere billions of years ago.

Hope will also monitor the Martian atmosphere's interactions with charged particles from the sun. Such interactions drive space weather around Earth and cause the aurora borealis.

The UAE might even be able to extend Hope's mission into a second Martian year, crafting new goals based on what the probe finds during its first year.

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09-02-2021 om 22:37 geschreven door peter  

Feest in de Emiraten: eerste Arabische sonde in baan rond Mars

Feest in de Verenigde Arabische Emiraten: hun Marssonde al-Amal (‘Hoop’) is in een preliminaire baan rond de rode planeet gekomen. Slechts drie landen en het Europese Ruimtevaartbureau ESA gingen hen daar in voor.

Bron: Belga

De sonde werd in juli vorig jaar met een Japanse draagraket gelanceerd en is de eerste van drie nieuwe expedities die Mars zal bereiken. Om 16.30 uur tijd floepten zes stuurraketten aan, waardoor de snelheid van het onbemande ruimtetuig daalde van 121.000 naar 18.000 kilometer per uur. Zo kreeg de zwaartekracht van onze buurplaneet greep op de sonde.

De ontbranding duurde 27 minuten. Daarna was het nog meer dan elf minuten nagelbijten vooraleer er bevestiging kwam dat het manoeuvre gelukt was.

© AFP

De Emiraten zijn nog maar de vijfde “natie” die in het huzarenstukje slaagt. De voorgangers waren de VS, de Sovjet-Unie, het Europese Ruimtevaartbureau ESA en India. Zowat de helft van alle Marsmissies is mislukt.

Al-Amal heeft ook een robotjeep bij, maar die zal pas in mei proberen te landen. De verkenner moet twee jaar lang het weer op Mars in kaart brengen. Bovendien moet hij helpen begrijpen waardoor waterstof en zuurstof verdwijnen uit de dunne dampkring van Mars. Die gassen vliegen de ruimte in, waardoor Mars geen kans meer heeft op leven zoals op aarde. Maar de missie is vooral bedoeld om de Emiraten op de kaart te zetten, in het jaar waarin het land zijn vijftigste verjaardag viert. Het land ziet wetenschap en technologie als een inkomstenbron voor de toekomst, wanneer olie opraakt. De Verenigde Arabische Emiraten hebben sinds 2014 een eigen ruimtevaartbureau en in 2019 ging voor het eerst een inwoner van het land naar de ruimte. 

© AP

Morgen moet ook de Chinese Marsverkener Tianwen-1 een soortgelijk manoeuvre uitvoeren. Het tuig zal nog twee tot drie maanden rondjes draaien vooraleer de riskante afdaling naar het Marsoppervlak in te zetten. China wil sporen van leven vinden en het oppervlak en de bodem van Mars in kaart brengen.

Op 18 februari moet de Amerikaanse Perseverance landen op Mars. Verborgen in het laadruim van de robotjeep zit de eerste buitenaardse helikopter, de Ingenuity. Als die technologie werkt, kunnen helikopters helpen om buitenaardse bestemmingen veel sneller te verkennen.

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09-02-2021 om 22:21 geschreven door peter  

{ https://www.hln.be/ }

09-02-2021 om 20:41 geschreven door peter  

Topwetenschapper Harvard blijft geloven dat aliens vier jaar geleden op bezoek kwamen, maar hij krijgt stevige tegenkanting

“Aliens hebben ons in 2017 een bezoek gebracht, maar wetenschappers hebben die realiteit genegeerd.” De stelling doet misschien de wenkbrauwen fronsen, maar ze komt niet van de eerste de beste. Avi Loeb is een topastronoom aan de universiteit van Harvard die ook al samengewerkt heeft met Stephen Hawking. In het wereldje wordt hij nu echter vooral afgedaan als een collega “die met straffe beweringen het publiek wil bespelen”.

 Bron: Forbes , Daily Mail

De bekende Israëlisch-Amerikaanse kosmoloog verwijst naar de doortocht van ‘Oumuamua’, een mysterieus object dat vier jaar geleden in sneltreinvaart door ons zonnestelsel vloog. Het 400 meter lange gevaarte wisselde soms van tempo, hield geen rekening met de zwaartekracht en had de vorm van een sigaar. Een komeet kon het niet zijn omdat de nevelige wolk van gassen en stof ontbrak. Experts spraken van het eerste interstellaire object dat vanop Aarde waargenomen werd.

Een kunstenaar maakte deze schets van Oumuamua.

 © AFP

Sonde

De ‘ruimterots’ kwam dus uit een ander zonnestelsel, maar was het daarom ook buitenaards? In dit geval: hadden aliens werkelijk een sonde gecreëerd waarmee ze een verkenningstocht uitvoerden?

De controversiële these won aan belang sinds Loeb zich in 2018 in het kamp van de ‘believers’ aansloot. Zijn artikel in het wetenschappelijke blad ‘Astrophysical Journal Letters’ deed alvast het nodige stof opwaaien.

Computersimulaties

Uit een studie van vorig jaar bleek echter dat Oumuamua - Hawaïaans voor ‘scout’ - volledig natuurlijk ontstaan zou zijn. Rotsachtige objecten kunnen immers uit een zonnestelsel gekatapulteerd worden door getijdenkrachten.

Computersimulaties vonden na lange tijd een verklaring voor de ‘sigaarvorm’ en ook het mysterie van de plotse versnellingen leek opgehelderd. “Een combinatie van waterijs met de uitwaseming van gas”, meent hoofdauteur Yun Zhang. Elk planetensysteem zou volgens haar zelfs zo’n 100 biljoen objecten als Oumuamua uitstoten.

“We zijn niet speciaal”

De wetenschappelijke uitleg kan Loeb echter niet overtuigen. Hij bracht nu een boek uit om zijn theorie rond buitenaardse wezens te staven. Zij zouden een lichtzeil gefabriceerd hebben dat via zonlicht voortgestuwd wordt.

“Denken dat we uniek en speciaal zijn is gewoon arrogant. We zouden ons beter verzoenen met het feit dat er nog veel andere culturen bestaan. We moeten ze nu enkel nog vinden”, klinkt het in ‘Extraterrestrial: The First Sign of Intelligent Life Beyond Earth’.

“Hij praat publiek naar de mond”

Astrofysicus Ethan Siegel betreurt dat Loeb die weg ingeslagen is. “Ooit was hij zeer gerespecteerd. Nu het niet meer lukt om collega’s met argumenten te overtuigen, praat hij het grote publiek maar naar de mond”, schrijft hij in ‘Forbes’.

Ook de Nederlandse hoogleraar Sterrenkunde Gijs Nelemans denkt er zo over. “Loeb heeft al eerder spraakmakende zaken aangekaart. Hij gooit ze in de groep en kan ze goed uitmelken, daarna mogen anderen het zaakje uitzoeken. Als ik zou moeten kiezen tussen aliens of de wetenschappelijke uitleg, dan wordt het toch de tweede optie. Er zijn bij dit object ook radiometingen gedaan en er werd geen enkel signaal vastgesteld.”

“Pesterijen”

Loeb noemt dit soort reacties pestgedrag. “Galileo werd ook ooit verketterd omdat hij ontdekte dat de Aarde niet het centrum van het universum was. We zouden veel meer middelen moeten besteden aan de zoektocht naar buitenlands leven. Als we hun technologie zouden bestuderen, kunnen we misschien wel een miljoen jaar winst boeken.”

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09-02-2021 om 20:32 geschreven door peter  

Jupiter’s Trojan Asteroids Offer Surprises Even Before NASA’s Lucy Mission has a Chance to Visit Them.

A new study out this month suggests that Jupiter’s Trojan asteroids may be more peculiar than previously thought. The Trojan asteroids are rocky objects which orbit the Sun just ahead of and just behind the gas giant, in gravitational sweet spots known as Lagrange points. The swarm ahead of Jupiter, known as the L4 (Greek) group, is slightly larger than the L5 (Trojan) swarm behind, but until now, astronomers believed that there was otherwise little differentiation between the two swarms. The paper released this month appears to change that.

The research team, using data from the Asteroid Terrestrial-impact Last Alert System (ATLAS) based in Hawaii, has discovered unexpected variations in the shape of the Trojans. This new study suggests that objects in the L4 population are actually more elongated than those in the L5 population, on average.

Why does this matter? Well, the difference “may imply a different collisional evolution within each cloud,” the paper suggests. The L4 swarm’s larger population means objects within it have had had more opportunities to collide with one another. As one Trojan slams into another, larger objects are worn down or broken into smaller pieces. Over billions of years of impacts, the result is that more L4 objects have been battered into eccentric shapes than those in L5.

This discovery is a lesson learned regarding the evolutionary history of the Solar System, and the Jupiter Trojans may have plenty more to offer scientists in that respect in the near future. In order to get a closer look at these primordial remnants of the early Solar System, NASA is set to launch a robotic spacecraft to visit the Trojans later this year. The mission is named Lucy, after the fossilized remains of an early human ancestor found in Ethiopia in 1974. Lucy taught paleontologists about the evolution of humans, and in a similar way, the Lucy spacecraft will be able to teach astronomers about the early history of the Solar System.

One of Lucy’s key objectives is to understand the composition and diversity of Trojan objects. It is believed that these asteroids represent the leftovers of planet formation, so learning about their structure, age, and component materials will help us to understand the ingredients which went into making the planets we see today, including, possibly, the organic materials which found their way to Earth in its infancy.

Lucy will take advantage of lessons learned from previous missions, carrying instruments similar to those flown on NASA’s New Horizons, which flew past Pluto in 2015, and OSIRIS-Rex, which is currently bringing a sample back to Earth from Asteroid Bennu. Using a series of clever gravity assists, Lucy will be able to visit more targets in a single mission than any solar system probe before it, flying past at least eight different asteroids over twelve years, starting with one in the main asteroid belt, then bouncing back and forth between objects in the L4 and L5 swarms.

Careful planning, and a bit of astronomical luck, means that Lucy will even get the chance to visit two targets in the L5 swarm which travel in high inclination orbits, making them normally very difficult to reach. The binary pair, Patroclus and Menoetius, will pass within reach of Lucy in 2033, making for a spectacular finale to Lucy’s primary mission.

Lucy will launch from Cape Canaveral, Florida on an Atlas V rocket in October. The complete mission timeline is as follows:

• October 16, 2021: The three-week long launch window opens.
• April 20, 2025: Main asteroid belt object (52246) Donaldjohanson.
• August 12, 2027: L4 object (3548) Eurybates and its satellite, Queta.
• September 15, 2027: L4 object (15094) Polymele.
• April 18, 2028: L4 object (11351) Leucus.
• November 11, 2028: L4 object (21900) Orus.
• March 2, 2033: L5 object (617) Patroclus and its partner, Menoetius.

Whatever else Lucy might discover, it is clear that a combination of ground based-astronomy and spacecraft flybys are opening up a new chapter in our understanding of planetary formation, and the Trojans probably have more surprises in store for us in the years to come.

Reference. 

• A. McNeill et al. “Comparison of the physical properties of the L4 and L5 Trojan asteroids from ATLAS data.” arXiv preprint arXiv:2101.04602 (2021)

The post Jupiter’s Trojan Asteroids Offer Surprises Even Before NASA’s Lucy Mission has a Chance to Visit Them. appeared first on Universe Today.

Source: 

• https://www.universetoday.com/149812/jupiters-trojan-asteroids-offer-surprises-even-before-nasas-lucy-mission-has-a-chance-to-visit-them/

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09-02-2021 om 18:05 geschreven door peter  

Dr. Steven Greer: The Cabal's Last Card Fake Alien Invasion - Deep State False Flags - The Classics

The work that medical doctor, researcher and author Steven Greer continues to do through the organization CSETI has made some tremendous breakthroughs in establishing contact with an intelligent phenomena, often perceived as UFOs, Light Phenomena and strange looking entities.

Steven demonstrates that there is a conscious connection being established with this phenomena and on many occasions they are being caught on camera.

Dr. Steven Greer: The Cabal’s Last Card Fake Alien Invasion – Deep State False Flags

{ https://beforeitsnews.com/ }

09-02-2021 om 17:47 geschreven door peter  

Tiny UFO Near UFO Cloud, Calgary, Canada 2-7-2021, MUFON UFO Sighting News.

Date of sighting: Feb 7, 2021

Location of sighting: Calgary, Canada

Source: MUFON #113591

 

Guys do you see the UFO lighting near the tree edge? Its a small UFO that came out the the huge UFO cloaked inside the cloud. Yes, two UFOs! The guy noticed the small one, and dismissed the cloud. But the cloud is the mother ship! Crazy cool that the eyewitness didnt even mention the UFO shaped cloud...its hiding a cloaked UFO in it. Wow, just wow! 

Scott C. Waring 

 

Eyewitness states: 

I was driving home and saw the brightest light I have ever seen during the day. It was hovering when I first spotted it then it proceeded to move and that’s where the video starts. It also disappears at the end. Thoughts on what this is?

{ https://www.ufosightingsdaily.com/ }

09-02-2021 om 17:25 geschreven door peter  

Triangle UFO Seen In Night Vision Over Rochester, Michigan. 11-2-2014, MUFON UFO Sighting News.

Date of sighting: Nov 2, 2014
Location of sighting: Rochester, Michigan, USA

Source: MUFON

 

This eyewitness was using a type 2 generation night vision scope. I know, because I own one. He also is holding a green pen laser, which I also have and use. He is using the green laser to get the attention of aliens so that they fly near him so he can catch it on night vision and record it. 

 

Here we see not a TR3B, but a cloaked triangle craft. Its just one craft! See the two screenshots above, both different but both show a solid triangle craft. It may be invisible, but its visible in night vision! This object was drawn to this location because of the green laser! It was curious about it since it could see the laser for many miles away. 

 

100% proof that triangle alien crafts do exist and do come to the UFO hunters when they try hard to get noticed with green pen lasers! Also nice he didn't hit the ship with the laser rather he politely followed it. Very thoughtful of the eyewitness. 

Scott C. Waring - Taiwan 

 

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09-02-2021 om 17:20 geschreven door peter