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 Ontdek de Fascinerende Wereld van UFO's en UAP's: Jouw Bron voor Onthullende Informatie!
Ben jij ook gefascineerd door het onbekende? Wil je meer weten over UFO's en UAP's, niet alleen in België, maar over de hele wereld? Dan ben je op de juiste plek!
België: Het Kloppend Hart van UFO-onderzoek
In België is BUFON (Belgisch UFO-Netwerk) dé autoriteit op het gebied van UFO-onderzoek. Voor betrouwbare en objectieve informatie over deze intrigerende fenomenen, bezoek je zeker onze Facebook-pagina en deze blog. Maar dat is nog niet alles! Ontdek ook het Belgisch UFO-meldpunt en Caelestia, twee organisaties die diepgaand onderzoek verrichten, al zijn ze soms kritisch of sceptisch.
Nederland: Een Schat aan Informatie
Voor onze Nederlandse buren is er de schitterende website www.ufowijzer.nl, beheerd door Paul Harmans. Deze site biedt een schat aan informatie en artikelen die je niet wilt missen!
Internationaal: MUFON - De Wereldwijde Autoriteit
Neem ook een kijkje bij MUFON (Mutual UFO Network Inc.), een gerenommeerde Amerikaanse UFO-vereniging met afdelingen in de VS en wereldwijd. MUFON is toegewijd aan de wetenschappelijke en analytische studie van het UFO-fenomeen, en hun maandelijkse tijdschrift, The MUFON UFO-Journal, is een must-read voor elke UFO-enthousiasteling. Bezoek hun website op www.mufon.com voor meer informatie.
Samenwerking en Toekomstvisie
Sinds 1 februari 2020 is Pieter niet alleen ex-president van BUFON, maar ook de voormalige nationale directeur van MUFON in Vlaanderen en Nederland. Dit creëert een sterke samenwerking met de Franse MUFON Reseau MUFON/EUROP, wat ons in staat stelt om nog meer waardevolle inzichten te delen.
Let op: Nepprofielen en Nieuwe Groeperingen
Pas op voor een nieuwe groepering die zich ook BUFON noemt, maar geen enkele connectie heeft met onze gevestigde organisatie. Hoewel zij de naam geregistreerd hebben, kunnen ze het rijke verleden en de expertise van onze groep niet evenaren. We wensen hen veel succes, maar we blijven de autoriteit in UFO-onderzoek!
Blijf Op De Hoogte!
Wil jij de laatste nieuwtjes over UFO's, ruimtevaart, archeologie, en meer? Volg ons dan en duik samen met ons in de fascinerende wereld van het onbekende! Sluit je aan bij de gemeenschap van nieuwsgierige geesten die net als jij verlangen naar antwoorden en avonturen in de sterren!
Heb je vragen of wil je meer weten? Aarzel dan niet om contact met ons op te nemen! Samen ontrafelen we het mysterie van de lucht en daarbuiten.
24-04-2025
«Presque de la science-fiction»… les scientifiques estiment que la forme du noyau interne de la Terre change
«Presque de la science-fiction»… les scientifiques estiment que la forme du noyau interne de la Terre change
Les chercheurs qui avaient récemment découvert l’inversion de la rotation du noyau interne de la Terre ont mis en lumière un autre phénomène surprenant : des changements dans la forme de ce noyau.
Depuis longtemps, il était supposé que cette partie de la Terre se déforme lentement pendant sa rotation. Cette nouvelle étude, basée sur des données sismiques collectées entre 1991 et 2023, offre la première preuve de ces modifications. Les scientifiques ont constaté des variations dans les ondes sismiques, indiquant des déformations à la surface du noyau interne.
Le noyau interne est une sphère métallique solide et chaude, entourée d’un noyau externe liquide. Ces déformations pourraient fournir des informations sur les « forces profondes » à l’intérieur de la Terre, responsables de notre champ magnétique. Si ce mouvement cessait, la Terre deviendrait une planète morte, comme Mars, qui a perdu son champ magnétique.
Les chercheurs précisent que ces modifications de la forme du noyau interne sont difficiles à observer directement. Cependant, l’étude apporte une nouvelle perspective aux recherches sur la dynamique terrestre, en complément des découvertes récentes concernant la rotation du noyau. Les experts estiment que ces déformations pourraient être plus fréquentes qu’on ne l’imagine, mais il reste difficile de savoir si elles représentent une anomalie ou une caractéristique normale.
Cette découverte des changements de forme du noyau interne ouvre de nouvelles pistes de réflexion sur des propriétés physiques encore inconnues, comme la viscosité de ce noyau. De telles recherches approfondissent notre compréhension des processus internes de la Terre et des forces qui la façonnent, avec des implications importantes pour notre compréhension de la géodynamique.
The oldest structures on Earth were built before history began — And they don’t match the history books
The oldest structures on Earth were built before history began — And they don’t match the history books
Before cities or writing, ancient builders carved massive stone sites with cosmic precision. Some are over 10,000 years old—and they don’t match the history books.
Long before the birth of cities, kings, or written language, someone was carving monuments out of stone with uncanny precision. These weren’t simple shelters or scattered rocks. They were massive, organized, astronomically aligned structures—built by hands we still don’t understand. And in many cases, long before we were supposed to be capable of building anything at all. In this article, I will take you across some of the oldest structures on Earth.
What we’ve found at sites like Göbekli Tepe, Karahantepe, Nabta Playa, Gunung Padang, and the deepest layers of Baalbek doesn’t align with the timeline printed in textbooks. If the dates are correct—and mounting evidence suggests they are—then our timeline of civilization is off by thousands of years. Despite this overwhelming evidence, history is not being corrected or updated. We continue to tach the same outdated information in school. Despite physical evidence that suggests that history as we know it is far more complex than what we believed only a couple o decades ago. In this article, I will take you across some of my favorite ancient sites and explain why they don’t match history as we are being told.
Göbekli Tepe Was Buried on Purpose—But Why?
A view of the megalithic stones at Göbekli Tepe. Most of the site still remains buried beneath the surface. 7Image Credit: Wikimedia Commons.
Tthis is, I think, one of my favorite ancient sites and literally one of the oldest strcutres on Earth, and I have written about it on various oacacions where I have outlined why this site is such a history breaker. Tucked beneath a dusty hill in southeastern Turkey, Göbekli Tepe stunned the archaeological world when it was first excavated in the 1990s. Carbon dating placed the site at least 11,500 years old, making it not only older than the pyramids, but older than agriculture, pottery, or any form of writing.
Carved T-shaped megaliths, each weighing up to 20 tons, stand in circular formations. They’re decorated with reliefs of wild animals, abstract symbols, and possibly mythological beings. The stonework is not rough or experimental—it’s precise. Intentional. Studies have demonstrated that he builders of this ancient site used advanced geometrical reasoning. And then there’s the strangest part: the entire complex was deliberately buried in antiquity. Someone not only built it—they entombed it. No one knows why.
What purpose did it serve? A temple? A place of ritual gathering? A sky-watching observatory? Nothing about Göbekli Tepe fits the narrative of primitive nomads just learning how to sow seeds. Tis site breaks history because sites like it should not have been possible according to mainstream experts. Yet there it is. Göbekli Tepe is truly a history changer and not many people know about it.
Karahantepe Adds Depth—Literally and Figuratively one of the Oldest Strcutures on Earth
Human depictions and 3D sculptures in the 11,000-year-old Karahantepe complex. Credit: Anadolu Agency
And a short distance away from Göbekli Tepe we have another shocker.
Just 35 kilometers from Göbekli Tepe lies Karahantepe, a site of the same age that may be even more complex. Unlike Göbekli’s open-air circles, Karahantepe includes deep, carved chambers—entire rooms built into the bedrock. More than 250 stone pillars have been uncovered so far, along with stylized human heads and abstract sculptures embedded in the walls. Who could have built these gigantic strcutres over 11,000 years ago? Where they really hunter-gatherers as mainstream experts suggest, or is there something more complex about these ancient people?
The complexity and site of this site was not a one-off anomaly. I believe that whoever built Göbekli Tepe was part of a broader cultural world—possibly a network of sacred or ceremonial sites. Karahantepe expands the story, suggesting the region was teeming with early symbolic architecture. And yet, just like Göbekli, it appears and disappears with no clear lineage, no gradual development, and no evolutionary trail. It’s as if it came from nowhere.
Nabta Playa May Have Tracked the Stars Before Egypt Had a Name
This is what some of the stone cricles of Nabta Playa look like. Reddit.
We cannot go through an article mentioning the oldest structures on Earth without mentioning this incredible acient site. In the Nubian Desert of southern Egypt, Nabta Playa looks at first like a scatter of rocks in the sand. But its alignment tells another story. Dating back 7,000 to 9,000 years, the stones were arranged to mark the rising of Sirius, the brightest star in the night sky—an event that would later become central to Egyptian calendar systems.
Long before pharaohs, this site may have served as both a ceremonial ground and a celestial clock. Buried cattle remains suggest ritual sacrifice, possibly tied to early pastoralist religion. This hints at a connection between astronomy, myth, and seasonal survival long before formal religion or kingdoms took shape. Though smaller in scale than Göbekli or Karahantepe, Nabta Playa reveals something similar: a deep concern with time, sky, and cosmic order. All from people we call “prehistoric.”
Gunung Padang Could Be the Oldest of Them All
The top of Gunung Padang. This ancient site is one of the most controversial. Credit: Wikimedia Commons.
Indonesia’s Gunung Padang might be the most controversial site on this list—but it could also be the most astonishing. On the surface, it looks like a stepped hill made of volcanic stone. But excavations in the last decade have revealed terraces, chambers, and layers of construction that extend 20 meters deep. Some geologists argue the deepest layers could date to as early as 20,000 BCE—a time when the Earth was still in the grip of the last Ice Age.
If proven true, it would be the oldest known human-built structure on Earth by a wide margin. But mainstream archaeologists remain skeptical. The core question is whether the deeper layers are artificial or natural. The debate is ongoing. Regardless of the final verdict, the site challenges our assumptions. At the very least, it shows human activity at the site far earlier than previously believed. At most, it suggests a lost chapter of human development buried—literally—beneath layers of time and earth.
Baalbek’s Megastones Hint at a Forgotten Foundation
Another one of my favorite sites.
High in the Bekaa Valley of Lebanon, the ruins of Baalbek are often credited to the Romans, who built temples to Jupiter and Bacchus atop its massive stone platform. But beneath those classical columns lies a deeper mystery—one that predates Roman engineering by millennia. At the heart of the platform are the Trilithon stones: three limestone blocks each weighing over 800 tons. Nearby, an unfinished stone known as the Stone of the Pregnant Woman weighs more than 1,000 tons. Even with today’s technology, moving and placing these megaliths would be a challenge.
No one knows how they were transported, lifted, or aligned with such precision—and the builders left no inscriptions, no clear cultural fingerprints. Some researchers argue the deepest layers of Baalbek’s foundation could stretch back to the pre-pottery Neolithic, possibly linked to the same horizon as Göbekli Tepe and Karahantepe. If that’s true, then Roman temples were built atop something far older—a platform whose origins remain undocumented. Baalbek’s base may not yet be as precisely dated as the others on this list, but it raises the same unsettling question: Who built the foundation—and when?
Why Were They Building at All?
This is the question that lingers. Why were people with no cities, no writing, no metallurgy, and supposedly no organizational complexity carving massive stones and aligning them to the stars? Some researchers believe these were spiritual centers. Others think they were calendars—designed to track the solstices, lunar cycles, or stellar movements crucial to seasonal survival. Still others suggest they were gathering places where ideas, stories, and collective memory were shared in symbolic form.
But here’s the problem: none of this fits with how we define “prehistory.” We were taught that humans built monuments after developing agriculture and complex societies. These sites flip that script. Maybe, just maybe, the desire to build came first—and everything else followed.
If even one of these sites is as old as the evidence suggests, then the timeline of human history needs serious revision. The builders were capable of organizing labor, understanding celestial cycles, and shaping stone on a massive scale. These weren’t scattered efforts. They show patterns — of intent, of knowledge, and of memory we no longer share. There’s still too much we don’t know. But it’s clear we’ve been starting the story too late.
Did lost civilizations before history vanish in a forgotten global disaster?
Did lost civilizations before history vanish in a forgotten global disaster?
Did lost civilizations before history disappear in a global catastrophe? From sunken cities to ancient monuments, new clues suggest we’ve barely scratched the surface.
The official story of human civilization begins around 6,000 years ago, with the rise of early city-states in Mesopotamia and Egypt. But new discoveries are challenging that timeline. What if we’ve overlooked an entire chapter—an era of lost civilizations before history, wiped out by a global catastrophe and forgotten beneath layers of earth, myth, and rising seas?
The mysterious climate crash that changed everything
Roughly 12,800 years ago, the Earth experienced a sudden, violent cooling event known as the Younger Dryas. Within decades, global temperatures dropped, megafauna went extinct, and entire ecosystems unraveled. No one knows exactly what caused it.
One of the most controversial theories—the Younger Dryas Impact Hypothesis—suggests that fragments of a massive comet struck Earth, triggering wildfires, floods, and atmospheric collapse. If such an impact occurred, it could have erased entire cultures in one swift blow.
But is there any trace of what may have existed before that disaster?
Gobekli Tepe is, by far, the oldest temple in the world and apparently, it is connected to a massive comet impact from around 13,000 years ago.
The discovery of Göbekli Tepe in southeastern Turkey stunned archaeologists. This is wihtout a doubt one of my favorite sites, for many reasons. Dated to around 9600 BCE, it predates Stonehenge and the pyramids by millennia. Its massive stone pillars, many over 5 meters tall and weighing up to 20 tons, were arranged in circular enclosures—carved with animals and symbols whose meanings are still unknown.
And yet, Göbekli Tepe is not alone.
Karahan Tepe (Turkey), just 35 km away, is even older and features human-like statues and T-shaped pillars similar in style.
Nevalı Çori, buried under a modern dam, showed early megalithic architecture from around 8500 BCE.
Wadi Faynan (Jordan) and Ain Ghazal (Amman), both Neolithic sites, reveal complex social structures and large-scale building from 8500–7500 BCE.
Tassili n’Ajjer (Algeria), though harder to date precisely, holds cave paintings of beings in strange suits, possibly over 10,000 years old.
These discoveries raise a serious question: How did people with no known agriculture or writing build such monuments? Did they inherit knowledge from an earlier culture—one wiped clean from the record?
Cities beneath the sea
During the last Ice Age, sea levels were more than 100 meters lower than today. As the glaciers melted, coastlines vanished. Much of humanity’s early settlements—always near water—would now lie submerged, often beyond reach of standard archaeological tools.
And yet, some of them have been found.
Dwarka, off the coast of India, is an underwater city with stone walls, grids, and anchors, dated by some researchers to at least 7500 BCE.
Pavlopetri (Greece), a sunken Bronze Age city, features streets, buildings, and a central square—submerged around 1000 BCE, but possibly older.
Atlit Yam (Israel), buried beneath the Mediterranean, contains stone houses, graves, and a stone circle—dated to 7000 BCE.
These cities suggest an entire world of early human habitation may now lie underwater—unmapped, unstudied, and forgotten. We know more about the surface of Mars then the surface of our oceans. And that is a fact.
Gaps too large to ignore
Archaeology is often focused on what can be confirmed. But it’s the missing pieces that tell another story. There is a gap of thousands of years between the Ice Age and the rise of “official” civilizations like Sumer and Egypt. Yet in that gap, we find stunning stonework, monumental architecture, and sudden cultural shifts.
Even the Sphinx at Giza has been reexamined by some geologists, who point to weathering patterns consistent with heavy rainfall—rain that Egypt hasn’t seen since at least 7000 BCE. Of course this is a massive controversy and this timeline is not acepted in mainstream science.
If these structures predate what we call history, who built them?
Are myths memory?
Ancient cultures from every corner of the world carry stories of floods, sunken lands, and golden ages lost to time. The Greeks had Atlantis. The Hindus speak of long cycles of destruction and rebirth. The Sumerians recorded kings reigning for thousands of years before the flood.
For decades, such stories were dismissed as metaphor. But as more evidence comes to light, researchers are beginning to ask: Were these myths rooted in real events—the fading memories of a civilization that fell beneath the waves?
The future of the past
Advances in LIDAR scanning, satellite imagery, and underwater exploration are rapidly transforming our view of the past. New sites are being discovered in the Amazon, under jungles in Cambodia, and possibly even beneath the sands of Egypt.
As our tools improve, so do the odds of finding proof—of cities that came before, of cultures lost to sea and flame, and of a history far deeper than textbooks allow.
What if we’re the second or third version of civilization?
What if everything we’ve built rests on the bones of a world we’ve already lost? The clues are mounting—and the silence between them might be the loudest signal of all. Did lost civilizations before history disappear in a global catastrophe? From sunken cities to ancient monuments, new clues suggest we’ve barely scratched the surface. And what if we are just a second or ever thrid version of civilization. But more on that, in a different article.
What Do Famous Astronomical Objects Look Like... in 3D?
What Do Famous Astronomical Objects Look Like... in 3D?
By David Dickinson
Simulations of four classic deep-sky objects. Credit: NASA/MSFC/Chandra X-ray Center/Smithsonian Astrophysical Center
A recent analysis gives us new views of key deep-sky objects.
It’s a cosmic shame, that we tend to only see flat-looking, 2-dimensional views of deep-sky objects. And while we can’t just zoom out past the Andromeda galaxy for another perspective, or see the Crab Nebula from another vantage point in space, we can use existing data to simulate objects in 3D.
A recent collection released by Marshall Space Flight Center’s Chandra X-ray Center and the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics shows us familiar objects in a new way. These models combine information from space-borne observatories, including the Chandra X-ray observatory. Released from the payload bay of Space Shuttle Columbia on STS-93, Chandra has proven itself over the last two decades as NASA’s flagship X-ray observatory in space.
Chandra, shortly after deployment from shuttle Columbia's payload bay.
Credit: NASA
The 3D renderings were made using a combination of observational data and computer simulations. The technique not only allows armchair observers to see old objects in new ways, but it also gives astronomers a method to study these familiar targets from all sides.
“These 3D models allow people to explore—and print—examples of stars in the early and end stages of their lives,” states a recent Chandra X-ray Center (NASA) press release. “They also provide scientists with new avenues to investigate scientific questions and find insights about the objects they represent.”
NASA is even providing users with the files to 3D print these deep-sky objects, free to download. This gives a tactile dimension to the sky, something the user can hold and feel. This is an important factor when it comes to science outreach… after all, none of us can see the sky at x-ray wavelengths.
Here’s the highlighted object-by-object breakdown:
Cassiopeia A: Located about 11,000 light-years distant, Cassiopeia A or Cas A is a well-studied supernovae remnant. A prodigious x-ray and radio source, Cas A hosted the last known galactic supernovae about 340 years ago, although no definitive observations of the event exist.
Cas A, to include the 'Green Monster' loop.
Credit: INAF-Osservatorio Astronomico di Palermo/Salvatore Orlando.
More recently, the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) has documented what’s become known as the ‘green monster’, a long oxygen-rich filament extending from Cas A. This may provide more insight into this young and evolving remnant.
A 3D printed rendition of Cas A.
Credit: NASA/CXC/SAO/A. Jubett & N. Wolk/Modeled by Sal Orlando.
BP Tauri: This is a young T Tauri star surrounded by a dust ring, just 10 million years old. T Tauri stars are crucial to our understanding of stellar and solar system formation, as they provide a snapshot of the early stages of the process. These are also very energetic and active stars, with flares that sculpt the surrounding cocoon of dust that the stars are embedded in. BP Tauri and the x-ray flares it produces are of primary interest to Chandra researchers.
The Cygnus Loop: This is a familiar target for deep-sky imagers located in the constellation of Cygnus, the Swan. Another, more ancient supernovae remnant, the Cygnus Loop has since undergone a complex interaction with the interstellar medium, allowing Chandra to probe this domain as the residual blast wave is heated to millions of degrees. The Cygnus Loop is an extended object visually extending over three degrees across, about six times the angular diameter of the Full Moon.
The location of the Cygnus Loop in the sky.
Credit: Stellarium.
G 292.0+1.8: The last selected object is an obscure but crucial one. G 292.0+1.8 is another supernovae remnant, located in the constellation Centaurus the Centaur. Astronomers are interested in this remnant for two main reasons: One, it is usually rich in molecular oxygen. Two, it exhibits a rare, reverse shock wave rebounding back towards the original explosion, giving the remnant an asymmetrical shape.
A cross section of the upper atmosphere, or troposphere, of Jupiter, showing the depth of storms in a north-south swath that crosses the planet’s equator, or equatorial zone (EZ). Blue and red represent, respectively, higher and lower than normal abundances of ammonia gas. Chris Moeckel, UC Berkeley
The weather gets a little wild and weird on Jupiter. How wild? Spacecraft instruments have measured strong winds, tracked fierce lightning, and found huge methane plume storms rising from deep beneath the clouds. How weird? Think: mushballs raining down like hailstones. They're made of ammonia and water encased in a water ice shell. According to planetary scientists, these mushballs plunge through the Jovian atmosphere. What's more, they probably form on the other gas and ice giants, too.
According to planetary scientist Chris Moeckel and his former advisor Imke de Pater at UC Berkeley, the proof for these strange Jovian slushies came from 3D visualizations of the Jovian atmosphere. You can't tell they're there just by looking at the clouds, however. You have to find a way to peer into the atmosphere and measure the chemical fingerprints of the gases it contains. In 2020, data from the Juno mission and observations by radio telescopes on Earth uncovered strange "nonuniformities" in ammonia gas distribution around the planet. In other words, it isn't distributed evenly throughout the atmosphere. The Juno data in particular showed that ammonia isn't just poorly distributed - it's actually depleted to atmospheric depths of about 150 kilometers, according to de Pater.
“Juno really shows that ammonia is depleted at all latitudes down to about 150 km (93 miles), which is really odd,” said de Pater, who discovered 10 years ago that ammonia was depleted down to about 50 km (31 miles). “That’s what Chris is trying to explain with his storm systems going much deeper than we expected.”
A flattened map of Jupiter reveals the distribution of ammonia beneath the planet’s cloud tops, extending tens of kilometers below the visible cloud deck. Red regions indicate where ammonia is depleted, while black regions show where it is rising from deeper within the atmosphere. The depleted zones appear in bands flanking the equator (0° latitude on the map) and at the poles (not shown), while the upwelling of ammonia is most prominent just north of the equator. The striking absence of deep activity in the mid-latitudes suggests that most of Jupiter’s atmosphere is relatively shallow, with only a few storms punching deeper into the planet.
Credit Chris Moeckel and Imke de Pater, UC Berkeley
Follow the Ammonia Trail
To explain that missing ammonia, another scientist named Tristan Guillot proposed a wild idea: that strong updrafts during storms on Jupiter can lift ice particles high above the clouds. There, the ice mixes with ammonia vapor, which melts the ice into a slush. Just like on Earth, as the ice balls rise and fall, they grow. Eventually, these softball-sized mushballs fall back into the atmosphere, taking the ammonia with them. This helps explain why ammonia appears to be missing from the upper atmosphere: it’s being dragged down and hidden deep inside the planet, where it leaves faint signatures to be observed with radio telescopes.
To Moeckel and others, that idea seemed like an "out there" explanation. "Imke and I both were like, ‘There’s no way in the world this is true,’” said Moeckel. “So many things have to come together to actually explain this, it seems so exotic. I basically spent three years trying to prove this wrong. And I couldn’t prove it wrong.”
Jovian Conditions Conducive to Mushballs
It turns out that conditions in Jupiter's atmosphere could support the formation of mushballs. That atmosphere is mostly hydrogen and helium, inhabited by clouds in its upper layers. Beneath the clouds and upper atmosphere lies a deeper layer of fluid metallic hydrogen. A rocky inner core lives deep inside the planet. The atmosphere contains smaller amounts of ammonia molecules and water vapor, which rise and freeze into droplets. On Earth, droplets of water fall onto the surface as rain or hail. However, Jupiter has no surface until you get to the core. So, if those droplets do fall, how far down do they go? How big do they get?
An illustration depicting how violent storms on Jupiter — and likely other gas giants — generate mushballs and shallow lightning. The mushballs are created by thunderstorm clouds that form about 65 km (40 miles) beneath the cloud tops and fuel a strong updraft that carries water ice upward to extreme altitudes, occasionally above the visible cloud layer. Once they reach altitudes of about 22 km (14 miles) below the visible cloud layer, ammonia acts like an antifreeze, melting the ice and combining with it to form a slushy ammonia-water liquid that gets coated with water ice — a mushball. The mushballs keep rising until they become too heavy and fall back through the atmosphere, growing until they reach the water condensation layer, where they evaporate. This ends up redistributing ammonia and water from the upper atmosphere (green and blue layer) to layers deep below the clouds, creating areas of depleted ammonia visible in radio observations.
Credit NASA/JPL-Caltech/SwRI/CNRS
This is where the mushballs come in. First, scientists began trying to figure out the strange distribution of ammonia in particular. There were proposals that water and ammonia ice get locked up in hailstones. However, nobody could quite explain how to form them heavy enough to fall hundreds of kilometers through Jupiter's messy atmosphere. That's when Guillot made his proposal for the growth of slushy hailstones.
Making a 3D Model
To understand the weather conditions and the possible formation of those weird mushballs, Moeckel began working on a different approach based on the observational data. “I essentially developed a tomography method that takes the radio observations and turns them into a three-dimensional rendering of that part of the atmosphere that is seen by Juno,” Moeckel said.
Moeckel's 3D picture of Jupiter’s troposphere shows that the majority of the weather systems on Jupiter really are shallow. Most extend down perhaps only 10 to 20 kilometers below the visible clouds. Most of the colorful, swirling patterns in the bands encircling the planet are part of that shallow contingent of clouds.
Some weather, however, emerges much deeper in the troposphere, redistributing ammonia and water and essentially unmixing what was long thought to be a uniform atmosphere. The three types of weather events responsible are hurricane-like vortices, hotspots coupled to ammonia-rich plumes that wrap around the planet in a wave-like structure, and large storms that generate mushballs and lightning.
Tripping with a Mushball
“The mushball journey essentially starts about 50 to 60 kilometers below the cloud deck as water droplets. The water droplets get rapidly lofted all the way to the top of the cloud deck, where they freeze out and then fall over a hundred kilometers into the planet, where they start to evaporate and deposit material down there,” Moeckel said. “And so you have, essentially, this weird system that gets triggered far below the cloud deck, goes all the way to the top of the atmosphere, and then sinks deep into the planet.”
Unique signatures in the Juno radio data for one storm cloud provided an important clue to the mushball formation. “There was a small spot under a cloud that either looked like cooling, that is, melting ice, or an ammonia enhancement, that is, melting and release of ammonia,” Moeckel said. “It was the fact that either explanation was only possible with mushballs that eventually convinced me.”
What About Other Planets?
The 3D model and explanations of mushballs on Jupiter offer a more complete look at the complicated dynamics of the Jovian atmosphere. Interestingly, it's very likely that similar conditions for mushball creation could exist at the other gas and ice giants of the solar system. If so, that would give planetary scientists much more insight into the interiors of those worlds as well as the activities going on in their atmospheres.
In an age of exoplanet research, it's also likely that researchers can use Moeckel's tools to extrapolate what they've seen at Jupiter to similar-type worlds around other stars. Since they can see only the upper atmospheres of distant worlds, the ability to interpret chemical signatures in those atmospheres using radio and other observations is important.
More Evidence that Snow and Water Formed Many of Mars's Landscapes
More Evidence that Snow and Water Formed Many of Mars's Landscapes
By Matthew Williams
Artist's depiction of water rushing into Mars' Jezero Crater, which billions of years ago was the site of a delta. Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech
Ever since the Mariner probes and Viking missions travelled to Mars, scientists have known that liquid water once flowed on the surface. This is indicated by specific features that form in the presence of water here on Earth, including flow channels, delta fans, hydrated minerals, and sedimentary rocks. In recent decades, the many missions that have studied Mars' atmosphere, surface, and climate have revealed that Mars was a warmer, wetter place during the Noachian period (ca. 4.1 to 3.7 billion years ago).
This has stimulated questions about whether life could have emerged on Mars and where its once-abundant water (and maybe even life) could be found today. A new study by geologists at the University of Colorado Boulder (CU Boulder) provides a potential glimpse of what Mars may have looked like billions of years ago. Their findings suggest Mars experienced heavy precipitation that likely fed valleys and channels that carved the features we still see there today.
While most scientists agree that Mars once had flowing water on its surface, where it came from remains a mystery. While most maintain that a global ocean once covered the entire Northern Lowlands of Mars, while large bodies spotted the southern hemisphere, many scientists assert that Mars was always cold and dry. In this scenario, water existed mainly as ice caps and glaciers that occupied the Northern Lowlands, which experienced occasional melting for short periods.
This is largely based on the fact that roughly 4 billion years ago, the young Sun was only 75% as bright as it is today. As a result, Mars must have had a significant greenhouse effect to maintain temperatures warm enough to support liquid water. Hence, there is an ongoing debate between proponents of the "warm-and-wet" versus the "cold-and-dry" models. To address this, Steckel and her colleagues ran a computer simulation originally developed for Earth studies by Professor Tucker. As Steckel explained in a CU Boulder press release:
"You could pull up Google Earth images of places like Utah, zoom out, and you’d see the similarities to Mars. It’s very hard to make any kind of conclusive statement. But we see these valleys beginning at a large range of elevations. It’s hard to explain that with just ice."
The researchers used the software to model the evolution of the Martian landscape on synthetic terrain similar to Mars' equatorial region. They added water from precipitation to some of their models and melting ice caps to others, and then simulated how this would shape the landscape over tens to hundreds of thousands of years. The team then compared the two models to data obtained by NASA's Mars Global Surveyor (MGS) and Mars Odyssey spacecraft. The precipitation model was consistent with what we see around Mars' equator today.
These include the vast network of channels in the Martian highlands that open onto the low-lying areas in the Northern Lowlands. The rock deposits and delta fans found in these areas further indicate that vast quantities of water once flowed across the landscape. "You'd need meters deep of flowing water to deposit those kinds of boulders," said Hynek. "Once the erosion from flowing water stopped, Mars almost got frozen in time and probably still looks a lot like Earth did 3.5 billion years ago."
While these results are convincing, there are still unanswered questions about Mars' ancient climate. For example, scientists are still unsure how Mars could maintain temperatures warm enough to support precipitation and flowing water, given how the Sun's output was less than it is today. However, this study still provides scientists with a glimpse at what Mars experienced in the past and could also provide new perspectives into the geological history of Earth.
Former Presidential Advisor Claims Direct Contact with UFO Material in Shocking Interview
In a groundbreaking interview on the American Alchemy podcast hosted by Jesse Michels, former presidential advisor Harald Malmgren made a series of astonishing disclosures that have reignited global interest in the topic of unidentified aerial phenomena (UAP), commonly referred to as UFOs. Malmgren, a respected economist and senior government official who served under multiple U.S. Presidents—including Kennedy, Johnson, Nixon, and Ford—shared previously unspoken revelations from his decades of experience at the highest levels of power.
Direct Handling of UFO Material
The most headline-grabbing statement from the interview came when Malmgren asserted that he had personally handled material connected to UFOs. This firsthand involvement suggests a level of access to classified information and technology far beyond what has been publicly acknowledged. Though Malmgren stopped short of detailing the nature or origin of the materials, the implication was clear: he had encountered physical evidence of phenomena the public has long speculated about.
Secret Antigravity Research Involving Tesla and Brown
Malmgren also referenced a mysterious communication from a foreign intelligence contact. According to his account, the message detailed a covert project involving two historically significant figures in scientific innovation—Nikola Tesla and Thomas Townsend Brown. Brown, known for his work on electrogravitics, and Tesla, often cited in speculative theories about advanced energy and propulsion systems, were allegedly linked through this secret initiative. The collaboration reportedly focused on antigravity technology, a concept that has long existed at the fringe of mainstream science but could revolutionize space travel and aeronautics if proven viable.
The Roswell Revelation: Living Extraterrestrials?
Perhaps the most emotionally charged revelation came from what Malmgren told his daughter, Pippa, in his final days. Off the record and away from public scrutiny, he confessed to having been shown a video depicting a living extraterrestrial being—the sole survivor from a UFO crash, widely believed to be the infamous Roswell incident of 1947. He also stated that biologics—referring to living or once-living non-human entities—had been recovered from other crash sites.
This information aligns with recent disclosures from whistleblowers and former military personnel who have testified before U.S. congressional panels about government possession of non-human craft and biologics.
The Implications
Harald Malmgren’s statements represent one of the most credible sources yet to publicly affirm the existence of UFO material and extraterrestrial life. Given his high-level roles and policy influence, his testimony has added significant weight to ongoing calls for greater transparency from governments regarding UAP investigations.
The interview arrives at a time when global interest in UFOs is surging. With congressional hearings, declassified military footage, and bipartisan political pressure building, Malmgren’s words may help push the conversation into new, more serious territory.
While the extraordinary nature of Malmgren’s claims demands healthy skepticism, his credibility and public service record make them difficult to dismiss outright. Whether these disclosures will lead to greater official acknowledgment or further secrecy remains to be seen. Nonetheless, this interview marks a pivotal moment in the long-running quest to uncover the truth about UFOs and what may lie beyond our understanding of the universe.
Mars's Atmosphere Used to be Thicker. Has Curiosity Found Where it All Went?
Mars's Atmosphere Used to be Thicker. Has Curiosity Found Where it All Went?
By Andy Tomaswick
NASA’s Curiosity Mars rover sees its tracks receding into the distance at a site nicknamed “Ubajara” on April 30, 2023. This site is where Curiosity made the discovery of siderite, a mineral that may help explain the fate of the planet’s thicker ancient atmosphere. Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/MSSS
Planetary scientists have plenty of theories about Mars and its environmental past. Two of the most widely accepted are that there was a carbon dioxide atmosphere and, at one point, liquid water on Mars' surface. However, this theory has a glaring problem: Where should the rocks have formed from the interactions between carbon dioxide and water? According to a new paper by scientists at several NASA facilities using data collected by the rover Curiosity, the answer is right under the rover's metaphorical feet.
According to geology, carbon dioxide and water should react together to form "carbonates," a type of mineral that contains an ion made up of carbon and oxygen. This process is relatively common on Earth and even in some manufacturing processes, but the results have never before been seen on Mars, at least not in any quantity.
That is despite a significant amount of effort spent looking for them. Rovers have looked for them to no avail. Even satellites have done spectroscopy on most of the planet and haven't seen anything that could be a carbonate anywhere near the quantities to prove that Mars had an atmosphere of carbon dioxide and liquid water at one time. That was, until the little rover that could stepped in.
Curiosity has had a hand in plenty of important discoveries on the Red Planet. Here's a video from Fraser 7 years ago that discusses some of them.
Curiosity has dug holes throughout Mars' Gale Crater for almost 13 years. During that time, some significant discoveries were made, but this latest one has dramatically impacted our understanding of the evolution of the Martian climate. At three different drill sites around Mount Sharp, Curiosity found evidence for a mineral called siderite, a carbonate material formed with iron.
Siderite itself wasn't present on the surface, though. It was only found when Curiosity drilled down 3-4cm into the surface of a rock and analyzed the resulting drill powder in its CheMin instrument. After the instruments zapped it with X-rays, the researchers found the presence of the elusive mineral that could explain where Mars' atmosphere went, at least partially.
The presence of carbonates under layers of other rock could also explain why they have been so hard to find up until now. Orbiting satellites wouldn't be able to see a few centimeters into existing rock, and most rover spectroscopy is done without drilling into a sample, so they wouldn't have been able to detect it either. But finding any does lend credence to the idea that Mars used to be habitable for basic microorganisms, at one point at least.
Here's a look back at Curiosity's first science target - Jake the Rock.
Scientists from several different NASA centers, including the Jet Propulsion Laboratory (Curiosity operation), Ames Research Center (CheMin Instrument operation), and John Space Center (data analysis) contributed to the work. According to Benjamin Tutolo, a professor at the University of Calgary, "the discovery of abundant siderite in Gale Crater represents both a surprising and important breakthrough in our understanding of the geologic and atmospheric evolution of Mars."
It certainly does, though the estimated amount of siderite and other carbonates based on this newest data isn't enough to explain where all of Mars' atmosphere went. There could be other, more abundant hiding places, or the Red Planet could have lost its atmosphere slowly over time due to the solar wind, since it has lacked a magnetic field for so long. As rovers continue to explore its surface, a steady stream of new findings will continue to intrigue planetary scientists, and hopefully help them refine their theories on how Mars came to be what it is today.
NASA's Lucy Probe Snaps Its Closeup of a Weirdly Shaped Asteroid
NASA's Lucy Probe Snaps Its Closeup of a Weirdly Shaped Asteroid
By Alan Boyle
NASA's Lucy probe captured this closeup of the asteroid Donaldjohanson from a distance of about 660 miles. (NASA / Goddard / SwRI / JHUAPL / NOIRLab)
NASA’s Lucy spacecraft made a successful flyby of the second asteroid on its must-see list over the weekend, and sent back imagery documenting the elongated object’s bizarre double-lobed shape.
“Asteroid Donaldjohanson has strikingly complicated geology,” said Hal Levison, a planetary scientist at the Southwest Research Institute who serves as the Lucy mission’s principal investigator. “As we study the complex structures in detail, they will reveal important information about the building blocks and collisional processes that formed the planets in our solar system.”
Lucy came as close as 600 miles (960 kilometers) to Donaldjohanson on April 20, snapping images every two seconds or so as it zoomed past. The pictures confirmed the asteroid’s status as a contact binary — that is, a compound object formed by the sticky collision of two smaller celestial bodies. Donaldjohanson is somewhat larger than it was previously thought to be, with a length of about 5 miles (8 kilometers) and a width of 2 miles (3.5 kilometers) at the widest point.
The Easter encounter took place three and a half years after Lucy was launched, and 17 months after the 52-foot-wide probe flew past its first target asteroid, Dinkinesh, and a mini-moon called Selam. Like Donaldjohanson, Selam was found to be a contact binary.
Researchers consider both of Lucy’s encounters in the main asteroid belt, which lies between the orbits of Mars and Jupiter, to be mere warmups for the mission’s main event: a detailed study of so-called Jupiter Trojan asteroids. Such asteroids are trapped harmlessly at resonance points in Jupiter’s orbit due to the giant planet’s gravitational influence. No spacecraft has ever gotten close to a Jupiter Trojan.
Tom Statler, NASA program scientist for the $989 million Lucy mission, said the quality of the early imagery demonstrates the “tremendous capabilities” of Lucy’s instruments. “The potential to really open a new window into the history of our solar system when Lucy gets to the Trojan asteroids is immense,” he said.
Over the next few weeks, researchers will retrieve, process and analyze data from Lucy’s black-and-white imager as well as its color imager, infrared spectrometer and thermal infrared spectrometer. The spacecraft is scheduled to spend most of this year traveling through the main asteroid belt.
Lucy’s first encounter with a Jupiter Trojan asteroid, known as Eurybates, is due to take place in August 2027. Four additional Trojan encounters will follow between 2027 and 2033.
Computer simulation of the solar wind. Credit - NASA / SwRI / Craig DeForest
Where did the water we believe is on the Moon come from? Most scientists think they know the answer - from the solar wind. They believed the hydrogen atoms that make up the solar wind bombarded the lunar surface, which is made up primarily of silica. When that hydrogen hits the oxygen atoms in that silica, the oxygen is sometimes released and freed to bond with the incoming hydrogen, which in some cases creates water. But no one has ever attempted to replicate that process to prove its feasibility. A new paper by Li Hsia Yeo and their colleagues at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center describes the first experimental evidence of that reaction.
To perform this experiment on Earth, the authors needed two things: something equivalent to the solar wind and something comparable to lunar regolith. The solar wind is comprised of protons—basically hydrogen atoms with their electrons stripped off. Mimicking this on Earth proved tricky, as they had to build a custom miniaturized particle accelerator to simulate the solar wind.
While it might seem technically simpler, their next task was certainly more administratively challenging—obtaining a sample of actual Moon regolith from the Apollo missions. Dust collected during Apollo 17's final lunar trip had already been packed in an airtight storage container since the 1970s, but the authors went ahead and baked the sample again just to make sure there was no water present.
Fraser discusses the best use of the Moon.
Once the samples were obtained and the accelerator was set up, the final piece of the experimental puzzle was a spectrometer, which could show the presence of water. When ready, they blasted the sample with enough simulated "solar wind" to be the equivalent of about 80,000 years on the lunar surface. During that time, they watched for infrared dips around 3um, precisely what they saw, representing a tell-tale water sign.
However, it is also a tell-tale sign of hydroxyl (OH), which has the same spectral profile as water and is also one of the potential by-products of the solar wind hitting the lunar regolith. As a press release announcing the finding states, "they can't conclusively say if their experiment made water molecules." However, finding even hydroxyl molecules is a step in the right direction.
One other data point lends credence to the continual replenishment of water via the solar wind, instead of more sporadic replenishment from sources such as micrometeoroids - the spectrographic signal of water seems to vary with time. It is strong in the morning, decreases throughout the lunar "day", and then increases again over the lunar "night". The most obvious explanation for this cycle is that some water burns off during the day, being exposed to the Sun. Over the two-week-long lunar night, the amount of water starts to build back up again, as would be expected if it is created by an external force such as the solar wind, and not being stripped away right away.
New data from LADEE shows how water might show up on the Moon after a micrometeoroid impact. Credit - NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center Conceptual Image Lab
Ultimately, this experiment lends more credibility to the idea that lunar water is created by the interaction between the lunar regolith and the solar wind and that the solar wind itself is always slightly replenishing the amount of water available on the Moon. Artemis astronauts, or whoever winds up back on the lunar surface, will undoubtedly be happy for that, no matter how that water got there.
Watch this amazing video of many orbs over Phoenix, Arizona two months ago. Many people have tried and succeeded at summoning orbs. It has nothing to do with chanting, ritual or anything else, it's about clearing your mind and mentally asking it to come. It's as easy as that. This is proof that if you try, you will succeed.
Scott C. Waring - Utah
Eyewitness states:
I prayed to God that if the intentions of these orbs were to be seen, that Dobblins point would be a perfect place to reveal themselves because it was crowded and over a populated area of downtown Phoenix. As the Sun set it was then I noticed an orb (similar to our first sighting in NM) began popping up along the ridge line adjacent from us which is the beginning of the video above. You can hear my reaction when I knew it was happening again that they were willing to reveal themselves over a populated area. For over an hour we watched these orbs first manifest ( same as some of our other sightings) on the hillside and then over the city as they would multiply, float back and forth between one another. Appear and disappear while changing size, cycling through full spectrum of light. Towards the end as you can see in the video they triangulated in an Inverted Triangle over the city and would hover.
Why are they now starting to disclose suppressed exotic technologies?
Why are they now starting to disclose suppressed exotic technologies?
For over 80 years, covert research into exotic propulsion, anti-gravity systems, and spacetime manipulation has been housed within deep black programs, classified efforts shielded from both public and congressional oversight.
Now, on April 14, 2025, Michael Katzios, the new White House science chief, made a bold claim: “Our technologies permit us to manipulate time and space...” Shortly after, he doubled down, promising innovations that would let us “bend time and space” and “drive us further into the endless frontier.” These weren’t offhand remarks, they were published on the official White House site, signaling intent.
What does "Manipulating Spacetime" really mean? Spacetime is the four-dimensional framework of our universe. Per Einstein’s theory, mass and energy warp this fabric, creating gravity and affecting time. To manipulate it would mean bending reality itself, shortening distances, warping time, or enabling faster-than-light travel.
Just days before Katzios’ remarks, President Trump said: “We have a weapon that no one has a clue what it is... more powerful than anything even close.”Was he referencing to a spacetime weapon?
Trump isn’t the first high-level figure to hint at such capabilities. Back in 2019, Lt. Gen. Steve Kwast publicly discussed technology capable of transporting a person anywhere on Earth in under an hour, suggesting real-world applications of physics far beyond current norms. He also touched on wireless, space-based energy transmission.
Rumors have long circulated about transatmospheric vehicles, craft capable of seamless operation both within Earth’s atmosphere and in space. Though unconfirmed, these platforms may represent a technological bridge between known aerospace systems and genuine spacetime engineering. (Consider Gary McKinnon’s 2002 discovery during his hack of U.S. military systems: references to a secret space fleet and "non-terrestrial officers.")
But it is not only about manipulating time and space.
What might they also have:
Anti-Gravity Propulsion:
Altering inertia with plasma or exotic materials, referenced in Navy patents.
Warp Drives:
Bending space around a craft to move without motion.
Zero-Point Energy: Tapping the quantum vacuum for limitless energy, a paradigm-shifting source of power.
But why some groups want to keep it secret? There are compelling reasons for secrecy, none of them rooted in public interest:
Control of Power – Whoever controls this tech controls the future.
Economic Impact – It would collapse the fossil fuel, aviation, and defense sectors.
Weaponization Risk – These tools could be catastrophic in the wrong hands.
Psychological Shock – It would rewrite everything we know about science and our place in the cosmos.
Despite growing testimony and a trove of leaked documents, officials continue to dismiss these claims. The Deep State line remains unchanged: “No empirical evidence exists for reverse-engineering extraterrestrial technology.” But the evidence says otherwise.
Supporting evidence:
Exotic materials reportedly recovered in 1950s, held by Lockheed.
The 1953 Robertson Panel even set the tone for decades of deliberate obfuscation, publicly debunking UFOs while secretly studying their implications. The CIA used Project Blue Book to publicly debunk UFOs.
As early as 1966, the U.S. Air Force reportedly managed over 30 classified anti-gravity projects.
A 1971 Australian Defense report referenced America’s "Advanced Saucer Aircraft" and a Cold War “UFO crash program” into anti-gravity propulsion.
The US government, through its CIA's Office of Global Access (OGA), is reported to have a secret program to retrieve and reverse-engineer crashed UFOs. This program, which began in 2003, is said to have recovered at least nine non-human aircraft, some of which were intact. The OGA works with special operations forces like SEAL teams to conduct these retrievals, keeping the operations highly secret.
CIA allegedly blocked a 2024 transfer of exotic materials from Lockheed to Bigelow Aerospace.
Ben Rich, former head of Lockheed Skunk Works, reportedly stated: “We now have the technology to take ET home.”
Don Phillips, also from Lockheed, confirmed reverse-engineering efforts related to recovered UFO craft, allegedly including materials from the infamous 1947 Roswell incident.
Dr. Salvatore Pais, a Navy scientist, filed patents (2016–2019) for highly unconventional devices, including a Space-Time Modification Weapon. These patents describe the use of electromagnetic fields, plasma, and rotational force fields. Theoretically, this device could create a spacetime modification weapon more powerful than hydrogen bombs. The Navy invested USD 508,000 testing the concept between 2016-2019.
But what could be the reason they are starting to reveal it now? The sudden shift toward public statements about advanced capabilities seems deliberate.
Consider the possible motives:
Strategic Signaling: A subtle warning to adversaries: “We possess technology beyond your reach.”
Controlled Disclosure: Shaping the narrative gradually to maintain public trust and institutional control.
Leaks Are Coming: Private-sector breakthroughs or whistleblowers may soon expose the truth.
Justifying Black Budgets: Revealing exotic tech lends credibility to decades of hidden spending under national security.
But perhaps the most compelling reason: a major event, whether real, staged, or cosmic in nature or eventually an alien contact scenario is on the horizon. This may be phase one of psychological preparation.
Finally; the evidence suggests that these exotic advanced technologies already exist, whether reverse-engineered or the result of disruptive physics breakthroughs. But what’s happening now isn’t full disclosure. It’s a carefully managed narrative operation, an information war cloaked in the language of advanced science.
A previously shared video from the U.S. Navy showed four “tic-tac-shaped” objects emerging from the water before flying away. The U.S. Navy has acknowledged that its personnel have witnessed things that can’t be explained, but sailors “may not want to make waves” and testify.
The mystery of the unmanned aerial systems (UAS) spotted in the skies over New Jersey last year has been attributed to commercial, hobbyist, and law enforcement drones. Misidentified manned aircraft, helicopters, and even stars were also likely culprits. The sightings created a form of mini-hysteria as many looked to the skies over the Garden State.
The FAA has further confirmed that some sightings were likely previously undisclosed research drones. Whether the disclosure puts the matter to rest is unlikely, as there will always be those who believe they saw something unexplainable in the night sky.
Another mystery is gaining traction again, one related to a potential mystery of the deep. That situation is even more complex, as a video captured by United States Navy sailors two years ago is making the rounds online, and there may be no easy answers.
A previously shared video showed four “tic-tac-shaped” objects emerging from the water before flying away. There was no conclusive explanation previously, and we’re surprisingly no closer to determining what the objects may be, even as it was widely seen.
Documentary filmmaker Jeremy Corbell suggested that additional individuals who witness such unexplained phenomena firsthand may be reluctant to come forward.
“It’s a long-haul thing. UFOs have been taboo for so long. It’s now admitted they’re flying without impunity in a restricted airspace, and we have footage like this. Military footage of an unidentified anomalous phenomenon (UAP) from a Navy warship in a critical area, just off the coast of California. It’s gonna take time,” Corbell told NBC News.
Did U.S. Navy Sailors See UAPs Flying at Sea?
Several sailors who served aboard the Independence-class littoral combat ship (LCS) USS Jackson had previously claimed to have witnessed the incident with the objects in 2023. It was just the latest unexplained incident of such objects, with other reports occurring in 2004 and then again in 2019.
The USS Jackson’s Senior Chief Operations Specialist Alexandro Wiggins, a twenty-three-year veteran of the U.S. Navy and a radar expert, recently came forward to offer a few new details about what he saw off the California coast during his shift in the combat information center (CIC). After an object appeared on the screens, Wiggins went to get a closer look.
“To my surprise, which is something I’ve never witnessed, was a light I noticed on the horizon, it looked as if it were surfacing out of the water and going up,” Wiggins explained to 8 News Now.
“We only saw the one, and then we saw the second one. It was only when we zoom out that we realize, holy crap, there’s two more out here, a total of four.”
He added that after returning to the CIC, he employed the ship’s SAFIRE thermal imaging sensor to acquire and track a target. The objects displayed no exhaust signature and produced no thermal trail.
However, Wiggins claimed, no formal incident report was filed because the objects remained at a safe distance and weren’t seen as a threat to the ship.
“I am skeptical about what I saw that day,” Wiggins continued. “Maybe one day I’ll know what that was, and I’ll be like eighty or ninety years old, and it’ll be normalized like… the stealth fighter or Area 51. It’ll be public at some point, but then I’ll be old.”
It may take more witnesses to come forward, but as Corbell noted, sailors may not want to make waves. In the meantime, the U.S. Navy has acknowledged that its personnel have witnessed things that can’t be explained. Is it a top-secret drone program being developed by the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA), an enemy surveillance program, or something else?
NASA's Curiosity Rover has discovered long carbon chains on Mars. On Earth, molecules like these are overwhelmingly produced by biological processes.
NASA's Curiosity rover took this selfie while inside Mars' Gale crater on June 15, 2018, which was the 2,082nd Martian day, or sol, of the rover's mission.
(Image credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/MSSS)
The longest molecules ever found onMarshave been unearthed by NASA's Curiosity rover, and they could mean the planet is strewn with evidence for ancient life.
Molecule chains containing up to twelve carbon atoms linked together were detected in a 3.7 billion-year-old rock sample collected from a dried-up Martian lakebed named Yellowknife Bay, according to a study published March 24 in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
These long carbon chains are thought to have originated from molecules called fatty acids, which, on Earth, are produced by biological activity. While fatty acids can form without biological input, which may be the case on Mars, their existence on the Red Planet means that signs of life may be lurking within its soil.
"The fact that fragile linear molecules are still present at Mars' surface 3.7 billion years after their formation allows us to make a new statement: If life ever appeared on Mars billions of years ago, at the time life appeared on the Earth, chemical traces of this ancient life could still be present today for us to detect," study co-author Caroline Freissinet, an analytical chemist at the French National Centre for Scientific Research in the Laboratory for Atmospheres and Space Observations, told Live Science.
The molecules — hydrocarbon strings of 10, 11 and 12 carbon atoms called decane, undecane, and dodecane — were detected by Curiosity's Sample Analysis at Mars (SAM) instrument.
No stone unturned
The Curiosity Rover arrived on Mars in 2012 at the Gale Crater, a massive 96-mile-wide (154 km-wide) impact crater formed by the planet's collision with an ancient meteorite. In the years since, the rover has traveled about 20 miles (32 km) across the crater, investigating places including Yellowknife Bay and Mount Sharp (Aeolis Mons), a 3.4-mile-high (5.5 km-high) mountain in the center of the crater.
Nicknamed "Cumberland", the sample analyzed for the new study was drilled by Curiosity in 2013 from Yellowknife Bay, and previous analyses found it to be rich in clay minerals, sulfur, and nitrates.
But despite many thorough tests, the hydrocarbon strings in the sample remained undetected for more than a decade. The hydrocarbons were actually discovered by accident as part of an attempt to find the building blocks of proteins — known as amino acids — in the sample.
The researchers behind the new study thought to test out a new method for finding these molecules by pre-heating the sample to 1,100°C (2,012°F) to release oxygen before analysis. Their results showed no amino acids, but, by pure luck, they discovered the fatty molecules hiding there instead.
"The excitement was super high when I saw the peaks on the spectrum for the first time," Freissinet said. "It was both surprising and not surprising. Surprising because those results were found on the Cumberland sample that we had already analyzed many times in the past. Not surprising because we have defined a new strategy to analyze this sample."
"New method, new results," she added.
The researchers suggest that the molecules may have broken off from the long tails of fatty acids named undecanoic acid, dodecanoic acid, and tridecanoic acid, respectively. Fatty acids are long chains of carbon and hydrogen with a carboxyl (-COOH) acid group at the end.
NASA graphic showing the long-chain organic molecules decane, undecane, and dodecane, which are the largest organic molecules discovered on Mars to date.
(Image credit: NASA/Dan Gallagher)
Life-forming chemistry
To test this theory, the researchers mixed undecanoic acid into a Mars-like clay in the lab before performing a test similar to that carried out by the SAM instrument As expected, the undecanoic acid broke down to decane, indicating that the carbon chains could indeed have originated from fatty acids.
On Earth, molecules like these are overwhelmingly produced by biological processes, but they can also occur naturally without life. However, non-biological processes usually only result in fatty acids with fewer than 12 carbon atoms, the researchers say. While the longest carbon chain detected by SAM had 12 carbons, the instrument is not optimized to detect longer molecules, meaning that it is possible longer chains were also present.
"There is evidence that liquid water existed in Gale Crater for millions of years and probably much longer, which means there was enough time for life-forming chemistry to happen in these crater-lake environments on Mars," study co-author Daniel Glavin, a researcher at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center, said in a NASA statement.
Regardless of what made them, the detection of the carbon chains and their likely origins as fatty acids confirms that Curiosity can detect molecules of this kind, and that the molecules can remain preserved for billions of years in the Martian environment. The researchers hope to one day bring samples of Martian soil back home to Earth to properly analyze the contents, and hopefully solve the mystery of the Red Planet's elusive life once and for all.
"We are ready to take the next big step and bring Mars samples home to our labs to settle the debate about life on Mars," said Glavin.
This article was originally published on March 25, 2025
Was There a Lunar Eclipse on Day of Jesus' Crucifixion? NASA, Bible Say Yes
Despite assertions to the contrary, science and religion are not always at odds. This has been demonstrated once again, as an intriguing NASA discovery appears to offer verification of the Biblical accounts of Jesus’ crucifixion, according to researchers from Oxford University.
Using models that chart the historical positions of the sun, moon, and Earth, NASA confirmed a lunar eclipse took place on Friday, April 3, 33 AD—a date traditionally believed to coincide with Jesus’ death. That evening, observers in Jerusalem would have witnessed the moon rising in a darkened sky, tinted red by the Earth’s shadow. This type of eclipse creates what is known as a blood moon, and this cosmic phenomenon has sparked renewed interest among scholars and Christians alike. The Bible does indeed say that the sun turned dark and a moon that appeared like blood on the day when Jesus was killed—as would actually be expected, if NASA’s calculations are correct.
The words that suggest an ancient lunar eclipse come from a verse that has gained traction again in recent years, particularly on platforms like TikTok, where users are rediscovering ancient prophecies through a modern lens.
“‘Christian texts mention that the Moon turned to blood after Jesus’s crucifixion—potentially referring to a lunar eclipse, during which the Moon takes on a reddish hue,’” NASA noted following their calculations, which were completed several years ago. This idea aligns with this passage in Acts 2:20: “The sun will be turned to darkness and the moon to blood before the coming of the great and glorious day of the Lord.”
Lunar eclipse and blood moon seen over Kuwait in 2018.
Many Biblical historians believe the eclipse described in NASA’s records may be the same one referenced in scripture. Despite being written in the form of a prediction, the verse from Acts is spoken by the apostle Peter during a gathering 50 days after the crucifixion. Because of this timing, some experts interpret Peter’s statement as a direct recollection of recent events, including the eerie sky on the day Jesus died.
However, not all scholars accept such an interpretation. Some argue that Peter’s words in Acts were not an eyewitness account but rather a quote from the Book of Joel, written centuries earlier, and were meant to reference a future time when Christ would return. That passage—Joel 2:28–31—similarly describes cosmic signs: “The sun shall be turned into darkness, and the moon into blood, before the great and terrible day of the Lord comes.”
But Oxford researchers Colin Humphreys and W. Graeme Waddington disagree with this interpretation. They have cross-referenced the Biblical account and the eclipse data to argue that the crucifixion and the lunar eclipse took place at the same time, and that the apostle Peter was not predicting the second coming of Christ but rather emphasizing how prophecy had already been fulfilled in their lifetimes. Their work presents the possibility that a real astronomical event—the April 3 eclipse—could have been seen by witnesses in Jerusalem, adding a dramatic visual component, as well as a prophetic element, to the crucifixion narrative.
Peter preaching the gospel to his followers after Jesus’ death, in painting by Jan Styka from late 19th century.
Humphreys and Waddington also highlight a lesser-known source from the New Testament apocrypha to back up their theory: a document sometimes referred to as the Report of Pilate. Though not part of the canonical Bible, the apocryphal text provides vivid imagery that mirrors Joel’s prophecy. It reads: “At his crucifixion the sun was darkened; the stars appeared and in all the world people lighted lamps from the sixth hour till evening; the moon appeared like blood.” The researchers believe this supports their hypothesis, offering yet another account of unusual atmospheric events occurring at the time of Jesus’ death.
The darkness itself is referenced in Matthew 27:45, which states: “From noon until three in the afternoon darkness came over all the land.” This passage aligns with descriptions of the crucifixion in multiple Gospels and further reinforces the association between celestial disturbances and this pivotal moment in Christian history.
A Magical Melding of Cosmic and Religions Themes
As Good Friday is commemorated around the world, the timing of the holiday remains intricately connected to both religious tradition and astronomical patterns. Good Friday always falls two days before Easter Sunday, which is determined by a formula that tracks the lunar cycle. Specifically, Easter takes place on the first Sunday following the first full moon after the spring equinox. This method of calculation has ancient roots and was designed to maintain Easter’s connection to the Jewish festival of Passover, which is governed by the Hebrew lunar calendar.
Master of the Legend of St. James: The Crucifixion, ca 1480, oil on wood.
Jesus’ crucifixion is believed to have occurred around Passover, and the Gospels describe his resurrection on the Sunday that followed. To reflect this timeline, early Christians sought to establish a calendar that would keep Easter in close relation to both Passover and the spring equinox. This alignment not only preserved theological significance but also highlighted the cosmic themes embedded in the crucifixion story.
As science and scripture continue to intersect, modern tools like NASA’s eclipse data provide a deeper look into the historical contexts behind Biblical events. In this case the total weight of the evidence suggests the Bible can be accurately interpreted as a history book as well as a sacred religious text.
With respect to the ancient lunar eclipse, whether one views such celestial signs as divine miracles or naturally occurring phenomena, their symbolism endures, and will continue to do so regardless of what the ultimate truth might be.
Top image: Multiple phases of a lunar eclipse and blood moon.
Pope Francis has died! However, not many people know that the Vatican has over 50 miles of underground archives containing the world’s history. Let that sink in… 50 miles. And this isn’t even a conspiracy theory.
The Vatican’s Secret Archives are real and located in one of the most famous religious and cultural places in the world—the Vatican. These archives stretch across 53 miles of shelving and include 35,000 volumes of catalogs. They hold documents that are over 1,200 years old.
The name “Secret Archives” adds to their mystery and makes people think of hidden secrets or dark stories. Because the indexes aren’t public and access is limited to certain scholars, many people imagine that the archives hold shocking or even strange things. Some even believe the Vatican is hiding aliens there! (Source)
But in truth, the archives are not actually meant to be “secret.” The word “secret” comes from a Latin word, secretum, which really means “private.” These archives were always meant to store the Pope’s official documents, letters, and important Church records.
Inside, you’ll also find some of the Church’s most valuable historical papers, with some dating back to the 700s. For a long time, not even religious scholars could read them. That changed in 1881 when Pope Leo XIII, a forward-thinking Pope, opened the archives to researchers. Since then, the documents have helped tell the story of both the Church and the wider world.
One of the most important documents in the Vatican’s Secret Archives changed the course of religious history. It’s the official paper that shows the Catholic Church kicking out Martin Luther. Luther was a German man who challenged the Church by writing his famous 95 Theses, which started the Protestant Reformation. In response, Pope Leo X wrote a statement called Decet Romanum Pontificem, officially excommunicating Luther. This allowed Luther to start his own church and created a major split in Christianity that still affects the world today.
Another fascinating document in the archives is called the Chinon Parchment. It records the trial of the Knights Templar, a Catholic military group that was accused of crimes like heresy during the Crusades. The parchment is huge—about the size of a dining table—and was lost for hundreds of years due to a filing error. It wasn’t rediscovered until 2001, hidden in a box with other papers. Once found, it was properly sorted and made available to researchers.
When the Vatican made the Chinon Parchment public in 2007, it revealed something surprising: in 1308, Pope Clement V had actually cleared the Knights Templar of heresy. This new information helped restore the group’s reputation, which had been damaged for centuries.
All these documents—and many more—are stored in a special place near the Vatican Library in Rome. The archives include regular stacks and reading rooms, but also an underground fireproof bunker to protect delicate materials. There’s even a school for clergy to study history, and because it’s the Vatican, there’s sacred art to enjoy as well.
Access to the archives isn’t open to everyone. Only carefully approved scholars are allowed in. Still, the Vatican has become a bit more open in recent years. In 2010, journalists were allowed to visit for the first time—partly due to public interest after Dan Brown’s book Angels and Demons. In 2012, the Vatican held a public exhibition for the archives’ 400th anniversary, showing off some of its most important documents.
In 2019, Pope Francis announced that the Vatican would open up its archives on Pope Pius XII. During an event honoring the 80th anniversary of Pius’s election, Francis said, “The Church is not afraid of history.”
What secrets do you think are hidden in the Vatican’s secret archives?
Throughout history, some people have had a deep knowledge of many subjects. One such person was a Russian man named Genrikh Mavrikiyevich Ludvig. He was very smart and skilled in ancient cultures, architecture, engineering, and old languages. Some people even compared him to Leonardo da Vinci. It’s said that Ludvig was able to access secret files from the Vatican and may have found information about ancient aliens.
Ludvig’s story became more widely known in 2011 when a Russian newspaper called Sovershenno Sekretno published an article about him. The writer described Ludvig as a large man with a bald head, a big forehead, and a beard. His eyes were intense and he often got into trouble with the Soviet government. In 1938, he was accused of being a Vatican spy and sent to a concentration camp.
The writer, who had been one of Ludvig’s students, remembered attending a lecture by him in the 1960s. At first, it seemed interesting, but then it became confusing as Ludvig talked about many different topics like language, history, plants, and science. The writer wasn’t sure if Ludvig was a genius or a mystic. However, he said meeting Ludvig changed his view of the world.
Ludvig claimed that during the 1920s, he was allowed to read secret documents in the Vatican Archives, a huge collection of very old records. These documents are usually hidden from the public for 75 years. He said he found strange texts about ancient codes, alchemy, and even stories about aliens and UFOs visiting Earth long ago. (Source)
According to Ludvig, some of these texts talked about aliens helping early civilizations like the Egyptians, Mayans, and Mesopotamians. He studied the Mayan symbols and believed they showed images of spaceships and astronauts. He even said there were signs of nuclear weapons being used in ancient times, like melted walls in Babylon.
Ludvig also had a deep interest in the Sumerians, one of the first known civilizations. He believed that they suddenly advanced around 4000 BC, learning to build cities, use irrigation, invent the wheel, and create writing. Their early writing was made up of picture-like symbols and dated back to around 3200 BC.
He also believed that the pyramids in Egypt were not just tombs, but tools for spiritual or cosmic communication. Ludvig thought Christian images of angels came from an earlier culture called the Etruscans.
During World War II, even while he was a prisoner in the GULAG, Ludvig worked as an inventor and engineer. Between 1941 and 1943, he created 17 military inventions. Today, many UFO researchers and people who believe in ancient aliens know his name.
In 2016, leaked emails from Hillary Clinton’s campaign showed that her advisor, John Podesta, had received messages about UFOs and extraterrestrial life. One of the emails came from astronaut Edgar Mitchell, who said that the Vatican was aware of alien life. He also spoke about the need to keep peace in space and prevent it from being used for war.
Despite these amazing claims, not everyone believes Ludvig’s story. There is not much solid evidence to prove he really saw the secret Vatican documents or discovered all this information.
Vatican’s involvement in UAPs & Alien life
In his other interview with James Landoli on “Engaging The Phenomenon,” Daniel Sheehan, who was a former Chief Council for the United States Jesuit order, revealed intriguing details about his conversations with the head of the Vatican archives regarding the Vatican’s knowledge of extraterrestrial life. Sheehan shed light on his involvement in a groundbreaking initiative to address the theological and philosophical implications of the discovery of extraterrestrial intelligence.
During the interview, James raised the topic of David Grusch‘s claim that the Vatican possessed knowledge of extraterrestrial phenomena. Sheehan discussed his access to the classified files of the Project Blue Book, where he encountered photos of UFO crash retrievals and concrete evidence of non-human piloted vehicles.
He proposed the formation of a task force involving all 54 major religious denominations to address the issue from a theological perspective. However, at that time, there was insufficient consensus, and the proposal was declined. Sheehan is currently working through his New Paradigm Institute to organize a global summit conference involving world religious leaders to discuss the recent recovery of an extraterrestrial spacecraft.
“The United States government is in possession of biological evidence and has actually taken into custody alive an extraterrestrial person. They’re keeping this secret, interrogating the being, and distorting the information to justify massive expenditures on weapon development under the guise of a perceived threat.”
– Daniel Sheehan
Sheehan highlighted the Vatican’s acknowledgment of the possibility of extraterrestrial life. He referenced a formal statement issued by the Catholic Church on November 10, 2009, authorized by Pope Benedict. The statement, issued by Father Jose Gabriel Alfuz, a director of the Pontifical Observatory in Rome, recognized the increasing discovery of exoplanets and called for a global discussion on the philosophical and theological implications of the imminent discovery of extraterrestrial life.
White Orb Watches Family BBQ Over Lakeland, Florida April 20, 2025, UFO UAP Sighting News.
White Orb Watches Family BBQ Over Lakeland, Florida April 20, 2025, UFO UAP Sighting News.
Date of sighting: April 20, 2025
Location of sighting: Lakeland, Florida, USA
Source: Email Report at scwaring @ yahoo.com
Guys this just in. An eyewitness at a family BBQ were enjoying the day when someone pointed out a white orb in the sky above. Then others came and they noticed it stayed over them as if it were watching them and recording the humans reactions to what they were seeing. You see, aliens love knowledge, like humans like money, knowledge is everything to them. The smaller orb drones are sent out from a mother drone and months later gathered after the orbs have recorded information about anything and everything they saw. Orbs record not just visual things, but also mental things like human feelings, fears, prayers...and yes every thought you have if you are outside with no obstruction between you and the orb above. How do I know? Because I have summoned them, and so have thousands of others worldwide. It validates everything I just said.
Scott C. Waring - Utah
Eyewitness states:
The object is still in the sky as of writing this, it doesn’t move from what we can tell, not even a little. My brother got out his binoculars and it looks circular in shape, almost like you can see through it, and had defined edges visible from the suns light. It was difficult to keep the binoculars steady enough to clearly make out what it is, but I feel like even if I could I couldn’t identify what it was. A high altitude jet flew fairly close to it at one point and it appears to me like the object is at a lower orbit than the jet was, that or it is a massive object. With the naked eye you can clearly tell it’s circular shape, but it doesn’t move with the wind.
Mind-blowing New Pyramid In Antarctica And More, Google Earth Map, UFO UAP Sighting News.
Mind-blowing New Pyramid In Antarctica And More, Google Earth Map, UFO UAP Sighting News.
Date of discovery: April 20, 2025
Location of discovery: Antarctica
Source: Me using Google Earth
Coordinates: Under my Youtube video in the description.
Guys I spent a few hours outside pulling weeds, gardening and making sure a chicken hawk didn't grab my tortoise in my yard, but I hope all of you had a great Easter, loved spending mine this way.
I found two newer discoveries in Antarctica that I have not seen before and that nobody else has reported on. The shadow is an old discovery of mine, but I believe it is that of a cloaked alien...a very tall one mind you. Cloaking might hide the object from view, however physics says it will still throw a shadow. Also near it today I found a pyramid and a barrel structure. The pyramid structure is proof of ancient aliens and is about 110 yards along one side and about 85 meters tall. Thats about half the size of the great pyramid in Egypt. The barrel structure almost looks like the old US Marine barracks made of steel, but it might just be an entrance to something deeper, like an alien base. It's hard to say but I sure would love a ground level view of all these three discoveries.
Mass extinctions have shaped life on Earth for millions of years, erasing dominant species and paving the way for new life to thrive. From the asteroid that ended the reign of the dinosaurs to the current biodiversity crisis driven by human activity, each extinction reshapes the evolutionary landscape. As the climate changes and ecosystems degrade, researchers warn that humans could be steering the planet toward another mass extinction.
This sobering possibility raises a fascinating question: which species might inherit the Earth if humanity vanishes? Dr. Tim Coulson, an ecologist at the University of Oxford, suggests an unlikely candidate—octopuses.
Octopuses: Ocean’s Master Survivors
“Octopuses have a distinct advantage in the race for survival,” Coulson explains. Unlike humans, they exist in diverse habitats, from shallow coastal waters to the deep sea. Their adaptability could allow some species to endure even catastrophic changes. “If humans ceased hunting them, octopuses might have the opportunity to diversify and expand their habitats over time,” he adds.
While the notion of octopus civilizations may sound far-fetched, history shows that ocean-dwelling creatures can evolve rapidly after mass extinctions. Dr. Andrew Whiten, a zoologist at the University of St. Andrews, points out that mammals rose to prominence after dinosaurs vanished, paving the way for humans. Could octopuses follow a similar path?
Octopuses already display remarkable problem-solving skills. From using coconut shells as makeshift shelters to escaping aquarium tanks, these marine animals show a level of intelligence rarely seen in other species. Some even use tools to solve puzzles, a trait often associated with advanced cognitive abilities.
“An octopus’s nervous system functions more like a distributed processing network than a central brain,” explains Dr. Andy Dobson from Princeton University. “Their intelligence comes from their ability to coordinate multiple limbs and process vast amounts of sensory data.”
Their dexterity also sets them apart. “Octopuses can manipulate objects with unparalleled precision,” says Coulson. “While crows and other birds exhibit tool use, they don’t match the fine motor skills of an octopus.”
Challenges to Octopus Civilizations
Despite their intelligence, octopuses face significant obstacles in evolving into complex societies. Dr. Peter Godfrey-Smith of the University of Sydney highlights their solitary nature. “Octopuses lack the social structure necessary to build a culture,” he explains. “For them to form communities, they’d need to develop stronger social bonds and nurture their young differently.”
These changes, however, may be a long shot. Octopuses have existed for over 100 million years without evolving significant social behavior. Still, recent studies suggest that some species show signs of communal living, offering a glimmer of hope for their societal potential.
Human Impact and Evolutionary Roadblocks
Ironically, human activity could hinder octopuses’ evolutionary journey before it even begins. Pollution, ocean warming, and overfishing threaten marine life globally. Microplastics, in particular, may harm octopuses in ways scientists are only beginning to uncover.
If not octopuses, who might inherit the Earth? Dobson speculates that nematodes—tiny, resilient worms—could dominate, while Godfrey-Smith places his bets on highly adaptable birds like cockatoos.
Whether or not octopuses ever build underwater cities, their unique traits make them one of nature’s most intriguing survivors. As humanity confronts its impact on the planet, understanding the resilience of other species could offer insights into the future of life on Earth.
Mars Has the Remnants of a Lopsided Magnetic Field
Mars Has the Remnants of a Lopsided Magnetic Field
By Andy Tomaswick
Simulation of the magnetic fields that were formerly found surrounding Mars. Credit - Ankit Barik / Johns Hopkins University
Scientists have known for a while that Mars currently lacks a magnetic field, and many blame that for its paltry atmosphere - with no protective shield around the planet, the solar wind was able to strip away much of the gaseous atmosphere over the course of billions of years. But, evidence has been mounting that Mars once had a magnetic field. Results from Insight, one of the Red Planet's landers, lend credence to that idea, but they also point to a strange feature - the magnetic field seemed to cover only the southern hemisphere, but not the north. A team from the University of Texas Institute for Geophysics thinks they might know why - in a recent paper, they described how a fully liquid core in Mars could create a lopsided magnetic field like the one seen in Insight’s data.
The Earth's core isn't completely molten despite what you may have learned in elementary school. There are two distinct cores - a solid "Inner" core and a molten "Outer" core. The inner core remains solid due to the immense pressures on the iron and nickel found there. So, the magnetic field that covers our whole planet is, in fact, created only by the Outer Core.
Researchers have long thought that a similar dynamic, solid inner and molten outer core, was present on Mars when it maintained a magnetic field billions of years ago. After about 3.9 billion years, the rocks that formed some of the large impact basins from that time, such as Hellas and Isidis, would contain rocks that would have magnetized while they were cooling due to the presence of the field. Since they don't, there is little evidence for a strong global magnetic field past that point. The going theory was that, as the planet's core cooled, the entire core became solid, eliminating the spinning molten metal that creates the magnetic field in the first place.
Fraser discusses the question of when Mars' dynamo shut down.
However, there was a strange feature in Mars' magnetic field—a massive difference in strength between the field in the northern and southern hemispheres. This dichotomy was first noticed during the Mars Global Surveyor mission back in 1997, but data from the Insight lander also confirmed a stark difference between the two hemispheres.
Various explanations have been offered for why the dichotomy existed. These ranged from the effects of large asteroid impacts to very early localized tectonic activity. However, the scientific community has not widely accepted previous explanations.
Enter the new theory from Chi Yan of the University of Texas and their co-authors. Theirs is a two-fold explanation. First, the red planet could have had a wholly molten core, and second, a massive temperature difference between the northern and southern hemispheres led to the heat escaping only in the southern hemisphere.
Magnetic fields can be artificial - as Fraser discusses here.
In Mars' case, a molten core would be a primary mover of the process known as a "planetary dynamo," which creates planetary-scaled magnetic fields. With a solid inner core like the Earth's, the dynamo effect could have been disrupted by inefficiencies in the system's fluid dynamics.
It could also explain how the temperature gradients allow such uneven heat extraction. If the southern hemisphere had much higher thermal conductivity, heat would be more likely to flow through it, causing the churning that creates the planetary dynamo to happen primarily on the southern side of the planet.
To prove their point, the authors created a model version of early Mars using a supercomputer at the Maryland Advanced Research Computing Center. They varied the fluid dynamics of Mars as well as the conductivity of its crust. They found that the conditions that most accurately matched the results from Insight and Global Surveyor occurred when Mars' core was wholly molten, and there was a significant difference in the thermal conductivity of the northern and southern hemispheres.
Keeping Mars' any artificial atmosphere Mars has would require a magnetic field - or something similar.
As with all research, there is plenty more left to do. The authors suggest further analysis of some of the seismic data from Insight to see if any additional data was already collected that could align with the molten core theory. Other potential paths forward could include improved modeling for a broader range of internal and external planetary conditions or a deeper understanding of Martian meteorites from various regions and times.
For now, this new theory seems to hold water—or molten iron, depending on who you ask. But there is a lot more work that needs to be done to prove this theory and its implications for the existence of life on Mars.
Beste bezoeker, Heb je zelf al ooit een vreemde waarneming gedaan, laat dit dan even weten via email aan Frederick Delaere opwww.ufomeldpunt.be. Deze onderzoekers behandelen jouw melding in volledige anonimiteit en met alle respect voor jouw privacy. Ze zijn kritisch, objectief maar open minded aangelegd en zullen jou steeds een verklaring geven voor jouw waarneming! DUS AARZEL NIET, ALS JE EEN ANTWOORD OP JOUW VRAGEN WENST, CONTACTEER FREDERICK. BIJ VOORBAAT DANK...
Druk op onderstaande knop om je bestand , jouw artikel naar mij te verzenden. INDIEN HET DE MOEITE WAARD IS, PLAATS IK HET OP DE BLOG ONDER DIVERSEN MET JOUW NAAM...
Druk op onderstaande knop om een berichtje achter te laten in mijn gastenboek
Alvast bedankt voor al jouw bezoekjes en jouw reacties. Nog een prettige dag verder!!!
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.
