The purpose of this blog is the creation of an open, international, independent and free forum, where every UFO-researcher can publish the results of his/her research. The languagues, used for this blog, are Dutch, English and French.You can find the articles of a collegue by selecting his category. Each author stays resposable for the continue of his articles. As blogmaster I have the right to refuse an addition or an article, when it attacks other collegues or UFO-groupes.
Druk op onderstaande knop om te reageren in mijn forum
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Deze blog is opgedragen aan mijn overleden echtgenote Lucienne.
In 2012 verloor ze haar moedige strijd tegen kanker!
In 2011 startte ik deze blog, omdat ik niet mocht stoppen met mijn UFO-onderzoek.
BEDANKT!!!
Een interessant adres?
UFO'S of UAP'S, ASTRONOMIE, RUIMTEVAART, ARCHEOLOGIE, OUDHEIDKUNDE, SF-SNUFJES EN ANDERE ESOTERISCHE WETENSCHAPPEN - DE ALLERLAATSTE NIEUWTJES
UFO's of UAP'S in België en de rest van de wereld Ontdek de Fascinerende Wereld van UFO's en UAP's: Jouw Bron voor Onthullende Informatie!
Ben jij ook gefascineerd door het onbekende? Wil je meer weten over UFO's en UAP's, niet alleen in België, maar over de hele wereld? Dan ben je op de juiste plek!
België: Het Kloppend Hart van UFO-onderzoek
In België is BUFON (Belgisch UFO-Netwerk) dé autoriteit op het gebied van UFO-onderzoek. Voor betrouwbare en objectieve informatie over deze intrigerende fenomenen, bezoek je zeker onze Facebook-pagina en deze blog. Maar dat is nog niet alles! Ontdek ook het Belgisch UFO-meldpunt en Caelestia, twee organisaties die diepgaand onderzoek verrichten, al zijn ze soms kritisch of sceptisch.
Nederland: Een Schat aan Informatie
Voor onze Nederlandse buren is er de schitterende website www.ufowijzer.nl, beheerd door Paul Harmans. Deze site biedt een schat aan informatie en artikelen die je niet wilt missen!
Internationaal: MUFON - De Wereldwijde Autoriteit
Neem ook een kijkje bij MUFON (Mutual UFO Network Inc.), een gerenommeerde Amerikaanse UFO-vereniging met afdelingen in de VS en wereldwijd. MUFON is toegewijd aan de wetenschappelijke en analytische studie van het UFO-fenomeen, en hun maandelijkse tijdschrift, The MUFON UFO-Journal, is een must-read voor elke UFO-enthousiasteling. Bezoek hun website op www.mufon.com voor meer informatie.
Samenwerking en Toekomstvisie
Sinds 1 februari 2020 is Pieter niet alleen ex-president van BUFON, maar ook de voormalige nationale directeur van MUFON in Vlaanderen en Nederland. Dit creëert een sterke samenwerking met de Franse MUFON Reseau MUFON/EUROP, wat ons in staat stelt om nog meer waardevolle inzichten te delen.
Let op: Nepprofielen en Nieuwe Groeperingen
Pas op voor een nieuwe groepering die zich ook BUFON noemt, maar geen enkele connectie heeft met onze gevestigde organisatie. Hoewel zij de naam geregistreerd hebben, kunnen ze het rijke verleden en de expertise van onze groep niet evenaren. We wensen hen veel succes, maar we blijven de autoriteit in UFO-onderzoek!
Blijf Op De Hoogte!
Wil jij de laatste nieuwtjes over UFO's, ruimtevaart, archeologie, en meer? Volg ons dan en duik samen met ons in de fascinerende wereld van het onbekende! Sluit je aan bij de gemeenschap van nieuwsgierige geesten die net als jij verlangen naar antwoorden en avonturen in de sterren!
Heb je vragen of wil je meer weten? Aarzel dan niet om contact met ons op te nemen! Samen ontrafelen we het mysterie van de lucht en daarbuiten.
About 71% of Earth's surface is covered in water, and that's a defining feature of our planet and its habitability. The source of that water is still being debated and determined. Image Credit: EUMETSAT/ESA
Alone among known planets, Earth has vast oceans on its surface and its landmasses are marked with lakes and extensive river drainage systems. Water is the biosphere's lifeblood, and without it, Earth would be just another dead world. If Earth life is a reliable indicator, then water is necessary for life, full stop.
That's why scientists are so interested in how Earth got its water.
For a long time, researchers examined the idea that Earth's water came from elsewhere in the Solar System. The protoplanetary disk the planets formed in was massive, and it was dissected by a snowline. This is a line in the disk, defined by its distance from the Sun, beyond which volatiles like water vapour can condense.
This artist's illustration shows how the astrophysical snow line works. The inner Solar System is water depleted due to the star's warmth, while outside of it, water can sublimate onto dust particles.
Image Credit: A. Angelich (NRAO/AUI/NSF)
The idea is that water can condense, freeze, then be delivered to Earth by asteroids, meteorites, or comets. Astronomers know that comets are icy bodies, and there's growing evidence that asteroids hold water, either in frozen form or locked in minerals. This is the 'late veneer hypothesis', which states that water was delivered to Earth after its core had already formed.
But a growing body of evidence and simulations shows that this picture may be incorrect. New research in The Astrophysical Journal Letters challenges the later veneer hypothesis by showing that the snow line may not accurately reflect reality. Rather than a single line which separates water sublimation as an on/off process, where it all sublimates on one side of the snow line and none sublimates on the other side, the reality is more nuanced.
"There is consensus on the fact that molecular water was mostly formed on micrometer-sized dust grains at the very beginning of the solar system formation, in the molecular cloud and prestellar phase, where it remained frozen on the icy mantle enveloping the grains," the researchers explain. Over time these grains formed rocks, asteroids, comets, and even the rocky planets. But as the Sun commenced shining, conditions changed. The material in the proto-solar nebula disk warmed up, and water sublimated from the surface of the dust grains inwards to the snow line, which is basically the condensation front of water.
As a result, conditions on the inside of the line changed. Any water that wasn't trapped inside larger bodies was dissipated, and the inner disk became depleted of water. This is where the rocky planets formed. Earth accreted out of this dry material, implying that water had to be delivered from beyond the snow line, and that's the late veneer hypothesis.
But in this new understanding, the line is more nebulous. The research is based on developments in quantum chemistry showing that there's no specific single temperature at which water binds itself to dust grains. Instead of a binary dividing line, the binding energies are subject to a Gaussian distribution of values.
This figure from the research shows how water binding energies are distributed.
Image Credit: L. Tinacci et al. 2023
"While the classically used snowline relies on a single condensation temperature, recent work in quantum chemistry shows that the binding energy (BE) of water on icy grains has a Gaussian distribution, which implies a gradual sublimation of water rather than a sharp transition," the authors write. The researchers computed the distribution of binding energies to understand how water ice on dust grains was spread across the proto-solar nebula (PSN) protoplanetary disk.
This figure show how different the frost lines are when calculated with a single binding energy (blue) compared to ten different binding energies (black).
Image Credit: Boitard-Crépeau et al. 2025. TApJL
Using the distribution of different water binding energies, the researchers established a frost line that is actually several astronomical units wide. "The adoption of a water BE distribution does not generate a single snowline, inside which water ices are fully desorbed and remain “completely dry,” as often assumed, but rather a water transition zone extending several astronomical units," the researchers write.
This all happened a long time ago, and aside from Earth itself, the only place we can look for evidence is in asteroids and meteorites. For the researchers work to be accurate, it would need to duplicate the Earth's water abundance and isotope ratio and the hydration patterns seen in meteorites. Chondrites can remain unchanged since the Solar System's early days and are an important evidentiary link with the deep past.
The research shows that while the bulk of water ice is desorbed farther out than about one astronomical unit, small percentages remain attached to dust grains inside that limit due to different binding energies. "This small fraction, between ∼ 0.04 and 2.5 wt%, can fully account for the Earth’s water content," the authors write. "In turn, terrestrial water could be mostly inherited from the dust grains that were in the Earth’s orbit, with no necessity of migration of outer ones."
So Earth's water abundance lines up with the researchers' results. But what about chondrites?
"Our model also successfully reproduces the observed water-equivalent content trend across chondrite groups," the authors write. Even though the parent bodies of these chondrites accreted at different times, their water-equivalent contents "likely represent lower limits of primitive water originally incorporated into silicate dust grains, the building blocks of chondrite matrices," they explain.
"In summary, at the light of the above discussion, it is possible that the terrestrial water was inherited from the icy grains in the orbit of Earth. i.e., locally," the authors write. Their results also agree with the idea that Enstatite Chondrites (EC), a rare form of meteorite, are the Earth's building blocks. ECs have a comparable isotopic ratio as Earth's water, and researchers think that they formed near Earth's orbit.
The timing of the late veneer hypothesis has always been tricky. How could the right quantity of water be delivered to Earth at the right time without disrupting the planetary accretion process? If Earth was gradually hydrated as it formed, that whole question can be side-stepped.
There are still some problems with the researchers' conclusions, and they point them out in their paper. For example, the Earth's currently measured ratio of heavy water (deuterium) with regular water is equivalent with an elemental ratio. But the currently measured ratio may not represent the actual elemental ratio because of "various processes that cycle water between the surface and the Earth’s interior," the authors explain. Those processes could've altered the ratio.
The researchers have shown that water ice doesn't necessarily sublimate along a sharply defined line. Instead, a range of binding energies means that even inside the generally agreed upon snowline, some water can survive on the inside of rocks and larger grains. They've also shown that enough water can survive to account for Earth's water.
"In summary, these results suggest that a significant share of Earth’s water could have originated locally, without requiring delivery from beyond the classical snowline," the authors conclude.
This won't be the end of the late veneer hypothesis, but if further work supports this research, the idea that Earth's water came from elsewhere and was delivered by comets and asteroids will grow weaker.
When the first astronauts walked on the Moon as part of the Apollo Program, the concept of lunar habitats ceased being the stuff of science fiction and became a matter of scientific study. With several space agencies planning on sending crewed missions to the Moon in the coming decade, these plans have become the subject of scientific interest again. Structures that will enable a "sustained program of lunar science and development" is the long-term aim of NASA's Artemis Program. China and the ESA have similar plans with the International Lunar Research Station (ILRS) and the Moon Village.
To limit the amount of materials that need to be launched for the Moon and reduce reliance on Earth, these plans will incorporate local resources for building materials and resources - in-situ resource utilization (ISRU). In a recent study, researchers from Poland and the UK proposed a developmental pathway for a lunar habitat that begins with a dome built using a regolith-based geopolymer. This dome would enclose a 17-meter (~56 ft) diameter crater in the Mare Tranquillitatis region that would house all the necessary buildings for a lunar base.
The research was led by Magdalena Mrozek, a Research Assistant with the Faculty of Civil Engineering at the Silesian University of Technology in Gliwice, Poland. She was joined by Dawid Mrozek and Mateusz Smolana, also researchers from the Silesian University of Technology, and Lorna Anguilano, a Senior Research Fellow with the Brunel University London, and the Assistant Director of the Wolfson Centre for Sustainable materials development and Processing. The paper that describes their findings recently appeared in Scientific Reports.
Apollo-12 astronaut Alan L. Bean operating on the lunar lander.
Credit: NASA
The concept outlined in their paper represents a simplified concept for a lunar base that would leverage ISRU and the production of geopolymers on-site. The site location also offers several advantages, not the least of which is protection from meteoroid impacts and the ejecta these produce. They also selected a mare region, which are lower in elevation than highland terrains and have a higher crater density. In addition, the Mare Tranquillitatis region near the Apollo 11 landing site (0.67 North by 23.47 East) was selected because of the sample data provided by moonrocks brought back by the Apollo-12 astronauts. As Mrozek told Universe Today via email:
The concept of utilizing a crater for construction holds considerable economic significance, as it diminishes the volume of structural materials needed by concentrating solely on the implementation of a cover. In the phase of our research presented in this paper, the specific location of the crater was not a primary focus. We selected a crater with dimensions appropriate for our design, situated in a region where the temperature range would facilitate the production of geopolymers without the need for supplementary energy.
The authors analysed the concept of a covering lid for their hypothetical lunar crater, which measures 17 meters (~56 ft) in diameter and 6 meters (~20 ft) in depth. This is consistent with craters in the Mare Tranquillitatis region, which average about 20 meters by 8 meters (65.5 by 26.25 ft). The next step was to conduct a numerical analysis to identify the appropriate dimensions and shapes for a lunar structure that could handle the load transfers and maintain an Earth-like atmospheric pressure (1,013.25 millibars or 1 bar) within. The next step was to select building materials that could handle the internal stress distributions and be produced on-site using local resources.
Ultimately, they selected lunar regolith-based geopolymers (GP), which consist of synthetic, inorganic monomers primarily composed of aluminium and silicon and have distinctive mechanical properties analogous to cement concrete. This is advantageous given that lunar regolith contains an average of 45% silicon oxide (SiO) by weight. The geopolymer they created consisted of a sodium hydroxide (NaOH) solution, sodium silicate water glass (NaO x nSiO x nHO), and the lunar highlands regolith simulant LHS-1 produced by Exolith Lab.
Location of the site for the analysed structure—a hypothetical crater near a 0.67 latitude North and a 23.47 longitude East within the selenographic coordinate system.
Credit: NASA
"The creation of building materials from original lunar regolith is not a viable option; therefore, one of the available lunar regolith simulants on the market must be used," said Mrozek. "We selected LHS, produced by Space Resource Technologies. Utilizing this material, we developed a geopolymer, which was subsequently tested to obtain the strength parameters that were input into the numerical model. The forces acting on a lunar structure differ significantly from those experienced on Earth; consequently, we needed to abandon certain methodologies applicable on Earth and re-examine the problem from a novel perspective.
The curing conditions for the samples were subjected to were selected to simulate lunar conditions in the Mare Tranquillitatis region. While temperatures range from 120 °C during lunar day and -180 °C during lunar night (248 to -292 °F), they do not drop below 60 °C (140 °F) for seven terrestrial days, which is conducive to the geopolymerisation process. With these considerations in mind, the team cured their samples in a thermal vacuum chamber at 60 °C and a pressure of 50 hPa (50 millibars), consistent with the near-vacuum conditions on the Moon.
After a total curing period of 28 days, the materials were subjected to bending and compression tests and analyzed using electron microscopy (SEM) and X-ray diffraction (XRD). These tests revealed that their regolith-based geopolymer had strength and elasticity comparable to masonry cement-sand calcium-silicate. The geopolymer and the design they selected could very well enable the construction of lunar bases in cratered mare regions, thus realizing a key goal of NASA's Artemis Program. Said Mrozek:
We are civil engineers, which is why our paper concentrates on this specific area of inquiry. However, we are currently collaborating with a diverse range of specialists from various countries in disciplines such as architecture, physics, geology, and chemistry. We are currently engaged in preparations for the initiation of a project of a lunar base, which will be significantly more complex and detailed.
The dark matter distribution of a Milky Way mass halo in a Lambda-cold dark matter (LCDM) cosmological simulation. This is the highest resolution simulation of a MW-mass dark matter halo ever performed, called Aquarius-A-L1. The MW halo (in the centre) is surrounded by myriad substructures, a key prediction of the "cold dark matter” model. Some of these subhalos host a satellite galaxy within them that could be observable. Credit The Aquarius simulation, the Virgo Consortium/Dr Mark Lovell
Whatever dark matter is, cosmologists are busy trying to understand the role it plays in the structure of the Universe. Our standard cosmological model, also called Lambda Cold Dark Matter(LCDM), makes a number of predictions about how galaxies form and evolve, largely focused on dark matter haloes. DM haloes are fundamental building blocks for the cosmological structure. Scientists often describe them as the scaffolding on which the Universe is built.
One of LCDM's predictions concerns satellite galaxies. Theory says that every galaxy forms and grows within a dark matter halo, including dwarf and satellite galaxies. LCDM theory predicts more small dark matter haloes than there are observed satellite galaxies around the Milky Way. New research presented at the Royal Astronomical Society's National Astronomy Meeting might have the answer.
The presentation is "The contribution of "orphan" galaxies to the ultrafaint population of MW satellites," and the lead researcher is Dr. Isabel Santos-Santos, from the Institute for Computational Cosmology in Department of Physics at Durham University, UK.
"The last decade has seen a rise in the number of known Milky Way (MW) satellites, primarily thanks to the discovery of ultrafaint systems at close distances," Santos-Santos writes. "These findings suggest a higher abundance of satellites within ~ 30kpc than predicted by cosmological simulations of MW-like halos in the CDM framework."
Astronomers have found about 60 satellite galaxies around the Milky Way. The Large and Small Magellanic Clouds are the most well-known satellite galaxies, and there are others like the Sagittarius Dwarf Spheroidal Galaxy and the Sculptor Dwarf. Santos-Santos says there should be dozens more of them.
Some of the known satellite galaxies of the Milky Way, including the well-known Large and Small Magellanic Clouds. There could be many more of them according to simulations, and if scientists can find them, it supports the Lambda Cold Dark Matter model.
Image Credit: ESA/Gaia/DPAC. CC BY-SA 3.0 IGO
"We know the Milky Way has some 60 confirmed companion satellite galaxies, but we think there should be dozens more of these faint galaxies orbiting around the Milky Way at close distances," she said in a press release.
The problem is that these small galaxies can be extremely difficult to detect. Scientists think that these galaxies might have had their dark matter stripped away through interactions with the much more massive Milky Way. Without their dark matter, which acts as a gravitational anchor, gas, dust and even stars are more easily stripped away. That means there's little active star formation, and only a dimmer population of older stars. This is why satellite galaxies can be so challenging to detect.
"If our predictions are right, it adds more weight to the Lambda Cold Dark Matter theory of the formation and evolution of structure in the universe. Observational astronomers are using our predictions as a benchmark with which to compare the new data they are obtaining," Santos-Santos said. "One day soon we may be able to see these 'missing' galaxies, which would be hugely exciting and could tell us more about how the universe came to be as we see it today."
The work is based on the Aquarius simulation produced by the Virgo Consortium. Aquarius simulates the evolution of the MW's dark matter halo in the highest resolution ever. It was created to investigate the fine-scale structure around the MW.
The researchers used Aquarius and other analytic galaxy formation models to watch as dwarf galaxies formed and evolved and to "estimate the true abundance and radial distribution of MW satellites" that LCDM predicts. They determined that small dark matter haloes that could host satellite galaxies have been orbiting the Milky Way for billions of years, but since they've been stripped, they're dim and hard to see. These are sometimes called 'orphaned' galaxies. The simulation showed that there could be up to 100 more MW satellites.
"Strikingly, orphans make up half of all satellites in our highest-resolution run, primarily occupying the central regions of the MW halo," the researchers write.
This illustration shows galaxies forming as part of the large-scale structure of the Universe.
Image Credit: Ralf Kaehler/SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory
The other piece of the puzzle concerns the approximately 30 satellite galaxies discovered recently, all small and dim. If these are stripped or orphaned galaxies, then their discovery is additional evidence in support of LCDM. They could be a subset of the dim satellite population the simulation predicts. However, they could also be globular clusters (GC).
Professor Carlos Frenk of the Institute for Computational Cosmology in the Department of Physics at Durham University is one of the co-researchers. Frenk said, "If the population of very faint satellites that we are predicting is discovered with new data, it would be a remarkable success of the LCDM theory of galaxy formation."
"It would also provide a clear illustration of the power of physics and mathematics," Frenk added. "Using the laws of physics, solved using a large supercomputer, and mathematical modelling we can make precise predictions that astronomers, equipped with new, powerful telescopes, can test. It doesn't get much better than this."
The Vera Rubin Observatory and its 10-year Legacy Survey of Space and Time might uncover the presence of these dim, orphaned satellites. "We predict that dozens of satellites should be observable within ~30 kpc of the MW, awaiting discovery through deep-imaging surveys like LSST," the researchers explain.
Scientists have been puzzling over the connections between the Milky Way, dark matter haloes, and satellite galaxies for a long time. Some research suggests that not only does the MW have more satellites that we haven't detected yet, but that those satellites may have had their own satellites that they dragged towards the MW with them. If that turns out to be true, then the MW may have another 150 dim satellites waiting to be found by observatories like the Rubin.
Scientists think that there are different sizes of DM haloes, some with only a few Earth masses, while some are enormously massive. They also think that they could've formed hierarchically, with smaller haloes merging with larger haloes, slowly building up the cosmic web that largely defines the modern Universe. If that's true, then the MW's orphaned galaxies might be strong evidence supporting their hierarchical nature.
Now that the Vera Rubin Observatory has achieved its long-awaited first light, we could get confirmation soon.
Maybe that will help us figure out what dark matter actually is one day .
Nieuwe ontdekking op mysterieuze Marsberg verborg zich in het volle zicht
Nieuwe ontdekking op mysterieuze Marsberg verborg zich in het volle zicht
Een verrassende ontdekking op Mars kan ons mogelijk antwoorden geven op de vraag of de planeet ooit leven heeft geherbergd – en dat misschien nog steeds doet.
Een illustratie van de Jezero-krater zoals die er miljarden jaren geleden uit kan hebben gezien op Mars, toen hij nog een meer was. Een berg op de bodem van het meer verbergt mogelijk een geheim.
Op 18 februari 2021 landde de NASA-rover Perseverance in de 45 kilometer brede Jezero-krater op Mars, waar 3,7 miljard jaar geleden een meer zou hebben gelegen.
Een van de belangrijkste taken van de rover is het vinden van tekenen van leven op de rode planeet en daarom is de krater een van de meest onderzochte gebieden op Mars tot nu toe.
Astronomen zien sinds 2007 een kleine berg naast de krater Jezero Mons, en speculeren sindsdien dat deze vulkanisch kan zijn geweest – of nog steeds is.
Dat kan nu worden opgehelderd.
Een onderzoeksteam onder leiding van het Georgia Institute of Technology (Georgia Tech) in de VS heeft grote hoeveelheden gegevens verzameld die erop wijzen dat Jezero Mons vulkanisch is.
Kort nadat de Perseverance op Mars landde, toonden de eerste gesteentemonsters aan dat de krater niet alleen de sedimentaire meerafzettingen bevatte die wetenschappers verwachtten – ze waren ook vulkanisch.
Nieuwe vondsten maken krater op Mars extra interessant
Om de berg verder te onderzoeken, gebruikten de onderzoekers gegevens van oudere sondes zoals de Mars Odyssey Orbiter, Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter en ExoMars Trace Gas Orbiter.
Ze gebruikten ook gegevens van de Perseverance en vergeleken de eindresultaten met gegevens van bestaande vulkanen op zowel Mars als de aarde.
De conclusie was duidelijk: Jezero Mons is vulkanisch en heeft zelfs een vulkaankrater.
Hij is nu niet actief en het zal waarschijnlijk nog lang duren voordat hij weer actief wordt, aldus de onderzoekers.
Maar de ontdekking opent de mogelijkheid dat de rode planeet meer vulkanen herbergt dan we dachten.
‘De Jezero-krater is een van de best bestudeerde plekken op Mars. Als we hier nu pas een vulkaan identificeren, stel je dan eens voor hoeveel meer er op Mars zouden kunnen zijn,’ zegt een van de onderzoekers, James Wray, in een persbericht.
Een topografische afbeelding van de 21 kilometer brede vulkanische berg Jerezo Mons.
De nieuwe ontdekking maakt de Jezero-krater nog interessanter.
Zoals gezegd denken de onderzoekers dat de krater ooit een meer was.
En als dat naast een actieve vulkaan lag, waren de omstandigheden misschien ideaal om leven in het meer in stand te houden.
Mars is miljarden jaren geleden opgedroogd – dat dachten we tenminste. Nieuwe vondsten op onze rode buurman onthullen nu een opmerkelijke comeback voor het water. Lees er hier over:
De Perseverance keert naar verwachting terug naar de aarde met gesteentemonsters uit de krater die meer aanwijzingen kunnen geven over de vraag of er miljarden jaren geleden leven was in het meer – en of er misschien nog steeds leven te vinden is.
De ontdekking en de monsters kunnen ook bijdragen aan een beter begrip van de geologische geschiedenis van Mars.
The Martian meteorite Northwest Africa (NWA) 16254 is a 406-g gabbroic shergottite found two years ago in Algeria.
Image of the entire NWA 16254 sample studied by Chen et al.: (a) a backscattered electron (BSE) image obtained by the TESCAN Integrated Mineral Analyzer (TIMA); (b) mineralogical mapping via TIMA; (c) distribution map of the iron content obtained via TIMA; (d) distribution map of the calcium content obtained via TIMA.
Image credit: Chen et al., doi: 10.15302/planet.2025.25002.
“Martian meteorites represent the only direct samples available in laboratory for studying the composition and evolution of the Martian mantle, as most are igneous in origin and retain geochemical fingerprints of mantle processes,” said lead author Dr. Jun-Feng Chen and colleagues at the Chengdu University of Technology.
“Among these available samples, shergottites, comprising approximately 90% of the Martian meteorite collection, are particularly critical for deciphering mantle dynamics, crust-mantle interactions, and magmatic differentiation on Mars.”
“Shergottites are classified into four petrological subtypes depending on their distinct textural and mineralogical characteristics: including basaltic, olivine-phyric, poikilitic, and gabbroic.”
“These variations reflect distinct formation environments, ranging from shallow subsurface crystallization to potential surface eruptions, with gabbroic shergottites notably preserving coarse-grained textures indicative of slow cooling in crustal magma chambers.”
In the new study, the authors combined advanced mineralogical mapping and geochemical analyses to decode the history of NWA 16254.
They revealed decoupled geochemical behaviors in pyroxene cores and rims, a phenomenon critical for reconstructing magma chamber dynamics.
“Our study reveals that NWA 16254 formed initially under high-pressure conditions (4.3-9.3 kbar) at the Martian mantle-crust boundary, where magnesium-rich pyroxene cores crystallized,” the researchers said.
“Later, the magma ascended to shallow crustal depths (<4 kbar), where iron-enriched pyroxene rims and plagioclase developed.”
“This prolonged cooling process, preserved in the meteorite’s coarse-grained texture, suggests episodic melt extraction from a long-lived, depleted mantle reservoir — a critical clue for reconstructing Mars’ magmatic evolution.”
“The meteorite’s geochemical depletion, marked by light rare earth element depleted and low oxygen fugacity, aligns it with a meteorite called QUE 94201, hinting at a shared magma source.”
“Its gabbroic texture, indicative of slow cooling in crustal chambers, distinguishes it as a unique archive of subsurface magmatism.”
“These findings challenge existing models of Martian volcanic evolution, as NWA 16254’s consistently low oxygen fugacity, corroborated by Ti3+-bearing ilmenite assemblages, implies sustained reducing conditions during crystallization.”
“This underscores the heterogeneity of Mars’ mantle and raises questions about the planet’s redox evolution over billions of years.”
“Future geochronological studies could resolve whether this meteorite represents ancient mantle melting (2.4 billion years ago) or younger magmatic activity, offering clues to Mars’ thermal history.”
The team’s paper was published May 13, 2025 in the journal Planet.
Jun-Feng Chen et al. Petrography and geochemistry of a newly discovered Martian gabbroic shergottite NWA 16254. Planet, published online May 13, 2025; doi: 10.15302/planet.2025.25002
The surface of Mars, destination for China's Tianwen-3 (Credit : NASA)
China is preparing to make history with its upcoming Mars Sample Return mission, Tianwen-3, scheduled to launch in 2028. This ambitious project aims to collect Martian soil and rock samples and bring them back to Earth for detailed analysis, potentially answering one of humanity's most profound questions; has life ever existed on Mars?
Mars, the red planet.
(Credit : NASA)
The mission represents leap forward in planetary exploration. While several countries have successfully landed rovers on Mars, returning samples to Earth requires an entirely different level of technological complexity and international coordination. If successful, China would become the first nation to bring potentially biologically active material from another planet back to Earth.
Mars wasn't always the cold, dry desert we see today. Studies suggest that Mars once had a dense atmosphere and a warm, moist climate early in its history, making it suitable for the emergence and development of microbial life. Like Earth, Mars sits within our Solar System's habitable zone, the region where liquid water can exist on a planet's surface and therefore potentially support life!
Scientists believe that if life ever emerged on Mars, it would likely have been microbial, similar to the extremophiles found in Earth's harshest environments. These hardy organisms thrive in conditions that would kill most life forms, surviving in environments with extreme temperatures, radiation, or chemical compositions.
Preliminary landing sites for the Tianwen-3 mission
(Credit : By Zengqian Hou, Jizhong Liu, Yigang Xu, Fuchuan Pang, Yuming Wang, Liping Qin, Yang Liu, Yu-Yan Sara Zhao, Guangfei Wei, Mengjiao Xu, Kun Jiang, Chuanpeng Hao, Shichao Ji, Renzhi Zhu, Bingkun Yu, Jia Liu, Zhenfeng Sheng, Juntao Wang, Chaolin Zhang, Yiliang Li)
The Tianwen-3 mission involves a complex two part operation. There will be two separate components; a lander which will land on the Martian surface to collect samples and an orbiter, which will wait in orbit around Mars to receive the samples and bring them back to Earth. The lander will drill two meters underground, a crucial depth because Mars' surface is constantly bombarded with radiation and corrosive chemicals that destroy organic materials. Below this hostile surface layer, valuable signs of past or present life might still be preserved after billions of years.
The mission's success depends on careful site selection so the team are searching for regions where liquid water likely existed in Mars' early history, areas rich in essential nutrients, and locations where traces of microbial activity could have been preserved. This preparatory research is ongoing and represents one of the mission's most critical phases.
Surprisingly, the greatest obstacle isn't the technical complexity of getting to Mars and back, it’s what happens when the samples arrive on Earth. The greatest challenge is in the quarantining and monitoring required once these extraterrestrial materials arrive, a process known as planetary protection. To address the risk, they plan to construct a specialised facility near Hefei Institute of Physical Sciences where Martian samples will undergo comprehensive testing under strict isolation from Earth's environment. The samples will remain quarantined until scientists can conclusively determine they contain no active biological agents that could threaten Earth's biosphere.
The Hefei Institutes of Physical Science
(Credit : Yen Tzu)
This cautious approach reflects the profound implications of the mission. While the risk of dangerous Martian microbes may be small, the potential consequences are too significant to ignore. Only after extensive safety testing will the samples be released to laboratories worldwide for detailed scientific analysis.
The Tianwen-3 mission builds on China's previous Mars success. In 2021, China became only the second country after the United States to successfully land and operate a rover on Mars with its Zhurong rover. This achievement demonstrated China's growing capabilities in interplanetary exploration. This mission represents more than just a technological achievement, it could fundamentally change our understanding of life in the universe. If the samples contain evidence of past or present Martian life, it would prove that life can emerge independently on different worlds, suggesting that life might be common throughout the universe.
Als mensen ooit echt op Mars willen wonen, dan moeten we eerst een oplossing vinden voor een gigantisch probleem: hoe bouw je een leefbare omgeving zonder duizenden en duizenden kilo’s aan bouwmateriaal vanaf de Aarde te verschepen? Dit is peperduur en logistiek bijna onmogelijk. Maar de redding komt misschien wel uit onverwachte hoek…
Onderzoekers van de Harvard John A. Paulson School of Engineering and Applied Sciences (SEAS) denken een oplossing te hebben gevonden in de levende natuur en schrijven erover in de nieuwste uitgave van het vakblad Science Advances. Hoofdonderzoeker Robin Wordsworth laat zien dat het mogelijk is om groene algen te laten groeien in bunkers gemaakt van bioplastic, onder omstandigheden die lijken op wat het oppervlak van Mars te bieden heeft. Het is een veelbelovende stap richting het bouwen van duurzame buitenaardse huizen die zichzelf kunnen onderhouden en nog kunnen groeien ook.
Bizarre omstandigheden In het lab bootste het onderzoeksteam de ijle atmosfeer van Mars na: een druk van 600 Pascal (dat is meer dan honderd keer lager dan op Aarde) en een omgeving rijk aan koolstofdioxide in plaats van alle stikstof en zuurstof waar onze atmosfeer vol mee zit. Onder die bizarre omstandigheden slaagden ze erin om de algensoort Dunaliella tertiolecta te laten groeien in een speciaal ontworpen, 3D-geprinte kamer gemaakt van het bioplastic polymelkzuur (in het Engels bekend als polylactic acid (PLA)). Deze stof is een biologisch afbreekbaar en composteerbaar plastic gemaakt van maïszetmeel, suikerriet of tapioca. Het wordt vaak gebruikt als een duurzaam alternatief voor traditionele plastics, vooral bij 3D-printen, voedselverpakkingen en medische implantaten.
De bioplastickamer heeft meerdere functies: hij laat genoeg licht door om de algen te laten fotosynthetiseren, houdt schadelijke UV-straling buiten en zorgt voor een drukverschil waardoor water – ondanks de lage luchtdruk – vloeibaar blijft. “Als je een habitat hebt gemaakt van bioplastic en je laat daar algen in groeien, dan kunnen die algen weer nieuw bioplastic produceren”, legt Wordsworth uit. “Zo krijg je een soort zelfvoorzienend systeem dat nog lang door kan blijven groeien, ook als het bouwwerk al lang en breed staat.”
Bioplastic met algengroei. Foto: Wordsworth Group / Harvard SEAS
Een leefbare bubbel op een dode planeet Tot nu toe waren plannen voor leven op Mars vooral gericht op industriële technieken, oftewel dure materialen produceren en met veel moeite recyclen. Het idee van Wordsworth is veel natuurlijker; het is een systeem dat werkt zoals de ecosystemen op Aarde. Het team werkte eerder ook al aan lokale ’terraforming’ van Mars: met behulp van aerogel – een superlicht en isolerend materiaal – creëerden ze een soort kaseffect dat de bodem opwarmde, zodat er planten konden groeien. Combineer je die technologie met deze nieuwe bioplastic-algenkamers, dan krijg je een leefbare omgeving waarin druk en temperatuur onder controle blijven.
Levende, groeiende gebouwen Wordsworth en zijn collega’s zijn al druk bezig met de volgende stap. Ze gaan de nieuwste versie van hun habitats testen onder vacuümomstandigheden, zoals het er op de maan of in de ruimte aan toegaat. Ook zijn er plannen om een volledig werkend ‘closed loop-systeem’ te bouwen: een leefruimte die zichzelf in stand houdt en zelfs nieuwe onderdelen kan produceren. “Het idee van habitats die opgebouwd zijn uit biologische materialen is niet alleen fascinerend, het is ook haalbaar”, zegt Wordsworth. “En als het lukt om deze technologie verder te ontwikkelen, dan kunnen we die misschien ook op Aarde gebruiken voor een duurzamer manier van bouwen.”
Gletsjers houden meer tegen dan we tot nu toe dachten.
Het smelten van gletsjers in de Chileense Andes leidt mogelijk tot meer frequente vulkaanuitbarstingen. Dat blijkt uit nieuw onderzoek van de Universiteit van Wisconsin-Madison. Daarbovenop zouden deze ook nog eens intenser kunnen worden. Het effect zou niet beperkt blijven tot de Andes. Het verdwijnen van gletsjers zou een wereldwijd effect kunnen hebben, menen de onderzoekers in een persbericht. Naarmate klimaatverandering het ijs sneller doet verdwijnen, zouden honderden vulkanen rond de wereld actiever kunnen worden. De studie is nog niet gepubliceerd, maar werd wel al gepresenteerd op de Goldschmidt Conferentie in Praag, een grote internationale bijeenkomst op het gebied van geochemie.
Laatste ijstijd De wetenschappers analyseerden om tot deze conclusie te komen zes vulkanen in het zuiden van Chili, waaronder de momenteel sluimerende Mocho-Choshuenco. Met behulp van argondatering (een techniek waarbij wordt gekeken naar de hoeveelheid argon in gesteente om te bepalen hoe oud het is) bepaalden ze exact wanneer eerdere uitbarstingen plaatsvonden. De analyse van kristallen in vulkanisch gesteente leerde de onderzoekers dan weer meer over de omstandigheden waarin magma gevormd wordt en opstijgt.
De studie keek specifiek naar de periode van de laatste ijstijd, tussen 26.000 en 18.000 jaar geleden. Toen bedekte een gigantische ijsmassa, de zogenoemde Patagonische IJskap, het gebied. Door deze technieken te combineren, konden ze zien hoe de aanwezigheid en het verdwijnen van al dat ijs de vulkanische activiteit beïnvloedde.
IJs houdt magma tegen De resultaten laten zien dat dikke gletsjers tijdens de ijstijd de aardkorst zwaar belastten, waardoor magma minder makkelijk naar boven kwam. Dit zorgde ervoor dat zich diep onder de grond, op 10 tot 15 kilometer, een grote voorraad magma opbouwde. Toen het ijs aan het einde van de ijstijd snel smolt, nam de druk op de korst af. De gassen in het magma konden uitzetten, wat leidde tot krachtige uitbarstingen. Dit proces verklaart waarom vulkanen actiever werden na het verdwijnen van het ijs.
Relevant door klimaatverandering
Hoofdauteur van de studie Pablo Moreno-Yaeger licht in het persbericht toe waarom dat vandaag de dag relevant is: “Gletsjers hebben de neiging om het volume van uitbarstingen van de vulkanen eronder te onderdrukken. Maar als gletsjers zich terugtrekken door klimaatverandering, suggereren onze bevindingen dat deze vulkanen vaker en explosiever uitbarsten. De belangrijkste voorwaarde voor meer explosiviteit is in eerste instantie een zeer dikke glaciale bedekking over een magmakamer, en de trigger is wanneer deze gletsjers zich beginnen terug te trekken, waardoor de druk vrijkomt.” De onderzoeker zegt dat de klimaatverandering niet alleen in Chili kan zorgen voor meer en zwaardere uitbarstingen. Vooral Antarctica, maar ook Nieuw-Zeeland, Noord-Amerika en Rusland, waar vulkanen onder gletsjers liggen, moeten volgens hem beter worden onderzocht.
Uitbarstingen hebben zelf ook impact Wereldwijd kan dit ook een impact hebben op het klimaat. Vulkanen spuwen bij een uitbarsting namelijk aerosolen uit die de aarde tijdelijk afkoelen. Een goed voorbeeld is de uitbarsting van de gigantische Filipijnse vulkaan Mount Pinatubo in 1991. Na de uitbarsting daalde de temperatuur wereldwijd met ongeveer 0,5 graden Celsius. Maar bij herhaalde uitbarstingen stapelen broeikasgassen zich net op, wat op lange termijn juist bijdraagt aan de opwarming van de aarde. Dit kan een vicieuze cirkel veroorzaken: meer uitbarstingen versnellen het smelten van gletsjers, wat weer meer vulkanische activiteit uitlokt.
De opbouw van zo’n magmareservoirs kan echter eeuwen kan duren. Dat geeft de mensheid tijd om gerichte systemen te ontwikkelen die ons op tijd kunnen waarschuwen voor uitbarstingen. De volledige studie verschijnt later dit jaar in een wetenschappelijk vakblad. De onderzoekers zeggen nog niet in welk vakblad.
Afbeelding bovenaan dit artikel: Joseph Vary / Unsplash
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OPMERKING PETER2011
Met het 'smelten van gletsjers' wordt in deze studie bedoeld: het smelten van een ijskap van 500.000 km^3 in Patagonië na de ijstijd. Zo'n ijskap zal zeker een invloed op de onderliggende aardkorst hebben en mogelijk tevens op vulkanisme. Maar om het effect van zo'n ijskap dan te extrapoleren naar de gletsjers van vandaag? Dat is echt een gigantisch schaalverschil, de grootste gletsjers nu hebben volumes van slechts enkele tientallen km^3. Om dit dan vervolgens te koppelen aan de huidige klimaatverandering wat 'wetenschappers zorgen baart' is wel heel vergezocht.
Researchers bombarded lichens with a year's worth of Martian radiation in just 5 hours — and they survived, hinting that the extremophiles could potentially live on the Red Planet.
A new study has revealed that lichens can withstand the intense ionizing radiation that hits Mars' surface. (The lichen in this photo is Cetraria aculeata.)
(Image credit: Pensoft)
Earth-based lifeforms known as lichens may be tough enough to survive on Mars, a new study suggests.
Scientists came to this conclusion after blasting the lichens with a year's worth of Martian radiation in less than a day during a lab experiment — and the terrestrial lifeforms survived the process.
Mars is not an easy place to live. The Red Planet is essentially one giant desert with a minimal atmosphere, low temperatures and no liquid water at its surface. But the biggest barrier to life on Mars is the lack of a strong magnetic field, which protects against the constant bombardment of ionizing radiation from cosmic rays and solar flares, which can damage living cells and mutate their DNA.
One group of living things that may be able to survive these extreme conditions is lichens, symbiotic associations between fungi and photosynthetic bacteria and/or algae. These hybrid lifeforms, which are not considered true organisms but are listed as species on the three of life, work together to stay alive and many are extremophiles, capable of tolerating no hydration and extreme temperatures for long periods. Some species have even survived being directly exposed to the vacuum of space.
In the new study, published March 31 in the journal IMA Fungus, researchers tested how two lichen species — Diploschistes muscorum and Cetraria aculeata — reacted to ionizing radiation under Martian conditions. To do this, the team placed the lifeforms in a specialized vacuum chamber at the Space Research Centre of the Polish Academy of Sciences in Warsaw, which replicated the atmospheric pressure, temperatures and composition on the Red Planet. They bombarded the lichens with a year's worth of Martian radiation in just 5 hours. Both species were able to remain metabolically active throughout the tests.
Cetraria aculeata (left) and Diploschistes muscorum (right) both survived the experiments. But D. muscorum is a better candidate for living on Mars. (Image credit: Wikimedia/Alberto Salguero (left)/Thayne Tuason (right))
"These findings expand our understanding of biological processes under simulated Martian conditions and reveal how hydrated organisms respond to ionizing radiation," Kaja Skubała, a researcher at the Institute of Botany at the Jagellonian University in Krakow, Poland, said in a statement. "Ultimately, this research deepens our knowledge of lichen adaptation and their potential for colonizing extraterrestrial environments."
Of the two species, D. muscorum showed the greatest resistance to the radiation, sustaining less damage to its cells, which suggests that some lichens will be better suited to Martian conditions than others. However, it is unlikely that any species would be able to survive on Mars unattended for long periods, as there is no known liquid water at the surface, which all of Earth's lifeforms need to survive.
This is the reason why it is unlikely that there is any extraterrestrial life currently alive on Mars.
Martian candidates
According to the researchers, the new experiments show that lichens are prime candidates for being taken on future Mars missions, although there are several resilient species other than D. muscorum that could also make the trip.
But lichens are not the only lifeforms that could potentially survive on the Red Planet.
Scientists collect lichens near the Mars Desert Research Station in Utah to replicate how they might study life on Mars. This experiment was not part of the new study.(Image credit: Mars 160 Crew/The Mars Society)
One extremophile group that has long been considered as future Martian tourists is tardigrades. These microscopic critters are nearly indestructible and can survive extreme temperatures, crushing pressures, total dehydration and the vacuum of space, largely thanks to an ability to switch off their metabolism and enter a state of suspended animation.
Other candidates include mosses — plants with similar abilities to lichens. Some desert moss species have even been shown to be resilient to gamma rays and liquid nitrogen, hinting that they too could fare well on Mars.
Single-celled microorganisms, such as bacteria, might also be able to survive on Mars if they were sheltered from radiation, living underground. Research has shown that these microbes could also survive for hundreds of millions of years beneath the surface in a hibernation-like state.
However, the first terrestrial lifeforms to touch down on Mars will likely be a species that is naturally very poorly suited to living on Mars — humans. NASA intends on launching the first crewed mission to the Red Planet sometime in the 2030s, when they will get a taste of how tough it is to survive there.
Editor's note: This article was originally published April 8, 2025
The thick, mineral-rich layers of clay found on Mars suggest that the Red Planet harbored potentially life-hosting environments for long stretches in the ancient past, a new study suggests.
(Image credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/UArizona)
The thick, mineral-rich layers of clay found onMars suggest that the Red Planet harbored potentially life-hosting environments for long stretches in the ancient past, a new study suggests.
Clays need liquid water to form. These layers are hundreds of feet thick and are thought to have formed roughly 3.7 billion years ago, under warmer and wetter conditions than currently prevail on Mars.
"These areas have a lot of water but not a lot of topographic uplift, so they're very stable," study co-author Rhianna Moore, who conducted the research as a postdoctoral fellow at the University of Texas' Jackson School of Geosciences, said in a statement.
"If you have stable terrain, you're not messing up your potentially habitable environments," Moore added. "Favorable conditions might be able to be sustained for longer periods of time."
On our home planet, such deposits form under specific landscape and climatic conditions.
"On Earth, the places where we tend to see the thickest clay mineral sequences are in humid environments, and those with minimal physical erosion that can strip away newly created weathering products," said co-author Tim Goudge, an assistant professor at the Jackson School's Department of Earth and Planetary Sciences.
Clays can be seen in the Hellas basin of Mars. (Image credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/UArizona)
However, it remains unclear how Mars' local and global topography, along with its past climate activity, influenced surface weathering and the formation of clay layers.
Using data and images from NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter — the second-longest-operating spacecraft around Mars, after the agency's 2001 Mars Odyssey — Moore, Goudge, and their colleagues studied 150 clay deposits, looking at their shapes and locations, and how close they are to other features like ancient lakes or rivers.
They found that the clays are mostly located in low areas near ancient lakes, but not close to valleys where water once flowed strongly. This mix of gentle chemical changes and less intense physical erosion helped the clays stay preserved over time.
"[Clay mineral-bearing stratigraphies] tend to occur in areas where chemical weathering was favoured over physical erosion, farther from valley network activity and nearer standing bodies of water," the team wrote in the new study, which was published in the journal Nature Astronomy on June 16.
The findings suggest that intense chemical weathering on Mars may have disrupted the usual balance between weathering and climate.
On Earth, where tectonic activity constantly exposes fresh rock to the atmosphere, carbonate minerals like limestone form when rock reacts with water and carbon dioxide (CO2). This process helps remove CO2 from the air, storing it in solid form and helping regulate the climate over long periods.
On Mars, tectonic activity is non-existent, leading to a lack of carbonate minerals and minimal removal of CO2 from the planet's thin atmosphere. As a result, CO2 released by Martian volcanoes long ago likely stayed in the atmosphere longer, making the planet warmer and wetter in the past — conditions the team believes may have encouraged the clay's formation.
The researchers also speculate that the clay could have absorbed water and trapped chemical byproducts like cations, preventing them from spreading and reacting with the surrounding rock to form carbonates that remain trapped and unable to leech into the surrounding environment.
"[The clay is] probably one of many factors that's contributing to this weird lack of predicted carbonates on Mars," said Moore.
This article was originally published onSpace.com.
Illustration of space debris around Earth. Credit: ESA
Tens of thousands of pieces of space debris are hurtling around Earth right now. These defunct satellites, spent rocket stages, collision fragments and even a toolbox threaten active spacecraft and could trigger cascading disasters that make space unusable for generations. Since removing just a single piece of debris can cost tens of millions of dollars, the critical question becomes which ones should we prioritise?
It was during a spacewalk around the ISS that astronauts dropped a toolbox that now poses a threat to future space travellers. (Credit : NASA)
The numbers tell a sobering story. NASA data shows the monthly count of objects in Earth's orbit continues to climb relentlessly, while computer simulations predict an alarming future. Without intervention, low Earth orbit could become so cluttered with debris that catastrophic collisions become routine, potentially triggering a runaway chain reaction known as Kessler Syndrome.
A few years ago, eleven international teams of space experts tackled this challenge by each creating a ranked list of the 50 most concerning objects in low Earth orbit. Although they used different approaches, 20-40% of the objects ended up on several experts' lists, showing remarkable consensus given the complexity of the problem. However, their lists didn't perfectly match. Now, researchers from France and Spain have applied social choice theory, the mathematical study of voting and collective decision making to this conundrum, revealing how different ways of combining expert opinions lead to dramatically different conclusions about our most urgent space threats.
International space agencies agree that simply preventing new debris isn't enough. To stabilise the space environment, experts estimate we need to actively remove five to ten large pieces of debris, each bigger than 10 centimetres, every year before they fragment into thousands of smaller, untrackable pieces.
Orbital Debris strike on one of the window’s within the International Space Station.
(Credit : NASA)
Thankfully, the technology for space cleanup missions is rapidly advancing, with the first operational tests scheduled for later in 2025 and 2026. But with removal costs in the tens of millions of dollars per object, choosing the right targets is crucial.
The eleven expert teams used sophisticated methods to evaluate space debris, considering factors like mass, collision probability, orbital lifetime, and proximity to operational satellites. Despite using different approaches, they showed remarkable agreement with 20-40% of objects appeared on multiple lists. Only one object appeared on every expert's list, while their collective work identified 273 different pieces of concerning debris across all lists.
This level of consensus is quite impressive given the complexity of weighing multiple risk factors. However, the remaining disagreements still matter significantly when deciding where to spend tens of millions of dollars on removal missions.
Illustration of a satellite breaking up into multiple pieces at higher altitudes.
(Credit : ESA)
The original study combined the expert opinions using a hybrid scoring method, multiplying each object's Borda score (based on its ranking positions) by the number of lists it appeared on. This approach identified object 22,566 as the most concerning piece of debris.
However, the new research demonstrates that this conclusion depends entirely on the aggregation method chosen. Using the classic Borda count alone, object 22,220 emerges as the top priority. Apply the Condorcet winner principle, which seeks the object that would beat all others in head to head comparisons, and object 27,006 takes the lead. These aren't minor technical differences though. Each method reflects different philosophical approaches to collective decision making, with real implications for where humanity spends its limited space cleanup resources.
The researchers argue for fundamental changes in how we approach space debris prioritisation. Rather than forcing experts to rank exactly 50 objects, they suggest allowing each team to identify however many objects they consider truly concerning. This acknowledges that the threshold for "concerning" debris shouldn't be artificially constrained by committee decisions.
They also propose moving from ranked ballots to evaluative voting, where experts would categorise debris as "extremely hazardous," "hazardous," or "acceptable risk" based on absolute criteria rather than relative comparisons. This approach would be more robust to changes in the candidate pool and better reflect how experts actually think about risk assessment.
This research illuminates a broader challenge in scientific decision making, how to fairly aggregate expert opinions when stakes are high and resources are limited. The space debris problem resembles other collective choices, from pandemic response priorities to climate change mitigation strategies, where multiple valid perspectives must be reconciled into policies.
The study also reveals a critical gap in current debris removal planning, the failure to account for removal costs and dynamic effects. When one piece of debris is removed, the risk profiles of remaining objects change, suggesting we need more sophisticated approaches that consider removal sequences rather than individual targets.
As private space companies launch thousands of new satellites and space tourism takes off (if you will pardon the pun,) the orbital environment will only become more crowded. The methods we develop today for democratically choosing which space junk to remove, combining expert knowledge with fair aggregation techniques, may determine whether future generations inherit accessible space or a debris filled orbital wasteland that takes centuries to clear.
Image of Uranus from the Hubble Space Telescope shows bands and a new dark spot in Uranus' atmosphere. (Credit : NASA/Space Telescope Science Institute)
In the vast expanse between Uranus and Neptune, a team of researchers have uncovered something really quite extraordinary, a minor planet that has been locked in precise gravitational manouevres with Uranus for at least a million years. This discovery sheds new light on the complex dynamics that govern our Solar System's outer reaches.
The object in question, designated 2015 OU₁₉₄, belongs to a class of small bodies called Centaurs, rocky and icy objects that orbit between Jupiter and Neptune. What makes this particular Centaur special is its remarkably stable relationship with Uranus, locked in what is known as a 3:4 mean motion resonance. This means that for every three orbits 2015 OU₁₉₄ completes around the Sun, Uranus completes exactly four. This precise mathematical relationship creates a gravitational partnership that keeps the two objects in a stable dance, preventing them from colliding or drifting apart.
Uranus, the 7th planet in the Solar System seems to have an asteroid tagging along.
(Credit : NASA)
The discovery came about through detective work with archival observations. Researchers led by Daniel Bamberger from the Northolt Branch Observatories in Germany, located additional observations of 2015 OU₁₉₄ from 2017 and 2018, extending the object's data points from just one year to 3.5 years. This longer observation period was crucial for understanding the object's true orbital behavior.
Computer simulations revealed the remarkable stability of this relationship. The resonance has remained stable for at least 1,000 years in the past, probably even 1 million years and is predicted to continue for another 500,000 years into the future. This longevity suggests that the gravitational partnership formed early in our Solar System's history and has persisted through countless changes.
What makes this discovery particularly significant is that no objects has previously been found in resonance between the orbits of Uranus and Neptune. It’s a region of space, while containing many small bodies, that appears to lack the kind of stable orbital relationships commonly found elsewhere in the Solar System.
The asteroids of the inner Solar System, where they are far more numerous than the outer Solar Sytem, are plotted on this diagram.
(Credit : MDF)
The researchers didn't stop with just one object though. Their investigation uncovered additional candidates, including 2013 RG₉₈, which also appears to maintain this same 3:4 resonance with Uranus for several hundred thousand years. A third candidate, 2014 NX₆₅, shows strong gravitational influence from Neptune, suggesting the complex interplay of forces in this region.
The existence of these Uranus resonant objects suggests that similar relationships may be more common than previously thought. As our survey capabilities improve and we discover more objects in the outer Solar System, we may find that these gravitational partnerships are common and fundamental to understanding how small bodies are distributed throughout the region.
Parker Solar Probe’s WISPR instrument during its record-breaking flyby of the Sun on Dec. 25, 2024, shows the solar wind racing out from the Sun’s outer atmosphere, the corona. NASA/Johns Hopkins APL/Naval Research Lab
From one perspective, the Sun is a benevolent orb of plasma and its warmth makes Earth habitable and has kept if habitable for billions of years, allowing complex things like human beings to evolve. From another perspective, it's a malevolent orb that sends deadly UV radiation our way, and sometimes erupts and hurls massive blobs of plasma toward Earth. The truth is somewhere in the middle, and NASA launched the Parker Solar Probeto flesh out that truth.
NASA launched the Parker Solar Probe (PSP) in 2018 and its mission is to examine the Sun's coronal plasma and its magnetic field. To do this, it has to get close. NASA describes it as a mission to "touch the Sun," and that's pretty accurate. Throughout its mission it has gotten progressively closer, setting a new record each time for closest approach to the Sun. On Dec. 24, 2024, the spacecraft flew just 6.1 million km (3.8 million miles) from the solar surface.
That is incredibly close, but luckily, the spacecraft has several layers of protection. The PSP is also the fastest-moving spacecraft ever built. It was travelling at 692,000 km/h (430,000 mph) during its 2024 flyby, and didn't spend much time that close to the star.
The result of this daring piece of coronal navigation is the closest images yet of our star. The PSP carries four main instruments, and one of them is WISPR, the Wide-field Imager for Solar Probe. WISPR has two radiation-hardened cameras that can withstand the Sun's power. It's job is to image the corona, the solar wind, and other phenomena near the Sun. On the last flyby, WISPR showed us the solar corona and the solar wind in a way we've never seen before.
“Parker Solar Probe has once again transported us into the dynamic atmosphere of our closest star,” said Nicky Fox, associate administrator, Science Mission Directorate at NASA Headquarters in Washington. “We are witnessing where space weather threats to Earth begin, with our eyes, not just with models. This new data will help us vastly improve our space weather predictions to ensure the safety of our astronauts and the protection of our technology here on Earth and throughout the solar system.”
There are important implications for understanding or misunderstanding the solar wind and coronal mass ejections (CME). They're ever present forces in the Solar System. The wind is a stream of charged particles that constantly flows outward from the Sun. It's responsible for the gorgeous aurorae that we love to gaze it, but it's also responsible for damaging power grids and satellites. As we expand into cislunar space and crowd more satellites into Low-Earth Orbit, it's important that we understand not only the solar wind, but everything that flows from the Sun, including coronal mass ejections (CME).
While the solar wind is a continuous phenomenon, coronal mass ejections are episodic. They're ejections of plasma that can reach Earth. CMEs can contain billions of tons of plasma moving at high speeds. Only a small number of them reach Earth, but when they do, they can also cause geomagnetic storms that can damage power grids and other equipment.
The Parker Solar Probe is named after the American heliophysicist Eugene Parker, who coined the term 'solar wind in 1958. His theories, though they faced stiff resistance at the time, revolutionized our scientific understanding of the Sun. Multiple spacecraft have been launched to study the Sun and the solar wind, but the Parker Solar Probe has outdone them all.
Each mission has revealed more about the Sun and the solar wind, but none have come as close to the star as the PSP. It also has the advantage of the most modern technologies and instruments. One of the things its revealed is the nature of so-called switchbacks.
When measured near Earth, the solar wind is pretty much constant. But closer to the Sun, things are more chaotic. The Sun has extremely powerful magnetic fields, and when the PSP came within 14.7 million miles of the Sun, it showed us that some of those fields zig-zag. These zig-zagging fields are called switchbacks. The PSP also showed us that these switchbacks are more common than thought, and that they come in clumps.
As the PSP got progressively closer and travelled through the Sun's corona, it noticed that the corona's boundary was uneven and complex. Getting even closer in subsequent flybys, it was able to pinpoint the source of the switchbacks. The source is patches on the Sun where magnetic funnels form and images showed that the switchbacks are partly responsible for the fast solar wind, one of the wind's two components.
“The big unknown has been: how is the solar wind generated, and how does it manage to escape the Sun’s immense gravitational pull?” said Nour Rawafi, the project scientist for Parker Solar Probe at the Johns Hopkins Applied Physics Laboratory. “Understanding this continuous flow of particles, particularly the slow solar wind, is a major challenge, especially given the diversity in the properties of these streams — but with Parker Solar Probe, we’re closer than ever to uncovering their origins and how they evolve.”
The slow solar wind is twice as dense as the fast solar wind, and interplay between the two seems to create moderately strong conditions on Earth that can rival conditions generated by CMEs. The slow solar wind appears to originate from the Sun's equatorial regions, but scientists are still debating what structures they originate in and how the material is released.
“We don’t have a final consensus yet, but we have a whole lot of new intriguing data,” said Adam Szabo, Parker Solar Probe mission scientist at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland.
We've learned a lot about the Sun in recent decades, and the PSP is poised to show us more and hopefully provide answers to our most probing questions. It's next perihelion will be in September, 2025, when it will again fly through the solar corona. That approach will gather even more data on the slow solar wind and other facets of the Sun.
Astrobiology can be split into two very distinct fields. There’s the field that astronomers are likely more familiar with, involving large telescopes, exoplanets, and spectroscopic signals that are pored over to debate whether they show signs of life. But there is another camp, collective known as the Origins researchers that focus on developing a scientific understanding of how life originally developed on Earth. A new paper from Cole Mathis at Arizona State and Harrison B. Smith at the Institute of Science in Tokyo suggests a new path forward to tackling those challenges - set them up as competitions and let a hefty prize motivate scientific teams and individuals to pursue them.
The paper, which was published on arXiv, is a response to NASA’s Decadal Astrobiology Research and Exploration Strategy (DARES) call for community input. It calls on the “challenge” funding model popularized by organizations like the X Prize, and the Defense Research Advanced Projects Agency (DARPA), whose early autonomous driving challenges inspired the self-driving cars that are finally starting to navigate public roadways.
A similar method could be used to stimulate research into specific, measurable, and important “origins” research according to Drs. Mathis and Smith. They point out that one hurdle holding back development in this field is a lack of consensus on even simple definitions, such as “what is life?”. However, they lay out five different “finish lines” that, though some of them would prove certain theories, lack of progress towards them could also be held up as proof of opposing theories.
Fraser interviews Mary Volek, the longtime head of NASA's astrobiology program.
One finish line will attempt to solve the debate of whether metabolism or genetics were developed first in the course of life. It focuses on creating a biological pathway known as the pentose phosphate pathway (PPP) using abiotic chemistry. If possible, it would make a strong case that the “metabolism first” camp is correct.
A second finish line utilizes the concept of “assembly theory”, a framework developed by Leroy Cronin and Sara Walker, that quantifies the complexity of organic molecules, and draws a distinct line at a certain complexity level, showing that anything more complex must be made within a biological system. The challenge the authors put forward is to create a sufficiently complex molecule using only abiotic chemistry.
The third challenge attempts to settle the debate between “determinism” and “contingency”. In the determinism world view, if we manage to rewind life back to its early beginnings, would the same process happen in the same way all over again if given the same starting conditions? Or, according to the “contingency” theory, would small differences in the chemistry makeup of early life lead to massive differences in the biochemistry of later lifeforms. The challenge itself is to design an organic chemistry experiment where exactly the same initial conditions can lead to different products. If someone manages to do this, it would prove the “contingency” theory of early life formation.
Fraser interviews Wallace Arthur, an expert on evolutionary biology.
The fourth challenge tackles self-replication, by requiring a team to make polymers that can self-replicate but still overcome “Eigen’s error threshold”. According to the information theory developed by Manfred Eigen that goes along with replicators passing data to the new copies of themselves, early replicators would have to be much smaller than would be necessary to contain any error-correcting biological machinery common when our cells copy their own DNA during the replication process. Understanding how early life got through this bottle neck to develop reliable error checking systems without losing all their information once they cross the threshold in terms of size is at the problem at the heart of this challenge.
Scientists have long thought that, somewhere in the process of evolution, there was a transition from RNA to DNA. However, that has never actually been proven, and the fifth and final challenge pushes researchers to prove that the RNA to DNA jump can be made gradually. If such a jump is infeasible, that would call into question the significance of RNA in the overall scheme of the development of life on Earth.
These challenges are well defined, measurable, and have an obvious tie back to the fundamental challenge of understanding where life originally came from. Whether or not NASA, especially with its own current funding challenges, would be willing to back a challenge-based structure to pursue these efforts remains to be seen. But there are plenty of other challenge-based funding supporters out there, such as the team around the Evolution 2.0 challenge and the X Prize itself. Astrobiology research remains key to understanding our place in the universe - it might be time to consider a different path to how we approach it.
This color image from the MRO's HiRISE camera shows a flat topped, heavily eroded fluvial sinuous ridge (FSR) on Mars. Sand dunes can be seen migrating over the top of the FSR. FSRs are created when rivers deposit sediment. The sediments hardens until it's harder than the surrounding terrain. As aeolian erosion wears down the softer, surrounding rock, the FSR is left behind as evidence of the ancient river. HiRISE Image: ESP_085386_1505. Image Credit: NASA/JPL/University of Arizona. Licence type: Attribution (CC BY 4.0)
There's very little scientific debate about the existence of surface water on Mars in its past. The evidence at this point is overwhelming. Orbiter images clearly show river channels and deltas, and rovers have found ample minerals that only form in the presence of water. Now the scientific debate has moved on. Scientists are trying to learn the extent of Martian surface water, both on the planet's surface and through time.
NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO) is a prolific purveyor of images of Mars' surface. One of its most well-known image shows Jezero Crater, the landing site of the Mars Perseverance rover. Jezero Crater is an ancient paleolake filled by an ancient river that created a delta of sediments. The orbiter also identified clays and carbonate salts, minerals that were altered by water in the planet's past.
This image of Jezero Crater is one of the MRO's most well-known images. It shows clear evidence of flowing water. The colours map the location of different minerals, including water-altered clays and carbonate salts.
Image Credit: NASA/ JPL-Caltech/ MSSS/ JHU-APL.
There are two schools of thought around Mars' watery past. One says that water was stable on the Martian surface for long periods of time, while the other states that the water channels were carved during geologically brief periods of time when climate shifts caused ice sheets to melt. Call the first one the 'warm and wet' theory and the second one the 'cold and dry' theory. Both theories are well developed, and make predictions about what scientists will find when they dig deeper.
Some research into Noachis Terra supports the idea that water features there were carved by ice-related processes during short-lived periods of wetness, the cold and dry theory. This 2016 paper illustrates that point of view. "Our studied valleys' association with ice-rich material and abundant evidence for erosion caused by downslope flow of ice-rich material are consistent with a cold, wet Mars hypothesis where accumulation, flow, and melting of ice have been dominant factors in eroding crater valleys," those researchers concluded.
Not all regions of Mars have been studied equally, and the Noachis Terra is not as well-studied as some other regions. The 'warm and wet' climate theory predicts that Noachis Terra would've had high levels of precipitation. However, there's an overall lack of Valley Networks (VNs) in the region. Valley Networks are similar to Earth's river drainage basins and are compelling evidence of Mars' watery past.
This map of Mars shows important surface features, as well as all of the planet's surface regions. Noachis Terra is a southern highland region of heavily cratered ancient terrain.
Image Credit: By Jim Secosky modified NASA image. - http://planetarynames.wr.usgs.gov/images/mola_regional_boundaries.pdf, Public Domain,
New research presented at the Royal Astronomical Society's National Astronomy Meeting presented a different sort of evidence to support the high levels of precipitation predicted in Noachis Terra by the warm and wet theory. It's titled "The Fluvial History of Noachis Terra, Mars," and the lead researcher is Adam Losekoot. Losekoot is a PhD student at the Open University, a public research university in the UK.
"Studying Mars, particularly an underexplored region like Noachis Terra, is really exciting because it's an environment which has been largely unchanged for billions of years. It's a time capsule that records fundamental geological processes in a way that just isn't possible here on Earth," Losekoot said in a press release.
The evidence Losekoot and his fellow researchers uncovered is in the form of Fluvial Sinuous Ridges.
"Noachis Terra, in Mars’ southern highlands, is a region where ‘warm, wet’ climate models predict high rates of precipitation, but is poorly incised by VNs," Losekoot explained. "We searched instead for Fluvial Sinuous Ridges (FSRs, aka inverted channels) here as they provide alternate evidence to VNs for stable surface water."
FSRs are winding, elevated features left behind from Mars' watery past. They form when water flows across the surface carrying sediment with it. The sediment deposits become harder than the rock in the surrounding terrain due to compaction and mineral precipitation. When Mars' water disappeared, aeolian erosion ate away at the softer, surrounding rock, leaving the elevated FSRs behind.
To find the FSRs in Noachis Terra, Losekoot and his co-researchers turned to NASA's MRO. No other mission has done more to reveal Mars' past than the MRO. They used data from its HiRISE and other instruments, as well as data from the Mars Orbital Laser Altimeter on the Mars Global Surveyor, to identify FSRs.
Losekoot and his co-researchers found 15,000 km of FSRs in Noachis Terra. "We find FSRs to be common across Noachis Terra, with a cumulative length of more than 15,000 km. These are often isolated segments, but some systems are hundreds of km in length," Losekoot writes.
This HiRISE image shows two branches of an FSR. The river split into two then rejoined outside of the image. The lower branch is heavily eroded and quite spread out, the upper branch is narrower but more clearly preserved. They could've had different exposure times or undergone different geological processes. Or they could be from different periods of water activity. There are remnants of an infilling material within the ridge and a meander where the branch turns back towards the lower trunk. The mesa in between the branches could be a crater that was filled with the same sediment as the FSR.
Image Credit: HiRISE Image: ESP_085519_1585NASA/JPL/University of Arizona. Licence type: Attribution (CC BY 4.0)
The FSRs are broadly distributed across Noachis Terra, and some are tens of meters tall. That means the water flowed for a long time.
"The broad distribution of FSRs suggests a broadly distributed source of water," Losekoot writes. "The most likely candidate is precipitation, suggesting a benign surface environment. For FSRs to have formed mature, interconnected systems, up to tens of meters high, these conditions must also have been relatively long-lived."
"This suggests that ~3.7 Ga, Noachis Terra experienced warm and wet conditions for a geologically relevant period," Losekoot explained.
This HiRISE image shows narrow FSR with a pointed pinnacle ridge. The pointed could indicate that this FSR has suffered heavy erosion for a long time until only a narrow peak remained, or it may be that only a narrow part of the original river infill has been preserved.
Image Credit: HiRISE Image: ESP_067439_1505 NASA/JPL/University of Arizona. Licence type: Attribution (CC BY 4.0)
The way the FSRs are distributed across Noachis Terra and their extent suggests that precipitation is responsible. They also form large, interconnected systems, which suggests the watery period was long-lived. This work supports the idea that Mars was warm and wet for a long time, rather than just for bursts of time when ice sheets melted.
This MRO CTX image gives an oblique view of part of a system of FSRs in Noachis Terra. It shows river tributaries that were probably active at the same time. The rivers meandered, and there are areas where the river banks burst and deposited fine layers of sediment. At the top of the image is a really clear example of an area where two FSRs intersect with an infilled crater. This is likely where the river flowed into the crater, filling it up and then breaching the other side to continue through the crater and down to the bottom of the image.
"Our work is a new piece of evidence that suggests that Mars was once a much more complex and active planet than it is now, which is such an exciting thing to be involved in," said Losekoot.
With its distinct owl-like appearance, it looks like a nature photo snapped in the woods in the dead of night.
It could also be an artistic portrait from an art gallery, with its shimmering shades of blue, orange and pink.
But this stunning image, newly published by astronomers, actually captures a remarkable moment in deep space, billions of light years away.
Two blue rings with orange centres, which look like an owl's eyes, are actually two ring-shaped galaxies colliding with each other.
The collision occurred 38 million years ago, but only now is it being picked up by NASA's James Webb Space Telescope (JWST).
The shot has been dubbed 'Comic Owl' by an international group of astronomers led by Dr Mingyu Li of the Tsinghua University in Beijing, China.
'The Cosmic Owl consists of a head-on merger involving two galaxies,' Dr Li and colleagues say.
'These phenomena mutually affect one another, collectively driving the evolution of this galaxy system.'
The international team of astronomers reports the detection of a peculiar merger of two similar ring galaxies that morphologically resemble an owl's face
The collected images show that the Cosmic Owl consists of two interacting galaxies that have formed nearly identical collisional ring structures
Cosmic Owl is made up of two ring galaxies, which, as the name suggests, are simply galaxies that have a circle-like appearance.
Ring galaxies have been described as one of the rarest galaxy types found in the universe, accounting for just 0.01 per cent of all galaxies discovered.
The first ring galaxy to be discovered, known as Hoag's Object, was identified in 1950 by American astronomer Arthur Hoag.
But capturing two ring galaxies colliding is even rarer, making this a 'unique' cosmic sight, according to the researchers.
This remarkable symmetry of the two rings suggests they have a similar mass, structure and size, each with a diameter of approximately 26,000 light years.
'[We] reveal a complex system of twin collisional ring galaxies, exhibiting a nearly identical morphology,' the team say in their paper.
'The symmetry of the rings suggests a head-on collision origin between two galaxies of similar mass and structure.'
The team estimate that the stellar mass of the entire merging system is about 320 billion solar masses – so 320 billion times the mass of our sun.
Taking a closer look at the image, the orange blobs at the centre are the incredibly luminous 'active galactic nucleus' (AGN)
The schematic artistic view of the Cosmic Owl, consisting of twin collisional ring galaxies with binary active galactic nucleus (AGN)
Why do galaxies collide?
Galaxies collide because they are being drawn together by the immense force of gravity.
Collisions may lead to mergers if neither galaxy has enough momentum to keep going after the collision.
As many as 25 per cent of galaxies are currently merging with others.
Source: Harvard–Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics
Taking a closer look at the image, the orange blobs at the centre are the incredibly luminous 'active galactic nucleus' (AGN).
AGNs – the most luminous persistent sources of electromagnetic radiation in the universe – are theorized to have supermassive black holes at their very centre which pull in surrounding matter.
According to the researchers, the black holes in these two galaxies have masses of around 67 million and 26 million solar masses.
Meanwhile, the space where the two galaxies merge – the 'beak' of the owl – is a region of 'intense' star formation, where new stars are created that could end up with planets in orbit around them.
Galaxy mergers such as play a crucial role in the evolution of galaxies, transforming their size and redistributing their gas.
They also eventually lead to stellar mass assembly – the processes by which galaxies acquire their stars and gradually grow in mass.
Our own galaxy, the Milky Way, is on a collision course with another galaxy called Andromeda, currently around 2.5 million light years away.
Cosmic Owl is described further in the team's paper, which has been published on the preprint server arXiv, meaning it's yet to be peer reviewed.
Further study could reveal more about the conditions that led to the collision, which started an estimated 38 million years ago.
'The rare twin-ring structure calls for dedicated numerical simulations to constrain the precise initial conditions of the merger,' the team conclude.
'Such collision-triggered starbursts may represent a previously under-appreciated channel for boosting early cosmic star formation.'
Data used to capture the image was also gathered by the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA) in Chile and the Very Large Array (VLA) in New Mexico.
The James Webb telescope has been described as a 'time machine' that could help unravel the secrets of our universe.
The telescope will be used to look back to the first galaxies born in the early universe more than 13.5 billion years ago, and observe the sources of stars, exoplanets, and even the moons and planets of our solar system.
The vast telescope, which has already cost more than $7 billion (£5 billion), is considered a successor to the orbiting Hubble Space Telescope
The James Webb Telescope and most of its instruments have an operating temperature of roughly 40 Kelvin – about minus 387 Fahrenheit (minus 233 Celsius).
It is the world's biggest and most powerful orbital space telescope, capable of peering back 100-200 million years after the Big Bang.
The orbiting infrared observatory is designed to be about 100 times more powerful than its predecessor, the Hubble Space Telescope.
NASA likes to think of James Webb as a successor to Hubble rather than a replacement, as the two will work in tandem for a while.
The Hubble telescope was launched on April 24, 1990, via the space shuttle Discovery from Kennedy Space Centre in Florida.
It circles the Earth at a speed of about 17,000mph (27,300kph) in low Earth orbit at about 340 miles in altitude.
This is because the planet's rotation has entered an unexpected period of acceleration, shaving a millisecond or so off the length of a solar day.
But what would happen if the world just kept getting faster?
Given that a blink takes 100 milliseconds, you are unlikely to notice any big changes for a long time.
However, scientists say that unchecked acceleration would eventually lead to disastrous consequences.
If Earth were spinning just 100 miles per hour faster than it does now, the world would be hit by stronger hurricanes, catastrophic flooding, and the collapse of satellite networks.
And, if the world were to double its speed, it would likely be the end of life as we know it.
As scientists reveal that the Earth's rotation has unexpectedly accelerated, experts explain what would happen if the world kept getting faster (stock image)
One mile per hour faster
On average, it takes the planet 24 hours, or 86,400 seconds, to complete one full rotation, which is called a solar day.
Because the Earth is a sphere, its circumference is smaller near the poles than at the equator, so the planet's surface moves faster the further you get from the poles.
Someone standing at the equator is rotating in space at around 1,037 mph (1,668 kmph) while somebody in London is only moving at about 646 mph (1,041 kmph).
Compared to these speeds, an increase of just one mile per hour might not seem like a big difference.
The days would be about a minute and a half shorter overall, which our body clocks probably wouldn't notice right away.
Witold Fraczek, an analyst at ESRI, a mapping software firm, told Popular Science: 'It might take a few years to notice it.'
Earth normally takes 24 hours, or exactly 86,400 seconds, to complete one full rotation, which is called a solar day. This means the equator is spinning at 1,037 mph (1,668 kmph)
What happens if the world spins faster
One mile per hour faster
- The days would be slightly shorter, and geosynchronous satellites might lose their position.
100 miles per hour faster
- Water would be pulled to the equator, flooding huge areas of land. At the same time, hurricanes would become stronger due to the Coriolis effect.
1,000 miles per hour faster or more
- The equator would be entirely submerged, except for the tallest mountains. Centrifugal forces would start to overwhelm gravity, causing weightlessness and catastrophic earthquakes.
However, an unexpected effect is that satellites in orbit would soon be knocked out of sync.
Some satellites are 'geosynchronous', meaning they move at the same speed as Earth's rotation to stay over the same location.
If the Earth speeds up, those satellites will lose their position and navigation, communication, and weather monitoring services would start to fail.
However, some satellites carry fuel to adjust their orbit, and others could be replaced, so the results should not be disastrous.
Mr Fraczek says: 'These could disturb the life and comfort of some people, but should not be catastrophic to anybody.
The bigger impact is that water would start to move from the poles to the equator due to the increased centrifugal forces.
Even at just one mile per hour, this would cause sea levels to rise by a few inches around the equator.
For cities already at or very near sea level, this could lead to devastating flooding.
If the Earth spun just one mile per hour faster, sea levels would rise by a few inches near the equator. This could lead to extensive flooding in low-lying cities such as New Orleans (AI impression)
100 miles per hour faster
If the Earth kept accelerating until it was moving 100 miles per hour faster at the equator, this would start to trigger seriously dangerous consequences.
Rather than rising by a few inches, these speeds would start to drown the equator as water rushed down from the poles.
Mr Fraczek says: 'I think the Amazon Basin, Northern Australia, and not to mention the islands in the equatorial region, they would all go under water.
'How deep underwater, I’m not sure, but I’d estimate about 30 to 65 feet.'
For anyone who survived the flooding, the world would start to become a much more hostile place.
The solar day would now only last 22 hours, knocking our circadian rhythms out of their natural balance.
The effect would be like setting your body clock back two hours every day without being given a chance to adjust.
At 100 miles per hour faster, cities in Northern Australia, such as Gold Coast (AI impression), would be completely submerged
This would be especially bad for southern cities in the US, which have already faced rapidly rising sea levels since 2010 (illustrated)
Could the world keep getting faster?
It is extremely unlikely that the world will start to spin faster.
In fact, the world is actually slowing down over time.
About 4.4 billion years ago, the planet was spinning so fast that days lasted four minutes.
But this slowed down after a large object hit Earth and created the moon.
The only way Earth could speed up is if a large object hits at just the right angle.
But this would likely liquify the planet's crust, so no humans would survive to see the results.
Studies have shown that changes like daylight saving lead to increased rates of heart attacks, strokes, and driving accidents - this would be even more severe.
Additionally, Earth's weather would start to become more extreme.
NASA astronomer Dr Sten Odenwald says: 'Temperature difference is still going to be the main driver of winds.
However, at these speeds, Dr Odenwald says that 'hurricanes will spin faster, and there will be more energy in them.'
This is due to something called the Coriolis effect, which gives hurricanes their rotational energy.
If the Earth didn't spin, winds would blow down from the North Pole to the equator in a straight line. But as the Earth rotates, the wind becomes deflected eastward, and this is what gives a hurricane its spin.
If the world starts to spin faster, the winds would be deflected more, and the Coriolis effect would become stronger.
Dr Odenwald says: 'That effectively makes the rotation more severe.'
As the Earth spins faster, hurricanes would spin more rapidly and contain more power due to the Coriolis effect
1,000 miles per hour faster or more
At 1,000 miles per hour faster, Earth would be rotating roughly twice as fast as it does today, with disastrous consequences.
Mr Fraczek says: 'It would clearly be a disaster.'
The centrifugal forces would pull hundreds of feet of water towards the equator.
'Except for the highest mountains, such as Kilimanjaro or the highest summits of the Andes, I think everything in the equatorial region would be covered with water,' says Mr Fraczek.
At 1,000 miles per hour faster, the centrifugal forces generated by spinning would also be much stronger.
This would make it easier for water to escape the force of gravity and evaporate up into the atmosphere.
The already flooded regions of the equator would experience near-constant rain and would be constantly shrouded in fog and mist.
At around 24,000 miles per hour (38,600 kmph), the tectonic plates would be forced towards the equator as the planet flattens out. This would lead to devastating earthquakes (stock image)
At really extreme speeds of around 17,000 miles per hour (27,350 kmph), 17 times faster than normal, the centrifugal forces would be powerful enough to overwhelm gravity.
Anyone at the equator would become weightless as centrifugal force counteracted gravity, and you might even start to get 'reverse rain' as water falls up into the atmosphere.
However, it is unlikely that there would be anyone around to see this since the equator would have long since become uninhabitable.
Mr Franczek says: 'If those few miserable humans would still be alive after most of Earth’s water had been transferred to the atmosphere and beyond, they would clearly want to run out of the equator area as soon as possible.'
Finally, once the planet started to reach speeds of about 24,000 miles per hour (38,600 kmph) at the equator, life as we know it would pretty much be over.
The centrifugal forces would now be so strong that they would start to flatten out the Earth like a spinning ball of clay.
The tectonic plates would shift and the Earth's crust would crack, leading to catastrophic results.
Mr Franczek says: 'We would have enormous earthquakes. The tectonic plates would move quickly and that would be disastrous to life on the globe.'
Mysterieus interstellair object 3I/Atlas mogelijk oudste komeet ooit waargenomen (en ouder dan ons zonnestelsel)
Mysterieus interstellair object 3I/Atlas mogelijk oudste komeet ooit waargenomen (en ouder dan ons zonnestelsel)
Artikel door Michaël Torfs
Een interstellair object is een object dat niet uit ons zonnestelsel komt, maar uit een ander sterrenstelsel. De mysterieuze, opvallende bezoeker in ons zonnestelsel werd begin juli gespot door de Atlas-telescoop in Chili. Op dat moment zou het object ongeveer 670 miljoen kilometer van de zon verwijderd zijn geweest.
Het is pas het derde interstellair object dat ooit is waargenomen. De komeet werd '3I/ATLAS' gedoopt en wordt met argusogen gevolgd door sterrenkundigen. Mogelijk is hij zowat 3 miljard ouder dan ons zonnestelsel, laten wetenschappers van Oxford nu weten. De komeet zou zo mogelijk 7,5 miljard jaar oud zijn.
"Het object komt uit een sterrenstelsel dat we nog nooit van dichtbij hebben gezien", vertelt professor Chris Lintott aan de BBC. "We denken dat de kans 2 op de 3 is dat het ouder is dan ons eigen zonnestelsel." Dat is ongeveer 4,5 miljard jaar oud.
Astronoom Matthew Hopkins had net een doctoraatsstudie afgerond over interstellaire objecten. Hij verdiepte zich meteen in het analyseren van de nieuwste bezoeker.
"3I vliegt sneller dan zijn 2 voorgangers, met ongeveer 60 kilometer per seconde. Dat is binnen de grens van wat we verwachten", schrijft hij daarover op de website van de universiteit van Oxford.
Ontstaan in de 'dikke schijf'
Hopkins denkt dat de komeet ontstaan is in het melkwegstelsel. Dat zou gebeurd zijn in de zogenoemde 'dikke schijf', een groep met bijzonder oude sterren die een belangrijk onderdeel vormt van de Melkweg. Het gaat om een groep sterren die zich bevinden rond de 'dunne schijf', waar de zon deel van uitmaakt.
"Om die reden is het zeer waarschijnlijk dat 3I de eerste kans is om een object te bestuderen dat in een volledig ander deel van de ruimte is gevormd", is Hopkins enthousiast.
IJswater
3I/Atlas zou zich gevormd hebben rond een oude ster en veel ijswater bevatten. Wanneer de komeet later dit jaar dichter bij de zon komt, zal hij opgewarmd worden en veel stoom en damp verliezen.
Volgens astronomen zou hij dan een oplichtende staart kunnen vertonen. Later dit jaar zou de komeet overigens zichtbaar moeten zijn vanaf de aarde met amateurtelescopen.
De vermoedelijke koers van de interstellaire bezoeker: hij blijft uit de buurt van de aarde.
Schematic of the Chinese Mars Sample Return mission, where the lander will drill 2 metres deep to collect the samples and scoop the surface materials with a robotic arm and drone. Credit: HKU
Was there once life on Mars? That question has been the subject of ongoing exploration and research for more than half a century, and is closely tied to questions about how and when life emerged on Earth. At present, there are six active missions exploring the Red Planet for possible evidence of past life (and possibly present), including NASA's Perseverancerover, the Curiosity rover, and the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO), the UAE's Hope orbiter, the ESA'sExoMars Trace Gas Orbiter(TGO), and China's Tianwen-1orbiter and rover. In the near future, they will be joined by Tianwen-3, a sample-return mission consisting of two spacecraft.
Similar to the NASA/ESA Mars Sample Return (MSR) mission architecture, the mission will include a lander/ascent vehicle to obtain the samples and an Orbiter/Earth-return element to bring them back to Earth. In recent news, the University of Hong Kong (HKU) announced that the scientific team will include Professor Yiliang Li, an astrobiologist from the Department of Earth Sciences. Li will be leading an HKU group responsible for selecting the mission's landing site: a region where liquid water once flowed and there's an abundance of materials that are likely to preserve evidence of past (or present) life.
The roadmap of the Chinese Mars Sample Return mission, which will be launched in 2028.
Credit: Hou, et al. (2025)
The search for evidence of life on Mars began with NASA's Viking 1 and 2 missions, consisting of an orbiter and lander element. The two landers set down in Chryse Planitia and Utopia Planitia, respectively, both of which are located in the Northern Lowlands. This region is believed to have once been a global ocean that spanned Mars' northern hemisphere, making it a promising location for NASA scientists to search for biosignatures. While the results were inconclusive, the search continues and has been bolstered by the arrival of missions like Pathfinder, Spirit and Opportunity,Curiosity, and Perseverance.
Astrobiological research has also benefited from recent discoveries made here on Earth. Based on the most recent fossilized evidence, scientists theorize that life emerged in Earth's oceans during the Archean Eon (ca. 4 billion years ago). Several lines of evidence also indicate that the evolution of microbial life during the first billion years was pivotal to Earth becoming a habitable planet. During Mars' Noachian Period (ca. 4.1 - 3.7 billion years ago), conditions were similar to Earth's, including a denser atmosphere, flowing water on the surface, and active volcanism. In other words, Mars had an environment favorable to the emergence of life while life was gaining a foothold on Earth.
To investigate this further, scientists hope to obtain samples from areas rich in hydrated minerals (which are essential to life) and where microbial activity could potentially be preserved for billions of years. As such, site selection is a crucial first step to any sample return mission, the protocol and strategy of which is detailed in the team's paper. Also described are the scientific payloads and the methods used to detect potential biosignatures in the returned samples. These samples will be extracted from a drill depth of 2 meters (~6.5 feet), which is critical since organic materials are safe from radiation and toxic perchlorites at this depth.
In accordance with the Committee on Space Research (COSPAR) Planetary Protection Policy, the team also recommends establishing a Mars Sample Laboratory on the outskirts of Hefei, a major hub for scientific research where many of China's leading research institutes are located. The laboratory will be equipped with the necessary scientific instruments to conduct a comprehensive analysis of the returned Mars samples while ensuring that they are safely contained to prevent exobiological contamination. If and when the samples are determined to contain no active biological agents, they will be released to designated laboratories for further detailed analyses.
The rover Zhurong, depicted in the image, became China's first rover to successfully land on the Martian surface in 2021.
Credit: CNSA
Due to the cancellation of the MSR mission, China is now poised to be the first country to return samples from Mars that could contain organic matter (and maybe even lifeforms!) The Tianwen-3 mission will build on the success of Tianwen-1, which successfully established orbit, landed on the surface, and deployed the Zhurong rover on Mars in 2021. In the process, China became the first nation to accomplish all three goals in a single mission, something the country hopes to do again in 2028. The CNSA released an Announcement of Opportunities (AO) on March 11th, which opened the mission to international collaboration.
The final selection of collaborators is scheduled for October 2025, and flight models of selected payloads are to be delivered in 2027. If everything goes according to plan, the samples will be returned to Earth by 2031.
An artist’s impression of the Robert C. Byrd Green Bank Telescope receiving signals from space. Credit: Danielle Futselaar/Breakthrough Listen.
We live in an exciting time of technological innovation and breakthroughs in astronomy, cosmology, and astrophysics. This is similarly true for the Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence (SETI), which seeks to leverage advances in instrumentation and computing to find evidence of "technosignatures" in the Universe. While the scope has expanded considerably since Cornell Professor Frank Drake and colleagues conducted the first SETI experiment over sixty years ago (Project Ozma), the vast majority have consisted of listening to space for signs of possible radio transmissions.
A prime example is Breakthrough Listen (BL), a project launched by Breakthrough Initiatives in 2016 and the largest SETI experiment ever mounted. BI combines radio observations from the Green Bank Observatory and the Parkes Observatory with visible light observations from the Automated Planet Finder. In a recent study, an international team of astronomers examined 27 exoplanets selected from the Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite (TESS) archive and examined them for signs of artificial radio signals that went silent as they passed behind their stars.
The field of SETI has grown considerably in the past six decades, reflecting our expanding knowledge of the cosmos and astrophysical phenomena. Per the NASA Technosignature Report (released in 2018), the list of potential technosignatures includes gravitational waves (GWs), neutrinos, directed energy (optical communications or propulsion), and more. Nevertheless, surveys in the radio spectrum are still at the forefront of SETI investigations because the technology has a proven track record as a cost-effective means of communication. Moreover, radio waves are easily detected since they experience minimal scattering as they pass through planetary atmospheres and the interstellar medium (ISM).
The field has also been bolstered by the spate of exoplanet discoveries that have taken place in the past twenty years. To date, more than 5,900 exoplanets have been confirmed in over 4,400 planetary systems, with thousands more awaiting confirmation. For their study, the team carefully selected a frequency band of radio data from a large set of observations made by BI from 2018 to 2022. The team ensured that these observations' field of view (FoV) corresponded to a selection of 27 confirmed and candidate exoplanets detected by NASA's Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite (TESS).
Specifically, the team looked for indications of potential radio signals that were interrupted as these planets passed behind their respective stars (occulted). As Barrett told Universe Today via email:
Occultations could provide a unique opportunity to search for and localise technosignatures. Hypothetically, if a transmitting exoplanet were to pass behind its host star, the signal should be interrupted, resuming when it re-emerges. A signal could thus potentially be isolated from the surrounding noise and RFI by subtracting emission received from the system during eclipse from emission during transit. This concept will be explored in future works.
Using occultations to detect and confirm targets for SETI technosignature searchers has gained popularity in the last decade. However, the focus has been on planet-planet occultation and signal spillover, whereas Barrett and her colleagues explored planet-star occultation. Their work was based on Barrett's 2023 Master's thesis, which established the first limits using targets of interest (TOIs) designated by TESS. Unfortunately, all 27 TOIs were attributed to radio frequency interference (RFI), ruling out the possibility of technological activity.
Murriyang, CSIRO's Parkes radio telescope at the Parkes Observatory.
Nevertheless, this study is the first case where planet-star occultations were used for technosignature searches and will serve as a benchmark for similar SETI surveys in the near future. Said Barrett:
I personally plan to commence a PhD in 2026, where I hope to continue developing tools that will aid in the search for intelligent life. I was very fortunate to work alongside some of the leading experts in the field during this project, and will undoubtedly do so again in the future! I would hope that this work could inspire further SETI investigations toward exoplanets during occultation and help spur the development of an efficient method for isolating unique emissions that could be applied as a background check in mainstream transiting exoplanet surveys.
The preprint of their paper was published online by the University of Cambridge Press and is being reviewed by the Publications of the Astronomical Society of Australia.
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Ik ben Pieter, en gebruik soms ook wel de schuilnaam Peter2011.
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