It’s the first spacecraft ever to use the Earth and the Moon for a gravitational slingshot, and it captured some images to share with us.

JUICE stands for Jupiter Icy Moons Explorer, and it’s on a mission to study three moons with suspected oceans buried under layers of ice. It’s got a long way to go, and on long-duration missions, economical use of propellant is critical. This Earth-lunar slingshot maneuver is all about saving propellant.

“The gravity assist flyby was flawless, everything went without a hitch, and we were thrilled to see Juice coming back so close to Earth,” says Ignacio Tanco, Spacecraft Operations Manager for the mission.

At its closest approach to Earth, JUICE passed overhead of Southeast Asia and the Pacific Ocean at only 6840 km (4250 miles) altitude. It was a risky maneuver but one that saved the mission between 100 and 150 kg of propellant.

This lunar-Earth flyby isn’t JUICE’s only gravity-assist maneuver. Next August, it will slingshot past Venus, and on September 26th and January 2029, it will slingshot past Earth. All these gravity-assist maneuvers will give JUICE momentum for its journey to Jupiter. JUICE will reach Jupiter in 2031, and because of all of these maneuvers it will have more propellant left when it gets there.

“Thanks to very precise navigation by ESA’s Flight Dynamics team, we managed to use only a tiny fraction of the propellant reserved for this flyby. This will add to the margins we keep for a rainy day, or to extend the science mission once we get to Jupiter,” said Ignacio Tanco, Spacecraft Operations Manager for the JUICE mission.

Modern orbiters bristle with science instruments, antennae, and cameras. JUICE is no exception. Among all its instruments and science cameras, it carries two monitoring cameras called JMCs, or JUICE Monitoring Cameras. They’re 1024×1024 pixel cameras with different fields of view. Their job is to monitor the spacecraft’s booms and antennae, and their job was especially critical when they were deployed after launch.

During the flyby, JUICE used its JMCs to capture images of the Earth and the Moon.

It also used eight of its ten instruments to collect scientific data from Earth and all ten for the Moon.

“The timing and location of this double flyby allows us to thoroughly study the behaviour of Juice’s instruments,” explains Claire Vallat, Juice Operations Scientist.

JUICE’s main science camera is JANUS, a high-resolution optical camera. Its role is to capture detailed images of the surface of Ganymede, Callisto, and Europa. The JUICE team used JANUS to capture more than 400 preliminary views of the Earth and the Moon.

“After more than 12 years of work to propose, build and verify the instrument, this is the first opportunity to see first-hand data similar to those we will acquire in the Jupiter system starting in 2031,” says Pasquale Palumbo, a researcher at INAF in Rome and principal investigator of the team that designed, tested and calibrated the Janus camera.

“Even though the flyby was planned exclusively to facilitate the interplanetary journey to Jupiter, all the instruments on board the probe took advantage of the passage near the Moon and Earth to acquire data, test operations and processing techniques with the advantage of already knowing what we were observing,” said Palumbo.

These early-mission images are whetting our appetite for when the real fun starts in seven years. JUICE will reach the Jovian system in July 2031 and will do 35 flybys of the gas giant’s icy moons. Then, in December 2034, it will enter orbit around Ganymede.

There is growing evidence that Europa, Ganymede, and Callisto have warm, salty oceans buried under thick layers of ice. These are prime targets in our search for life. But, maddeningly, we don’t know for sure if they could support life or even if the oceans are real.

Hopefully, JUICE can tell us. But it can’t do that without these risky, early-mission maneuvers.

{ https://www.universetoday.com/ }

27-08-2024 om 00:48 geschreven door peter  

A ‘Speckling of Stars’ At the Edge of the Milky Way Is Still Puzzling Astronomers

Leo A is small, dim and young.

by Doris Elín Urrutia

 

NASA, ESA, A. del Pino Molina (CEFCA), K. Gilbert and R. van der Marel (STScI), A. Cole (University of Tasmania);

Image Processing: Gladys Kober (NASA/Catholic University of America)

This “speckling of stars,” the European Space Agency wrote in 2016, forms a single entity. “The relatively open distribution of stars in this diminutive galaxy allows light from distant background galaxies to shine through,” NASA Goddard Space Flight Center officials wrote in Thursday’s image description.

This image comes from data Hubble took during four observation programs. Three of these looked at star formation and its history, in relatively nearby dwarf galaxies, including Leo A.

Although sparsely populated, Leo A’s stars have an order. They make a spherical shape in space. A pattern also emerged when astronomers peered at their ages.

The recent Hubble observations have revealed that Leo A’s younger stars are located in the middle, and they are older the farther they are from the dwarf galaxy’s center. This could offer clues about how galaxies evolve.

Perhaps stars formed from “the outside-in,” NASA wrote. Or, perhaps, older stars migrated towards the edges of Leo A.

But older is a relative term. According to NASA, “around 90 percent of the stars in Leo A are less than eight billion years old — young in cosmic terms!” Astronomers are puzzled about why this small galaxy, one of the most isolated galaxies in our local group of galaxies, didn’t form stars on a “usual” timescale.

“Instead,” NASA says, Leo A “waited until it was good and ready.”

{ https://www.inverse.com/ )

26-08-2024 om 20:51 geschreven door peter  

NASA’s Stranded Astronauts Have Another Major Problem — This Time With Their Spacesuits

The Boeing Starliner saga continues.

by Doris Elín Urrutia

 

Joe Raedle/Getty Images

If an emergency happens on the International Space Station (ISS) sometime in the next six weeks, NASA astronauts Butch Wilmore and Suni Williams may have to flee without the added safety of in-flight spacesuits.

At a media teleconference NASA held on August 14, agency officials said the spacesuits that Williams and Wilmore wore inside the Boeing Starliner are not compatible with other spacecraft.

This complicates NASA’s decision on whether the astronauts should fly home aboard Starliner or on a SpaceX vehicle. Starliner encountered technical problems shortly after it brought Wilmore and Williams into low-Earth orbit almost three months ago. If teams deem Starliner unfit to carry them back, they’d likely come home on a SpaceX Dragon capsule.

The Dragon of the Crew-8 mission is in space now, but it is the contingency plan for Wilmore and Williams if Starliner isn’t suitable to carry them home, NASA officials said. To complicate matters, there aren't any spare SpaceX suits. Those arrive no earlier than September 24, when the Dragon of Crew-9 launches towards the ISS with two empty seats and two extra spacesuits.

If Starliner flies home uncrewed, and their Dragon Crew-9 rescue vessel hasn’t yet reached the station with its specific spacesuits in tow, Wilmore and Williams would have no choice but to enter the Crew-8 Dragon without spacesuits in an emergency situation.

That is, unless NASA decides Starliner will return with its crew after all. The space agency is expected to make a final decision about Starliner coming back to Earth empty, or with Wilmore and Williams inside, by the end of this month.

Why do spacesuits differ?

Onboard the orbiting laboratory, a spacesuit is not necessary. Regular clothing or a uniform suffices.

When astronauts make repairs outside the station, they wear extravehicular spacesuits to remain alive and tethered to the station during their spacewalk.

Another type of spacesuit is used when launching up towards the station, aborting a flight or landing back to Earth. These are sometimes referred to as intravehicular spacesuits — and they’re tailor-designed for the spacecraft the astronauts are riding. These indoor spacesuits provide an extra layer of protection. They’re an additional buffer from the potentially hazardous launch or reentry environments around them.

Why would Starliner undock without Wilmore and Williams?

Starliner suffered helium leaks and thruster anomalies not long after launching on June 5. Since the technical dilemmas began, the aerospace giant and the space agency continue to pore over data from a slew of tests to determine if Starliner will return to Earth with its test pilots onboard.

Although designed originally as an eight-day mission, their trip has now entered its 12th week.

{ https://www.inverse.com/ )

26-08-2024 om 20:44 geschreven door peter  

The two NASA astronauts stuck aboard the International Space Station (ISS), Butch Wilmore and Suni Williams, won’t be coming home anytime soon. During a press conference at the Kennedy Space Center on Saturday, Aug. 24, NASA administrator Bill Nelson announced that the space agency was giving up on the idea of bringing Wilmore and Williams home aboard their balky Boeing Starliner spacecraft—which has been experiencing thruster problems since its launch on June 5. Instead, the Starliner will be flown home uncrewed, and Wilmore and Williams will hitch a ride back to Earth aboard a SpaceX Crew Dragon spacecraft, which will launch to the ISS in September for a five-month station stay, returning in February. This extends what was supposed to be an eight-day ISS rotation for Wilmore and Williams to a whopping eight months.

“NASA has worked very hard with Boeing to reach this decision,” Nelson said. “The decision is a result of a commitment to safety.”

The ruling rested on what NASA calls a flight readiness review (FRR). As agency brass explained at an Aug. 14 news conference, FRR’s are typically held before launch, when officials gather for a final go or no-go on the planned mission.

“We bring in representatives from all of the related centers, the technical authorities, the NASA engineering, and safety center flight operations,” explained Ken Bowersox, a former astronaut and an associate administrator for NASA’s space operations mission directorate. “We listen to the status of the mission, go through some special topics, and then we poll everybody at the end on whether or not they think we're ready to undertake the mission.”

On one occasion, that panel’s decision led to disaster. The FRR for the final mission of the space shuttle Challenger was held on Jan. 15, 1986, and the ship was cleared to launch. Thirteen days later, on Jan. 28, that liftoff took place, ending in a fuel tank explosion and the death of all seven crew members just 73 seconds after the ship left the pad. That tragedy, followed by the breakup of the shuttle Columbia and a similar loss of all hands on Feb. 1, 2003, left NASA much more risk-averse than it had been before.

Read More: 

• The Polaris Dawn Mission Opens a New Chapter in Private Space Flight

“We did not have the governance structure that we have today with technical authorities,” said Russ DeLoach, chief of NASA safety and mission assurance, during the earlier press conference. “So at that time, the program managers pretty much had near-unilateral decision making. And so if there were views that maybe a path we were taking was not correct, there was really no strong additional authority to step in and say, ‘Wait a minute.’”

That additional authority exists today, in the form of FRRs that take place mid-mission—though they often go by a different name: a mission risk acceptance forum. Whatever they’re called, the official panels are intended to bring the scrutiny of an FRR to bear at any point between the time a crew leaves the ground and the time they return to Earth. For the past several weeks, NASA has been under the gun to make such a decision about the hobbled Starliner—and to do it fast. The spacecraft’s batteries have a limited lifespan, and if the ship was not deemed fit to carry the crew home, it would have to fly back empty soon.

The FRR that resulted in the decision not to bring Wilmore and Williams home on the Boeing Starliner spacecraft was held on Aug. 23, and Nelson was very much in the loop. If there are dissenting opinions during the review, the decision goes first to Jim Free, NASA associate administrator. After him, Nelson could step in, and clearly he did.

Ahead of the decision being finalized, it was still possible that NASA could surprise the public—not to mention Wilmore and Williams—and announce that the stranded astronauts would be flying their dodgy Starliner home. But that was never likely. NASA’s institutional sorrow runs deep—back far before the Challenger and Columbia disasters, to the Jan. 27, 1967, launch pad fire that claimed the lives of astronauts Gus Grissom, Ed White, and Roger Chaffee, when they were conducting a dress rehearsal for the launch of their Apollo 1 spacecraft. Shortly after that tragedy, legendary flight director Gene Kranz gathered the grieving NASA staffers together for a grim but bracing post-mortem.

Read More: 

• Fly Me to the Moon Is a Lighthearted Conspiracy Romp. But It Speaks to a Spiritual Sickness

“From this day forward, flight control will be known by two words: Tough and competent,” Kranz said, chalking the words on a blackboard. “Tough means we are forever accountable for what we do or what we fail to do. We will never again compromise our responsibilities. Competent means we will never take anything for granted. Mission Control will be perfect. When you leave this meeting today you will go to your office and the first thing you will do there is to write ‘tough and competent’ on your blackboards. It will never be erased. Each day when you enter the room, these words will remind you of the price paid by Grissom, White, and Chaffee. These words are the price of admission to the ranks of Mission Control.”

That price still stands. NASA could have decided to spare Boeing the embarrassment of flying their Starliner home empty, and Wilmore and Williams the ordeal of spending six more months in space, but that’s not the route the agency chose. Astronaut lives are on the line. A chastened NASA chose not to risk them again.

• Write to Jeffrey Kluger at jeffrey.kluger@time.com.

{ https://www.msn.com/en-us/channel/ }

25-08-2024 om 21:34 geschreven door peter  

Once astronomers began to map deep into the universe, however, the cosmic web could not be ignored. While some galaxies found their homes in the clusters, most inhabited long, thin filaments and broad walls. This cosmic web was defined by the voids, the vast regions of almost-nothing that dominate the volume of the universe.

The largest portions of the cosmic web are the superclusters. But unlike the clusters, they are not gravitationally bound. That means that the member galaxies in a supercluster have not yet finished their building project. The superclusters are still in the process of forming. This fact makes it difficult to pick out exactly what a supercluster is.

Recently astronomers have turned to dynamical definitions of a supercluster. This means that they don’t just consider the position in space of a particular galaxy, but also its movement. Since superclusters are in the process of continual construction, this method looks at what galaxies are trying to build.

This method allows astronomers to distinguish one supercluster from another, and that’s how we’ve recognized that the Virgo supercluster is just one individual branch of a much larger structure known as Laniakea, which contains an astounding 100,000 galaxies. And that is our home in the universe.

{ https://www.universetoday.com/ }

25-08-2024 om 21:10 geschreven door peter  

Ever since the Apollo missions brought samples of lunar rocks and soil back to Earth for analysis, scientists have known that there is abundant water on the Moon. These findings were confirmed by several subsequent robotic sample-return missions, including China’s Chang’e-5 mission. However, much of this water consists of hydroxyl (OH) created through the interaction of solar wind (ionized hydrogen) and elemental oxygen in the regolith. There is also plenty of water in the form of ice that can be found in permanent shadowed regions (PSRs), such as the craters that cover the South Pole-Aitken Basin.

Unfortunately, lunar regolith contains very little hydroxyl that can be converted into water, ranging from 0.0001% to 0.02%. Moreover, the icy patches found in cratered regions are mixed with regolith, forming layers that extend beneath the surface. As such, extraction is a challenge regardless of where the water is coming from. After they examined the samples returned by the Chang’e-5 mission, the team led by Wang determined that the highest concentrations of water were contained in ilmenite (FeTiO₃), a titanium-iron oxide mineral found in lunar regolith.

According to the research team, this is due to “its unique lattice structure with sub-nanometer tunnels.” The team then conducted a series of in-situ heating experiments that revealed how hydrogen in lunar minerals could be used to produce water on the Moon. According to their study, the process consists of heating lunar regolith to temperatures exceeding 1,200 K (~930° C; 1700° F) with concave mirrors. This led to the formation of iron crystals and water bubbles in the material, the latter being released as water vapor. The chemical process is expressed mathematically as:

FeO/Fe₂O₃ + H –> Fe + H₂O.

The resulting water vapor is then reclaimed at a rate of 51-76 mg of water for every gram of lunar soil. That works out to 50 liters (13.2 gallons) of water for every ton of processed regolith, enough to sustain 50 people daily. As the team noted in their paper, “[t]his amount is ~10,000 times the naturally occurring hydroxyl (OH) and H₂O on the Moon.” In addition to drinking water, this process could provide the necessary irrigation water for growing crops, another important task for future lunar settlements to lessen their dependence on Earth.

This same process could be used to chemically separate hydrogen and oxygen gas from regolith, which could then be fashioned into propellant – liquid hydrogen (LH₂) and liquid oxygen (LOX) – or used as fuel and for maintaining supplies of breathable oxygen. “Our findings suggest that the hydrogen retained in [lunar regolith] is a significant resource for obtaining H2O on the Moon, which is helpful for establishing scientific research stations on the Moon,” they conclude.

Another benefit is that the process is driven almost entirely by focused sunlight, while solar arrays can provide the additional power that drives the retention process. The one limiting factor is that this process will only be possible during a lunar day in the southern polar region (where China, NASA, and the ESA plan to build their bases). This means that the facility could run for two weeks straight, followed by a two-week lull.

However, this can be mitigated by stationing processing facilities away from the polar regions or possibly creating a network of solar mirrors or satellites that can direct light toward the southern polar region. In any case, this method presents a potential means of harvesting water on the Moon that is cost-effective compared to heating regolith in industrial furnaces and could be paired with ice extraction and processing to ensure future settlements have plenty of water.

Further Reading: 

• NIMTE, 
• The Innovation

{ https://www.universetoday.com/ }

25-08-2024 om 21:04 geschreven door peter  

Super-Earths and Sub-Neptunes Contain Much More Water than Previously Thought

Water is an important component of exoplanets, with its distribution, that is, whether at the surface or deep inside, fundamentally influencing the planetary properties. According to new research, for Earth-size planets and planets more massive than 6 times the mass of Earth, the majority of water resides deep in the cores of planets.

The majority of water can be stored deep within the exoplanet’s core and mantle, and not at the surface.

Image credit: Sci.News.

“Most of the exoplanets known today are located close to their star,” said ETH Zurich’s Professor Caroline Dorn.

“This means they primarily comprise hot worlds of oceans of molten magma that have not yet cooled to form a solid mantle of silicate bedrock like the Earth.”

“Water dissolves very well in these magma oceans — unlike, for instance, carbon dioxide, which quickly outgasses and rises into the atmosphere.”

“The iron core is located beneath the molten mantle of silicates. So how is the water distributed between the silicates and the iron?”

“The iron core takes time to develop. A large share of the iron is initially contained in the hot magma soup in the form of droplets.”

“The water sequestered in this soup combines with these iron droplets and sinks with them to the core. The iron droplets behave like a lift that is conveyed downwards by the water.”

Until now this behavior had only been known to be the case for moderate pressures of the sort that also prevail in the Earth.

It was not known what happens in the case of larger planets with higher pressure interior conditions.

“This is one of the key results of our study,” Professor Dorn said.

“The larger the planet and the greater its mass, the more the water tends to go with the iron droplets and become integrated in the core.”

“Under certain circumstances, iron can absorb up to 70 times more water than silicates.”

“However, owing to the enormous pressure at the core, the water no longer takes the form of water molecules but is present in hydrogen and oxygen.”

This study was triggered by investigations of the Earth’s water content, which yielded a surprising result four years ago: the oceans on the Earth’s surface only contain a small fraction of our planet’s overall water.

The content of more than 80 of the Earth’s oceans could be hidden in its interior.

This is shown by simulations calculating how water behaves under conditions of the kind that prevailed when the Earth was young. Experiments and seismological measurements are accordingly compatible.

The new findings concerning the distribution of water in planets have dramatic consequences for the interpretation of astronomical observation data.

Using their telescopes in space and on the Earth, astronomers can under certain conditions measure the weight and size of an exoplanet.

They use these calculations to draw up mass-radius diagrams that permit conclusions to be drawn about the planet’s composition.

“If in doing so — as has been the case so far — the solubility and distribution of water are ignored, the volume of water can be dramatically underestimated by up to ten times,” Professor Dorn said.

“Planets are much more water-abundant than previously assumed.”

Water distribution is also important if we wish to understand how planets form and develop. The water that has sunk to the core remains trapped there forever.

However, the water dissolved in the magma ocean of the mantle can degas and rise to the surface during mantle cooling.

“So if we find water in a planet’s atmosphere, there is probably a great deal more in its interior,” Professor Dorn said.

Water is one of the preconditions for life to develop. There has long been speculation about the potential habitability of water-rich super-Earths.

Then calculations suggested that too much water could be hostile to life. The argument was that in these water worlds a layer of exotic high-pressure ice would prevent the exchange of vital substances at the interface between the ocean and the planet’s mantle.

The current study reaches a different conclusion: planets with deep water layers are likely to be a rare occurrence as most of the water on super-Earths is not located on the surface, as has been assumed until now, but is trapped within the core.

This leads the astronomers to assume that even planets with a relatively high water content could have the potential to develop Earth-like habitable conditions.

“Their study thus casts a new light on the potential existence of water-abundant worlds that could support life,” the authors said.

• The study was published in the journal Nature Astronomy.
• H. Luo et al. The interior as the dominant water reservoir in super-Earths and sub-Neptunes. Nat Astron, published online August 20, 2024; doi: 10.1038/s41550-024-02347-z

{ https://www.sci.news/ }

24-08-2024 om 17:57 geschreven door peter  

• READ MORE:  Only people with high IQ can solve stargazer test in 30 seconds

By Nikki Main Science Reporter For Dailymail.Com

An eye-popping video of seven suns taken from a hospital in China has captured the attention and baffled viewers around the world.

A woman was recording the sun’s descent over the horizon when something spectacular occurred - the image showed more than one sun in the sky.

However, the minute-long video which seemed like a cosmic miracle was actually an optical illusion created by the glass window through which it was filmed.

The phenomenon was caused by the light refracting through the window’s layered glass.

A woman in China captured an image of what appeared to be seven suns in the sky. The image was caused by refracted light through the paned glass window

The video was captured from the 11th floor of a hospital in Chengdu, China southwest of Sichuan on August 18, showing the sun duplicated with varying levels of intensity.

The woman who reportedly captured the video, known as Wang, said viewers were transfixed by the surreal display, according to Jam Press, as many have offered theories about how the phenomenon occurred.

‘This happened because of a magnetic field glitch that made parallel universes visibly manifest,’ one person wrote on the Chinese social media platform Weibo.

‘The Cosmic Bureau has fixed the issue, and those responsible have been reprimanded,’ they added.

Read More

• NASA's James Webb snaps two galaxies coming together to form image of a beloved animal 

Others argued on Reddit that the fragmented suns were a sign of ‘immense pollution’ in China and another person wrote: ‘The truth about global warming has finally been revealed.

Meanwhile, one person simply joked: ‘Will the real Sun shady please rise up?’ in a nod to rapper Eminem’s famed hit ‘The Real Slim Shady.’

However, one commenter did correctly address the question of how a video showed seven suns, writing: ‘This is caused by the reflection/refraction in glass in a multi-pane window. Light from the sun bounces between layers causing the distinct visual separation of the reflections.’

Similar to how you would see a reflection in a mirror, the light refracted and reflected off the layered glass, with each layer creating another copy of the image.

Except for the brightest sun in the center, which is the real one, the others are part of the optical illusion.

Although there is a scientific explanation for the seven suns, some people still preferred to believe that the spectacle fell under the story of Hou Yi.

In Chinese mythology, Hou Yi was portrayed as the god of archery who was sent from the Heavens to help humans.

He is said to have stopped 10 suns from burning up the earth and according to the tale, shot them down with his magic bows and arrows.

The tenth sun begged for its life and agreed to separate the day from the night as punishment for attempting to burn up the earth.

{ https://www.dailymail.co.uk/ }

24-08-2024 om 17:22 geschreven door peter  

Scientists analyse the famous 'WOW!' signal first detected in 1977 - and finally reveal the truth about the mysterious flash

• Scientists have new found evidence that the signal was not sent by aliens
• The signal could have been caused by a natural microwave laser hitting Earth  

By Wiliam Hunter

In 1977, the Ohio State University's Big Ear radio telescope captured a signal from space so strange that scientists are still baffled by it almost 50 years later.

For decades, scientists have struggled to find any natural process capable of producing the 72-second burst which prompted astronomer Jerry Ehman to write 'WOW!' on the telescope's readout.

Now, new analysis of the so-called WOW! signal has revealed that it might have been caused by a hugely powerful laser slamming into Earth.

Experts say this was not the first salvo of an alien invasion, but rather the entirely natural product of a rare alignment between a collapsed star and a cloud of cool hydrogen.

Unfortunately for alien-hunters, scientists from the University of Puerto Rico at Arecibo say this new evidence shows that the WOW! signal is not evidence of life beyond Earth.

For decades, scientists have struggled to find any natural process capable of producing the 72-second burst which prompted astronomer Jerry Ehman to write 'WOW!' on the telescope's readout

What are the theories to explain the WOW! signal?

There have been many theories over the years for what could have been the source for the short-lived, narrow band radio signal that became known as the Wow! signal.

At the time, it was seen has having all the traits of having come from a distant planet, but the inability to pick it up again has frustrated astronomers.

While some have taken it to be a radio message broadcast by an alien beacon into space, others have looked for other astronomical sources. 

Theories have included collisions between asteroids and stars, flares from stars, merging white dwarfs and colliding neutron stars. 

Now, experts suggest that it could have been caused by energy from a neutron star trigger a cloud of atomic hydrogen gas to release a laser burst. 

When the WOW! signal hit Earth, many scientists put forward the idea that this could have been the first 'hello' from a distant alien civilisation.

The signal was not only uniquely powerful but also arrived in an unusually narrow band of frequencies around 1420 MHz - similar to those produced by atomic hydrogen.

Since hydrogen is so abundant in the universe, some suggested that advanced civilisations might be using its frequency as a calling card for signalling to other intelligent species.

Other natural explanations for the signature have been proposed, such as passing comets releasing clouds of gas.

In the absence of any good natural explanation, the idea that the WOW! signal was a 'technosignature' from another world became widespread.

Now, Professor Abel Méndez and his colleagues believe they have identified a series of similar signals which could explain the WOW! signal's origin.

The made the discovery by combing through the archives of the now-collapsed Arecibo Observatory's Radio Emissions from Red Dwarf Stars (REDS) project.

Since this telescope had a similar experimental set-up to the Big Ear radio telescope, he hoped that it would be able to reveal if anything like the WOW! signal had ever been spotted.

The researchers spotted several signals which appeared to be extremely similar to the WOW! signal, albeit considerably fainter. 

In 1977, the Ohio State University's Big Ear radio telescope (pictured) captured a signal from space so strange that scientists are still baffled by it almost 50 years later 

Researchers have used data from the now defunct Arecibo Observatory (pictured) to find signals that match the original WOW! signal. This evidence suggests it could be been the product of a giant space laser 

Read More

• Amateur astronomer traces possible source of notorious 'WOW!' signal first detected in 1977 to a sun-like star 1,800 light years from Earth  

Four of those originated from the tiny red dwarf star, Teegarden's Star, which is just 12.5 light-years from Earth.

Professor Méndez says: 'Our latest observations, made between February and May 2020, have revealed similar narrowband signals near the hydrogen line, though less intense than the original Wow! signal.'

What makes Teegarden's star unique, however, is that it is surrounded by clouds of cool atomic hydrogen.

When intense light from the red dwarf hits these clouds of hydrogen atoms, they are stimulated to produce a powerful burst of microwave energy in the 1420 MHz. 

Researchers spotted similar bands of energy (pictured) being produced at fainter levels from a nearby red dwarf star called Teegarden's Star. Importantly this star is surrounded by clouds of atomic hydrogen 

Read More

• Signals from outer space: The FOUR times scientists have believed we were contacted by aliens... as 'impossible' spinning object 4,000 light years away sends repeated radio bleeps to earth  

The result is an entirely natural microwave laser, or maser, within the hydrogen range which looks extremely similar to that of the WOW! signal.

The researchers argue that the WOW! signal was likely produced when an even more powerful burst of energy collided with a similar hydrogen cloud, producing an even bigger maser.

A burst that powerful is rare, but could have been produced by a type of neutron star called a magnetar.

These are formed when a star collapses and explodes into a supernova, leaving behind an ultra-dense, fast-spinning core with an extremely powerful magnetic field.

If the burst from a neutron star hit a cloud of cool hydrogen gas it could trigger a colossal maser burst just like the WOW! signal.

The signal may have been produced by a microwave laser triggered by the collision of energy from a magnetar (artists impression pictured) and a cloud of hydrogen gas. This means that the Wow! signal is not evidence for alien life 

Since it would be extremely rare for a magnetar to line up with a hydrogen cloud in just the right way, this also explains why we haven't heard the signal again.

If true, this would mean there is no need to suppose that the WOW! signal is evidence of alien life.

In their paper, published on arXiv, Professor Méndez and his colleagues write: 'Our hypothesis accounts for all observed characteristics of the Wow! signal introduces another source of false positives in technosignature searches, and suggests that this signal represented the first recorded astronomical maser flare in the hydrogen line.

'We will continue with Arecibo Wow! exploring our extensive sets of observations from Arecibo REDS. Future studies will incorporate archival data from the Arecibo Observatory.'

WHAT IS THE FERMI PARADOX?

The Fermi Paradox questions why, given the estimated 200bn-400bn stars and at least 100bn planets in our galaxy, there have been no signs of alien life. 

The contradiction is named after its creator, Italian physicist Enrico Fermi.

He first posed the question back in 1950.

Fermi believed it was too extraordinary that a single extraterrestrial signal or engineering project has yet to be detected in the universe — despite its immense vastness. 

Fermi concluded there must a barrier that limits the rise of intelligent, self-aware, technologically advanced space-colonising civilisations.

This barrier is sometimes referred to as the 'Great Filter'.

Italian physicist Enrico Fermi devised the so-called Fermi Paradox in the 1950s. It explores why there is no sign of alien life, despite the 100 billions planets in our galaxy

If the main obstacle preventing the colonisation of other planets is not in our past, then the barrier that will stop humanity's prospects of reaching other worlds must lie in our future, scientists have theorised.  

Professor Brian Cox believes the advances in science and engineering required by a civilisation to start conquering the stars ultimately lead to its destruction.

 He said: 'One solution to the Fermi paradox is that it is not possible to run a world that has the power to destroy itself and that needs global collaborative solutions to prevent that.

‘It may be that the growth of science and engineering inevitably outstrips the development of political expertise, leading to disaster.'

Other possible explanations for the Fermi Paradox include that no other intelligent species have arisen in the universe, intelligent alien species are out there — but lack the necessary technology to communicate with Earth.

Some believe that the distances between intelligent civilsations are too great to allow any kind of two-way communication.

If two worlds are separated by several thousand light-years, it's possible that one or both civilisation will be extinct before a dialogue can be established. 

The so-called Zoo hypothesis claims intelligent alien life is out there, but deliberately avoids any contact with life on Earth to allow its natural evolution.

{ https://www.dailymail.co.uk/ }

24-08-2024 om 16:44 geschreven door peter  

Since landing on June 1, Chang’e 6 has been carrying out a robotic lunar exploration mission launched by China’s National Space Administration. The Chinese probe was initially launched in early May.

Nearly a week after Chang’e 6 touched down in the Apollo basin, NASA’s LRO passed above its landing site, allowing it an opportunity to capture images that revealed the Chinese spacecraft’s location near the rim of a 50-meter crater.

With the new imagery in hand, LRO imaging experts were quickly able to determine the coordinates of Chang’e 6’s position to be roughly 42 degrees south latitude, 206 degrees east longitude, and placing the probe at an elevation of about minus 5,256 meters.

The new imagery obtained by the LRO was released amid a flood of recent social media posts that falsely link earlier imagery obtained by NASA, some dating as far back as 2010, to the recent landing of Chang’e 6.

Land of the Ancient Lunar Lava Flows

Billions of years ago, the area where Chang’e 6 is carrying out its mission was the site of basaltic lava flows that made their way to the area, where they likely subsided once they met a geological fault believed to exist in the area.

Chang’e 6’s landing site is roughly halfway between a pair of prominent dorsum or “wrinkle ridges,” features that are ubiquitous on lunar basalt plains and can sometimes reach several hundreds of kilometres in length. The basaltic flow in this region appears to overlap with an earlier one located to the west, which lacks the iron oxide and titanium dioxide that is evidenced by the adjacent younger basaltic formation.

NASA’s Spy in Lunar Orbit

Since June 18, 2009, the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (LRO) has been observing the moon from its unique eccentric mapping orbit, providing crucial imagery for creating a 3D map of the lunar surface.

Although the LRO was initially planned for a two-year mission, its operation was extended to gather data addressing various scientific questions, including the evolution of the moon’s crust and regolith.

The recent photos the LRO obtained of China’s Chang’ e 6 spacecraft aren’t the first time NASA’s ever-watchful eye in lunar orbit has successfully spotted operations on the lunar surface undertaken by other countries. Last September, the LRO captured images of India’s Chandrayaan-3 spacecraft at its landing site. Also, in April of this year, the LRO managed to capture images of the Korea Pathfinder Lunar Orbiter (KPLO), an orbital spacecraft operated by the Korea Aerospace Research Institute (KARI).

Mapping the Moon and Beyond

Apart from photographing spacecraft sent to the Moon by other nations, the LRO has provided an unprecedented amount of information that has helped scientists expand our knowledge of Earth’s natural satellite. With a suite of high-resolution cameras and other powerful instruments, the LRO has succeeded at mapping the surface of the Moon with an impressive amount of detail, imagery which NASA has made available for viewing online.

Artist’s concept of NASA’s Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter in orbit around the Moon

(Credit: NASA).

The LRO has played a significant role in several major discoveries, including the confirmation of water ice in craters on the Moon that remain in permanent shadow. Last December, the LRO also transmitted a laser beam from its laser altimeter instrument toward a tiny device on the Indian Space Research Organization’s (ISRO) Vikram lander, proving that the LRO could be used to locate retroreflectors on the surface of the Moon.

Currently, Chang’e 6 is carrying out China’s second sample return mission. The samples collected by the lander were transferred to an ascender module and carried to an orbiter where it docked on June 6 for their transfer back to Earth. The Chang’e 6 lander and its associated rover have also conducted experiments while operating on the lunar surface.

Additional information on China’s Chang’e 6 mission can be found here, and more about the ongoing operations of NASA’s Lunar Reconnaissaince Orbiter can be found on NASA’s official LRO mission webpage.

• Micah Hanks is the Editor-in-Chief and Co-Founder of The Debrief. He can be reached by email at micah@thedebrief.org. Follow his work at micahhanks.com and on X: @MicahHanks.

• https://youtu.be/7kagUc6kDho

{ https://thedebrief.org/category/space/  }

24-08-2024 om 01:39 geschreven door peter  

{ https://www.universetoday.com/ }

24-08-2024 om 00:41 geschreven door peter  

Planetary scientists want to know more about the moon’s geological processes. Io is considered a high heat flux world, and scientists want to learn more about its tidal dissipation. Studying Io can also tell us more about primitive planetary bodies that were once more volcanic, which Earth likely was early in its history.

Io can also tell us more about volcanogenic atmospheres, which can play a vital role in shaping a planet’s environment. This 2020 paper draws a link between Earth’s volcanic activity and the Great Oxygenation Event, a critical period when oxygen accumulated in Earth’s atmosphere. A better understanding of the link between volcanic activity and atmospheric evolution will help us better understand exoplanets and habitability.

Scientists know that the Galilean moons exchange material with Jupiter’s atmosphere and magnetosphere. They also know that material ejected from Io’s volcanoes can reach the surfaces of the other moons. Some of it can be turned into plasma by Jupiter’s powerful magnetosphere, forming Io’s plasma torus. They’re curious about this mass exchange in the Jupiter system and how it’s shaped the moons.

These are the reasons for a dedicated mission to Io.

In 2010, scientists at the University of Arizona and Johns Hopkins University’s Applied Physics Laboratory first proposed the Io Volcano Observer (IVO) as part of NASA’s Discovery Program. IVO was proposed as a low-cost mission to explore Jupiter’s volcanic Moon. It was proposed again in 2015 and in 2019. In 2020, IVO was selected with two other missions for further study but ultimately lost out to the DAVINCI+ and VERITAS missions to Venus.

Now, there’s another proposal for the Io Volcano Observer, but this time, it’s under NASA’s New Frontiers Program. The new proposal shows that the desire for an Io-focused mission won’t go away. Instead, it’s gaining steam.

In a new paper still subject to peer review, a group of mostly American scientists present their case for the New Frontiers IVO. It’s titled “Comparing NASA Discovery and New Frontiers Class Mission Concepts for the Io Volcano Observer (IVO).” The first author is Christopher Hamilton from the Lunar and Planetary Laboratory, University of Arizona.

The IVO NF would address our scientific questions by reaching three goals, according to the authors:

• Determine how and where tidal heat is generated inside Io;
• Understand how tidal heat is transported to the surface of Io;
• Understand how Io is evolving.

The original IVO proposal had the spacecraft encounter Io ten times in four years after reaching the moon in 2033. It would’ve carried five instruments, with a sixth under consideration. The IVO would’ve crossed Io from pole to pole, passing over the equator at an altitude of between 200 and 500 kilometres (124 and 310 miles.)

The closest approaches were carefully designed to give the spacecraft the best observations of the moon’s magnetic field, gravity field, and libration amplitude. The approaches also would’ve allowed for both sunlit and dark views of volcanoes, allowing the spacecraft to study the composition of lava. The polar perspective would’ve provided new views of heat emanating from the moon that were unavailable to Galileo and unobservable from Earth.

The new IVO NF proposal maintains the polar orbit of the original IVO but improves it in several ways. Universe Today talked with lead author Christopher Hamilton about the new proposal. His remarks have been lightly edited for clarity.

The first change in the new proposal concerns the number of flybys, which would increase from 10 to 20.

“10 flybys for the original Discovery-level IVO mission would fill important gaps in image coverage that remain unfilled after the Voyager and Galileo era,” Hamilton said. So why double it?

“The new tour not only doubles the image coverage of Io’s surface with high-resolution imaging but also enables more flybys of active volcanoes, like Loki, Loki Patera, and Pillian Patera,” Hamilton said. “These are highly dynamic volcanic systems that include active lava lakes and explosive eruptions—one pass over the volcanic systems is simply not enough to constrain their time-variability and eruption dynamics.”

Like Earth’s Moon, Io is tidally locked to Jupiter, with one side more readily available for study than the Jupiter-facing side. But Jupiter’s effect on Io is much stronger than Earth’s effect on the Moon. “However, tidal interactions between Jupiter and Io are much stronger, exciting tides in solid rock with an amplitude of about 100 m (328 feet), which is taller than the Statue of Liberty!” Hamilton said. These tidal interactions drive Io’s powerful volcanism. “However, studies of the past decade have suggested that this heat has also melted a layer within Io to form a subsurface ‘”‘magma ocean,'” Hamilton said.

The original IVO’s ten orbits, with its magnetometer instrument, would have confirmed or excluded this hypothesis. The new proposal will carry an improved version of this instrument, and with more orbits, it could answer questions about Io’s magma ocean.

“IVO-NF would also carry a fluxgate magnetometer and with the repeat passes, carefully timed to measure Io’s induced magnetic field at different times in its orbit, would greatly reduce the uncertainty in estimating a potential magma oceans depth,” Hamilton said. The current uncertainty is ±10 km, but IVO NF would reduce it to ±3 km. This “would revolutionize our understanding of Io’s interior and the links between tidal heating and volcanism,” Hamilton told Universe Today.

“Both IVO and IVO-NF are great missions, but doubling the number of flybys more than doubles the scienctific return from an Io mission!” Hamilton said.

IVO-NF would also approach Io much closer than the original IVO. The original mission called for an altitude of 200 and 500 kilometres (124 and 310 miles) above Io’s surface. IVO-NF would begin its mission with high-altitude fly-bys, but as the mission progressed and objectives were reached, it would come much closer.

“With 20 flybys, IVO-NF can be more daring, flying closer to Io’s surface and even flying through its volcanic plumes to determine the chemistry of its erupted products in unprecedented detail,” Hamilton told Universe Today.

Initial flybys would be at about 200 km, “but as the mission progresses and Baseline objectives are achieved, we will be able to lower the altitude of later flybys over active volcanoes like Pele Patera,” Hamilton said.

“Nonetheless, we would image and analyze these volcanoes first, making use of repeat coverage to further constrain the safety of the close approach, and take precautions like reorienting the spacecraft’s solar panels so that they fly through the plume side-on rather than exposing the full cross-sectional area,” Hamilton told Universe Today. “Plume flythroughs for Io would also open the door to other sampling opportunities for plumes on Saturn’s active moon, Enceladus.”

“This may seem dangerous, but even at altitudes of 50 km, there would be very few particles,” Hamilton said. But before the spacecraft comes that close, it’ll use its Surface Dust Analyzer to understand the hazard. This instrument was added to the IVO-NF as a top priority. It will measure surface dust composition and the composition of nanograins in the volcanic plumes. Overall, it will give scientists a better understanding of Io’s dust environment and inform them if it’s safe to approach within 50 km.

According to Hamilton, we’re experiencing a renaissance in exploring the Jovian system.

“This is an important time in Planetary Exploration, and exploration of the Jupiter System is undergoing a renaissance, with Juno, Europa Clipper, and JUICE examining Jupiter, Europa, and Ganymede at the same time,” Hamilton told Universe Today. Io is a critical part of Jupiter’s moon system. It’s at the heart of the orbital resonance configuration between Io, Europa, and Ganymede, and the resonance drives geological activity on all three moons, including volcanism, tectonic activity, and the formation of surface features.

“Juno has filled some important gaps left after the end of the Galileo mission (1995–2003), but IVO and IVO-NF would be the first to have an instrument suite that is optimized specifically for Io,” said Hamilton.

To the intellectually curious, everything in nature is worthy of study and deeper understanding. An extraordinary world like Io is certainly no exception, with everything it has to tell us about itself, its sibling moons, and even about the early Earth and Moon.

“Our paper makes the case that Io is a priority target for exploration that should be considered in the next New Frontier Announcement of Opportunity,” Hamilton told Universe Today. He acknowledges that the original IVO mission at the Discovery level is possible, but the IVO New Frontiers mission would accomplish a lot more and would more thoroughly address our outstanding questions about Io.

“A larger mission to Io via New Frontiers would more than double the scientific return of the mission and would offer the best approach to understanding not just Io, but the Jupiter System as a whole, and the origins of high-heat flux worlds like the early Earth, early Moon, and other terrestrial planets in the Solar System and beyond,” Hamilton concluded.

{ https://www.universetoday.com/ }

24-08-2024 om 00:35 geschreven door peter  

“Our species, Homo sapiens, has been successful at adapting to ecological conditions — from tropical forests to arctic tundra — that require different kinds of problems to be solved,” said associate professor Charles Perreault, an anthropologist from Arizona State University’s School of Human Evolution and Social Change. and a research scientist with the Institute of Human Origins.“Cumulative culture is key because it allows human populations to build on and recombine the solutions of prior generations and to develop new complex solutions to problems very quickly.”

Toolmaking Suddenly Underwent a Rapid Advance in Technology

In their published study, “3.3 million years of stone tool complexity suggests that cumulative culture began during the Middle Pleistocene,” which appeared in the journal PNAS, Perreault and fellow author Jonathan Paige, a University of Missouri anthropologist, explain how their analysis of stone tools dating back to 3.3 million years ago revealed this sudden and unexpected technological leap.

The researchers analyzed tools collected from 57 separate ancient hominin sites. The oldest tool, dating back over 3 million years, came from an African site. However, the researchers also studied ancient stone tools discovered at ancient hominin sites in Eurasia, Greenland, Sahul, Oceania, and the Americas.

Next, the team ranked the tools’ complexity. This meant analyzing how many steps would need to be taken to create the tool in question. The researchers characterized and ranked 62 distinct tool-making sequences.

Above: Tools that become increasingly more complex over the course of 3 million years. Left: First time period studied — Oldowan core, Koobi Fora, Kenya; Center: Second time period studied — Acheulean cleaver, Algeria; Right: Characteristic of 600,000 years ago technology — Levallois core, late Pleistocene Algeria (Image credits: (left) Curry, Michael. 2020. Oldowan Core, Koobi Fora. Museum of Stone Tools LINK; (middle) Curry, Michael. 2020. Acheulean Cleaver, Morocco, Koobi Fora. Museum of Stone Tools. LINK; (right) Watt, Emma. 2020. Levallois Core, Algeria. Museum of Stone Tools. LINK).

After charting the tools’ complexity, the team saw some unexpected patterns. Tools made between 3.3 million years ago and 1.8 million years ago required somewhere between two and four procedural units to manufacture. The complexity of stone tools steadily increased over the next 1.2 million years, with the top samples requiring an impressive seven steps. While significantly more complex than tools made over a million years earlier, the researchers say this is still within the range of complexity for a single craftsman. This means knowledge from previous generations of toolmakers had most likely not been passed down over that span.

However, the researchers discovered that when they looked at tools made around 600,000 years ago, in the Middle Pleistocene, they began to see a sudden and unexpected increase in complexity. Tools from this time period were not only more complex, but more complex manufacturing processes were required to make these tools.

“We analyzed the stone tools made during the last 3.3 million years,” the researchers explain. “We found that these stone tools remained simple until about 600,000 B.P. After that point, stone tools rapidly increased in complexity.”

Where previous tools had required only a handful of procedural steps to manufacture, tools from this time often required as much as 18 steps. According to Paige and Perreault, this is way too many steps for a single generation of craftsmen to achieve without the knowledge passed down from previous generations.

This evidence, the researchers write, is consistent with findings from other research teams, suggesting that such a rapid transition “signals the development of cumulative culture in the human lineage.”

“By 600,000 years ago or so, hominin populations started relying on unusually complex technologies, and we only see rapid increases in complexity after that time as well,” said Paige. “Both of those findings match what we expect to see among hominins who rely on cumulative culture.”

Dawn of Cumulative Culture and the Evolution of Modern Humans

Although the evolution of stone toolmaking provides evidence for the dawn of cumulative culture, the researchers behind the findings say such a leap likely affected all aspects of early humans. This likely included changes in human culture, biology, and even the ability to adapt to a range of environments and habitats found across the globe.

Such changes can increase in complexity as genetic and cultural evolution happen concurrently. According to the researchers, this “gene-culture coevolution process” may explain increases in relative brain size, a prolonged life history, “and other keystone traits underlying human uniqueness.”

Notably, the researchers point out that the Middle Pleistocene shows many other examples of evolving technology. For example, studies of this era reveal consistent evidence of the controlled use of fire, hearths and other domestic spaces. This era also features the evolution of wooden structures constructed with logs hewn using hafted tools, which, the researchers explain, “are stone blades affixed to wooden or bone handles.”

In their conclusion, Paige and Perreault note that toolmaking is just one measure of cumulative culture, and further study could spot other increases in this behaviour that may have occurred in the past but are not immediately evident in the archaeological record. “It is possible that early hominins relied on cumulative culture to develop complex social, foraging, and technological behaviours that are archaeologically invisible,” they write.

Ultimately, the research team believes that their findings show how knowledge can be passed down through the generations without each successive generation having to rediscover the knowledge of the past. When enough knowledge makes it through, like what appears to have happened 600,000 years ago, this process can result in an ever-increasing and adaptive knowledge pool that allows for a consistent upward progression in cultural and technological evolution.

“Generations of improvements, modifications, and lucky errors can generate technologies and know-how well beyond what a single naive individual could invent independently within their lifetime,” the researchers conclude. “When a child inherits her parent’s generation’s culture, she inherits the outcome of thousands of years of lucky errors and experiments.”

“The result is, our cultures — from technological problems and solutions to how we organize our institutions — are too complex for individuals to invent on their own,” Perreault adds.

• Christopher Plain is a Science Fiction and Fantasy novelist and Head Science Writer at The Debrief. Follow and connect with him on X, learn about his books at plainfiction.com, or email him directly at christopher@thedebrief.org.

{ https://thedebrief.org/category/science/ }

23-08-2024 om 21:38 geschreven door peter  

23-08-2024 om 20:43 geschreven door peter  

A rare landing on the south pole of the moon led to this scientific discovery

There was once a magma-filled ocean on the south pole of the moon, scientists recently discovered after analyzing lunar soil that revealed ancient information about the moon's origin.

The study of soil taken from a less-studied region of the moon suggests the presence of remnants of a former ocean of magma, according to a study published Wednesday in Nature.

• MORE: Climate change is altering the length of days on Earth, according to new research

The researchers analyzed lunar soil extracted from high-latitude regions on the southern portion of the moon -- taken as part of the Chandrayaan-3 mission when India’s Vikram lander module made a historic touchdown near the south pole of the moon in August 2023. The mission is the southern-most landing that has ever taken place on the moon -- a difficult feat considering the lack of sunlight, which can create visibility and communication issues, Anil Bhardwaj, director of Physical Research Laboratory in Ahmedabad and co-author of the study, told ABC News. Most lunar landings, especially human landings, have taken place in the equatorial or low-latitude regions.

India's lunar mission found remnants of a magma ocean on the south pole

The mission embarked the use of new technology -- a particle access spectrometer -- an instrument aboard the rover that was able to make observations and collect data very close to the lunar surface, M. Shanmugam, the lead engineer of the alpha particle X-ray spectrometer at the Physical Research Laboratory in Ahmedabad, told ABC News.

The Moon's South Pole.

© NASA GSFC Scientific Visualization Studio

The composition of the soil found on Vikram’s landing site is consistent with an ancient magma ocean, the authors conclude.

When analyzing the soil, the researchers found a relatively uniform elemental composition among 23 measurements at various spots along the lunar surface, primarily containing the rock-type ferroan anorthosite. The spectrum of elements also included all of the major and minor elements of the presence of magma, including sodium, aluminum, magnesium, carbon, silicon, sulfur, potassium, iron, titanium, chromium and manganese, Bhardwaj said.

MORE: The future of space exploration is a transforming, animal-like robot, scientists say

The moon is believed to have formed after a body the size of Mars struck Earth about 4.24 billion years ago, Bhardwaj said. The material that formed as a result of the volatile impact was likely magma that was thrown into space that remained within the Earth's gravitational pull and eventually began forming a planetary-mass object.

The magma ocean is likely to have existed for tens to hundred million years, Santosh Vadawale, a professor in the Physical Research Laboratory and lead author of the study, told ABC News.

Researchers believed the magma disappeared as the moon cooled throughout its formation, hypothesizing that, less dense ferroan anorthosite floated to the lunar surface while heavier minerals sank to form the mantle during the cool-down -- forming the lunar highlands as a result of the floatation of lighter anorthositic rock.

Previous research into the Moon’s geology has primarily relied on samples taken by missions to lunar mid-latitudes, such as the Apollo program, giving scientists a more nuanced look into the history of the moon's formation, according to the paper.

Chandrayaan-3's rover Pragyaan explored the south pole region for 10 days last August

• MORE: Water vapor and temperatures that could support life found on exoplanet, NASA says

While the lunar magma ocean hypothesis has existed for decades, ever since the Apollo mission placed humans on the moon in 1969, the new research has allowed researchers to confirm the evolutionary history of the moon from billions of years ago, Vadawale said.

"Our next mission, we would like to try to go as close as possible to poles, where there are these permanently shadowed regions where there is water is supposed to be there," he said.

{ https://www.msn.com/en-us/channel/topic/ }

23-08-2024 om 18:45 geschreven door peter  

SpaceX’s Polaris Dawn Is Sending Astronauts to a Literal Radiation Belt to Test New Spacesuits

The risky new private space mission will launch on Monday, August 26.

by Kiona Smith

 

The mission is scheduled to launch Monday, August 26 from Kennedy Space Center, sending four astronauts in a SpaceX Crew Dragon capsule (like the one the stranded Starliner crew will ride home in) on a long, narrow orbit that will carry them through the innermost of the Van Allen belts — bands of high-energy radiation that surround our planet — making them the first people to cross the belts in 52 years. Midway through the 5-day mission, two crew members will leave the capsule for the first spacewalk by private astronauts.

Those plans might look like more space billionaire stunts — this is also the age of space tourism, after all — but Isaacman (who will fly on Polaris Dawn as the mission’s commander) insists the Polaris program has real science and technology development goals.

Polaris Dawn Will Test SpaceX’s New EVA Suits

One goal of the Polaris Dawn mission is to test new technology for deep space travel. The mission will be the first flight test of SpaceX’s new pressure suits for extravehicular activities (EVAs), such as spacewalks. Isaacman and mission specialist Sarah Gillis are about to become the first non-government-employed astronauts to ever attempt a spacewalk, but they’re also about to depressurize their spacecraft, open the door, and step outside while wearing spacesuits that have never flown before.

The design is meant to be lighter and more maneuverable than the ones currently in use, and the helmet comes with a heads-up display that shows a mission clock alongside the suit’s pressure, temperature, and humidity. At the moment, neither NASA’s spacesuits nor SpaceX’s current generation “intervehicular activity” (IVA) suits have the heads-up display. Both the IVA suits and the new EVA suits are much less bulky than NASA’s version, but Isaacman and SpaceX claim the EVA suits flying on Polaris Dawn offer more mobility at the joints, and they’re also easier to get into and out of.

SpaceX previously took the new suits to White Sands Missile Range in New Mexico to fire tiny projectiles at them at thousands of miles an hour, arguably the most direct way to test whether the suits could endure strikes from micrometeorites or other tiny bits of orbital debris. Next week’s mission will be their first flight test — and since the mission calls for opening up the whole Crew Dragon cabin to the vacuum of space before Isaacman and Gillis venture outside, it will be a high-stakes test, and it carries more than the usual amount of risk that comes with flying to space.

The four astronauts will also test communications systems using laser links between the Crew Dragon capsule and SpaceX’s (increasingly problematic) constellation of StarLink satellites in low Earth orbit.

What Will Happen During Polaris Dawn’s Spacewalk?

While the spacesuits are very new and Polaris Dawn’s crew are about to be the first non-space-agency astronauts to ever attempt a spacewalk, the method they’ll be using for this test is extremely old-school. The Polaris Dawn spacewalk is going to look almost exactly like the very first American spacewalk back in 1965, except with twice the number of people and much sleeker spacesuits.

Astronauts aboard the International Space Station will breathe pure oxygen for about two hours before a spacewalk, then step into an airlock (a separate room that air can be let in and out of) and then into the vast vacuum of space — leaving the rest of the space station safely sealed and pressurized behind them. But the Crew Dragon capsule doesn’t have an airlock, just a main hatch, so in order to walk in space, the crew will have to open the hatch and expose the whole cabin to vacuum.

Isaacman and Gillis will float out the hatch, tethered to the capsule by umbilical cables that provide life support and keep them tethered to the ship. Pilot Scott Poteet and mission specialist and medical officer Anna Menon will be strapped into their seats, managing the umbilicals and the ship’s systems — but all four of them will be exposed to the unforgiving forces of vacuum, with nothing but their suits and open hatchway between them and eternity. That’s exactly how the crew of Gemini 4 — pilot Edward White and commander James McDivitt — did it 59 years ago, when White became the first American spacewalker.

Spacesuits keep astronauts’ bodies under enough air pressure to survive and function, but the pressure inside an EVA suit will still be very low compared to the normal air pressure in the room you’re sitting in now, or in the Crew Dragon’s cabin.

That’s why astronauts on the ISS spend a couple of hours “pre-breathing” oxygen before an EVA. The goal is to make sure there’s no nitrogen in their bloodstream, so they can avoid a painful and often fatal condition called decompression sickness (DCS), or the bends. Normal air is 78 percent nitrogen, which ends up in our bloodstream when we breathe. That’s not a problem, unless our bodies are suddenly under much lower pressure than normal. Then, it quickly becomes a big problem because all the nitrogen gas mixed with our blood comes fizzing out, like the bubbles in soda bottles when you take the lids off too quickly.

Polaris Dawn’s crew will spend a lot more time pre-breathing. They’ll start as soon as they reach orbit, and for the next two days, they’ll gradually turn the cabin pressure down and the oxygen concentration up. That will force the nitrogen out of their bodies even as they’re adjusting to lower pressure. By day 3, it will be time to open the hatch and hope it worked.

Medical Research in Space

Exploring how the human body responds to the physical weirdness of being in space — changing air pressure, microgravity, and radiation exposure — is another key goal of the Polaris Dawn mission (and pretty much every crewed mission, on some level). During their 5 days in orbit, the crew will gather data for more than 30 experiments on the human body.

When it launches, the Crew Dragon capsule will be carrying samples of human tissues and cells, which researchers at Baylor College of Medicine and Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University will compare with their “BioBank” samples here on Earth. The goal is to learn how deep space affects the tissues that make up the human body on a microscopic level, looking for changes on the cellular level.

Other experiments will study bone and muscle loss in microgravity — and test a couple of possible methods to track and prevent them. Still other experiments will study changes to astronauts’ vision, which are believed to be caused by changes in the amount of fluid in astronauts’ heads during spaceflight. The crew will measure the pressure on their eyes with portable ultrasound instruments, tiny sensors in contact lenses, and small cameras that measure the size of astronauts’ pupils.

A couple of other experiments are focused on how exposure to microgravity and cosmic radiation impacts medicines; a NASA study will track whether there are any physical or chemical changes to medicines stored on the Crew Dragon capsule during the flight, while a UTHealth Houston study will measure blood flow in the astronauts’ liver and kidneys (again with portable ultrasound devices) to build digital models of how the human body might process medicines taken during a space flight.

Meanwhile, NASA will be testing a nasal spray for space sickness, a type of motion sickness that happens to people in space. All of these tests will hopefully get us all one step closer to feeling safer and healthier in space.

{ https://www.inverse.com/ }

23-08-2024 om 17:10 geschreven door peter  

True Story of a Man who Worked for the CIA: He was Tasked with Viewing Jupiter and Made Wild Claims that Later Came True.

This is the true story of a man who was part of a secret government program. As a CIA psychic informant, he was tasked with viewing Jupiter and the far side of the Moon. He made wild claims about Jupiter, and they later came true…

INGO SWANN (1933-2013) was internationally known as an advocate and researcher of the exceptional powers of the human mind and as a leading figure in governmental and scientific projects to investigate and identify the scope of subtle human perceptions.

In the 1970s, Ingo was involved in remote viewing experiments established by the U.S. Army and the CIA in collaboration with the Stanford Research Institute. This clandestine initiative — code-named Project Stargate — later became the basis for the movie The Men Who Stare at Goats, starring George Clooney and Jeff Bridges. (Source)

For Stargate, Ingo and a group of psychics used their abilities to spy on Russia from Palo Alto, California, even remotely discovering a downed Soviet spy plane under a jungle canopy in the African country of Zaire after the U.S. Department of Defense had deemed it lost.

Ingo’s various remote views of celestial bodies included: Jupiter (1973), Mercury (1974), the Moon (1975), and Mars (1975, 1976, and 1984). Selected information on these sessions is provided below. More can be found in his archives at the University of West Georgia.

In 1973, most scientists, academics, and media strongly opposed research into parapsychology or psychoenergetics. So, it was surprising when the country’s second-largest think tank started researching these topics. This caused a big reaction because the think tank, SRI, was highly respected and connected to the military and intelligence communities.

The idea of controlled remote viewing was a process in which viewers could view a location given nothing but its geographical coordinates and was developed and tested by Puthoff and Targ with CIA funding.

The experiment was controlled by Harold Puthoff and according to the account, during the experiment; Swann using the power of his thought visited the distant planet. The experiment was dated April 27, 1973.

According to Ingo, in the space to the right of the room, he could see Jupiter, remotely located many millions of miles away. (Source)

He could see how it was shining with a blinding light. He could look at it from all directions of his mind’s eye. At first, everything was seen in miniature and then everything was suddenly expanded.

“These visions are inside me, then outside. There is a yellow cast to space and seeming dark objects show through it. Can they be other moons of contrasting colors or densities? The impressions come to me that there are 17, some yet undiscovered by earth scientists, much closer to Jupiter, and the feeling also comes that some of them have been and are being spawned by the conclusive, volcanic action in the interior..,” Swann said, according to the document.”

Ingo also “saw” rings around Jupiter, but, he said that they were not as noticeable as that of Saturn. (Source)

Later, in 1979, the space probe Voyager confirmed the existence of the Jovian ring system; however, the hypothesis of its existence was put forward by the Soviet astronomer Sergey Vsehsvatskiy in the 1960s.

Perhaps, it was Swann who earlier provided the CIA with information regarding ancient civilizations on Mars. The Stargate project was launched in 1970 after the CIA stated that the Soviet Union reportedly spent more than $1 million a year on research into Psychotronics.

This experiment has been ridiculed by skeptics, who often haven’t reviewed its details. There are two key points that skeptics overlook: first, the Jupiter Probe was just an exploratory experiment, not a claim of any findings; second, it had prestigious sponsorship and scientific oversight.

The experiment’s focus on remote sensing of a distant planet was seen as radical, challenging not only mainstream academic views but also the usual practices in parapsychology.

Six of these thirteen factors were given scientific substantiation by 1975. Before Jupiter’s ring was “scientifically” discovered in 1979, most scientists flatly denounced the possibility of the RING. (Source)

In February 1975, he was contacted by a certain highly-placed figure from Washington, DC, who guardedly told Swann that he, Swann, would soon be receiving a telephone call from the aforementioned Mr. Axelrod

Ingo quickly agreed to a mysterious, last-minute meeting, despite feeling concerned. He met a man who resembled a Marine, exchanged brief formalities, and was then driven to a helicopter. Blindfolded for a 30-minute flight, Swann was taken to what seemed like a secret underground location. Once there, he met a man named Mr. Axelrod, who admitted the name was fake, adding to the secrecy of the situation.

Axelrod quickly got to the main point, asking Ingo many questions about remote viewing. He also made it clear that he wanted to use Swann’s skills for a secret mission and offered a large sum of money. It was an offer Swann couldn’t refuse, and he didn’t.

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Axelrod then asked Ingo what he knew about the Moon, revealing the true purpose of their meeting. Someone in the government wanted the Moon to be remote-viewed, and Swann agreed to do it.

When Ingo began his work, he was shocked by what he saw. His mind focused on an image of a massive tower on the Moon, similar in size to the United Nations Secretariat Building. Swann was told that this structure wasn’t made by humans but by mysterious extraterrestrials. However, no one knew where they came from.

In later remote-viewing sessions, Ingo saw many unusual things on the Moon. He described domed structures, advanced machines, tall towers, large cross-shaped structures, and strange tubes spread across the landscape. He also saw signs of what looked like mining operations. It seemed that someone, or something, had secretly built a base on the Moon.

Ingo also focused on a group of people on the Moon who looked human. They were inside some kind of enclosure and were digging into a cliff. The strange thing was that they were all completely naked.

Suddenly, Axelrod, who was overseeing the experiment, stopped it. He hinted that the beings on the Moon might have noticed they were being watched and that Ingo could be in serious danger if they decided to confront him.

Axelrod asked Ingo if he knew a man named George Leonard. Ingo said no, he didn’t know him.

At the same time, Axelrod was asking him to investigate strange things on the Moon. Meanwhile, George Leonard was writing a book called “Somebody Else is on the Moon”.

In 1977, Leonard’s book was published. It talked about strange structures on the Moon, which was exactly what Axelrod was worried about —strange, possibly man-made structures on the Moon.

Ingo and Axelrod had several secretive meetings about strange events on the Moon. These meetings, which felt almost like a spy movie, ended suddenly in 1977, leaving Swann confused.

He wondered if he had psychically seen an advanced base on the Moon built by extraterrestrials. However, since the people he “saw” there looked like naked humans, he also considered it might be a secret Earth-based installation that Axelrod wanted to investigate.

The mystery remains unsolved, but there are more questions. The idea of aliens secretly using our Moon brings to mind similar claims about aliens on Earth.

In the 1997 book Remote Viewers, Jim Schnabel shared a story about the U.S. Intelligence community’s involvement in psychic spying, which started in the 1970s.

One remote viewer, Pat Price, believed that Alaska’s Mount Hayes housed one of the largest alien bases. He claimed the aliens looked human but had different hearts, lungs, blood, and eyes, and could control people through thought. Price also mentioned that this base caused problems for both U.S. and Soviet space missions.

{ https://www.howandwhys.com/ }

23-08-2024 om 16:46 geschreven door peter  

“For the first time, we have shown that even a tiny fraction of cellular material could be identified by a mass spectrometer onboard a spacecraft,” said lead author Fabian Klenner, a University of Washington (UW) postdoctoral researcher in Earth and space sciences. “Our results give us more confidence that using upcoming instruments, we will be able to detect lifeforms similar to those on Earth, which we increasingly believe could be present on ocean-bearing moons.”

Oceans Beneath Surface of Icy Moons are Ideal Targets for Alien Lifeforms

While the search for life outside Earth has many targets, including the soil of Mars or the clouds of Venus, astrobiologists are increasingly optimistic about finding signs of past and present alien lifeforms within the subsurface oceans of the solar system’s icy moons. Along with Europa, these targets include Saturn’s moon Enceladus. Those hopes received even more fuel when researchers recently found evidence of phosphate on the surface of Enceladus.

The researchers explain, “This planetary body now appears to contain energy, water, phosphate, other salts, and carbon-based organic material, making it increasingly likely to support lifeforms similar to those found on Earth.”

This image shows red streaks across the surface of Europa, the smallest of Jupiter’s four large moons. The upcoming Europa Clipper mission will send instruments to investigate this moon.

Credit: NASA/JPL/Galileo

In the decade since NASA’s Cassini mission detected plumes of water and ice being ejected by Enceladus, mission planners and amateur enthusiasts alike have theorized about how such a life-hunting mission might actually take place. While some of the more exotic proposals include mini submarines or a snakelike probe that can crawl down into those subsurface oceans, the most popular involves flying a sample mission through those ejected plumes and scanning them for clues to alien lifeforms.

Now, an international team of researchers says instruments that might be included on upcoming missions should not only be able to detect signs of alien lifeforms, but they believe the conditions are ideal for such a finding as soon as the Europa Clipper.

Lab Study Shows Instruments Could Spot Signs of Life in a Single Grain of Ice

To see if instruments slated to join future missions would be able to detect signs of life in the plumes ejected from Enceladus and Europa, the UW research team selected a type of bacteria called Sphingopyxis alaskensis for study. That’s because this particular bacterium lives in cold environments on Earth and can survive on very little nutrients, making it a likelier analog of extraterrestrial bacteria that may thrive beneath the surface of these icy moons. The researchers also say this bacterium is just the right size for future probes to spot within a single grain of ice.

“They are extremely small, so they are, in theory, capable of fitting into ice grains that are emitted from an ocean world like Enceladus or Europa,” Klenner said.

After coming up with a lab experiment that would best simulate the conditions a future mission might experience these ejected ice grains, the team used a mass spectrometer to see if they could spot the life signs of their chosen bacterium in a single grain of ice. Significantly, they note that their instrument was less sensitive than the one planned for the Europa Clipper.

As hoped, their study was a success. An analysis of water injected into a vacuum showed that the right instruments could indeed detect alien lifeforms as they were ejected from Enceladus or Europa. In fact, the scientists behind the successful experiments say searching for life in this method “is more successful than averaging across a larger sample containing billions of individual grains.”

Instrument on NASA’s Europa Clipper Mission May Be First to Discover Alien Lifeforms

In their published study, the UW researchers supplemented their experiments by looking at the conditions on Earth that cause bacteria to collect on the ocean’s surface and cause a layer of “ocean scum.” They soon realized that a similar set of conditions likely exists on the surface of these extraterrestrial oceans. As a result, any subsurface water ejected into space would likely capture pieces of alien lifeforms and encapsulate them within grains of space ice, where NASA’s instruments could detect them.

“We here describe a plausible scenario for how bacterial cells can, in theory, be incorporated into icy material that is formed from liquid water on Enceladus or Europa and then gets emitted into space,” Klenner said.

Although they are not directly involved with the planning of NASA’s missions, the team notes that NASA’s Europa Clipper, thanks to its unique instrumentation, could be perfectly equipped to find alien lifeforms living beyond Earth.

“With suitable instrumentation, such as the SUrface Dust Analyzer on NASA’s Europa Clipper space probe, it might be easier than we thought to find life, or traces of it, on icy moons:” said senior author Frank Postberg, a professor of planetary sciences at the Freie Universität Berlin, “if life is present there, of course, and cares to be enclosed in ice grains originating from an environment such as a subsurface water reservoir.”

•  Christopher Plain is a Science Fiction and Fantasy novelist and Head Science Writer at The Debrief. Follow and connect with him on X, learn about his books at plainfiction.com, or email him directly at christopher@thedebrief.org.

{ https://thedebrief.org/category/space/ }

23-08-2024 om 01:35 geschreven door peter  

The ionosphere, a layer of the Earth’s atmosphere extending from about 50 to 400 miles above the surface, is a region where solar radiation ionizes atmospheric particles, creating a plasma of charged particles. 

This layer plays a crucial role in long-distance radio communications, as it can reflect radio waves back to Earth. However, GOLD’s new observations have shown formations that challenge current scientific models.

Observations from NASA’s GOLD mission shows charged particles in the ionosphere forming an X shape on Oct. 7, 2019. (The colors indicate the intensity of the ultraviolet light emitted, with yellow and white indicating the strongest emission, or highest ionospheric density.) 

(Image credit: F. Laskar et al.)

“A unique phenomenon—A geomagnetically quiet time merging of Equatorial Ionization Anomaly (EIA) crests, leading to an X-pattern (EIA-X) around the magnetic equator—has been observed in the night-time ionospheric measurements by the Global-scale Observations of the Limb and Disk mission,” researchers wrote in the study published in the Journal of Geophysical Research: Space Physics.

Observations of these distinctive X-pattern structures had previously been noted only during geomagnetic disturbances, such as after solar storms or volcanic eruptions. However, these new sightings during geomagnetically calm conditions suggest that unknown processes from the lower atmosphere can affect the ionosphere, presenting a new scientific mystery.

Computer simulations showed that these bizarre X-shaped equatorial ionization anomalies are generated during pre-sunset hours and persist until after sunset at local times. 

Models also propose that these X-shapes may develop when changes in the lower atmosphere draw plasma downward. However, this hypothesis requires further investigation. 

Images from NASA's GOLD mission show C-shaped and reverse-C-shaped plasm

“The X is odd because it implies that there are far more localized driving factors,” Dr. Jeffrey Klenzing, a scientist at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center who studies the ionosphere, said in a statement. “This is expected during the extreme events, but seeing it during ‘quiet time’ suggests that the lower atmosphere activity is significantly driving the ionospheric structure.”

Additionally, GOLD identified C-shaped and reverse-C-shaped plasma bubbles near each other. C-shaped plasma bubbles are typically long and straight and form along magnetic field lines. However, on several occasions, GOLD found these structures a mere 400 miles apart, implying that strong turbulence or vortex-like activity in the lower atmosphere influences the ionosphere. 

This discovery of closely linked C-shaped bubbles offers further evidence that more complex dynamics are at work in the Earth’s atmosphere than is currently understood. 

Dr. Deepak Karan, a research scientist at the University of Colorado’s Laboratory for Atmospheric and Space Physics (LASP) and author of a 2023 study on these mysterious C-shaped bubbles, highlighted the significance of these recent discoveries. 

“Within that close proximity, these two opposite-shaped plasma bubbles had never been thought of, never been imaged,” Dr. Karan said. “To have wind patterns change course in such a small area suggests some sort of strong turbulence — like a vortex, wind shear, or tornado-like activity — is likely at play in the atmosphere.”

“The fact that we have very different shapes of bubbles this close together tells us that the dynamics of the atmosphere is more complex than we expected,“ Dr. Klenzing added.

GOLD’s findings are notable for their clarity and consistency, thanks to the satellite’s geostationary orbit, which allows it to continuously monitor the same region of the Earth. This extended observation capability has enabled scientists to detect the persistent nature of these X- and C-shaped structures.

Since its launch in 2018, GOLD has only recorded two instances of C-shaped atmospheric structures being closely paired. Researchers say the bizarre X-shape anomaly has been detected “very clearly on one occasion and to some extent on other six occasions, during geomagnetically quiet periods.“ This suggests that this mysterious phenomenon, which researchers likened to atmospheric “alphabet soup,” is extremely rare. 

Nevertheless, these findings are significant as they could impact our understanding of how the ionosphere interacts with communication and navigation signals, which can be disrupted by such plasma structures. 

The presence of strong turbulence or localized disturbances in the ionosphere can lead to signal loss or degradation. Our reliance on technologies that depend on stable ionospheric conditions, such as GPS and satellite communications, makes understanding these influences increasingly critical.

Likewise, the mission’s findings underscore the complexity of the Earth’s atmosphere and the need for continued research to understand the various factors that influence its behavior. 

NASA says ongoing observations by GOLD, alongside data from other heliophysics missions, are expected to provide more insights into these phenomena. Scientists hope to use this information to shed more light on these enigmatic structures and their implications for our technological world.

Researchers concluded their recent study by noting, “A comprehensive understanding of the dynamics during the pre- to post-sunset period will not only advance our knowledge of the ionosphere’s response to external (lower atmospheric or geomagnetic) drivers but also plays a crucial role in the development of space weather forecasting capability.”

NASA scientists have discovered some unusual shapes high up in the Earth’s ionosphere, which is a layer stretching from 50 to 400 miles above the planet.

Normally, the ionosphere can get electrically charged, especially when influenced by space weather.

In addition to the X shapes, scientists have also found C-shaped bubbles in the ionosphere. These shapes can appear close to each other, indicating that the dynamics of the atmosphere are more complex than previously thought.

• Tim McMillan is a retired law enforcement executive, investigative reporter and co-founder of The Debrief. His writing typically focuses on defense, national security, the Intelligence Community and topics related to psychology. You can follow Tim on Twitter: @LtTimMcMillan.  Tim can be reached by email: tim@thedebrief.org or through encrypted email: LtTimMcMillan@protonmail.com 

{ https://thedebrief.org/category/space/ }

23-08-2024 om 01:16 geschreven door peter  

In 1977, Big Ear detected a peculiar signal that’s taken on a life of its own: the Wow! Signal. The Wow! Signal was a strong narrowband radio signal right near the frequency of neutral hydrogen. The Big Ear telescope is long gone now, but the effort to understand what the signal is lives on.

The signal lasted the full 72-second window in which Big Ear was able to observe it. A few days later, astronomer Jerry R. Ehman was looking over the data when he saw the signal on a computer printout. Astronomers had never seen anything like it, and he wrote “Wow!” beside it, and the name has stuck ever since.

The signal has another name: 6EQUJ5. This has been interpreted as a message hidden in the signal, but it really represents how the signal’s intensity varied over time.

The signal generated a lot of excitement. Some thought it was extraterrestrial in origin, some thought it could come from some type of human-generated interference, and some thought it could be from an unexplained natural phenomenon.

New research shows that the Wow! Signal has an entirely natural explanation.

The research is “Arecibo Wow! I: An Astrophysical Explanation for the Wow! Signal.” The lead author is Abel Méndez from the Planetary Habitability Laboratory at the University of Puerto Rico at Arecibo. It’s available at the pre-print server arxiv.org.

Arecibo Wow! is a new effort based on an archival study of data from the now-defunct Arecibo Radio Telescope from 2017 to 2020. The observations from Arecibo are similar to those from Big Ear but “are more sensitive, have better temporal resolution, and include polarization measurements,” according to the authors.

“Our latest observations, made between February and May 2020, have revealed similar narrowband signals near the hydrogen line, though less intense than the original Wow! Signal,” said Méndez.

Arecibo detected signals similar to the Wow! signal but with some differences. They’re far less intense and come from multiple locations. The authors say these signals are easily explained by an astrophysical phenomenon and that the original Wow! signal is, too.

“We hypothesize that the Wow! Signal was caused by sudden brightening from stimulated emission of the hydrogen line due to a strong transient radiation source, such as a magnetar flare or a soft gamma repeater (SGR),” the researchers write. Those events are rare and rely on precise conditions and alignments. They can cause clouds of hydrogen to brighten considerably for seconds or even minutes.

The researchers say that what Big Ear saw in 1977 was the transient brightening of one of several H1 (neutral hydrogen) clouds in the telescope’s line of sight. The 1977 signal was similar to what Arecibo saw in many respects. “The only difference between the signals observed in Arecibo and the Wow! Signal is their brightness. It is precisely the similarity between these spectra that suggests a mechanism for the origin of the mysterious signal,” the authors write.

These signals are rare because the spatial alignment between source, cloud, and observer is rare. The rarity of alignment explains why detections are so rare.

The researchers were able to identify the clouds responsible for the signal but not the source. Their results suggest that the source is much more distant than the clouds that produce the hydrogen signal. “Given the detectability of the clouds as demonstrated in our data, this insight could enable precise location of the signal’s origin and permit continuous monitoring for subsequent events,” the researchers explain.

The Wow! Signal was originally interpreted as a technosignature by many. By explaining where the signal came from, this research outlines a new source of false positives.

“Our hypothesis explains all observed properties of the Wow! Signal, proposes a new source of false positives in technosignature searches, and suggests that the Wow! Signal could be the first recorded event of an astronomical maser flare in the hydrogen line,” the authors explain in their conclusion.

{ https://www.universetoday.com/ }

22-08-2024 om 21:12 geschreven door peter