September 17, 2009, 11:50 PM CT

Whole New Way Of Seeing The Moon

NASA's Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (LRO), an unmanned mission to comprehensively map the entire moon, has returned its first data. One of the seven instruments aboard, the Diviner Lunar Radiometer Experiment, is making the first global survey of the temperature of the lunar surface while the spacecraft orbits some 31 miles above the moon.

Diviner has obtained enough data already to characterize a number of aspects of the moon's current thermal environment. The instrument has revealed richly detailed thermal behavior, throughout both the north and south polar regions, that extends to the limit of Diviner's spatial resolution of just a few hundred yards.

"Most notable are the measurements of extremely cold temperatures within the permanently shadowed regions of large polar impact craters in the south polar region," said David Paige, Diviner's principal investigator and a UCLA professor of planetary science. "Diviner has recorded minimum daytime brightness temperatures in portions of these craters of less than -397 degrees Fahrenheit. These super-cold brightness temperatures are, to our knowledge, among the lowest that have been measured anywhere in the solar system, including the surface of Pluto." .

"After decades of speculation, Diviner has given us the first confirmation that these strange, permanently dark and extremely cold places actually exist on our moon," said science team member Ashwin Vasavada of NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif. "Their presence greatly increases the likelihood that water or other compounds are frozen there. Diviner has lived up to its name"......... Posted by: Sean      Read more         Source

September 15, 2009, 9:48 PM CT

James Webb Space Telescope Begins to Take Shape

NASA's James Webb Space Telescope is starting to come together. A major component of the telescope, the Integrated Science Instrument Module structure, recently arrived at NASA Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Md. for testing in the Spacecraft Systems Development and Integration Facility.

The Integrated Science Instrument Module, or ISIM, is an important component of the Webb telescope. The ISIM includes the structure, four scientific instruments or cameras, electronics, harnesses, and other components.

The ISIM structure is the "backbone" of the ISIM. It is similar to the chassis of a car. Just as a car chassis provides support for the engine and holds other components, the ISIM Structure supports and holds the four Webb telescope science instruments : the Mid-Infrared Instrument (MIRI), the Near-Infrared Camera (NIRCam), the Near-Infrared Spectrograph (NIRSpec) and the Fine Guidance Sensor (FGS). Each of these instruments were created and assembled by different program partners around the world.

When fully assembled, the ISIM will be the size of a small room with the structure acting as a skeleton supporting all of the instruments. Ray Lundquist, ISIM Systems Engineer, at NASA Goddard, commented that "The ISIM structure is truly a one-of-a-kind item. There is no second ISIM being made."........ Posted by: Sean      Read more         Source

September 15, 2009, 2:27 PM CT

A peek at nest of black holes

Less than two months after they inaugurated the world's largest telescope, University of Florida astronomers have used one of the world's most advanced telescopic instruments to gather images of the heavens.

A team led by astronomy professor Stephen Eikenberry late last week captured the first images of the cosmos ever made with a UF-designed and built camera/spectrometer affixed to the Gemini South telescope in Chile. The handful of "first light" images include a yellow and blue orb-like structure that depicts our Milky Way galaxy, home to thousands of black holes - including, at its core, a "supermassive" black hole believed to be as massive as 4 million suns put together.

"We plan to use this instrument to provide the first accurate tracking of the growth and evolution of this black hole over the last 4 billion years," Eikenberry said.

Installation of the instrument, called FLAMINGOS-2, caps a seven-year, $5 million effort involving 30 UF scientists, engineers, students and staff. Once the instrument is scientifically tested - a process expected to last around six months - it will support a range of new science. Astronomers will use FLAMINGOS-2 (FLAMINGOS is short for the Florida Array Multi-object Imaging Grism Spectrometer) to hunt the universe's first galaxies, view stars as they are being born, reveal black holes and investigate other phenomena......... Posted by: Sean      Read more         Source

September 10, 2009, 7:00 AM CT

Hubble's first images since Servicing Mission 4

Astronomers today declared the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope a fully rejuvenated observatory ready for a new decade of exploration, with the release of observations from four of its six operating science instruments.

"This is one more important step in the confirmation of this wonderful mission. We Europeans are proud to be part of this and heartily congratulate the engineers, astronauts and researchers who got us to this point," said ESA's Director of Science and Robotic Exploration, David Southwood.

Topping the list of exciting new views are colourful multi-wavelength pictures of far-flung galaxies, a densely packed star cluster, an eerie "pillar of creation" and a butterfly-shaped nebula. Hubble's suite of new instruments now allows it to study the Universe's across a wide swath of the light spectrum, from ultraviolet light all the way to near-infrared light. In addition, researchers released spectroscopic observations that slice across billions of light-years to map the structure of the cosmic web that permeates the Universe and also the distribution of the chemical elements that are fundamental to life as we know it.

"This marks a new beginning for Hubble," said Ed Weiler, associate administrator for NASA's Science Mission Directorate at NASA Headquarters. "The telescope was given an extreme makeover and is now significantly more powerful than ever - well equipped to last well into the next decade"......... Posted by: Sean      Read more         Source

August 31, 2009, 10:04 PM CT

Is The Milky Way Doomed To Be Destroyed? Probably Not

As researchers attempt to learn more about how galaxies evolve, an open question has been whether collisions with our dwarf galactic neighbors will one day tear apart the disk of the Milky Way.

That grisly fate is unlikely, a newly released study now suggests.

While astronomers know that such collisions have probably occurred in the past, the new computer simulations show that instead of destroying a galaxy, these collisions "puff up" a galactic disk, especially around the edges, and produce structures called stellar rings.

The finding solves two mysteries: the likely fate of the Milky Way at the hands of its satellite galaxies -- the most massive of which are the Large and Small Magellanic Clouds -- and the origin of its puffy edges, which astronomers have seen elsewhere in the universe and dubbed "flares".

The mysterious dark matter that makes up most of the universe plays a role, the study found.

Astronomers think that all galaxies are embedded within massive and extended halos of dark matter, and that most large galaxies lie at the intersections of filaments of dark matter, which form a kind of gigantic web in our universe. Smaller satellite galaxies flow along strands of the web, and get pulled into orbit around large galaxies such as our Milky Way......... Posted by: Sean      Read more         Source

August 20, 2009, 7:06 AM CT

Understanding the Birth and Early Evolution of the Universe

A significant advance in our understanding of the early evolution of the universe has been achieved by a team of researchers linked to the LIGO (Laser Interferometer Gravitational-Wave Observatory) Scientific Collaboration and the Virgo Collaboration. The team's results will appear in the 20 August 2009 issue of the journal Nature.

The gravitational-wave scientists, including Lee Samuel Finn, a Penn State professor of physics and of astronomy and astrophysics and Benjamin Owen, a Penn State professor of physics, have put new constraints on the details of how the universe looked in its earliest moments. Analysis of the team's data, taken over a two-year period from 2005 to 2007, has set the most stringent limits yet on the amount of gravitational waves that could have come from the Big Bang.

"Our results are a major step toward the detection of primordial gravitational waves -- ripples in the fabric of space and time -- that were created as the universe expanded in its earliest moments," said Finn, who has been a member of the LIGO Scientific Collaboration since its inception. "This type of information would provide vital clues to understanding how the structure of the universe evolved. For example, why is our universe clumped into galaxies? This information also would tell us whether some of the fantastical proposals are correct about the way our universe came to be"......... Posted by: Sean      Read more         Source

August 16, 2009, 9:58 PM CT

Outsized Heat of Sun's Atmosphere

"Why is the sun's corona so darned hot?" asks James Klimchuk, an astrophysicist at the Goddard Space Flight Center's Solar Physics Laboratory in Greenbelt, Md.

The mystery of why temperatures in the solar corona, the sun's outer atmosphere, soar to several million degrees Kelvin (K) -much hotter than temperatures nearer the sun's surface-has puzzled researchers for decades. New observations made with instruments aboard Japan's Hinode satellite reveal the culprit to be nanoflares.

Nanoflares are small, sudden bursts of heat and energy. "They occur within tiny strands that are bundled together to form a magnetic tube called a coronal loop," says Klimchuk. Coronal loops are the fundamental building blocks of the thin, translucent gas known as the sun's corona.

Researchers previously thought steady heating explained the corona's million degree temperatures. The steady heating model indicates that a coronal loop of a given length and temperature should have a specific density. However, observations showed that coronal loops have much higher density than the steady heating model predicts. Newer models based on nanoflares can explain the observed density. But no direct evidence of the nanoflares existed until now.

Observations from the NASA-funded X-Ray Telescope (XRT) and Extreme-ultraviolet Imaging Spectrometer (EIS) instruments aboard Hinode reveal that ultra-hot plasma is widespread in solar active regions. The XRT measured plasma at 10 million degrees K, and the EIS measured plasma at 5 million degrees K. "These temperatures can only be produced by impulsive energy bursts,"says Klimchuk, who presented the findings on August 6 at the International Astronomical Union General Assembly meeting in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil......... Posted by: Sean      Read more         Source

August 13, 2009, 7:08 AM CT

Storm clouds over Titan

Taking advantage of advanced techniques to correct distortions caused by Earth's atmosphere, astronomers used the NSF-supported Gemini Observatory to capture the first images of clouds over the tropics of Titan, Saturn's largest moon.

The images clarify a long-standing mystery linking Titan's weather and surface features, helping astronomers better understand the moon of Saturn, viewed by some researchers as an analog to Earth when our planet was young.

The effort also served as the latest demonstration of adaptive optics, which use deformable mirrors to enable NSF's suite of ground-based telescopes to capture images that in some cases exceed the resolution of images captured by space-based counterparts.

Emily Schaller from the University of Hawai'i, Henry Roe from Lowell Observatory, and Tapio Schneider and Mike Brown, both of Caltech, reported their findings in the Aug. 13, 2009, issue of Nature.

"Adaptive optics are helping our ground-based telescopes accomplish feats that have until now been capable only with telescopes in space," said Brian.

Patten, a program director in NSF's Astronomy Division. "Now, we can remove the affects of the atmosphere, capturing images that in some cases exceed the resolution of those captured by space-based telescopes. Investments in adaptive optics technology are really starting to pay off"......... Posted by: Sean      Read more         Source

July 29, 2009, 11:06 PM CT

Experts urge reformulation of US space policy

The Obama Administration has an opportunity to fundamentally reformulate United States space policies that are anchored in Cold War-era mindsets, as per the director of an American Academy of Arts and Sciences study. At a Capitol Hill briefing today in conjunction with the release of three new policy monographs, experts outlined the current state of U.S. and foreign space policy and encouraged the Administration to set a clear direction that advances the country's national security, civilian, and commercial interests in space.

Space has proven to be an arena for "uplifting collaboration among nations as well as ominous confrontation," said John Steinbruner, University of Maryland Professor of Public Policy and Director of the Academy's project on Reconsidering the Rules of Space. The end of the U.S.-Soviet competition that defined the modern space age, as well as an increase in the ranks of space-faring nations and an expansion of commercial space ventures, dictates a new approach that embraces "the equitable utilization of space by all nations for common benefit," he said.

The Academy released three white papers today dealing with separate aspects of space policy. All are available online on the Academy's web site along with previously released volumes at http://www.amacad.org/projects/space.aspx. The new papers include:........ Posted by: Sean      Read more         Source

July 28, 2009, 11:24 PM CT

GOES-14 satellite takes first full disk image

The latest Geostationary Operational Environmental Satellite, GOES-14, provided its first visible full disk image of Earth on July 27, at 2:00 p.m. EDT. The prime instrument on GOES, called the Imager, is taking images of Earth with a 1 kilometer (km) or 0.62 mile resolution from an altitude of 36,000 km (22,240 miles) above Earth's surface, equivalent to taking a picture of a dime from a distance of seven football fields.

"The first GOES-14 visible full disk image shows little activity in the Atlantic Ocean and two tropical waves located in the East Pacific Ocean with a low probability of becoming a tropical cyclone. Numerous thunderstorms are seen scattered along the east coast and western Atlantic Ocean, with more significant rains and thunderstorms in the southeast Oklahoma and northeast Texas area," remarked Thomas Renkevens, a User Services Coordinator from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's (NOAA) National Environmental Satellite, Data and Information Service, Camp Springs, Md. "NOAA will continue to follow the tropical waves and thunderstorms for possible further development".

The GOES satellite system aids forecasters in locating severe weather events and is instrumental in providing early warnings for residents located in the surrounding areas. "Being able to predict the path of a hurricane with reasonable certainty and only evacuating the areas at risk saves communities roughly a million dollars per mile," Renkevens stated......... Posted by: Sean      Read more         Source